POST TWO OF TWO
APOSTASY AMONG THE CHRISTIANS
I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.(gal 1:6-7)
Individuals quote (and often mis-use) Gal 1:6 as only regarding latter day apostasy when it applied to the Galations themselves and apostasy among the earliest Christians themselves. However, the same pattern of innovation and apostasy that became prominent among the Jews became a pattern within Christianity.
For example : Clement discusses this same unrelenting tendency to conflict, schism and apostasy among the earliest Christians in the very early text of 1st Clement : “Why is there strife and angry outbursts and dissension and schisms and conflict among you? Do we not have one God and one Christ and one Spirit of grace which was poured out upon us? And is there not one calling in Christ? Why do we tear and rip apart the members of Christ, and rebel against our own body, and reach such a level of insanity that we forget that we are members of one another? ...Your schism has perverted many; it has brought many to despair, plunged many into doubt, and caused all of us to sorrow. And yet your rebellion still continues!” (1st Clement 46:5-9)
Such schisms were not simply the hypocrites who did not live the law, but they often resulted from Christians who think they know the “real” Christianity and wanted to teach their interpretations to others. Among these were ones described as “Desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm.“ (1 Tim 1:6-7) Their motives were NOT necessarily to HARM the Christian religion, but instead They are trying to HELP God by offering their interpretations of religion.
This apostasy is not simply a phenomenon of our time, but it happened in the early congregations and from the earliest time Christians were given the gospel and, it is NOT the anti-Christians in the main, who changed Christianity from without, but it is the Christian disciples themselves who are changing doctrines from within the christian movement itself as the early text from the Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah reminds us :
“And afterwards, at his approach, his disciples will abandon the teaching of the twelve apostles, and their faith, and their love, and their purity. And there will be much contention at his coming and at his approach. And in those days (there will be) many who will love office, although lacking wisdom. And there will be many wicked elders and shepherds who wrong their sheep, (and they will be rapacious because they do not have holy shepherds). And many will exchange the glory of the robes of the saints for the robes of those who love money; and there will be much respect of persons in those days, and lovers of the glory of this world. And there will be many slanderers and [much] vainglory at the approach of the Lord, and the Holy Spirit will withdraw from many. And in those day there will not be many prophets, nor those who speak reliable words, except one here and there in different places, because of the spirit of error and of fornication, and of vainglory, and of the love of money, which there will be among those who are said to be servants of the One, and among those who receive that One. 29 And among the shepherds and the elders there will be great hatred towards one another. 30 For there will be great jealousy in the last days, for everyone will speak whatever pleases him in his own eyes. 31 And they will neglect (gr) the prophecy of the prophets who were before me, and my visions also...they will make ineffective, in order that they may speak what bursts out of their heart.”(Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah . 3:21-31)
The difficulty for non-historian Christians is that they are often unaware of "doctrinal shifts" and "evolutions" of "orthodoxy" over time. So much so, that they are often disoriented by early Christian doctrines and traditions. Add to this, the difficulty caused by lack of insight among the religious resulting in the inability to see that all of us interpret according to our bias (myself included), AND, we all have bias, and we all teach according to our own bias. The end result is that we tend to innovate and guess and use imperfect logic in our interpretations of religion and the net result is that we move away from original and authentic religion to our own versions of it. Even if we hold to the most basic text as a "canon", we still tend to innovate and interpret and change that "canons" text to reflect our personal beliefs. It is a very difficult situation.
The centuries following the death of Christ were described by a logia of Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas as follows :
“Jesus said, “The kingdom of the [father] is like a certain woman who was carrying a [jar] full of meal. While she was walking [on the] road, still some distance from home, the handle of the jar broke and the meal emptied out behind her [on] the road. She did not realize it; she had noticed no accident. When she reached her house, she set the jar down and found it empty.”
This logia is one of many sad descriptions of the failed attempt to pass on the doctrines and traditions of the early Christianities to later generations. In the last days, when one looks inside of modern Christian Churches, often, one finds that most of the substance that gave the early Church its’ value, is no longer to be found in it.
I think this concept that all men (ALL of us) tend to make cognitive and philosophical errors and then adopt them into our religious worldview is important since it is a concept all of us are subject to. Though the vast majority of complaints of apostasy are aimed outward or often drift toward apostasy in the early Roman Religious Movement, still, all individuals within all other movements are subject to the same principle of error. The LDS ought to be reminded regarding how many times their leaders have called them to repentance on some principle or another. This reminder of their own calls to repent ought to tell them that they as individuals, share the same weakness and tendency to get things wrong, to get doctrines wrong, to develop bad habits, to apostatize from an original and authentic principle toward the adoption of incorrect beliefs and / or habits.
The early Christians were no different in their tendency to come to erroneous conclusions, except that they had leaders who received living, on-going revelation for the religious movement and individuals as Christians were also able to receive living revelation for their own lives. It was living revelation which, to a certain extent, allowed them to more accurately adjust and compensate (“repent”) and change their thoughts and actions on points of importance.
