[quote]Severiano wrote:
Yeah, the omni properties of god that we tend to discuss in Philosophy of Religion are Omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence, and all good.
They can’t all be true, I.E. God cannot do logically impossible things like make a rock so heavy he cannot lift it or make a square circle. But, so what if you can’t make or do things that are logically impossible? If God is around and is all good, but not omnipotent, then who cares? He’s still the most powerful thing around (if he exists).
[/quote]
False. The fact that logically impossible things “cannot” be done does not necessarily make God not omnipotent. You should read more Plantinga, he describes the flaws in that jump. [/quote]
I LOVE Plantinga! If you read, what I posted, I’m saying exactly that. Logically impossible things are things that make no sense. He’s arguing about the definition of omni, I’m saying who gives a shit if God gives up only logically impossible things, like pooping and not pooping at the same time? Making Pi=1+1 without any special values of 1, making a square circle. These are things we can’t even make sense of in our minds, we aren’t even capable of making sense of a square circle. Hope that clears up my point, I thought it was made quite clear. Go ahead, imagine a square circle… Now, imagine the Universe being formed via big bang, or just popping into existence? You CAN imagine those, but you CANT EVEN IMAGINE WHAT A SQUARE CIRCLE IS.
So to Aragorn and brother Chris, I’m saying I think the problem of evil isn’t such a problem. Rather, all the suffering and ubiquitous nature of evil on the planet brings into question whether God is all good, or omniscient, which are much more bothersome than not being able to do logically impossible things.
And btw, what a classy man Professor Alvin Plantinga is. The illustrious gent has my complete respect and more than holds/ held his own against the 4 horseman.
Nice little piece from him.
So again, I bring up not that there is evil in the world, but the scale of it. This is the real problem of evil. That, “God is asleep.” [/quote]
I see your making a distinction between the logical problem of evil and the evidential one and it know that logical one is pretty much defeated. But even the evidental one has been talked about and under christian theism doesn’t present a problem since the meaning of life isn’t comfort but rather the knowledge of God.
Fist off, I want to point out that there isn’t such thing as having faith in something once you gain knowledge of it. If you have knowledge of God and Gods existence, then you can’t have faith in God anymore. That’s completing the bridge to knowledge, or the old Knowledge = justified true belief. Faith = unjustified belief, truth or falseness isn’t so important in it’s frame… Faith is there to laugh in the face of knowledge, so the purpose of life for a christian CANT be to gain knowledge of God, it’s a self defeating purpose.
I don’t think the video did much of anything to address the level of anguish and suffering in the world. It just says that the world is mysterious and somehow AIDS might be good… I’m saying whoever made this claim hasn’t gone out and seen the world outside of a 4-5 diamond/ star resort.
Thngs like Malaria, Trachoma, Dysentery, and AIDS are all horrible things, no excuse as to why they should lead to such levels of suffering. If God really wanted folks dead by disease, then it should make sense that there would be diseases that take large amounts of people with minimal or no measurable suffering. But, so long as there are 5 and 6 year old kids fighting Malaria with every oz of fight they have, or there are rape victims or children suffering from nasty secondary diseases from AIDS I’m not even stepping close to that explanation. Once you see some of this stuff, it really seems to be more ammo for there not being a God, or God just not really caring.
Just my two. I wish I could come away with a rosy picture of this problem of evil, but it’s pretty ugly if you ask me.
[/quote]
My first response is intended to deal with the false dichotomy you set up between faith and knowledge. Firstly the Bible speaks of both the knowledge and faith in God and never has faith set out as unjustified belief. Nor has it been the general belief of Christianity for the last 2000 years except for a movement in the 1800 in America which emphasized feelings over the intellect. I have to run some errands brb.
KingKai, my trainer and teacher since defeating Raditz (DBZ fans anyone?) may correct me, but Echad in reference to God means, not a simple “one”, but rather a “compound unity” of one, a “togetherness”.[/quote]
That’s quite insightful, Son Goku! While ehad can denote simply “one,” it can also emphasize “togetherness” or “unity.” Next thing you know, you’ll be mastering the Kaio-Ken attack!
If this is in reference to the Shema, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one,” OT Professor Daniel Block argues on grammatical grounds (based on the nature of nominal or verbless clauses) that the proper rendering of that phrase into English is actually, "Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone." This rendering also makes more sense contextually as the purpose of the Shema was not to preclude any claims to Yahweh’s triune nature (again, the Jews at this time had no revelation concerning such), but rather to assert Yahweh’s position as Israel’s sole deity. [/quote]
No.
'echad" is the cardinal number, one.
If the author of Deuteronomy had intended to convey “alone,” he/she would have used the familiar term “levad”
Why misuse a commonly understood term for another commonly understood term?
[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Asking if God is perfect is already a conclusion in self exaltation in that it advances a standard other than God Himself.[/quote]
I don’t see how it does, please explain further. This sounds like you’re restating your conclusion earlier. I’m not sure how asking a question implies a conclusion already made by the asker.
I don’t see how this statement is true. Sounds presumptuous and false. Can you explain to me by what logic or authority you say that if someone asks a question they are in effect making a statement?
And, P.S. If anything it seems anti-biblical (1 Thess 5:21). Talk about superstitious and close minded, can’t even ask a question without being called an idolater.
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:<<< can’t even ask a question without being called an idolater.[/quote]There you go again Christopher. Not A question, THAT question. God, by Christian definition, is Himself the measure of all things. To ask “is he perfect”, is to assume the possibility He is not. The questioner will decide. THAT is self exaltation. “I’ll define “perfect” and also decide IF God is”. That is worshiping the creature, in this case one’s self over the creator who is alone authorized and qualified to define ANYTHING, to say nothing of Himself. I’m going to develop a 12 step program just for you called “Aquinas Anonymous”. The first step is admitting that you’re powerless over Thomistic epistemology and that your mind is unmanageable. I volunteer to be your sponsor. You have my phone number. Call me anytime, day or night and I will be there as an instrument of our Father God to help restore you to biblical sanity.
KingKai, my trainer and teacher since defeating Raditz (DBZ fans anyone?) may correct me, but Echad in reference to God means, not a simple “one”, but rather a “compound unity” of one, a “togetherness”.[/quote]
That’s quite insightful, Son Goku! While ehad can denote simply “one,” it can also emphasize “togetherness” or “unity.” Next thing you know, you’ll be mastering the Kaio-Ken attack!
If this is in reference to the Shema, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one,” OT Professor Daniel Block argues on grammatical grounds (based on the nature of nominal or verbless clauses) that the proper rendering of that phrase into English is actually, "Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone." This rendering also makes more sense contextually as the purpose of the Shema was not to preclude any claims to Yahweh’s triune nature (again, the Jews at this time had no revelation concerning such), but rather to assert Yahweh’s position as Israel’s sole deity. [/quote]
No.
'echad" is the cardinal number, one.
If the author of Deuteronomy had intended to convey “alone,” he/she would have used the familiar term “levad”
Why misuse a commonly understood term for another commonly understood term?
One is not alone in this interpretation.
[/quote]
It’s a much more complex issue than that, Skeptix; you can’t solve this one with a simple word study. There is a complex syntactical argument supporting the reading I’ve given above, revolving around the structure of nominal (verbless) clauses in Hebrew. I’ll try to find the article; we discussed it at length in my exegesis of Deuteronomy course. And once again, the context favors the reading I’ve provided above - Yahweh’s “unity” was not even a problem on their radar, whereas his unique position as Israel’s sole object of worship is the centerpiece of Moses’ speeches in Deuteronomy.
