By Their Fruits You Shall Recognize Them

[Scuba Pete]

Both sides here are WAY TOO LEGALISTIC when cojmpared to the scriptures.

Too often the NT is used as a rule book: something it was never meant to be. Look at the start of the Galations discussion on the fruits:

Galations 5:1 It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. NIV

 

[James the Persian]

Both sides here are WAY TOO LEGALISTIC when cojmpared to the scriptures.

Boith sides? I count at least three in this thread, at least two of which I don't find legalistic. It is not legalism to suggest one must work with God's grace and it's not legalistic to suggest that only the elect are saved, regardless of what they do (I'd suggest that that is perversely anti-legalistic).

Too often the NT is used as a rule book: something it was never meant to be. Look at the start of the Galations discussion on the fruits:

Galations 5:1 It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. NIV

I actually very rarely see people use the NT in this way at all. I'm surprised your experience differs. Usually when people make such assertions it's because they don't actually listen to what those of us they accuse of legalism are actually saying (and yes I know you believe my faith is legalistic and that no matter how much I demonstrate it isn't you won't accept that).

James

 

[Scuba Pete]

Yes, I believe that Catholicism (Roman and Orthodox) is highly legalistic. So are the Protestant religions. Man loves rules and regulations: who can be a priest, who decides who is a Christian, which books should I consider scripture? Look at the discussion about error and heresies here. You cite your source, they site their source and everyone is trying to quantify/qualify their interpretation of the what the scriptures mean.

Freedom. Wow. Freedom. No rules. No regulations. No laws concerning religious festivals and the like. Freedom. That's what the fruits are all about: Freedom.

 

[*Paul*]

Boith sides? I count at least three in this thread, at least two of which I don't find legalistic. It is not legalism to suggest one must work with God's grace and it's not legalistic to suggest that only the elect are saved, regardless of what they do (I'd suggest that that is perversely anti-legalistic).

Am I on one of these unlegalistic sides or am i the legalistic third here in your opinion?

 

[James the Persian]

Am I on one of these unlegalistic sides or am i the legalistic third here in your opinion?

I don't know enough about your views to say. As, I said, though, I find legalism to be truly rare among Christians. There are at least three sides in this thread, though, not just three and I only picked on my own position and that of the Calvinist opposition as non-legalistic as an example of two radically different positions, neither of which are based on legalism. I didn't mean to imply that anyone else's viw was legalistic. Really, I don't see anything legalistic in Christianity until you go down the Ebionite/Adnevtist type of route, but then I also lack Pete's almost Stirnerite enthusiasm for personal freedom.

James

 

[*Paul*]

I don't know enough about your views to say. As, I said, though, I find legalism to be truly rare among Christians. There are at least three sides in this thread, though, not just three and I only picked on my own position and that of the Calvinist opposition as non-legalistic as an example of two radically different positions, neither of which are based on legalism. I didn't mean to imply that anyone else's viw was legalistic. Really, I don't see anything legalistic in Christianity until you go down the Ebionite/Adnevtist type of route, but then I also lack Pete's almost Stirnerite enthusiasm for personal freedom.

James

Thanks for confirming that James, I personally think that the cries for freedom are often cries to escape Gods standards for Christian living, there are clearly a few do's and don'ts - just my opinion though.

 

[Scuba Pete]

After a brief research of Max Stirner, I don't believe that the "Stirnerite" appellation to be warranted or accurate. Why is there a need to label me? I fully abhor "egoism" and embrace selflessness and being a liivng sacrifice.

My views of freedom parrallel none but Paul's. Jesus tried to get the Apostles to understand this very concept, but men love rules. We just do.

 

[James the Persian]

After a brief research of Max Stirner, I don't believe that the "Stirnerite" appellation to be warranted or accurate. Why is there a need to label me? I fully abhor "egoism" and embrace selflessness and being a liivng sacrifice.

As I said you had an almost Stirnerite love of personal freedom, I wasn't labeling you (though given your past reactions to my posts I'm hardly surprised to seeing you crying wolf again). I do admit that the allusion was hyperbolic but I made it so pointedly as I do not believe your cries of freedom to be healthy and the extreme of Stirnerism serves as a more than adequate warning as to the destructive tendency I see in such attitudes. Hoever, I was not suggesting that you are actually about to go out and follow Stirner's example.

