Only One Truth

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
142

[quote]Fishlips wrote:
Stellar_horizon you tread some very dangerous ground with assertions that you can add one word to the Bible. Perhaps remember these words of Revelation 22:18,19 “I am bearing witness to everyone that hears the words of the prophecy of this scroll: If anyone makes an addition to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this scroll; and if anyone takes anything away from the words of the scroll of this prophecy, God will take his portion away…”[/quote]

First of all, St. John the Apostle is specifically referring to Revelations in this passage. He makes no reference to the Bible as a whole, so be careful when conveying your own private interpretations on any phrase or passage in Scripture. Revelations is the prophetic book of the Bible whereas the other books are not about prophecies, but about either the good news, labors of the Apostles to spread the Christian Faith, or about exhortations or commendations to the various Orthodox churches.

Furthermore, you remain ignorant to the fact that when St. John the Apostle wrote Revelations in 95 AD, there was no such thing as the Bible; there were various epistles floating around the Roman Empire, including works of counterfeiters. At that time, the Bible was not yet compiled. The Orthodox Church at Corinth possessed the letters to the Corinthians while the Orthodox Church of Ephesus possessed the letter to the Ephesians, while the Orthodox Church at Thessalonica possessed the letters to the Thessalonians, etc. The Bible was not compiled in its current form until 367 AD. Therefore, if you want to take St. John’s warning out of context via your own private interpretations, the only book you should be hailing as the Bible according to this passage is Revelations and none other.

And before you slander me again, let it be known that the Orthodox Christian Church makes absolutely no additions or subtractions to the Bible. I don’t appreciate being falsely accused of making the assertion that the Bible can be added to or subtracted from…

Like some other Orthodox Christians here, I’m being as courteous as possible because I was once a Protestant too until I learned the fullness of Truth. That being said, I’m a sinner and my patience wanes just like anyone else’s. I can easily stop replying to posts in this thread. Once I was lost, but now I’m found. As an Orthodox Christian, I remain firm in my convictions. This is the Church which Jesus Christ established. I abide in the Church which He commissioned in 33 AD because I believe in Him. The One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Faith is Orthodox Christianity. There is no other faith in Christ.

Ephesians 4:4
“There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.”

Ephesians 4:11
“And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to be a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ;”

One Lord, One Body, One Faith
Anyone belonging to a faith other than the One which the Apostles and early Church preached can not validly proclaim to be a part of this One Body. Anyone not part of this One Body bears no communion with the One Lord.

Peace be with you.

143

[quote]Fishlips wrote:
pkradgreek wrote:
Fishlips wrote:
One final point, with the destruction of Jerusalem and ALL GENEOLOGICAL RECORDS nobody can claim authentic lineage today.

Ok so you are not a believer in The Lord Jesus Christ and what He established. That’s fine and dandy by me. laters pk

Where do you possibly make a link between what you’ve quoted me saying and your reply? I’m speechless at the seeming irrelevance of your point. Interestingly you don’t question the historical FACT that all the geneological records were destroyed in 70 AD making it impossible for any today to claim apostolic succession.
[/quote]

The geneological records of the Christian churches were not destroyed. What makes you say that? And there were already churches estabilshed in Alexandria, Cyprus, Antioch and others.

Even if some “record” was desroyed in Jerusalam, what your saying is like saying that if the white house were destroyed today, we would never be able to establish the order of presidents of the United States.

144

[quote]Fishlips wrote:
Additionally, why did the apostle Paul defer authoritative decisions on Christian doctrine regarding the early teachings to ones who were not apostles? “…and the apostles AND older men gathered to see about this affair.” Acts 15:6. This affair was what Paul and Barnabas came to Jerusalem to ascertain the answer to rather than answer themselves. Obviously they didn’t see themselves as having the authority to do so.
[/quote]
Great observation. In fact, matters of doctrine were resolved via councils. No Apostle spoke on his own accord. To settle any doctrinal disputes, the Apostles and others who they themselves ordained (ie. Barnabas, Titus, Timothy) participated in these councils to manifest the Truth. The Orthodox Church preserves this tradition today, unlike the Roman Catholics whose Pope is considered infallible when speaking ex cathedra.