KingKai, my trainer and teacher since defeating Raditz (DBZ fans anyone?) may correct me, but Echad in reference to God means, not a simple “one”, but rather a “compound unity” of one, a “togetherness”.[/quote]
That’s quite insightful, Son Goku! While ehad can denote simply “one,” it can also emphasize “togetherness” or “unity.” Next thing you know, you’ll be mastering the Kaio-Ken attack!
If this is in reference to the Shema, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one,” OT Professor Daniel Block argues on grammatical grounds (based on the nature of nominal or verbless clauses) that the proper rendering of that phrase into English is actually, "Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone." This rendering also makes more sense contextually as the purpose of the Shema was not to preclude any claims to Yahweh’s triune nature (again, the Jews at this time had no revelation concerning such), but rather to assert Yahweh’s position as Israel’s sole deity. [/quote]
No.
'echad" is the cardinal number, one.
If the author of Deuteronomy had intended to convey “alone,” he/she would have used the familiar term “levad”
Why misuse a commonly understood term for another commonly understood term?
One is not alone in this interpretation.
[/quote]
It’s a much more complex issue than that, Skeptix; you can’t solve this one with a simple word study. There is a complex syntactical argument supporting the reading I’ve given above, revolving around the structure of nominal (verbless) clauses in Hebrew. I’ll try to find the article; we discussed it at length in my exegesis of Deuteronomy course. And once again, the context favors the reading I’ve provided above - Yahweh’s “unity” was not even a problem on their radar, whereas his unique position as Israel’s sole object of worship is the centerpiece of Moses’ speeches in Deuteronomy. [/quote]
One who does not hear the double pun will study alone.
KingKai, my trainer and teacher since defeating Raditz (DBZ fans anyone?) may correct me, but Echad in reference to God means, not a simple “one”, but rather a “compound unity” of one, a “togetherness”.[/quote]
That’s quite insightful, Son Goku! While ehad can denote simply “one,” it can also emphasize “togetherness” or “unity.” Next thing you know, you’ll be mastering the Kaio-Ken attack!
If this is in reference to the Shema, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one,” OT Professor Daniel Block argues on grammatical grounds (based on the nature of nominal or verbless clauses) that the proper rendering of that phrase into English is actually, "Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone." This rendering also makes more sense contextually as the purpose of the Shema was not to preclude any claims to Yahweh’s triune nature (again, the Jews at this time had no revelation concerning such), but rather to assert Yahweh’s position as Israel’s sole deity. [/quote]
No.
'echad" is the cardinal number, one.
If the author of Deuteronomy had intended to convey “alone,” he/she would have used the familiar term “levad”
Why misuse a commonly understood term for another commonly understood term?
One is not alone in this interpretation.
[/quote]
It’s a much more complex issue than that, Skeptix; you can’t solve this one with a simple word study. There is a complex syntactical argument supporting the reading I’ve given above, revolving around the structure of nominal (verbless) clauses in Hebrew. I’ll try to find the article; we discussed it at length in my exegesis of Deuteronomy course. And once again, the context favors the reading I’ve provided above - Yahweh’s “unity” was not even a problem on their radar, whereas his unique position as Israel’s sole object of worship is the centerpiece of Moses’ speeches in Deuteronomy. [/quote]
One who does not hear the double pun will study alone.[/quote]
That should link anyone who wants to read it to Dr. Daniel Block’s article on the subject. It’s twenty pages of relatively complex material, so I’ll note the highlights…
In response to the claim that the author would have used levad instead of ehad if he intended to convey “alone,” Block makes three key points. First of all, this is a verbless clause, and levad is an adverb (meaning its primary function is to modify a verb), so it would be inappropriate in this context. Secondly, and most importantly, there are several examples that suggest that this word can function as a semantic equivalent to levaddo (“unique, only, alone”) (Josh 22:20, 2 Sam. 7:23, 1 Chron. 29:1, Job 23:13, Job 31:15, Zech. 14:9). Finally, the claim that “Yahweh is one” is essentially meaningless; “a discrete entity is not normally in danger of being taken for more than one or less than one.” It requires some significant exegetical gymnastics to make “Yahweh is one” into a coherent claim.
The syntax also supports the reading, “Yahweh alone.” Based on the rules of verbless clauses, if the last clause was meant to convey, “Yahweh is one,” it should have read “yahweh ehad hu” or “ehad Yahweh,” NOT “Yahweh ehad.”
KingKai, my trainer and teacher since defeating Raditz (DBZ fans anyone?) may correct me, but Echad in reference to God means, not a simple “one”, but rather a “compound unity” of one, a “togetherness”.[/quote]
That’s quite insightful, Son Goku! While ehad can denote simply “one,” it can also emphasize “togetherness” or “unity.” Next thing you know, you’ll be mastering the Kaio-Ken attack!
If this is in reference to the Shema, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one,” OT Professor Daniel Block argues on grammatical grounds (based on the nature of nominal or verbless clauses) that the proper rendering of that phrase into English is actually, "Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone." This rendering also makes more sense contextually as the purpose of the Shema was not to preclude any claims to Yahweh’s triune nature (again, the Jews at this time had no revelation concerning such), but rather to assert Yahweh’s position as Israel’s sole deity. [/quote]
No.
'echad" is the cardinal number, one.
If the author of Deuteronomy had intended to convey “alone,” he/she would have used the familiar term “levad”
Why misuse a commonly understood term for another commonly understood term?
One is not alone in this interpretation.
[/quote]
It’s a much more complex issue than that, Skeptix; you can’t solve this one with a simple word study. There is a complex syntactical argument supporting the reading I’ve given above, revolving around the structure of nominal (verbless) clauses in Hebrew. I’ll try to find the article; we discussed it at length in my exegesis of Deuteronomy course. And once again, the context favors the reading I’ve provided above - Yahweh’s “unity” was not even a problem on their radar, whereas his unique position as Israel’s sole object of worship is the centerpiece of Moses’ speeches in Deuteronomy. [/quote]
One who does not hear the double pun will study alone.[/quote]
That should link anyone who wants to read it to Dr. Daniel Block’s article on the subject. It’s twenty pages of relatively complex material, so I’ll note the highlights…
In response to the claim that the author would have used levad instead of ehad if he intended to convey “alone,” Block makes three key points. First of all, this is a verbless clause, and levad is an adverb (meaning its primary function is to modify a verb), so it would be inappropriate in this context. Secondly, and most importantly, there are several examples that suggest that this word can function as a semantic equivalent to levaddo (“unique, only, alone”) (Josh 22:20, 2 Sam. 7:23, 1 Chron. 29:1, Job 23:13, Job 31:15, Zech. 14:9). Finally, the claim that “Yahweh is one” is essentially meaningless; “a discrete entity is not normally in danger of being taken for more than one or less than one.” It requires some significant exegetical gymnastics to make “Yahweh is one” into a coherent claim.
The syntax also supports the reading, “Yahweh alone.” Based on the rules of verbless clauses, if the last clause was meant to convey, “Yahweh is one,” it should have read “yahweh ehad hu” or “ehad Yahweh,” NOT “Yahweh ehad.”[/quote]
Well, this is not complete nonsense, but there is not great merit in incomplete nonsense either.
“Verbless?” Interesting interpolation, there; the verb “to be” is an incomplete verb in the sense that it is seldom explicit in the present tense. It is an understood or implied verb in the present tense. Therefore, the author’s list of English renditions on 196 has its merits.
But I disagree with this business of “alone.” If you believe that “levad” is only used as an adverb, it would modify the (unspoken) “to be”. No problem. (Incidentally, in common use, if one says “xxx hu” it is generally understood as, “He is xxx,” with xxx representing an adjective, or a teh equivalent of a predicate adjective in the case of the verb “to be.” “echad” is the cardinal number “one,” a noun and not an adjective, in an English rendition. Further, YHWH ehad hu is a redundancy.) Or if you really think it should read “ehad hu” to express “(is) one,” then the Deutoronomist should have written “levad hu” (or some such) if he/she had intended to express the English idea of “alone” or “apart.”
