Was Jesus and Paul wrong about the Second Coming?

[polonius]

Matt 24:34 Amen, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place.

Matt 10:23 When they persecute you in one town, flee to another. Amen, I say to you, you will not finish the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.

Matt 26:64 Jesus said to him in reply, “You have said so.[a] But I tell you: From now on you will see ‘the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Power’ and ‘coming on the clouds of heaven.’�

1Thes 4:15-17 Indeed, we tell you this, on the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will surely not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord himself, with a word of command, with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet of God, will come down from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Thus we shall always be with the Lord.

[Monta]

[Replying to polonius.advice]

"RESPONSE: But God didn't. He let man write a storybook containing bits of history. And then men claimed it was divinely inspired. "

If so, and if we are happy with it,

why should it bother anybody.

[marco]

[Replying to polonius.advice]

"RESPONSE: But God didn't. He let man write a storybook containing bits of history. And then men claimed it was divinely inspired. "

If so, and if we are happy with it,

why should it bother anybody.

It should bother people if the claim is false because the book gives God's authority to do things. Over the centuries people have been tortured and burned because of statements in the book. Division is caused because the statements in the book can often be taken in various ways. The sister holy book, the Koran, is also the word of God and we can see today where that can lead.

By being nice to each other we are, according to Christ, serving God. That should do.

[Monta]

[Replying to marco]


"It should bother people if the claim is false because the book gives God's authority to do things. Over the centuries people have been tortured and burned because of statements in the book. Division is caused because the statements in the book can often be taken in various ways. The sister holy book, the Koran, is also the word of God and we can see today where that can lead. "

And who is going to decide whether the claim is false?

[marco]

[Replying to marco]


"It should bother people if the claim is false because the book gives God's authority to do things. Over the centuries people have been tortured and burned because of statements in the book. Division is caused because the statements in the book can often be taken in various ways. The sister holy book, the Koran, is also the word of God and we can see today where that can lead. "

And who is going to decide whether the claim is false?

The onus is always on the person making the claim. Those who claim the Koran is the word of God point out that Muhammad was illiterate and yet the words he dictated are beautifully expressed in Arabic. Apparently this constitutes a miracle.

Those who claim the Bible is God's inspired word point out references to events that were seemingly predicted. This too seems miraculous.

Others require stronger items of proof or they decide to believe, through an act of faith.

[polonius]

[Replying to marco]


"It should bother people if the claim is false because the book gives God's authority to do things. Over the centuries people have been tortured and burned because of statements in the book. Division is caused because the statements in the book can often be taken in various ways. The sister holy book, the Koran, is also the word of God and we can see today where that can lead. "

And who is going to decide whether the claim is false?

The onus is always on the person making the claim. Those who claim the Koran is the word of God point out that Muhammad was illiterate and yet the words he dictated are beautifully expressed in Arabic. Apparently this constitutes a miracle.

RESPONSE: No. It means the actually writer of the Koran or someone who copied it over for him, was skilled in the use of Arabic. No miracles here.


Those who claim the Bible is God's inspired word point out references to events that were seemingly predicted. This too seems miraculous.

RESPONSE: Not if the report was only written after the event. That wouldn't be miraculous at all.

Others require stronger items of proof or they decide to believe, through an act of faith.

RESPONSE: As Wikipedia points out regarding faith " Fideism holds that faith is necessary, and that beliefs may be held without any evidence or reason and even in conflict with evidence and reason."

[Checkpoint]

Matt 24:34 Amen, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place.

Curious, which generation do you think he was talking about and why?

What I find curious about this is the several answers given by believers and unbelievers.

The word "generation", as used here and elsewhere by Jesus, has a meaning other than what nearly all assume.

A generation is that which has been generated by a progenitor. It can be a whole genealogy.

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 91 by Monta]




[center]
Why would it bother anybody if I'm wrong:
Part One[/center]

"RESPONSE: But God didn't. He let man write a storybook containing bits of history. And then men claimed it was divinely inspired. "

If so, and if we are happy with it,

why should it bother anybody.

There are two answers:

1. It bothers me that people believe things that aren't true. It might not bother them, but then again, they believe in falsehoods, if they don't mind being wrong, I suppose, that's up to them. But if this was a test, they would fail it. I'd like more people to pass.
2. However, our beliefs inform our actions. People with false beliefs might behave quite irrationally.

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 95 by polonius.advice]




[center]Fideism vs. Truth:
Part One[/center]

RESPONSE: As Wikipedia points out regarding faith " Fideism holds that faith is necessary, and that beliefs may be held without any evidence or reason and even in conflict with evidence and reason."

Beliefs may held for irrational reasons such as faith.
This is the reasons that logic doesn't work to defend the truth of a belief that is solely based on faith...

____________

Question:

• 
  
  Does faith guarantee the truth of a belief?
  
  

____________

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 96 by Checkpoint]



[center]Generation vs. Genealogy:
Part One[/center]

What I find curious about this is the several answers given by believers and unbelievers.

The word "generation", as used here and elsewhere by Jesus, has a meaning other than what nearly all assume.

A generation is that which has been generated by a progenitor. It can be a whole genealogy.

Yes, people can and do use words in different ways. That's why that in dictionaries, we will have different entries... SO many of our discussions in here end up debating the meaning of quite common words. This site might be re-named "Debating semantics", because discussing the meaning of a word is NOT a theological question.

I suggest that we look at this common dictionary entry for "generation", and see what Oxford imagines it to mean:

2 [countable] the average time in which children grow up, become adults and have children of their own, (usually considered to be about 30 years) a generation ago My family have lived in this house for generations.

3 [countable, uncountable] a single stage in the history of a family

http://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.c ... generation

____________

Questions:

• 
  1. Did Jesus or Mathew define the term "generation" in the gospels, or is the word open to interpretation?
  
  2. Could you give us the evidence that your interpretation of the word "generation" is the correct one?
  
  3. Do you see any difference between the term "generation" and it's plural "generations" with an s at the end?
  
  4. What is the distinction between the phrase "this generation" and the phrase "a whole genealogy"?
  
  5. Is Matthew 24:34 ever translated as "a whole genealogy", and if not, why not?
  
  6. You say that the term "generation" CAN be interpreted to mean genealogy, how confident of that possibility?
  
  

____________

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 93 by Monta]




[center]The Outsider Test for Faith
Part One[/center]

And who is going to decide whether the claim is false?

Of course, that's what these debates are about.

If we use the "outsider test for faith"... it might be easier for a theist to take a hard look at what doesn't work logically in some OTHER religion, and see if it can't apply to theirs.

As an agnostic and a skeptic, I am an outsider to all religions, Islam and Christianity included. I can plainly see the bad logic in Islam. I can also see the bad logic being used in Christian apologetics.

People who are INSIDE a faith tradition seem to be somewhat "blind" ( read "an enormous amount of bias" ) to their own fallacious reasoning, but PERHAPS might be able to notice the fallacious reasoning of those religions that they themselves are outside of.

Being INSIDE a religion seems to blind the faithful from seeing any logical flaws in their religious beliefs and the reasoning that supports them.

In this 35 minute video, John Loftus explains "The Outsider Test for Faith " quite well: