Sorry i'm so late in posting this.
***Look again:
".....BEFORE ABRAHAM WAS, I AM."
Why didn't Jesus say before Abraham was, I was? But then how could He have been 1500 years before He is speaking?
Because God IS. His name is I AM.***
I've already debunked this. Did you check the link i gave you? I'll write the argument here so you don't need to bother.
1: "before Abraham was" - This is nothing special. Read Proverbs 8:22: "The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. From everlasting i was established, from the earliest times of the earth..." A quote ascribed to Moses.
Also read Jer. 1:5 - "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I have appointed you a prophet to the nations." regarding Jeremiah. These verses indicate that these prophets had some sort of presence before thier earthly manifestations.
2: "I am" - Christian versions of the Bible mistranslate Exodus 3:14. The correct reading in Hebrew would be "I WILL BE who I WILL BE. Thus you shall say to the children of Israel, I WILL BE has sent me to you". So 'I am' isn't mentioned in this verse after all. So Jesus wasn't claiming divinity.
Don't take my word for it, see what fluent Hebrew speakers have to say:
http://www.jewsforjudaism.com/web/faq/faq128.html***John 10:30 I AND [MY] FATHER ARE ONE. 31 Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him.
That "one" is in the koine Greek neuter gender meaning of one essence. That is why they wanted to stone him again.***
Not speaking Greek, I wouldn't know. But then, neither did Jesus, who spoke either Hebrew or Aramaic. This is a strawman argument, and makes no sense when the verse is put in it's proper context.
The same word "one" is used by Jesus in John 17:21 refering to God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and the twelve disciples. Common sense indicates that if Jesus was speaking metaphorically here when he says the disciples are "one" with him, the Father and the Holy Ghost, then he was also speaking metaphorically in John 10:30.
Otherwise you would have a God unit of 15. And that's just plain silly.
***It is your mistake. You fail to recognize the difference between sons of God - that is regenerate Christians and Jews - and THE ONLY begotten Son of God. The ONLY person EVER conceived by a virgin by the will of God.
Gal 4:6 And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.
Why doesn't Jesus call God "our" father here:
Jhn 20:17 Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and [to] my God, and your God.***
1: Read Mark 12:29 - “The first of all the commandments is : Hear, O Israel, the Lord OUR God, the Lord is one..."
God is his Lord as well as ours.
2: When I started this correspondence with you, I challenged you to give me a quote from Jesus in the Bible claiming to be God, or the "begotten" son. The closest you have come to this John 10:30 and John 8:58, which I have thoroughly disproven. Whether you admit it or not, you can't provide a single quote from Jesus to this effect.
Mark 28:18: Who GIVES God his power?
***The Jews accept the Son of God as the Old Testament verses reveal.*** - Sorry. Rubbish. Show me any modern mainstream Jewish donomination who are waiting for God to "beget" a son for them.
***Muslims can see Jesus is the Messiah, but then tragically REJECT HIM AS THE SON OF GOD. Purely because of a 6th century self-serving illiterate false prophet that taught the opposite.*** - No, we reject him as the begotten son of God because he never claimed to be the begotten son of God.
***Receiving the Son of God the ONLY unpardonable sin (in Islam).***
No, it isn't. This is why you shouldn't get your information from those silly Christian websites that say the Qur'an commands us to kill all non-Muslims and that Allah is the name of some pagan moon god.
Tawheed, or monotheism, is the primary doctrine of Islam. Shirk, or polytheism, is the primary sin, much the same way as it is in Judaism. It is not unforgivable.
Claiming that God "begat" a son with a human girl is obviously a major blasphemy against God in Islam and Judaism. But Shirk encompases all pagan beliefs which associate partners with God, whether the partners are Jesus, Rama, Krishna, the Emperor of Japan or David Icke. The same as in modern Judaism.
Christianity and the writtings of Paul turn all these concepts on their head, without a shred of scriptural support. It was Paul who aboragated the Bible. This is why we (and the Jews) reject them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tawheedhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shirk_(polytheism)
***The reason rejecting the Son is the most important fundamental in Islam is that it was inspired by a jealous fallen angel named Satan who hates the Son of God. The EXACT, PERFECT, MIRROR OPPOSITE of God's Word and people.***
Of the Abrahamic faiths, it is Christianity that is the odd one out, with opposite doctrines.
1: Islam and Judaism teach salvation through works. Christianity doesn't.