Nope. Whether rendered in English as “one” or “alone” or “singular,” or “unique” or some other synonymous adjective–Prof. Block is imparting a theologic and not a linguistic understanding. (His analogies in other verses simply do not ring in parallel to the dual declarative of Deut 6:4). The rest of the article is a Christian superimposition (note the dancing around the meaning of the simple word “nefesh.”) I agree that the first few translations on p 196 are linguistically acceptable, the concept of the unity of Divinity in the Shema is not perfectly rendered into English. Nevertheless, it requires absolutely no “significant exegetical gymnastics” to the clear understanding of the Hebrew that “YHWH is one” is fused as a concept.
And further, I am stunned that no one appreciates a good pun when they read one.
[quote]Severiano wrote:
Yeah, the omni properties of god that we tend to discuss in Philosophy of Religion are Omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence, and all good.
They can’t all be true, I.E. God cannot do logically impossible things like make a rock so heavy he cannot lift it or make a square circle. But, so what if you can’t make or do things that are logically impossible? If God is around and is all good, but not omnipotent, then who cares? He’s still the most powerful thing around (if he exists).
[/quote]
False. The fact that logically impossible things “cannot” be done does not necessarily make God not omnipotent. You should read more Plantinga, he describes the flaws in that jump. [/quote]
I LOVE Plantinga! If you read, what I posted, I’m saying exactly that. Logically impossible things are things that make no sense. He’s arguing about the definition of omni, I’m saying who gives a shit if God gives up only logically impossible things, like pooping and not pooping at the same time? Making Pi=1+1 without any special values of 1, making a square circle. These are things we can’t even make sense of in our minds, we aren’t even capable of making sense of a square circle. Hope that clears up my point, I thought it was made quite clear. Go ahead, imagine a square circle… Now, imagine the Universe being formed via big bang, or just popping into existence? You CAN imagine those, but you CANT EVEN IMAGINE WHAT A SQUARE CIRCLE IS.
So to Aragorn and brother Chris, I’m saying I think the problem of evil isn’t such a problem. Rather, all the suffering and ubiquitous nature of evil on the planet brings into question whether God is all good, or omniscient, which are much more bothersome than not being able to do logically impossible things.
And btw, what a classy man Professor Alvin Plantinga is. The illustrious gent has my complete respect and more than holds/ held his own against the 4 horseman.
Nice little piece from him.
So again, I bring up not that there is evil in the world, but the scale of it. This is the real problem of evil. That, “God is asleep.” [/quote]
I see your making a distinction between the logical problem of evil and the evidential one and it know that logical one is pretty much defeated. But even the evidental one has been talked about and under christian theism doesn’t present a problem since the meaning of life isn’t comfort but rather the knowledge of God.
Fist off, I want to point out that there isn’t such thing as having faith in something once you gain knowledge of it. If you have knowledge of God and Gods existence, then you can’t have faith in God anymore. That’s completing the bridge to knowledge, or the old Knowledge = justified true belief. Faith = unjustified belief, truth or falseness isn’t so important in it’s frame… Faith is there to laugh in the face of knowledge, so the purpose of life for a christian CANT be to gain knowledge of God, it’s a self defeating purpose.
I don’t think the video did much of anything to address the level of anguish and suffering in the world. It just says that the world is mysterious and somehow AIDS might be good… I’m saying whoever made this claim hasn’t gone out and seen the world outside of a 4-5 diamond/ star resort.
Thngs like Malaria, Trachoma, Dysentery, and AIDS are all horrible things, no excuse as to why they should lead to such levels of suffering. If God really wanted folks dead by disease, then it should make sense that there would be diseases that take large amounts of people with minimal or no measurable suffering. But, so long as there are 5 and 6 year old kids fighting Malaria with every oz of fight they have, or there are rape victims or children suffering from nasty secondary diseases from AIDS I’m not even stepping close to that explanation. Once you see some of this stuff, it really seems to be more ammo for there not being a God, or God just not really caring.
Just my two. I wish I could come away with a rosy picture of this problem of evil, but it’s pretty ugly if you ask me.
[/quote]
My first response is intended to deal with the false dichotomy you set up between faith and knowledge. Firstly the Bible speaks of both the knowledge and faith in God and never has faith set out as unjustified belief. Nor has it been the general belief of Christianity for the last 2000 years except for a movement in the 1800 in America which emphasized feelings over the intellect. I have to run some errands brb.[/quote]
If I ever set up a dichotomy between faith and knowledge, it was in the very previous post. There isn’t a false dichotomy between faith and knowledge given the existence of God. God either exists, or doesn’t exist, and nobody knows for sure, otherwise there isn’t a point to having faith, other than your faith becoming a justified true belief/ knowledge. At which point it isn’t faith anymore anyhow… There’s a certain strength in faith, I respect it, because it has nothing to do with knowledge, it scoffs in the face of knowledge…
If you can’t know something exists, then how the heck are you going to claim know that things qualities? You have faith God exists, the same way you have faith in God’s qualities. Otherwise you have knowledge of God, and maybe you can explain away the evils of the world? I think not, more likely you have some idea of what you want God to be like, and then the idea that your mind is so minute that God is greater than you imagined? That’s faith too. In that case, you have faith in something you take for granted is knowledge that is just a belief that God is better than what you imagine.
KingKai, my trainer and teacher since defeating Raditz (DBZ fans anyone?) may correct me, but Echad in reference to God means, not a simple “one”, but rather a “compound unity” of one, a “togetherness”.[/quote]
That’s quite insightful, Son Goku! While ehad can denote simply “one,” it can also emphasize “togetherness” or “unity.” Next thing you know, you’ll be mastering the Kaio-Ken attack!
If this is in reference to the Shema, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one,” OT Professor Daniel Block argues on grammatical grounds (based on the nature of nominal or verbless clauses) that the proper rendering of that phrase into English is actually, "Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone." This rendering also makes more sense contextually as the purpose of the Shema was not to preclude any claims to Yahweh’s triune nature (again, the Jews at this time had no revelation concerning such), but rather to assert Yahweh’s position as Israel’s sole deity. [/quote]
No.
'echad" is the cardinal number, one.
If the author of Deuteronomy had intended to convey “alone,” he/she would have used the familiar term “levad”
Why misuse a commonly understood term for another commonly understood term?
One is not alone in this interpretation.
[/quote]
It’s a much more complex issue than that, Skeptix; you can’t solve this one with a simple word study. There is a complex syntactical argument supporting the reading I’ve given above, revolving around the structure of nominal (verbless) clauses in Hebrew. I’ll try to find the article; we discussed it at length in my exegesis of Deuteronomy course. And once again, the context favors the reading I’ve provided above - Yahweh’s “unity” was not even a problem on their radar, whereas his unique position as Israel’s sole object of worship is the centerpiece of Moses’ speeches in Deuteronomy. [/quote]
One who does not hear the double pun will study alone.[/quote]
That should link anyone who wants to read it to Dr. Daniel Block’s article on the subject. It’s twenty pages of relatively complex material, so I’ll note the highlights…
In response to the claim that the author would have used levad instead of ehad if he intended to convey “alone,” Block makes three key points. First of all, this is a verbless clause, and levad is an adverb (meaning its primary function is to modify a verb), so it would be inappropriate in this context. Secondly, and most importantly, there are several examples that suggest that this word can function as a semantic equivalent to levaddo (“unique, only, alone”) (Josh 22:20, 2 Sam. 7:23, 1 Chron. 29:1, Job 23:13, Job 31:15, Zech. 14:9). Finally, the claim that “Yahweh is one” is essentially meaningless; “a discrete entity is not normally in danger of being taken for more than one or less than one.” It requires some significant exegetical gymnastics to make “Yahweh is one” into a coherent claim.
