Contextualizing is the same as

Proving God 

Eliminates Faith

I came upon this Old Testament story when quite young and not far from being fooled by a logical fallacy. My extreme youth set me apart from adults and I thought God was in on the same religious pretenses as the minister and the church elders.

The angle can change the story

This was the fallacy of the misplaced authority. I believed the Bible, and the adults didn't. They gave me coloring books but not communion. Thru persistence I finally made it but I labored  under my fallacy for a long time. 

It was somewhere in this stage that I casually came upon this story about circumcision. One of the early fathers in his old age gave one of his younger leaders jurisdiction,  who was approached by families who wanted to join the Hebrews since theirs was dying out. 

They were accepted on the condition they would be circumcised first. They were and that night while recovering in their tents were broken into and killed. Where upon finding this out Jacob or maybe Isaac said this has brought disgrace upon us.

My conclusion was it was hard for me to to think the stories were made up if a story like this one was included. 

 Some, too many, scholars contextualized the story to such an over riding extent as to excuse the entire event. How next.......

Circumcision & Tonsils

Always Watch the Context!

There is not much universal under standing of how circumcision came to be nor even its' purpose. 

But I believe the ancient writings, particularly the Old Testament are right. It is right on because there is one story , a very negative one included which, I believe anyway, that casts a solid aura of truth to it all. Continuing.....   

Jumping right in

Right Into John 1:17

There are an untold number of arguments, views, opinions, whatever which exploded when Saul, a murderer of Messianic Jews, was chosen by God to a missionary to the uncircumcised, and who became known as St. Paul.

Thru a window darkly

Everything changed with Jesus. No one knows the settled purpose or origins of circumcision. It was revealed by the prophets, not many know which one or ones.

It seems to be rooted in a time when small family populations were easily enslaved by larger ones. To survive they needed soldiers to keep their women from being stolen. 

Men not only had many wives with many sons but those powerful enough could support many concubines as well. There was an instinctual air to it all.

I read in the Old Testament at an early age a story which would not have been  told only if it were not all true. To be edited... 

Talking about myself

When I Talk About Others

I did not make my point clearly enough in my previous post. I believe that everything that I say, no matter to whom or about whom, is effecting me more than any others. I knew that as far back as when the Lone Ranger told Tonto when I had to be in bed-y-bye, the guilty always speak up first. 

We All Write for Our Own Benefit

As we all do, I write for my own benefit as well everybody else. I benefit from everything I say whether it be good or bad. Largely I am trying, always trying, to convince myself.

Outlook lost without guidance

Whatever I say, good or bad, I am speaking to that end which is already, yearningly, is or will be my present end.

It is not what goes into a man's mouth that defiles a man, it is what comes out, according to Jesus the Christ. Matt 15:11 & Mark 7:15

Picking up my primary thread

The incident which proved to me that the collected books of the Old Testament were true involved an unfavorable account of a dwindling group of families who wanted to join the Hebrews because they felt they were not going to survive if they could not more greatly multiply.

Things are not always clear.

The Hebrews agreed on the condition they were circumcised. When this was agreed they broke into their tents and killed them all. 

I no longer recall the leader, whether it was Isaac or Jacob in their old age rebuked the general they had placed in charge who authorized this, saying this has brought humiliations upon us.

Upon researching this story I uncovered a vast complicated story involving so much context as to obscure the entire event.

So I abandoned that whole effort to rely only what I remember reading in one of the books in the Old Testament.

I do this to concentrate on the subject of circumcision and its' origins which I find confusing to this very day. See John 1:17

The strong & the weak

 The more things change

Believing every word

 Not every verse in the Bible, while believable, was of any interest to me. When I was in Sunday School shrugging off coloring books, I thought Matthew was the only begats in the Bible.

The begats are eventually forgot...

The Old Testament is loaded with long lists of them. Atheists have made fun of them because a person is one age in one book and another age in yet another book. Maybe it was recorded in a different time, but it is for certain if it were the same, atheists' would call it collusion. I find it boringly historical but boring just the same. There is one I do not, which proves the Bible's is of the truth and the lack of collusion better.....the next time.

In Progress

 This is important. John 1:17 frees us from the law. I am under Jesus now, according to John's Gospel.

This, I believe, was and is interpreted to mean that when Jesus said it was finished, the Temple curtain, chief among other things was then newly true, rent top to bottom. This I believe signaled anyone could now approach God without permission or instead of any representative. Later....

The Law was given by Moses

But Grace & Truth Came by Jesus 

This is from John 1:17 right out of the box in John, the best book of all the Gospels for red letter reading Jesus in my view. 

I believe it was one of the last Gospels to be published. Any child can be taught to read at three, I proved that wanting to read the daily column in the paper about Peter Rabbit and Mr MacGregor. With no time to look up definitions in dictionaries I later took literally the meaning of grace to be just an English title as in Lords  and Ladies. The best meaning was really Love, as in the KJV. So the full meaning of this verse fell under my radar and I missed for a long time what it was really saying....next.

Depending on the physical

Requires the Invisible

 To Break Free

My brain is a physical organ that needs physical intelligence to function and it can wear out or fill up beyond my understanding to continue to grow in physical awareness indefinitely.

The physical came from the unseen and is identified as such by being seen. Returning physical evil for evil fires more evil than before. 

As Paul points out repeatedly, the seen can change, growing into something else worse than its' original trend line. In true change a fire needs something similar to its' very opposite like a baptism of water which seeks its' own level. 

If anyone feels they can cast judgement on evil then one is their own God without portfolio. Good for evil replaces evil with good... for me, but it is hard to keep my hands free do good for evil. That is why revenge belongs only to God, for my sake.

Robert Morley

"Time Always Enters

The Picture in the End"

Quote from 1953 movie Beat the Devil. 

Whenever people want God to heal them I believe they should thank Him, when I do, for doing so first thing right off the bat. If everything to God is present tense it is too late to thank Him if you are up front sitting around waiting to be healed. So I thank Him for already healing me. And since I believe whenever I am wrong it was because God was right, then I will be better off up the road a piece. I win with Jesus who watches the Holy Father who does the healing within Jesus because Jesus said so. See Manna.