We are not talking about individuals who are evil, but individuals who may be wonderful and moral and good, but who simply get things wrong and as the errors accumulate, at some point, a repair and reorientation of their ideas and actions needs to take place in the same way that we constantly make adjustments in speed and direction when we drive our car. IF these tiny (and sometimes large) corrections are not made, we will be taken into directions and conditions that will cause us and others, harm.
2) REGARDING THE CHURCH GUARANTEEING SALVATION THROUGH ORDINANCE
I very much agree with Katzpur. The church does not and cannot guarantee salvation by a simple ordinance. Outward ordinances, by themselves are of no value, and are NOT independent of the persons relationship to God and other principles.
For example, when speaking of hypocrites who recieve ordinances but who have not changed their own hearts, the early Jewish documents point out that ordinances do not do anything for them : “Ceremonies of atonement cannot restore his innocence, neither cultic waters his purity. He cannot be sanctified by baptism in oceans and rivers, nor purified by mere ritual bathing. Unclean, unclean shall he be all the days that he rejects the laws of God, refusing to be disciplined in the Yahad of His society. For only through the spirit pervading God’s true society can there be atonement for a man’s ways, all of his iniquities; thus only can he gaze upon the light of life and so be joined to his truth by his Holy Spirit, purified from all iniquity. Through an upright and humble attitude his sin may be covered, and by humbling himself before all God’s laws his flesh can be made clean. Only thus can he really receive the purifying waters and be purged by the cleansing flow. 1QS, 4Q255-264a, 5Q11 Col. 3
Phillip describes in simple logic, those who are baptized without being honest of heart (and who then are not given the gift of the Holy Ghost by God because their hearts are not right)
If one goes down into the water and comes up without having received anything and says, “I am a Christian,” he has borrowed the name at interest. But if he receives the Holy spirit, he has the name as a gift. He who has received a gift does not have to give it back, but of him who has borrowed it at interest, payment is demanded.” The gospel of Phillip;
Joseph Smith makes a similar point : “You might as well baptize a bag of sand as a man, if not done in view of the remission of sins and getting of the Holy Ghost. Baptism by water is but half a baptism, and is good for nothing without the other half—that is, the baptism of the Holy Ghost” (Hch, 5:499). Smiths' declaration in in agreement with the ancient concept that ordinances themselves are of no value in and of themselves without authentic relationship with and the intervention of a loving and patient God.
Good luck in your journey True_Faith13;
Clear
φιφυσεσιω
APOSTASY AMONG THE CHRISTIANS
I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.(gal 1:6-7)
Individuals quote (and often mis-use) Gal 1:6 as only regarding latter day apostasy when it applied to the Galations themselves and apostasy among the earliest Christians themselves. However, the same pattern of innovation and apostasy that became prominent among the Jews became a pattern within Christianity.
For example : Clement discusses this same unrelenting tendency to conflict, schism and apostasy among the earliest Christians in the very early text of 1st Clement : “Why is there strife and angry outbursts and dissension and schisms and conflict among you? Do we not have one God and one Christ and one Spirit of grace which was poured out upon us? And is there not one calling in Christ? Why do we tear and rip apart the members of Christ, and rebel against our own body, and reach such a level of insanity that we forget that we are members of one another? ...Your schism has perverted many; it has brought many to despair, plunged many into doubt, and caused all of us to sorrow. And yet your rebellion still continues!” (1st Clement 46:5-9)
Such schisms were not simply the hypocrites who did not live the law, but they often resulted from Christians who think they know the “real” Christianity and wanted to teach their interpretations to others. Among these were ones described as “Desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm.“ (1 Tim 1:6-7) Their motives were NOT necessarily to HARM the Christian religion, but instead They are trying to HELP God by offering their interpretations of religion.
This apostasy is not simply a phenomenon of our time, but it happened in the early congregations and from the earliest time Christians were given the gospel and, it is NOT the anti-Christians in the main, who changed Christianity from without, but it is the Christian disciples themselves who are changing doctrines from within the christian movement itself as the early text from the Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah reminds us :
“And afterwards, at his approach, his disciples will abandon the teaching of the twelve apostles, and their faith, and their love, and their purity. And there will be much contention at his coming and at his approach. And in those days (there will be) many who will love office, although lacking wisdom. And there will be many wicked elders and shepherds who wrong their sheep, (and they will be rapacious because they do not have holy shepherds). And many will exchange the glory of the robes of the saints for the robes of those who love money; and there will be much respect of persons in those days, and lovers of the glory of this world. And there will be many slanderers and [much] vainglory at the approach of the Lord, and the Holy Spirit will withdraw from many. And in those day there will not be many prophets, nor those who speak reliable words, except one here and there in different places, because of the spirit of error and of fornication, and of vainglory, and of the love of money, which there will be among those who are said to be servants of the One, and among those who receive that One. 29 And among the shepherds and the elders there will be great hatred towards one another. 30 For there will be great jealousy in the last days, for everyone will speak whatever pleases him in his own eyes. 31 And they will neglect (gr) the prophecy of the prophets who were before me, and my visions also...they will make ineffective, in order that they may speak what bursts out of their heart.”(Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah . 3:21-31)
The difficulty for non-historian Christians is that they are often unaware of "doctrinal shifts" and "evolutions" of "orthodoxy" over time. So much so, that they are often disoriented by early Christian doctrines and traditions. Add to this, the difficulty caused by lack of insight among the religious resulting in the inability to see that all of us interpret according to our bias (myself included), AND, we all have bias, and we all teach according to our own bias. The end result is that we tend to innovate and guess and use imperfect logic in our interpretations of religion and the net result is that we move away from original and authentic religion to our own versions of it. Even if we hold to the most basic text as a "canon", we still tend to innovate and interpret and change that "canons" text to reflect our personal beliefs. It is a very difficult situation.