My views of freedom parrallel none but Paul's. Jesus tried to get the Apostles to understand this very concept, but men love rules. We just do.

I disagree very strongly indeed. Your views paralel your interpretation of Paul (as indeed most anyone's view would paralel their own interpretation) but you'd have a very hard time trying to show that your views are objective truth. Certainly those closest to the time, those in the early Church, do not seem to have viewed Paul's words in the way you suggest we should. It's not that men love rules it's that our society needs rules, or at least guidelines (and I know you frequently have confused the two in the past) in order to function. They act as a social lubricant, if you will, which is one of the major failings of anarchist politics suchas Stirner's (although he got around that by ignoring the reality of society in the first place).

James

 

[love]

ROMANS 6: 20-23
For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness.
What fruit had ye then in those things where of ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death.
But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.
For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

 

[*Paul*]

Doamne Iisuse Hristoase, Fiul lui Dumnezeu, miluieşte-mă pe mine păcătosul.
James

Lord Jesus Christ, my soul.

James I keep meaning to ask, what does this mean Dumnezwu looks similar to Doamne so i think it has to do with dominion, fiul gives me the idea like fililouque, proceeding.

Please tell.

 

[James the Persian]

Lord Jesus Christ, my soul.

James I keep meaning to ask, what does this mean Dumnezwu looks similar to Doamne so i think it has to do with dominion, fiul gives me the idea like fililouque, proceedeing.

Please tell.

It's the Jesus Prayer in Romanian. Doamne Iisuse Hristoase is the vocative form of Domnul Iisus Hristos (so calling out to Him), which is Lord Jesus Christ as you rightly figured out. Not sure where you got 'my soul' from, though - that would be 'sufletul meu', which isn't in the prayer. Fiul is related to filioque, but because it means the Son, not proceeding. Dumnezeu is, also, related to Domn (Lord) but it means God (in Romanian a god is zeu while God is Dumnezeu - literally Lord God - from the Latin Dominus Deus).

A literal word for word rendering of the prayer would be bizarre because miluieste-ma pe mine means have mercy on me, but literally says 'forgive-me on me', the latter two words being emphatic, and because the ending -ul is 'the' (it's not a separate word but an ending in Romanian and that's the masculine version).

The end result of all this is that the prayer actually says (and it's the one we use when praying with a prayer rope, which is what some call an Orthodox rosary, though that's not really accurate):

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, the sinner.

James

 

[*Paul*]

mine păcătosul.

I got my soul from "mine" you can see whay i would think that meant my.

I saw the word soul in pacatosul and guessed that following my it meant soul but i wasn't sure what paca might mean though i had an inkling it had do do with degredation of some sort but I'm not really sure why.

It's the Jesus Prayer in Romanian. Doamne Iisuse Hristoase is the vocative form of Domnul Iisus Hristos (so calling out to Him), which is Lord Jesus Christ as you rightly figured out. Not sure where you got 'my soul' from, though - that would be 'sufletul meu', which isn't in the prayer. Fiul is related to filioque, but because it means the Son, not proceeding. Dumnezeu is, also, related to Domn (Lord) but it means God (in Romanian a god is zeu while God is Dumnezeu - literally Lord God - from the Latin Dominus Deus).

Thanks a lot for that. I have never heard of a Jesus prayer or prayer rope though i'm afraid.

 

[Scuba Pete]

Yeah, freedom is so anti-legalism, that those firmly entrenched in the need for man made rules just don't get it. However, it is at the foundations of Jesus' teachings:

John 8:31 To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. 32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." 33 They answered him, "We are Abraham's descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?"
34 Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. 35 Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. 36 So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. 37 I know you are Abraham's descendants. Yet you are ready to kill me, because you have no room for my word. 38 I am telling you what I have seen in the Father's presence, and you do what you have heard from your father. NIV

 

[James the Persian]

Yeah, freedom is so anti-legalism, that those firmly entrenched in the need for man made rules just don't get it. However, it is at the foundations of Jesus' teachings:

John 8:31 To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. 32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." 33 They answered him, "We are Abraham's descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?"
34 Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. 35 Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. 36 So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. 37 I know you are Abraham's descendants. Yet you are ready to kill me, because you have no room for my word. 38 I am telling you what I have seen in the Father's presence, and you do what you have heard from your father. NIV

Yes, no argument, but freedom from what? You appear to take the concept of freedom way further than anyone - anyone at all - in the early Church ever did. Forgive me if I prefer the opinions of the Fathers over yours - they just seem so much more qualified.