The syntax also supports the reading, “Yahweh alone.” Based on the rules of verbless clauses, if the last clause was meant to convey, “Yahweh is one,” it should have read “yahweh ehad hu” or “ehad Yahweh,” NOT “Yahweh ehad.”[/quote]
Well, this is not complete nonsense, but there is not great merit in incomplete nonsense either.
“Verbless?” Interesting interpolation, there; the verb “to be” is an incomplete verb in the sense that it is seldom explicit in the present tense. It is an understood or implied verb in the present tense. Therefore, the author’s list of English renditions on 196 has its merits.
[/quote]
“Verbless/ nominal” are standard grammatical designations for clauses lacking a finite verb; I think you need a refresher on Hebrew syntax, Doc.
It actually is a problem because (1) a nominal clause isn’t simply a construction with an “unspoken” haya; (2) levad IS an adverb; (3) there are no examples of levad functioning as the predicate of nominal clause. In other words, we have no biblical examples where levad is predicated of a subject in a verbless clause.
Again, you need a serious refresher course in biblical Hebrew syntax, since you aren’t familiar with the grammatical concept of a verbless/ nominal clause and the rules that govern such clauses. The “xxx” (i.e., the word in the predicate position) is NOT always an adjective. See, for example, Ps. 81:5 - ki hok leyisrael hu (“it it a statute for Israel”). Hok is in the predicate position and is a noun. Or Psalm 73:16 - amal hu be’eyina (it was trouble in my eyes). Again, a noun. And there are many more such examples.
More importantly, however, you were so bent on trying to prove him wrong (and not just him, but other scholars who actually know what nominal clauses are and the rules that govern them) that you completely missed his point. Once again, in verbless clauses, the positioning of the nouns relative to one another matters. And since when is redundancy avoided in the Hebrew bible? Linguistic parsimony was hardly a feature of Hebrew style.
As I said previously, we have no examples in biblical of Hebrew of levad being used as the predicate in a nominal clause, so this point is mute.
Lol This is a ridiculous claim coming from someone unfamiliar with basic grammatical concepts. While the end of the article (which I did NOT cite anything from) makes more of a theological argument, he begins with a specifically linguistic and contextual analysis of the passage. And your dismissal of the other occurrences where ehad functions as levad shows not only your lack of understanding of his point, but also you inability to actually refute it. He didn’t offer those other passages as parallels to the Shema; he was making a substantive argument about the semantic domain of the words ehad and levad, his point being that there are several occasions where ehad is used in a similar way to levad, suggesting that, though they have some distinct functions, they also overlap in meaning. You know how synonyms work, right Doc? Synonyms are rarely exact parallels; they have both distinctive senses and senses in common. The same applies here. Consequently, if there are other occasions in which the semantic domains of levad and ehad overlap, there is AMPLE reason to suspect that they might do so here in the Shema. Couple that with the fact that (as Block notes) there are Phoenician and Ugaritic parallels to the exclusive use of the cardinal “one,” and you’ve got an excellent case.
Superimposition? In the words of Inigo Montoya, “I no think you know what that word means.” He is certainly reading the text through a Christian lens, but everything he does is justifiable from a scholarly position. And his discussion of nefesh is excellent, because nefesh isn’t a simple word at all; he lists several different examples where it has a multitude of uses. Seriously, Doc, their going to revoke your PhD soon if you keep up this kind of carelessness.
And please, tell us what “Yahweh is one” means, WITHOUT having to rely on an theological structure external to the text.
[quote]
And further, I am stunned that no one appreciates a good pun when they read one. [/quote]
KingKai, my trainer and teacher since defeating Raditz (DBZ fans anyone?) may correct me, but Echad in reference to God means, not a simple “one”, but rather a “compound unity” of one, a “togetherness”.[/quote]
That’s quite insightful, Son Goku! While ehad can denote simply “one,” it can also emphasize “togetherness” or “unity.” Next thing you know, you’ll be mastering the Kaio-Ken attack!
If this is in reference to the Shema, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one,” OT Professor Daniel Block argues on grammatical grounds (based on the nature of nominal or verbless clauses) that the proper rendering of that phrase into English is actually, "Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone." This rendering also makes more sense contextually as the purpose of the Shema was not to preclude any claims to Yahweh’s triune nature (again, the Jews at this time had no revelation concerning such), but rather to assert Yahweh’s position as Israel’s sole deity. [/quote]
No.
'echad" is the cardinal number, one.
If the author of Deuteronomy had intended to convey “alone,” he/she would have used the familiar term “levad”
Why misuse a commonly understood term for another commonly understood term?
One is not alone in this interpretation.
[/quote]
It’s a much more complex issue than that, Skeptix; you can’t solve this one with a simple word study. There is a complex syntactical argument supporting the reading I’ve given above, revolving around the structure of nominal (verbless) clauses in Hebrew. I’ll try to find the article; we discussed it at length in my exegesis of Deuteronomy course. And once again, the context favors the reading I’ve provided above - Yahweh’s “unity” was not even a problem on their radar, whereas his unique position as Israel’s sole object of worship is the centerpiece of Moses’ speeches in Deuteronomy. [/quote]
One who does not hear the double pun will study alone.[/quote]
That should link anyone who wants to read it to Dr. Daniel Block’s article on the subject. It’s twenty pages of relatively complex material, so I’ll note the highlights…
In response to the claim that the author would have used levad instead of ehad if he intended to convey “alone,” Block makes three key points. First of all, this is a verbless clause, and levad is an adverb (meaning its primary function is to modify a verb), so it would be inappropriate in this context. Secondly, and most importantly, there are several examples that suggest that this word can function as a semantic equivalent to levaddo (“unique, only, alone”) (Josh 22:20, 2 Sam. 7:23, 1 Chron. 29:1, Job 23:13, Job 31:15, Zech. 14:9). Finally, the claim that “Yahweh is one” is essentially meaningless; “a discrete entity is not normally in danger of being taken for more than one or less than one.” It requires some significant exegetical gymnastics to make “Yahweh is one” into a coherent claim.
The syntax also supports the reading, “Yahweh alone.” Based on the rules of verbless clauses, if the last clause was meant to convey, “Yahweh is one,” it should have read “yahweh ehad hu” or “ehad Yahweh,” NOT “Yahweh ehad.”[/quote]
Well, this is not complete nonsense, but there is not great merit in incomplete nonsense either.
“Verbless?” Interesting interpolation, there; the verb “to be” is an incomplete verb in the sense that it is seldom explicit in the present tense. It is an understood or implied verb in the present tense. Therefore, the author’s list of English renditions on 196 has its merits.
[/quote]
“Verbless/ nominal” are standard grammatical designations for clauses lacking a finite verb; I think you need a refresher on Hebrew syntax, Doc.
It actually is a problem because (1) a nominal clause isn’t simply a construction with an “unspoken” haya; (2) levad IS an adverb; (3) there are no examples of levad functioning as the predicate of nominal clause. In other words, we have no biblical examples where levad is predicated of a subject in a verbless clause.
Again, you need a serious refresher course in biblical Hebrew syntax, since you aren’t familiar with the grammatical concept of a verbless/ nominal clause and the rules that govern such clauses. The “xxx” (i.e., the word in the predicate position) is NOT always an adjective. See, for example, Ps. 81:5 - ki hok leyisrael hu (“it it a statute for Israel”). Hok is in the predicate position and is a noun. Or Psalm 73:16 - amal hu be’eyina (it was trouble in my eyes). Again, a noun. And there are many more such examples.
