Commemorating the death of Christ-11 April

[JehovahsWitness]

Jehovah's Witnesses meet together to commemorate the death of Christ. Do you think this can be considered a Christian ceremony?


Opnions welcome.

JW

[onewithhim]

The Torah was not a "new covenant". That "new covenant" was something future to the time of Jeremiah. It would be the key to a new world in which all human suffering will be elminated on this our planet earth.

.

So what do you think the "new covenant" is?

I believe it is what Moshe' and Yeremiyahu said it was, HaTorah written on our hearts such that no one needs to instruct his neighbor on what it says.

How do you understand Daniel 2:44?

.

[bluethread]

So what do you think the "new covenant" is?

I believe it is what Moshe' and Yeremiyahu said it was, HaTorah written on our hearts such that no one needs to instruct his neighbor on what it says.

How do you understand Daniel 2:44?

In literal, historical and cultural context.

44 “In the time of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed, nor will it be left to another people. It will crush all those kingdoms and bring them to an end, but it will itself endure forever. 45 This is the meaning of the vision of the rock cut out of a mountain, but not by human hands—a rock that broke the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver and the gold to pieces. “The great God has shown the king what will take place in the future. The dream is true and its interpretation is trustworthy.�

Historically, this is Dani'el's confirmation and interpretation of the dream of N'vukhadnetzar. It is a revelation of the Empires that followed him. What is more important is the "rock cut out of a mountain". This being a dream, grammatically, it would be an idiom, as are the other things in the dream. Culturally, that idiom would refer to the tablets of stone cut out of the rock at Mount Sinai, which represents HaTorah. Yeshua, being the embodiment of Torah, reaffirmed(made new) the Kingdom promised to Avraham, Yitz'chak, Ya'akov, David, Shlomo, Yechezk'el, and Yirmeyahu. Now one could quibble over whether a Kingdom was established before Yeshua. However, one can not quibble about the kingdom promised to each of these being an eternal one. So, either none of these lived in Adonai's Kingdom, or the Kingdom Yeshua affirmed is indeed the same kingdom.

[onewithhim]

[Replying to post 82 by bluethread]

I apologize, Bluethread, but I don't understand what you are saying. Daniel explained what the kingdoms were that made up the immense image that Nebuchadnezzar dreamed about. They would fall, one after the other, starting with Babylon itself. The kingdoms after Babylon were Medo-Persia, Greece and Rome. Rome fell back in the 5th century A.D., and we are now living in the time pictured by the feet of the great image. We are living in the time of the last kingdom that is in opposition to God's Kingdom (that last kingdom, or, government, being the United States of America). The rock cut out of a mountain pictures God's own government shattering all other governments and then itself ruling over the earth forever.

Christ's government hasn't been set up yet over the earth, but we're pretty close to that event. We'd have to be, living in the time that is symbolized by the feet of the image.


www.jw.org/en/publications/bible/study- ... rch_result]


.

[bluethread]

[Replying to post 83 by onewithhim]

Yes, I understand dispensational theology, I just don't put much stock in it. The reason is that it presumes revelations that are totally alien to the recipient of the revelation. To me the passage makes much more sense, if it is understood in the historical, literal and cultural contexts of the time. I don't view the Scriptures as a secret code book, but, from beginning to end, an exhortation to live in accordance with Adonai's ways.

[onewithhim]

[Replying to post 83 by onewithhim]

Yes, I understand dispensational theology, I just don't put much stock in it. The reason is that it presumes revelations that are totally alien to the recipient of the revelation. To me the passage makes much more sense, if it is understood in the historical, literal and cultural contexts of the time. I don't view the Scriptures as a secret code book, but, from beginning to end, an exhortation to live in accordance with Adonai's ways.

Did you go to the website I provided a link to? If you did, and you saw the context of what is being said, how would what Daniel told Nebuchadnezzar be alien to anyone? What he said would be totally understandable to any person of that day, it seems to me. Babylon was the head of gold and it would fall to Medo-Persia and then to other powers. Completely historical. No secret code.

(And the reason for the fall of those nations was because they WERE NOT living in accordance with Jehovah's ways.)


.

[bluethread]

Did you go to the website I provided a link to? If you did, and you saw the context of what is being said, how would what Daniel told Nebuchadnezzar be alien to anyone? What he said would be totally understandable to any person of that day, it seems to me. Babylon was the head of gold and it would fall to Medo-Persia and then to other powers. Completely historical. No secret code.

(And the reason for the fall of those nations was because they WERE NOT living in accordance with Jehovah's ways.)

I have no problem with that part. The part I am referring to is "the rock cut out of a mountain". The imagery is that of HaTorah, i.e. the covenant with Israel. Yeshua reestablished that kingdom, that undermined and ultimately broke up the Roman Empire. Now, unlike the dispensationalists that see a different kingdom than that of Israel, I see it as a reestablishment of the same kingdom.

[onewithhim]

Did you go to the website I provided a link to? If you did, and you saw the context of what is being said, how would what Daniel told Nebuchadnezzar be alien to anyone? What he said would be totally understandable to any person of that day, it seems to me. Babylon was the head of gold and it would fall to Medo-Persia and then to other powers. Completely historical. No secret code.

(And the reason for the fall of those nations was because they WERE NOT living in accordance with Jehovah's ways.)

I have no problem with that part. The part I am referring to is "the rock cut out of a mountain". The imagery is that of HaTorah, i.e. the covenant with Israel. Yeshua reestablished that kingdom, that undermined and ultimately broke up the Roman Empire. Now, unlike the dispensationalists that see a different kingdom than that of Israel, I see it as a reestablishment of the same kingdom.

But I still don't understand. The Bible is for ALL nations. It is not limited to just one nation (Israel). Israel was originally God's "mouth-piece," if you will, to the entire world as to what life is all about and Who the true God is. Daniel, for one, has information that applies to all of mankind. Do you think that Daniel 12:2 applies to only Israel? Why would only Israelites be resurrected from their graves?

The Torah says, right from the beginning, that ALL nations will be blessed by Abraham's descendant:

"And by means of your offspring all nations of the earth will bless themselves due to the fact that you [Abraham] have listened to my voice." (Genesis 22:18)


.