The centuries following the death of Christ were described by a logia of Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas as follows :
“Jesus said, “The kingdom of the [father] is like a certain woman who was carrying a [jar] full of meal. While she was walking [on the] road, still some distance from home, the handle of the jar broke and the meal emptied out behind her [on] the road. She did not realize it; she had noticed no accident. When she reached her house, she set the jar down and found it empty.”
This logia is one of many sad descriptions of the failed attempt to pass on the doctrines and traditions of the early Christianities to later generations. In the last days, when one looks inside of modern Christian Churches, often, one finds that most of the substance that gave the early Church its’ value, is no longer to be found in it.
I think this concept that all men (ALL of us) tend to make cognitive and philosophical errors and then adopt them into our religious worldview is important since it is a concept all of us are subject to. Though the vast majority of complaints of apostasy are aimed outward or often drift toward apostasy in the early Roman Religious Movement, still, all individuals within all other movements are subject to the same principle of error. The LDS ought to be reminded regarding how many times their leaders have called them to repentance on some principle or another. This reminder of their own calls to repent ought to tell them that they as individuals, share the same weakness and tendency to get things wrong, to get doctrines wrong, to develop bad habits, to apostatize from an original and authentic principle toward the adoption of incorrect beliefs and / or habits.
The early Christians were no different in their tendency to come to erroneous conclusions, except that they had leaders who received living, on-going revelation for the religious movement and individuals as Christians were also able to receive living revelation for their own lives. It was living revelation which, to a certain extent, allowed them to more accurately adjust and compensate (“repent”) and change their thoughts and actions on points of importance.
We are not talking about individuals who are evil, but individuals who may be wonderful and moral and good, but who simply get things wrong and as the errors accumulate, at some point, a repair and reorientation of their ideas and actions needs to take place in the same way that we constantly make adjustments in speed and direction when we drive our car. IF these tiny (and sometimes large) corrections are not made, we will be taken into directions and conditions that will cause us and others, harm.
2) REGARDING THE CHURCH GUARANTEEING SALVATION THROUGH ORDINANCE
I very much agree with Katzpur. The church does not and cannot guarantee salvation by a simple ordinance. Outward ordinances, by themselves are of no value, and are NOT independent of the persons relationship to God and other principles.
For example, when speaking of hypocrites who recieve ordinances but who have not changed their own hearts, the early Jewish documents point out that ordinances do not do anything for them : “Ceremonies of atonement cannot restore his innocence, neither cultic waters his purity. He cannot be sanctified by baptism in oceans and rivers, nor purified by mere ritual bathing. Unclean, unclean shall he be all the days that he rejects the laws of God, refusing to be disciplined in the Yahad of His society. For only through the spirit pervading God’s true society can there be atonement for a man’s ways, all of his iniquities; thus only can he gaze upon the light of life and so be joined to his truth by his Holy Spirit, purified from all iniquity. Through an upright and humble attitude his sin may be covered, and by humbling himself before all God’s laws his flesh can be made clean. Only thus can he really receive the purifying waters and be purged by the cleansing flow. 1QS, 4Q255-264a, 5Q11 Col. 3
Phillip describes in simple logic, those who are baptized without being honest of heart (and who then are not given the gift of the Holy Ghost by God because their hearts are not right)
If one goes down into the water and comes up without having received anything and says, “I am a Christian,” he has borrowed the name at interest. But if he receives the Holy spirit, he has the name as a gift. He who has received a gift does not have to give it back, but of him who has borrowed it at interest, payment is demanded.” The gospel of Phillip;
Joseph Smith makes a similar point : “You might as well baptize a bag of sand as a man, if not done in view of the remission of sins and getting of the Holy Ghost. Baptism by water is but half a baptism, and is good for nothing without the other half—that is, the baptism of the Holy Ghost” (Hch, 5:499). Smiths' declaration in in agreement with the ancient concept that ordinances themselves are of no value in and of themselves without authentic relationship with and the intervention of a loving and patient God.
Good luck in your journey True_Faith13;
Clear
φιφυσεσιω
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(I don't like these new smilies. This winking one looks so sarcastic and mean.)