St. Matthew 18:20
“For where two or more are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them.”

Did you know that in 325 AD, when the Bible was in its primitive stage of compilation, over 300 Orthodox Christian bishops from England to Africa presided in forming a rough draft? This council is known as the First Ecumenical Council of Nicea. This same group of people who helped compile the Bible in its current form also established a Creed, known as the Nicene Creed which Orthodox Christians profess to this day during every liturgy.

The Nicene Creed
-written by the same Orthodox Church which compiled the Holy Bible during the First Ecumenical Council in 325 AD

"I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Only-begotten, begotten of the Father before all ages; Light of Light: true God of true God; begotten, not made; of one essence with the Father; by Whom all things were made: Who for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became man; And was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried; And arose again on the third day according to the Scriptures; And ascended into Heaven, and sitteth at the right hand of the Father; And shall come again, with glory, to judge both the living and the dead; Whose kingdom shall have no end.

And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life; Who proceeds from the Father; Who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified; Who spake by the prophets. In One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins. I look for the resurrection of the dead, And the life of the age to come. Amen."

Peace be with you.

145

[quote]Fishlips wrote:

This hang-up a number of you on this thread have on apostolic succession seems to make the time from 33AD to the time the first gospels were written(approx. 20 years) of monumental importance. An important time period of course, but any importance to us was recorded in the the portions of the Bible written later. You want to make the Bible, which was in development for approx. 1500 years BEFORE the apostles were ever picked, inferior. Why would you want to do that?
[/quote]

You keep avoiding. I brought up that the protestants have removed many books (which they found confusing) from the O.T. Also, the Jews had 20 times more commentary on how to interpret the Bible than the bible itself, and as a Rabbi, Jesus JOB was to INTERPRET the old testament, which he did on a regular basis.

You have consistently picked the approximately 1/3 of issues that you can give some kind of answer to and completely avoided the rest.

146

[quote]Croooz wrote:
The issue I have with the Apocrypha is there are 263 direct quotations of the O.T. found in the N.T. Beside this, there are 370 statements found in the N.T. which are references to passages in the O.T. In both the O.T. and N.T., there are no quotes and no allusions to any of the writings of the Apocrypha.[/quote]

Your totally wrong about their being no allusions. The temple? The morning star? Oh, yea, but you guys took out all of those confusing books. But the Apocrypha is never read in Orthodox services. It was the one book included which was not specifically chosen so that it could be read in church.

I sometimes wonder why we kept it in, because it does more to confuse non orthodox christians than anything else in the bible.

147

[quote]Fishlips wrote:
One final point, with the destruction of Jerusalem and ALL GENEOLOGICAL RECORDS nobody can claim authentic lineage today.[/quote]

By what authority or research do you allege that the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD resulted in the destruction of records tracing the lineage of the Orthodox Christian priesthood back to the Twelve Apostles?

I’m going to go on an offensive here and ask you to prove your allegation (ie. with a prominent study supported by historians or theologians).

FYI, the Orthodox Church spread into all parts of the Roman Empire and well beyond Jerusalem. Orthodox Christianity even spread into Rome itself by 55 AD as is evident by St. Paul’s epistle to the Romans. The Orthodox Church was anchored down by her faithful in the Middle East, Europe, and Africa by 70 AD. By that time, Jerusalem was no longer the epicenter of Christianity. Your allegation is ridiculous.

*I’ll be waiting for some credible evidence. I’m not here to speculate how many angels can dance on the head of a needle. Whatever I post can be supported by credible evidence. If you can’t fulfill this prerequisite, I must kindly ask you to just stick with the facts.

Peace be with you.