More importantly, however, you were so bent on trying to prove him wrong (and not just him, but other scholars who actually know what nominal clauses are and the rules that govern them) that you completely missed his point. Once again, in verbless clauses, the positioning of the nouns relative to one another matters. And since when is redundancy avoided in the Hebrew bible? Linguistic parsimony was hardly a feature of Hebrew style.
As I said previously, we have no examples in biblical of Hebrew of levad being used as the predicate in a nominal clause, so this point is mute.
Lol This is a ridiculous claim coming from someone unfamiliar with basic grammatical concepts. While the end of the article (which I did NOT cite anything from) makes more of a theological argument, he begins with a specifically linguistic and contextual analysis of the passage. And your dismissal of the other occurrences where ehad functions as levad shows not only your lack of understanding of his point, but also you inability to actually refute it. He didn’t offer those other passages as parallels to the Shema; he was making a substantive argument about the semantic domain of the words ehad and levad, his point being that there are several occasions where ehad is used in a similar way to levad, suggesting that, though they have some distinct functions, they also overlap in meaning. You know how synonyms work, right Doc? Synonyms are rarely exact parallels; they have both distinctive senses and senses in common. The same applies here. Consequently, if there are other occasions in which the semantic domains of levad and ehad overlap, there is AMPLE reason to suspect that they might do so here in the Shema. Couple that with the fact that (as Block notes) there are Phoenician and Ugaritic parallels to the exclusive use of the cardinal “one,” and you’ve got an excellent case.
Superimposition? In the words of Inigo Montoya, “I no think you know what that word means.” He is certainly reading the text through a Christian lens, but everything he does is justifiable from a scholarly position. And his discussion of nefesh is excellent, because nefesh isn’t a simple word at all; he lists several different examples where it has a multitude of uses. Seriously, Doc, their going to revoke your PhD soon if you keep up this kind of carelessness.
And please, tell us what “Yahweh is one” means, WITHOUT having to rely on an theological structure external to the text.
[quote]
And further, I am stunned that no one appreciates a good pun when they read one. [/quote]
Yes, Doc, it was a great pun. [/quote]
Well, thanks for the acknowledgment!
Aas for this business of “xxx hu” yes, I did not intent that it xxx is meantonly as a predicate adjective, but in uthis case, “echad"is a noun, the verb “is” is understood, and in the poetic declarative here, “to be” takes the nominative case: YHWH (is) one. Now, I can offer a whole alphabet of counter-examples of “xxx (to be) hu” wherein xxx is an adjective: adir hu, bahor hu, gadol hu, dagol hu…tamid hu.”
Next, if one cannot grasp the essence of Deut 6:4, no English rendition will do, and grammar and syntax are being used to deny meaning. If one needs a faulty and belabored English rendition of that verse, one will never grasp the message of the unity of Divinity. I need not explain further.
As for my knowledge of biblical syntax…are they taxing everything nowadays?
[quote]Severiano wrote:
Yeah, the omni properties of god that we tend to discuss in Philosophy of Religion are Omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence, and all good.
They can’t all be true, I.E. God cannot do logically impossible things like make a rock so heavy he cannot lift it or make a square circle. But, so what if you can’t make or do things that are logically impossible? If God is around and is all good, but not omnipotent, then who cares? He’s still the most powerful thing around (if he exists).
[/quote]
False. The fact that logically impossible things “cannot” be done does not necessarily make God not omnipotent. You should read more Plantinga, he describes the flaws in that jump. [/quote]
I LOVE Plantinga! If you read, what I posted, I’m saying exactly that. Logically impossible things are things that make no sense. He’s arguing about the definition of omni, I’m saying who gives a shit if God gives up only logically impossible things, like pooping and not pooping at the same time? Making Pi=1+1 without any special values of 1, making a square circle. These are things we can’t even make sense of in our minds, we aren’t even capable of making sense of a square circle. Hope that clears up my point, I thought it was made quite clear. Go ahead, imagine a square circle… Now, imagine the Universe being formed via big bang, or just popping into existence? You CAN imagine those, but you CANT EVEN IMAGINE WHAT A SQUARE CIRCLE IS.
So to Aragorn and brother Chris, I’m saying I think the problem of evil isn’t such a problem. Rather, all the suffering and ubiquitous nature of evil on the planet brings into question whether God is all good, or omniscient, which are much more bothersome than not being able to do logically impossible things.
And btw, what a classy man Professor Alvin Plantinga is. The illustrious gent has my complete respect and more than holds/ held his own against the 4 horseman.
Nice little piece from him.
So again, I bring up not that there is evil in the world, but the scale of it. This is the real problem of evil. That, “God is asleep.” [/quote]
I see your making a distinction between the logical problem of evil and the evidential one and it know that logical one is pretty much defeated. But even the evidental one has been talked about and under christian theism doesn’t present a problem since the meaning of life isn’t comfort but rather the knowledge of God.
Fist off, I want to point out that there isn’t such thing as having faith in something once you gain knowledge of it. If you have knowledge of God and Gods existence, then you can’t have faith in God anymore. That’s completing the bridge to knowledge, or the old Knowledge = justified true belief. Faith = unjustified belief, truth or falseness isn’t so important in it’s frame… Faith is there to laugh in the face of knowledge, so the purpose of life for a christian CANT be to gain knowledge of God, it’s a self defeating purpose.
I don’t think the video did much of anything to address the level of anguish and suffering in the world. It just says that the world is mysterious and somehow AIDS might be good… I’m saying whoever made this claim hasn’t gone out and seen the world outside of a 4-5 diamond/ star resort.
Thngs like Malaria, Trachoma, Dysentery, and AIDS are all horrible things, no excuse as to why they should lead to such levels of suffering. If God really wanted folks dead by disease, then it should make sense that there would be diseases that take large amounts of people with minimal or no measurable suffering. But, so long as there are 5 and 6 year old kids fighting Malaria with every oz of fight they have, or there are rape victims or children suffering from nasty secondary diseases from AIDS I’m not even stepping close to that explanation. Once you see some of this stuff, it really seems to be more ammo for there not being a God, or God just not really caring.
Just my two. I wish I could come away with a rosy picture of this problem of evil, but it’s pretty ugly if you ask me.
[/quote]
My first response is intended to deal with the false dichotomy you set up between faith and knowledge. Firstly the Bible speaks of both the knowledge and faith in God and never has faith set out as unjustified belief. Nor has it been the general belief of Christianity for the last 2000 years except for a movement in the 1800 in America which emphasized feelings over the intellect. I have to run some errands brb.[/quote]
If I ever set up a dichotomy between faith and knowledge, it was in the very previous post. There isn’t a false dichotomy between faith and knowledge given the existence of God. God either exists, or doesn’t exist, and nobody knows for sure, otherwise there isn’t a point to having faith, other than your faith becoming a justified true belief/ knowledge. At which point it isn’t faith anymore anyhow… There’s a certain strength in faith, I respect it, because it has nothing to do with knowledge, it scoffs in the face of knowledge…
If you can’t know something exists, then how the heck are you going to claim know that things qualities? You have faith God exists, the same way you have faith in God’s qualities. Otherwise you have knowledge of God, and maybe you can explain away the evils of the world? I think not, more likely you have some idea of what you want God to be like, and then the idea that your mind is so minute that God is greater than you imagined? That’s faith too. In that case, you have faith in something you take for granted is knowledge that is just a belief that God is better than what you imagine. [/quote]
Faith in the bible is never used concerning the existence of God, nor is it taken by some nowadays to believe in something against the face of evidence like Bertrand Russell took it to mean but (Pistis) the word translated as faith is closer to today’s understanding of what trust is.