James

 

[Scuba Pete]

And pardon me if I take the SCRIPTURES at face value.

You rely on your rules and regulations, and I rely on the Spirit of Grace.

Jesus told us that he gave us a NEW commandment and that ALL the old stuff was derived from it anyway. He told us men would recognise his disciples by how they followed THIS ONE commandment.

He fulfilled the old law and FREED us from all those human regulations. We have but one law: LOVE.

This is why the fruits of the Spirit are so important. We can guage our own progress in the Spirit of Grace by how these manifest themselves in our lives. We are FREE to love God and our fellow men without the need or constraints of your man made laws.

 

[James the Persian]

And pardon me if I take the SCRIPTURES at face value.

But this is impossible. No text, whether Scripture or not, has 'face value'. All texts rely on interpretation. In effect what you are saying is that you prefer your late, individual interpretation over the early corporate interpretation of the Church that actually wrote the Scripture. Fine if that makes you happy, bu to me it's rather like arguing with Shakespear about what he says his plays mean.

James

 

[Scuba Pete]

But this is impossible. No text, whether Scripture or not, has 'face value'. All texts rely on interpretation. In effect what you are saying is that you prefer your late, individual interpretation over the early corporate interpretation of the Church that actually wrote the Scripture. Fine if that makes you happy, bu to me it's rather like arguing with Shakespear about what he says his plays mean.

James

I prefer to let the Scriptures interpret themselves. Take the subject of this thread for instance. Have you or I really added anything substantive to the OP's question since I quoted Galatians 5? I think not! Or even more, do you disagree with anything that Galatians 5 says? Do you "interpret" this any differently than how it is sincerely and succinctly laid before us? I often see people use "interpret" when they really mean "rationalize". Of course, when you are trying to justify a complex system of works, rules and traditions such as the Orthodox Church, the New Testament can be just as onerous and confusing as the Old Testament. It was never meant to be that way. I do not worship a God of confusion.

All the pieces are right there for us to read, contemplate and implement. All that is lacking is our decision to listen to the Spirit who will lead us into ALL understanding. You listen by doing. The more you do, the more you understand and the more that you are able to do. This is what growing in Grace is all about. Being transformed in our thinking to know what God wants. Then you need no other law, but the law of love, and THAT my friend is true freedom. It's exhilarating and simple and does not need all these man made rules and traditions.

The bottom line is, you want to employ RULES, and God simply wants our hearts. That's in the Scriptures too.

As for YOU having some kind of Shakespearian knowledge of the Scriptures, you only need to trot out the authors for me to accept this. NONE of them claimed to be Orthodox or even Catholic. The scriptures do not bear witness of your Church's alleged authority and your claim is empty. That is merely your corporate pride to think such a thing.

Edit: I am heading to Coral Gables (South Florida) and then the Keys in just a few moments. I may not be back on until Tuesday. I can't believe that I let Scuba Diving get in the way of religion!

 

[beloved57]

I see nobody on here has spiritual fruit :no:

 

[Scuba Pete]

Fortunately for us...

God will be the one to determine that and not some one who doesn't know us and is eager to extrapolate his erroneous perceptions in order to try to make a point.

 

[MysticSang'ha]

Fortunately for us...

God will be the one to determine that and not some one who doesn't know us and is eager to extrapolate his erroneous perceptions in order to try to make a point.

Dude, I thought you were enjoying the Keys, strolling along down Highway 1, drinking in the sights from underwater.........you got a laptop in your wetsuit or are you just happy to see us? :cover:



Peace,
Mystic