148

[quote]Fishlips wrote:
Where do you possibly make a link between what you’ve quoted me saying and your reply? I’m speechless at the seeming irrelevance of your point. Interestingly you don’t question the historical FACT that all the geneological records were destroyed in 70 AD making it impossible for any today to claim apostolic succession. Kinda makes the whole succession arguments moot. The ability to establish lineage was only critical to establishing the identity of the Messiah(as far as Christians are concerned). Once the Messiah had arrived and his lineage authenticated lineage really didn’t matter anymore, hence God allowed all the records to be destroyed in his own judgement against Jerusalem.
[/quote]

you do not seem to undertand what the term apostolic succession means. It means that Jesus Christ formed His Church through several men. These men went out and became Bishops of various metropolitan areas, cities, regions, whatever you want to call them. Through them the continuation of Christianity was established. Now there is a very specific ritual in the ordination of someone becoming Bishop. It is still carried out today just as it was then.

Do do you think it is cool if some warlord wannabe king comes and kills the Bishops who have apostolic lineage and then inserts his own puppet bishops to do his dirty work so he can control the people. Wait a minute, after this happens people start to fall away and rebel because they are no longer learning the truth. They start to become pagan, atheists, or just start to make things up about Christianity because they see the evils of what their church is. This all occured because of the breaking of apostolic succession. In case you did not realize what i was refering to before, it was the Franco-Latin church which lead to the rebellion of people to become Protestant. laters pk

149

i just like to thank some people for their input. Without them i would not even be looking at the thread. As i said before i wrote this to be a fire starter and i think i accomplished my purpose. As far as me being a sniper i like that quote. I guess when i have the luxury of having a tank and a machine gun besides me gives me a lot of confidence. I let off a couple of rounds here and there knowing i have the big gunz taking care of the heft. laters pk

150

With all the interest in Holy Scripture, I’m furnishing a site which everyone can use to attain complete & detailed information:
http://www.fatheralexander.org/page8.htm

Peace be with all.

151

[quote]pkradgreek wrote:

Do do you think it is cool if some warlord wannabe king comes and kills the Bishops who have apostolic lineage and then inserts his own puppet bishops to do his dirty work so he can control the people. Wait a minute, after this happens people start to fall away and rebel because they are no longer learning the truth. They start to become pagan, atheists, or just start to make things up about Christianity because they see the evils of what their church is. This all occured because of the breaking of apostolic succession. In case you did not realize what i was refering to before, it was the Franco-Latin church which lead to the rebellion of people to become Protestant. laters pk[/quote]

I would just add that China and India had been largely converted, but the Papists spread their political influence, took over the churches in China and many returned to Paganism as a result.

152

S.H. Wrote
Furthermore, you remain ignorant to the fact that when St. John the Apostle wrote Revelations in 95 AD, there was no such thing as the Bible; there were various epistles floating around the Roman Empire, including works of counterfeiters. At that time, the Bible was not yet compiled. The Orthodox Church at Corinth possessed the letters to the Corinthians while the Orthodox Church of Ephesus possessed the letter to the Ephesians, while the Orthodox Church at Thessalonica possessed the letters to the Thessalonians, etc. The Bible was not compiled in its current form
until 367 AD.

True the current form of the Bible (which neither the protestants nor Romans, nor the Jews with regard to the old testament even use) was canonized in 367, but their recent evidence of the Gospels being translated and sent to churches as early as 50 to unify the readings at the liturgy which now it appears were very close to our current liturgy by 50 A.D. as well.

Here are some links-not necessarily put out by orthodox groups, about the Liturgy of Saint James, the first bishop of Jerusalem.