For example I know there is a chair by my computer; through my prior experiences with the chair I have faith that it can support my weight. Likewise the figure for faith in the New Testament Abraham already knew about God’s existence and his trust in him wasn’t for naught. He remembered how God had provided for him on his journey and how he delivered his nephew Lot twice, and how he took care of his first born and most miraculous of all the birth of his son Isaac in his and his wife’s old age even though she was previously unable to conceive. Abraham knowing of God’s promise concerning his son Isaac trusted God when he said to his servants, me and the boy will return to you as they went up the mount. This is the bible’s and in general what Christianity has taken faith to mean in the last 2000 years. James 2:19 is also an example of having knowledge but not faith.
If you read Plantinga you should know that for Plantinga God is a properly basic belief and properly basic belief is knowledge for the one who has it. Now I can’t say that I’ve read his works personally but have read the works of others who are qualified to present his work accurately. Since I haven’t read those books in a while I think it pertains to his book “Warranted Christian Belief”.
KingKai, my trainer and teacher since defeating Raditz (DBZ fans anyone?) may correct me, but Echad in reference to God means, not a simple “one”, but rather a “compound unity” of one, a “togetherness”.[/quote]
That’s quite insightful, Son Goku! While ehad can denote simply “one,” it can also emphasize “togetherness” or “unity.” Next thing you know, you’ll be mastering the Kaio-Ken attack!
If this is in reference to the Shema, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one,” OT Professor Daniel Block argues on grammatical grounds (based on the nature of nominal or verbless clauses) that the proper rendering of that phrase into English is actually, "Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone." This rendering also makes more sense contextually as the purpose of the Shema was not to preclude any claims to Yahweh’s triune nature (again, the Jews at this time had no revelation concerning such), but rather to assert Yahweh’s position as Israel’s sole deity. [/quote]
No.
'echad" is the cardinal number, one.
If the author of Deuteronomy had intended to convey “alone,” he/she would have used the familiar term “levad”
Why misuse a commonly understood term for another commonly understood term?
One is not alone in this interpretation.
[/quote]
It’s a much more complex issue than that, Skeptix; you can’t solve this one with a simple word study. There is a complex syntactical argument supporting the reading I’ve given above, revolving around the structure of nominal (verbless) clauses in Hebrew. I’ll try to find the article; we discussed it at length in my exegesis of Deuteronomy course. And once again, the context favors the reading I’ve provided above - Yahweh’s “unity” was not even a problem on their radar, whereas his unique position as Israel’s sole object of worship is the centerpiece of Moses’ speeches in Deuteronomy. [/quote]
One who does not hear the double pun will study alone.[/quote]
That should link anyone who wants to read it to Dr. Daniel Block’s article on the subject. It’s twenty pages of relatively complex material, so I’ll note the highlights…
In response to the claim that the author would have used levad instead of ehad if he intended to convey “alone,” Block makes three key points. First of all, this is a verbless clause, and levad is an adverb (meaning its primary function is to modify a verb), so it would be inappropriate in this context. Secondly, and most importantly, there are several examples that suggest that this word can function as a semantic equivalent to levaddo (“unique, only, alone”) (Josh 22:20, 2 Sam. 7:23, 1 Chron. 29:1, Job 23:13, Job 31:15, Zech. 14:9). Finally, the claim that “Yahweh is one” is essentially meaningless; “a discrete entity is not normally in danger of being taken for more than one or less than one.” It requires some significant exegetical gymnastics to make “Yahweh is one” into a coherent claim.
The syntax also supports the reading, “Yahweh alone.” Based on the rules of verbless clauses, if the last clause was meant to convey, “Yahweh is one,” it should have read “yahweh ehad hu” or “ehad Yahweh,” NOT “Yahweh ehad.”[/quote]
Well, this is not complete nonsense, but there is not great merit in incomplete nonsense either.
“Verbless?” Interesting interpolation, there; the verb “to be” is an incomplete verb in the sense that it is seldom explicit in the present tense. It is an understood or implied verb in the present tense. Therefore, the author’s list of English renditions on 196 has its merits.
[/quote]
“Verbless/ nominal” are standard grammatical designations for clauses lacking a finite verb; I think you need a refresher on Hebrew syntax, Doc.
It actually is a problem because (1) a nominal clause isn’t simply a construction with an “unspoken” haya; (2) levad IS an adverb; (3) there are no examples of levad functioning as the predicate of nominal clause. In other words, we have no biblical examples where levad is predicated of a subject in a verbless clause.
Again, you need a serious refresher course in biblical Hebrew syntax, since you aren’t familiar with the grammatical concept of a verbless/ nominal clause and the rules that govern such clauses. The “xxx” (i.e., the word in the predicate position) is NOT always an adjective. See, for example, Ps. 81:5 - ki hok leyisrael hu (“it it a statute for Israel”). Hok is in the predicate position and is a noun. Or Psalm 73:16 - amal hu be’eyina (it was trouble in my eyes). Again, a noun. And there are many more such examples.
More importantly, however, you were so bent on trying to prove him wrong (and not just him, but other scholars who actually know what nominal clauses are and the rules that govern them) that you completely missed his point. Once again, in verbless clauses, the positioning of the nouns relative to one another matters. And since when is redundancy avoided in the Hebrew bible? Linguistic parsimony was hardly a feature of Hebrew style.
As I said previously, we have no examples in biblical of Hebrew of levad being used as the predicate in a nominal clause, so this point is mute.
Lol This is a ridiculous claim coming from someone unfamiliar with basic grammatical concepts. While the end of the article (which I did NOT cite anything from) makes more of a theological argument, he begins with a specifically linguistic and contextual analysis of the passage. And your dismissal of the other occurrences where ehad functions as levad shows not only your lack of understanding of his point, but also you inability to actually refute it. He didn’t offer those other passages as parallels to the Shema; he was making a substantive argument about the semantic domain of the words ehad and levad, his point being that there are several occasions where ehad is used in a similar way to levad, suggesting that, though they have some distinct functions, they also overlap in meaning. You know how synonyms work, right Doc? Synonyms are rarely exact parallels; they have both distinctive senses and senses in common. The same applies here. Consequently, if there are other occasions in which the semantic domains of levad and ehad overlap, there is AMPLE reason to suspect that they might do so here in the Shema. Couple that with the fact that (as Block notes) there are Phoenician and Ugaritic parallels to the exclusive use of the cardinal “one,” and you’ve got an excellent case.
Superimposition? In the words of Inigo Montoya, “I no think you know what that word means.” He is certainly reading the text through a Christian lens, but everything he does is justifiable from a scholarly position. And his discussion of nefesh is excellent, because nefesh isn’t a simple word at all; he lists several different examples where it has a multitude of uses. Seriously, Doc, their going to revoke your PhD soon if you keep up this kind of carelessness.
And please, tell us what “Yahweh is one” means, WITHOUT having to rely on an theological structure external to the text.
Doc, I’m scheduling you a Hebrew 101 class. If you’re intent on making definitive claims about the meaning of biblical passages, you should at least have some idea what you are talking about. “To be” takes the nominative case? Hebrew has no case endings; the nominative case refers to the subject of a clause, and we know what the subject is in Hebrew based on word order and the absence of other markers. So what’s your point?
Also, I’m not sure what the point of counter-examples is; I was simply showing that your implicit claim that xxx is only a predicate noun is wrong, as there are many examples of nominal constructions with both nouns and adjectives. And most importantly, you are wrong about ehad - it is an attributive adjective. The rest of the cardinal numbers are substantives (a noun, pronoun, or other construction functioning as a noun), but ehad is an attributive adjective.