2: Christianity teaches original sin and atonement. Islam and Judaism don't.
3: Christianity teaches the concept of trinity. Trinity has NO support in the Torah. Don't you think it odd that this doctrine didn't appear in the Torah, but in Greek paganism? Check
http://www.sabbatarian.com/Paganism/HecateTrinity.html4: Christianity teaches that God impregnated a human girl with his son. This concept is not only blasphemous to both Islam and Judaism, but is utterly repugnant to basic human sensibilities. Even you struggle to justify it.
According to a recent survey, most religious Jews consider Islam as closer to their religious doctrines than Christianity.
Read -
http://www.ynet.co.il/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3676026,00.html***Even the Quran teaches there IS ONLY ONE person EVER born of a virgin, BY THE WILL OF GOD.
Then you turn around and deny who His Father is.***
As gratifying as it is to see you refer to the Qur'an as an authority in this matter, it is clear that you get this information from those silly evangelist websites that you frequent, and not from the book itself.
God didn't say Jesus was the ONLY person to be created in this manner in the Qur'an. Adam was also created without a father, and without a mother also. That he didn't gestate in a virgin's womb for 9 months makes his creation even more miraculous. If Jesus was God because he had no father, than Adam was a greater God by the same standard.
The fact that you concede here that Jesus was born through God's will proves that he was created, as all are created by the will of God. You don't use the word 'begotten' because you're embarrassed by the obvious sexual connotation of the word.
***Now consider the term begat:
1. To father; sire.
2. To cause to exist or occur; produce: Violence begets more violence.
Does violence have to have sex with violence to produce more violence? Of course not.***
If you're saying God is a father to Jesus as violence is a father to violence, then you are concedeing the the metaphorical nature of Jesus' sonship.
On the other hand, if God is the literal father of Jesus, then he "begat" him either sexually or asexually. There is no getting around this. Whether or not there was penetration or the exchange of body fluids is besides the point: Sexual and asexual reproduction are animal acts, and as such, beneath the dignity of God.
***Yet you choose to adopt the mentally deficient mindset of a 6th century illiterate, that put God in a box the size of his own personal comprehension...***
No, the mentally deficient mindset is to think that God cannot create someone without the aid of a male sperm, so if a virgin gets pregnant, God must have fathered the child. This reasoning may have made sense in Paul's time, but today it is possible to impregenate a woman without a father and with the aid modern science. If we can do it, then for God it's surely an easy thing.
***It is immaterial who said what, but you don't believe Jesus words when they are quoted anyway, so why pretend to make a distinction?
Mat 26:28 For this is MY BLOOD of the new testament, which is SHED FOR MANY for the remission of sins.
You only have to reject that single verse and you reject THE WHOLE SUBJECT of Jesus and the New Testament. New Testament MEANS new covenant.***
I do reject that verse and i've never claimed to take the modern verions of the NT as my holy books. I believe in what Jesus ORIGINALLY brought, but the NT has undergone enormous alteration and corruption over the centuries. This isn't an opinion. It is fact, as supported by many Christian scholars.
It's up to YOU to prove that Jesus claimed divinity in the NT. This is the BARE MINIMUM that you need to substantiate your claims. The fact that you can't do this should raise questions in your mind about Paul's (the real founder of modern Christianity) legitimacy and the reliability of the modern Bible versions.
***Did you ever stop to wonder why it is that declaring Jesus to be the Son of God is the ONLY unpardonable sin in Islam?***
It isn't. Yet more lies and lunacy from the websites that you unwisely rely on for your information about Islam. Why not open a Qur'an and find out for yourself?
http://www.muslim.org/english-quran/quran.htmhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shirk_(polytheism)
***Act 13:33 God hath fulfilled the same unto us their children, in that he hath raised up Jesus again; as it is also written in the second psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.
Thus you accidentally helped me confirm that Jesus is the begotten Son.***
Of couse, that would rely on our having a geneology linking Jesus as a descendant of David. Do you know of any?
I'll apologise here for not taking your points in order, or for tackling all of them as it would take too much time. I'll post a reply to the Jews/antichrists thread within the next few days.
I ask you again to be patient and refrain from posting until i've replied to both threads. You can then reply to both and save alot of time. It's confusing to us and to anyone reading to follow 2 parralell arguments at the same time.
I might take some time in posting. I'm sure you understand that i have a life to lead away from this forum, and that my answers won't always be swift.
Take care.