The second link will be interesting for those who have mentioned the book of Revelation. The Third is the complete service, including, of course the communion prayers when the bread and wine become the body and blood of Jesus.

http://web.ukonline.co.uk/ephrem/lit-james.htm

http://www.acns.com/~mm9n/liturgy/liturgy.htm

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/07090100.htm

153

[quote]mertdawg wrote:
True the current form of the Bible (which neither the protestants nor Romans, nor the Jews with regard to the old testament) was canonized in 367, but their recent evidence of the Gospels being translated and sent to churches as early as 50 to unify the readings at the liturgy which now it appears were very close to our current liturgy by 50 A.D. as well.[/quote]

Liturgically, all Orthodox Churches essentially have the same style of worship. This style of worship is one way that Orthodox Christianity exhibits direct lineage to the Apostles, but I admit I lack the necessary education to expand upon the topic. I personally feel that most Roman Catholics & Protestants aren’t as interested in matters of worship because they seem to argue over religious doctrines rather than anything else. I could be wrong though.

By the way, I noted that one of the sites you posted mentions that the Eucharist [holy communion] is merely a symbol of Christ’s Body and Blood, which we both know is a heresy. I wanted to emphasize to heterodox readers that the bread & wine during the Divine Liturgy of Orthodox Church services is transubstantiated into the actual Blood and Body of the Lord Jesus Christ - this is no mere symbol.

I realize from the get-go that most Protestants will be jumping off their fannies upon hearing this because they’ve been taught that the communion [crackers/wafers] they receive in their so-called churches is merely symbolic - if they administer communion at all, since for most Protestant denominations this holy tradition is extinct.

1 St. John 6:53
“Then Jesus said to them, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him’.”

If anyone hasn’t partaken of the actual Body and Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, there should be grave concern for that person’s final spiritual destination.

Peace be with all.

154

[quote]pkradgreek wrote:
…after this happens people start to fall away … They start to become pagan, atheists…[/quote]

So some good comes of it then. :wink:

155

Wow! Where do you all find the time? Took me an hour just to read all the replies. It’s nice to talk to others who make an educated effort to defend their faith. BTW mertdawg - I’ve only posted twice how could I possibly ‘keep avoiding’ anything at this point. Now I don’t have all night and the Orthodox contingent have asked a million questions so if every one isn’t addressed yet please don’t attribute it to negligence.

First I will say for all the individuals on this thread who consider themselves Christians there sure doesn’t seem to be a lot of references being made to the scriptures as opposed to secular sources. What might be your stance(open question)if your secular references or ‘church’ teaching contradicted scripture? Very important question.

Stellar - I think semantics have caused some confusion. When I say ‘author’ it’s with regard to whose thoughts are really expressed in scripture. 2 Tim. 3:16 says ALL scripture is inspired of God. You’re likely aware of that scripture. All the different writers of the scriptures(66 different books of the bible/40 different writers)were simply used like secretaries by God(not denigrating them, they were very faithful courageous men). Multiple scriptural references(written by those very writers)attribute their expressions to divine inspiration(like you said). Would any of the writers of any portion of the Bible have been able to write anything God did not want written? The answer is obvious. Hence, the writers of the Bible, without God’s inspiration and their own faithfulness were nothing in themselves. Paul even said at 1 Cor. 13:2 “if I…do not have love, I am nothing.”(Just so you don’t think I’m being degrading in any way)
As a result, clearly God is the only TRUE author of the bible.

Oral expressions - the apostles were critical teachers in the formation of the early Christian congregations. However, we’ve all played the game where one person says something then it gets passed on and so on and so forth. At the end of the line, does the story sound the same at all? Easily the simplest way for any message to be corrupted is by oral transmission. Writing those thoughts down though makes them permanent and much more difficult to corrupt. You gave 3 reasons why everything wasn’t written down. More simply to the point was John’s own expression at John 21:25 “There are, in fact, many other things also which Jesus did, which, if ever they were written in full detail, I suppose, the world itself could not contain the scrolls written.” No need to worry about the cost of Papyrus, there apparently wouldn’t have been enough anyway.

So I agree not everything could be recorded in the Bible. But what was not recorded would certainly not have contradicted written scripture nor would critical information have been left out.

156

Stellar wrote: First of all, St. John the Apostle is specifically referring to Revelations in this passage. He makes no reference to the Bible as a whole.