Lol actually, you DO need to explain further, if you are going to posit that, in the context of a covenantal ceremony where God demands from Israel exclusive worship, Moses makes a random declaration about Yahweh’s unity. Once again, as noted in Block’s article, the statement 'Yahweh is one" is as pointless as the phrase, “Bob Dylan is one” - how many did they think he was? If, however, the Shema is the declaration, “Yahweh is your God - Yahweh alone,” then the statement makes PERFECT sense in the covenantal context.
Unless, of course, you wish to posit that God put that statement of his “oneness” in there because he foresaw the problems the Trinitarian doctrine would present. Still, that would only be speculation…
And there are few things more ridiculous than the claim that the grammatical and syntactical analysis of a dead language has been undertaken “to deny meaning.” Translation isn’t about cutting and pasting, Doc, and contrary to what you’ve implied before, there were a lot of lexical, grammatical and syntactical issues the Rabbis did NOT understand.
perfect or imperfect, Man created this childish idea as an explanation of the observable world in a time where there was no other knowledge. It has long been an antiquated explanation that no longer fits with our knowledge of our environment and it’s interactions.
Adhering to concepts that are as incorrect now as they were in the stone ages is pathetic.
[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Aragorn is right of course. It is an absolutely non starting impossibility to get something from “nothing”?
Except when almighty God commands light, matter, time and space to “BE” and they not yet existing obey Him. LOL! Once you have a God like this? The discussion of what’s possible changes just a bit. People is jist the silliest critters. [/quote]
And yet, in making that flawed argument, you try to explain the complexity observed by stating that something else created it. This doesn’t actually answer the question, and just removes thought from the situation. Using an inherently more complex explanation is an unacceptable answer.
It is unbelievably stupid to think that even if this god of yours exists, that for the first 4-5 billion years of the existence of the earth and life on earth your imaginary friend did nothing, and did not intervene. For more than 60 million years after the last great extinction event, your fanciful fiend did nothing. And yet, in the past 2000 years, it got so butt hurt that a species that has existed for such a relatively minute amount of time, that it started killing and convincing gullible fools that there was something else?
Something doesn’t quite fit into the story. It is far more beautiful and moving a story without your mental illness inserted giving command hallucinations.
[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Aragorn is right of course. It is an absolutely non starting impossibility to get something from “nothing”?
Except when almighty God commands light, matter, time and space to “BE” and they not yet existing obey Him. LOL! Once you have a God like this? The discussion of what’s possible changes just a bit. People is jist the silliest critters. [/quote]
And yet, in making that flawed argument, you try to explain the complexity observed by stating that something else created it. This doesn’t actually answer the question, and just removes thought from the situation. Using an inherently more complex explanation is an unacceptable answer.
It is unbelievably stupid to think that even if this god of yours exists, that for the first 4-5 billion years of the existence of the earth and life on earth your imaginary friend did nothing, and did not intervene. For more than 60 million years after the last great extinction event, your fanciful fiend did nothing. And yet, in the past 2000 years, it got so butt hurt that a species that has existed for such a relatively minute amount of time, that it started killing and convincing gullible fools that there was something else?
Something doesn’t quite fit into the story. It is far more beautiful and moving a story without your mental illness inserted giving command hallucinations.[/quote]
Wow man. No need for all this vitriol. It’ll be lost on mental incompetents like me anyway. You’re waaay late to this game bub. Some of us have a few thousand posts relating to everything you just said. There are some rather substantive philosophical discussions (which always have to happen first) around here. Feel free to blast away though. My skin IS the full armor of the most high God. I can take it. With a smile. Welcome aboard.
[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Aragorn is right of course. It is an absolutely non starting impossibility to get something from “nothing”?
Except when almighty God commands light, matter, time and space to “BE” and they not yet existing obey Him. LOL! Once you have a God like this? The discussion of what’s possible changes just a bit. People is jist the silliest critters. [/quote]
And yet, in making that flawed argument, you try to explain the complexity observed by stating that something else created it. This doesn’t actually answer the question, and just removes thought from the situation. Using an inherently more complex explanation is an unacceptable answer.
It is unbelievably stupid to think that even if this god of yours exists, that for the first 4-5 billion years of the existence of the earth and life on earth your imaginary friend did nothing, and did not intervene. For more than 60 million years after the last great extinction event, your fanciful fiend did nothing. And yet, in the past 2000 years, it got so butt hurt that a species that has existed for such a relatively minute amount of time, that it started killing and convincing gullible fools that there was something else?
Something doesn’t quite fit into the story. It is far more beautiful and moving a story without your mental illness inserted giving command hallucinations.[/quote]
I may be wrong here, but it seems that your a fan of the late Christopher Hitchens.
I may be wrong here, but it seems that your a fan of the late Christopher Hitchens.[/quote]
Our arguments merely align on this point. I can’t say I agree with everything that he has ever written, but I admire his argumentative style and his eloquent delivery.
It was refreshing when I first heard him speak and write about this subject specifically. I have been bemused that our species whilst so apparently intelligent feels the need to believe in fanciful idiocy like horoscopes, god, heaven, water divining and honest politicians.
KingKai, my trainer and teacher since defeating Raditz (DBZ fans anyone?) may correct me, but Echad in reference to God means, not a simple “one”, but rather a “compound unity” of one, a “togetherness”.[/quote]
That’s quite insightful, Son Goku! While ehad can denote simply “one,” it can also emphasize “togetherness” or “unity.” Next thing you know, you’ll be mastering the Kaio-Ken attack!
If this is in reference to the Shema, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one,” OT Professor Daniel Block argues on grammatical grounds (based on the nature of nominal or verbless clauses) that the proper rendering of that phrase into English is actually, "Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone." This rendering also makes more sense contextually as the purpose of the Shema was not to preclude any claims to Yahweh’s triune nature (again, the Jews at this time had no revelation concerning such), but rather to assert Yahweh’s position as Israel’s sole deity. [/quote]
No.
'echad" is the cardinal number, one.
If the author of Deuteronomy had intended to convey “alone,” he/she would have used the familiar term “levad”
Why misuse a commonly understood term for another commonly understood term?
One is not alone in this interpretation.
[/quote]
It’s a much more complex issue than that, Skeptix; you can’t solve this one with a simple word study. There is a complex syntactical argument supporting the reading I’ve given above, revolving around the structure of nominal (verbless) clauses in Hebrew. I’ll try to find the article; we discussed it at length in my exegesis of Deuteronomy course. And once again, the context favors the reading I’ve provided above - Yahweh’s “unity” was not even a problem on their radar, whereas his unique position as Israel’s sole object of worship is the centerpiece of Moses’ speeches in Deuteronomy. [/quote]
One who does not hear the double pun will study alone.[/quote]
That should link anyone who wants to read it to Dr. Daniel Block’s article on the subject. It’s twenty pages of relatively complex material, so I’ll note the highlights…
In response to the claim that the author would have used levad instead of ehad if he intended to convey “alone,” Block makes three key points. First of all, this is a verbless clause, and levad is an adverb (meaning its primary function is to modify a verb), so it would be inappropriate in this context. Secondly, and most importantly, there are several examples that suggest that this word can function as a semantic equivalent to levaddo (“unique, only, alone”) (Josh 22:20, 2 Sam. 7:23, 1 Chron. 29:1, Job 23:13, Job 31:15, Zech. 14:9). Finally, the claim that “Yahweh is one” is essentially meaningless; “a discrete entity is not normally in danger of being taken for more than one or less than one.” It requires some significant exegetical gymnastics to make “Yahweh is one” into a coherent claim.
The syntax also supports the reading, “Yahweh alone.” Based on the rules of verbless clauses, if the last clause was meant to convey, “Yahweh is one,” it should have read “yahweh ehad hu” or “ehad Yahweh,” NOT “Yahweh ehad.”[/quote]
Well, this is not complete nonsense, but there is not great merit in incomplete nonsense either.