Are you saying it would be damning to play with any part of Revelation but perfectly OK with other parts of the Bible? Common sense tells us this standard can be applied to all scripture without that being a private interpretation or stretch of the imagination.

There has also been confusion of the idea you add to the Bible. No you have not added or taken scriptures from the Bible but saying your church as extra expressions or thoughts that equate with the Bible(if I’ve got that right)is certainly equivalent to doing just that.

I must go now but I will try to get to some of yours and mertdawg’s other thoughts soon.

157

[quote]mertdawg wrote:

I would just add that China and India had been largely converted, but the Papists spread their political influence, took over the churches in China and many returned to Paganism as a result.[/quote]

I honestly didn’t know the term Papists was used outside of Klan meetings.

158

[quote]doogie wrote:
mertdawg wrote:

I would just add that China and India had been largely converted, but the Papists spread their political influence, took over the churches in China and many returned to Paganism as a result.

I honestly didn’t know the term Papists was used outside of Klan meetings.
[/quote]

Papism is the heresy that the Pope is the single ultimate theological authority in the church.

159

[quote]stellar_horizon wrote:
mertdawg wrote:
By the way, I noted that one of the sites you posted mentions that the Eucharist [holy communion] is merely a symbol of Christ’s Body and Blood, which we both know is a heresy. I wanted to emphasize to heterodox readers that the bread & wine during the Divine Liturgy of Orthodox Church services is transubstantiated into the actual Blood and Body of the Lord Jesus Christ - this is no mere symbol.
[/quote]

Yes, the Liturgy was discussed in a site that was not Orthodox, the words of the Liturgy itself clearly state that the bread and wine become Jesus’ body and blood.

This is a response to various posts:
One site also mentions the authority of scripture. The fathers have never gone contrary to the bible. When a certain interpretation of the bible came into question, the fathers met to discuss which interpretation had been handed down to them by the apostles.

Also, the first half of the liturgy was developed to instruct converts in Christian beliefs. The bible was then put together FOR THE LITURGY to be a source of instruction. The Bible IS, and ONLY is, a part of our Liturgy, and the apocalypse is an apocryphal description of our Liturgy. The protestants have simply taken a small part of our Liturgy and made it an Idol.

160

I have noticed a lot of Christians always say to Atheists and Agnostics, why not give Jesus a try? You have nothing to lose etc etc

This makes no sense, I am an atheist. I don’t believe in God, no part of me believes there is such a thing as a higher being. You cannot just give belief a try, I have been gathering knowledge and thoughts my whole life to lead me to my current belief. It isn’t possible to give Jesus a try. You hear both sides of the story and you judge for yourself. I can’t just try to believe in God, I still won’t.

I find major issue with the thought of a God who would only let into his kingdom, those who believed in him whether they were good people or not. God is supposed to be all loving all forgiving etc. For someone who, according to the old testament, is the evilest being ever even heard of by man I don’t like the idea of him judging people based on whether they believed in him or not. Especially when religion is totally non based on fact, the Bible is a totally hypocritical, non factual book on which we place all our beliefs and every single thing about the universe makes me think there is no God. Oh sorry big guy I didn’t believe in you, well what did you expect?? You put the theory of evolution in there to test my faith? Oh I see, all those evil popes, yeah you personally picked them guys out and still thought you were the perfect being I see…Im blathering but you see where I am going with this.

161

"I wanted to emphasize to heterodox readers that the bread & wine during the Divine Liturgy of Orthodox Church services is transubstantiated into the actual Blood and Body of the Lord Jesus Christ - this is no mere symbol. "

Yeah I actually laughed at a bishop when I was 9 years old when he said this very thing. I followed it up with, and we’re expected to believe we are actually eating Jesus? In what way could this ever make sense? Does it change into the actual molecules of Jesus’ blood? Hmm not possible, so in what way is it the real body and blood of jesus? And why is Jesus’ body so inherently suitable for vegetarians?