“Verbless?” Interesting interpolation, there; the verb “to be” is an incomplete verb in the sense that it is seldom explicit in the present tense. It is an understood or implied verb in the present tense. Therefore, the author’s list of English renditions on 196 has its merits.
[/quote]
“Verbless/ nominal” are standard grammatical designations for clauses lacking a finite verb; I think you need a refresher on Hebrew syntax, Doc.
It actually is a problem because (1) a nominal clause isn’t simply a construction with an “unspoken” haya; (2) levad IS an adverb; (3) there are no examples of levad functioning as the predicate of nominal clause. In other words, we have no biblical examples where levad is predicated of a subject in a verbless clause.
Again, you need a serious refresher course in biblical Hebrew syntax, since you aren’t familiar with the grammatical concept of a verbless/ nominal clause and the rules that govern such clauses. The “xxx” (i.e., the word in the predicate position) is NOT always an adjective. See, for example, Ps. 81:5 - ki hok leyisrael hu (“it it a statute for Israel”). Hok is in the predicate position and is a noun. Or Psalm 73:16 - amal hu be’eyina (it was trouble in my eyes). Again, a noun. And there are many more such examples.
More importantly, however, you were so bent on trying to prove him wrong (and not just him, but other scholars who actually know what nominal clauses are and the rules that govern them) that you completely missed his point. Once again, in verbless clauses, the positioning of the nouns relative to one another matters. And since when is redundancy avoided in the Hebrew bible? Linguistic parsimony was hardly a feature of Hebrew style.
As I said previously, we have no examples in biblical of Hebrew of levad being used as the predicate in a nominal clause, so this point is mute.
Lol This is a ridiculous claim coming from someone unfamiliar with basic grammatical concepts. While the end of the article (which I did NOT cite anything from) makes more of a theological argument, he begins with a specifically linguistic and contextual analysis of the passage. And your dismissal of the other occurrences where ehad functions as levad shows not only your lack of understanding of his point, but also you inability to actually refute it. He didn’t offer those other passages as parallels to the Shema; he was making a substantive argument about the semantic domain of the words ehad and levad, his point being that there are several occasions where ehad is used in a similar way to levad, suggesting that, though they have some distinct functions, they also overlap in meaning. You know how synonyms work, right Doc? Synonyms are rarely exact parallels; they have both distinctive senses and senses in common. The same applies here. Consequently, if there are other occasions in which the semantic domains of levad and ehad overlap, there is AMPLE reason to suspect that they might do so here in the Shema. Couple that with the fact that (as Block notes) there are Phoenician and Ugaritic parallels to the exclusive use of the cardinal “one,” and you’ve got an excellent case.
Superimposition? In the words of Inigo Montoya, “I no think you know what that word means.” He is certainly reading the text through a Christian lens, but everything he does is justifiable from a scholarly position. And his discussion of nefesh is excellent, because nefesh isn’t a simple word at all; he lists several different examples where it has a multitude of uses. Seriously, Doc, their going to revoke your PhD soon if you keep up this kind of carelessness.
And please, tell us what “Yahweh is one” means, WITHOUT having to rely on an theological structure external to the text.
Doc, I’m scheduling you a Hebrew 101 class. If you’re intent on making definitive claims about the meaning of biblical passages, you should at least have some idea what you are talking about. “To be” takes the nominative case? Hebrew has no case endings; the nominative case refers to the subject of a clause, and we know what the subject is in Hebrew based on word order and the absence of other markers. So what’s your point?
Also, I’m not sure what the point of counter-examples is; I was simply showing that your implicit claim that xxx is only a predicate noun is wrong, as there are many examples of nominal constructions with both nouns and adjectives. And most importantly, you are wrong about ehad - it is an attributive adjective. The rest of the cardinal numbers are substantives (a noun, pronoun, or other construction functioning as a noun), but ehad is an attributive adjective.
Lol actually, you DO need to explain further, if you are going to posit that, in the context of a covenantal ceremony where God demands from Israel exclusive worship, Moses makes a random declaration about Yahweh’s unity. Once again, as noted in Block’s article, the statement 'Yahweh is one" is as pointless as the phrase, “Bob Dylan is one” - how many did they think he was? If, however, the Shema is the declaration, “Yahweh is your God - Yahweh alone,” then the statement makes PERFECT sense in the covenantal context.
Unless, of course, you wish to posit that God put that statement of his “oneness” in there because he foresaw the problems the Trinitarian doctrine would present. Still, that would only be speculation…
And there are few things more ridiculous than the claim that the grammatical and syntactical analysis of a dead language has been undertaken “to deny meaning.” Translation isn’t about cutting and pasting, Doc, and contrary to what you’ve implied before, there were a lot of lexical, grammatical and syntactical issues the Rabbis did NOT understand.[/quote]
So sorry, no. This is one of those instances of “high context” communications that you yourself has introduced as a defense elsewhere. One either understands the context, or not.
[quote]DrSkeptix wrote:
Next, if one cannot grasp the essence of Deut 6:4, no English rendition will do, and grammar and syntax are being used to deny meaning. If one needs a faulty and belabored English rendition of that verse, one will never grasp the message of the unity of Divinity. I need not explain further.
[/quote]
Lol actually, you DO need to explain further, if you are going to posit that, in the context of a covenantal ceremony where God demands from Israel exclusive worship, Moses makes a random declaration about Yahweh’s unity. Once again, as noted in Block’s article, the statement 'Yahweh is one" is as pointless as the phrase, “Bob Dylan is one” - how many did they think he was? If, however, the Shema is the declaration, “Yahweh is your God - Yahweh alone,” then the statement makes PERFECT sense in the covenantal context.
Unless, of course, you wish to posit that God put that statement of his “oneness” in there because he foresaw the problems the Trinitarian doctrine would present. Still, that would only be speculation…
And there are few things more ridiculous than the claim that the grammatical and syntactical analysis of a dead language has been undertaken “to deny meaning.” Translation isn’t about cutting and pasting, Doc, and contrary to what you’ve implied before, there were a lot of lexical, grammatical and syntactical issues the Rabbis did NOT understand.[/quote]
So sorry, no. This is one of those instances of “high context” communications that you yourself has introduced as a defense elsewhere. One either understands the context, or not.
[/quote]
I don’t think you know what “high context” communication refers to, Doc. When I argue that a particular concept is “high context,” I’m saying that the concept forms a foundational background to a particular statement and renders that statement intelligible. I’m not saying that it’s something “you get or you don’t;” it’s culture-specific, so unless you lived thousands of years ago as a denizen of the culture in which Deut. 6:4 was written, I have no reason to believe that the statement is a reference to the “divine unity” just because you say so.
If you’re going to dabble in biblical scholarship, Doc, you still have to provide evidence for your claims. In the examples of high context communication that I cited, I referred to the role the concept of “representation” played as a basic assumption of the cognitive environment in which the text was composed. In other words, people understood “representatives” to possess, in some sense, the identity (and thus authority) of those they represented. I make this claim on the basis of both allusions to and outright discussions in primary texts of the roles of ancient mediators. So if you’re going to argue that the statement “Yahweh is one” would have actual relevance in the context of Moses’ speech in Deuteronomy, then it’s YOUR responsibility to demonstrate why the assertion of the divine unity in this particular part of a speech calling people to recognize and serve Yahweh alone fits. You can’t just chalk it up to “high context” when you weren’t a part of that context lol.
Hope that clears up my point, I thought it was made quite clear. Go ahead, imagine a square circle… Now, imagine the Universe being formed via big bang, or just popping into existence? You CAN imagine those, but you CANT EVEN IMAGINE WHAT A SQUARE CIRCLE IS.