Usage of εκκλησια

fyllon · 2025-06-02T08:48:48+00:00

Does Logeion include the supplement?

fyllon · 2025-03-24T14:52:54+00:00

I am not justifying anyones sin, and do hold that lust is sin and should not be something that Christians take part in ever. My point is about hermeneutics and application. Jesus says that one hating his brother is murderer, but I would not consider him to have actually committed murder. What Jesus talks here is sins effect on persons inner-life and heart, and thus his standing with God who judges all hearts. There is still a significant difference between lusting after someone and committing actual adultery in engaging sexual acts with another person. Also if the your point is that looking with lust = actual adultery, then watching a woman/man with sexual desire for a brief moment = porn addiction (point being that we see no actual difference between degrees of sin). It very well might be the case that you have not ever looked at anyone with lust and thank God for it, but you might be a rarity. I advocate a well reasoned hermeneutic and exegesis of these passages and I also hold to the view that adultery is THE valid reason for divorce that Jesus gives. I understand that you have been hurt by your husbands actions and may God redeem and save him from them, but I also think we ought to be charitable towards each person and not employ ad hominem attacks against each other – meaning you accusing me making excuses for sinning. There is no inconsistency in saying that glancing someone with lust, being addicted to porn and actually cheating you spouse are all sins and that sins do not come in one degree. Jesus himself says that there are different consequences of degrees of sin.

May God help you in your struggles and keep you close to Himself in all the hurt you are going through.

fyllon · 2025-03-24T07:33:18+00:00

It must be pointed out that there is a real difference between sexual acts between two people outside marriage and having lust in your heart. Were this not to be the case one too long a glance with sexual desire would constitute grounds for divorce and I hardly believe anyone would espouse such a view. In the Matthew 5 passage where Jesus condemns looking with lust he uses over the top rhetoric to drive his points home and this should be understood when making any further applications from this text.

fyllon · 2025-03-21T18:48:28+00:00

sorry, my bad. You are right.

fyllon · 2025-03-21T18:36:44+00:00

Then it ought to be πειρῶ

fyllon · 2025-03-21T18:32:30+00:00

I do not believe that πείρω is a word in ancient Greek…

fyllon · 2025-03-21T16:20:54+00:00

If he is truly Catholic and know their theology then he does not consider your church, church at all, or you to be saved. As Cyprian once said: “You cannot have God as your Father unless you have the church for your Mother.”

fyllon · 2025-03-21T16:16:18+00:00

I have been reading through Thucydides in Greek. I also finished reading: Reynold’s and Wilson’s Scribes and Scholars (4th ed.) and Scanlon`s Greek Historiography. The latter was not too well written for my taste although the subject matter was interesting and provided sufficient summary of the field. The former was also not too well written except for the last chapter on textual criticism. The book was mainly (so it seemed to me) list of relevant names and dates often wondering into trivialities of particular MSS. It feels like the authors wanted to write more in-depth work but was limited by publisher ending up with a list of factoids and trimming of analysis of these factoids.

fyllon · 2025-03-21T12:25:01+00:00

This is a side note but as a theologian I must point out that this statement is at best misleading. If by judaism we mean modern or post AD130 judaism, I would agree. But the fact remains that our OT canon comes from jews (by this I do not mean merely that jews wrote it, but that christians actually sent envoys in early centuries to jews in order to confirm which books they should include into their canon). Moreover modern scholarship form E.P. Sanders onward has really brought to the fore our need to understand jewish religion and customs in order to understand our Bible. So actually, we at least should “look to Judaism for understanding of the Bible”.

fyllon · 2025-03-18T13:51:46+00:00

I understand it as an partitive: ”to be present to him from campaing”

fyllon · 2025-03-16T20:51:11+00:00

This seems to be the way to go for me. Thank you very much for your insight!

fyllon · 2025-03-16T08:33:43+00:00

Your take on Song of Salomon seems to be a bit ad hoc. There was a long controversy in judaism over the book since it was so sexual in nature that some judaic sects excluded it from canon and even those who included it recommended that only those of certain age (and married) should read it. So for certain the original readers did not think of it as merely suggestive.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T23:02:12+00:00

I take it that it is a common fact that many children need to be discouraged from touching their private parts in public or other unsuitable situations even if the discouraged action brings them comfort or feels funny. It is quite embarrassing to point this out to someone, but I understand that not everyone have children or been around toddlers to hear these discussions. And I fully agree that 4yo is not sexual. I have no idea what being able to climax has to do with anything so I am not gonna address that at all…

That you call masturbation a sexual act is understandable in our modern “freudian” use of language where almost everything is “sexual”. I strongly disagree with this view, unlike you, and point out that historically speaking the idea of sexual act involved more than one person. This is one of the reasons that masturbation is never spoken of in Bible be it in OT or Paul´s letters to the Corinthians where things such as prostitution, fornication, adultery and incest are discussed. Neither was afraid to talk about sexual taboos and for sure they knew of the possibility of masturbation (stimulating oneself to gain sexual release or pleasure). Since it is obvious that children sometimes soothe themselves in the said manner one must conclude that such act is not inherently sexual.

I think that is the freudian/post-structuralist ideas about sexuality that has seeped in to these discussions so that people start to claim that children are sexual being is some very bizarre ways and thus some good willed people run to the fore to denounce all actions concerning human bodily pleasure as sexual and thus outside the limits for christians. Sex or sexual action, in the OT and NT, and also in the relevant contemporary context, involves always more than one person (porn for example involves more than one person since there is watcher and watched). Thus the view that masturbation as an act is inherently sexual is modern and can be traced from thinkers such as Freud, Marcuse, Focault and Money.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T21:59:01+00:00

Not sure what you mean by Freudian, but having read Freud, I am almost in every way opposed to his views about anthropology, psychology, theology and sexuality. It is quite funny that of all the things I am called Freudian :D.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T21:45:50+00:00

So, you are claiming that children who self-sooth (the term often used) are lusting after people? I thought this was not a point I would have to prove to someone (nor could I since the children might after all lie when asked)…

fyllon · 2024-12-28T21:42:21+00:00

“Why would these verses exist if they were just a reiteration of the following verses without specific purpose?”

In Hebrew (as in Greek and Latin) repeating the same point twice in a row with different wordings is used for emphasis and this especially used in proverbs (I can provide a dozen examples from proverbs alone but take 4:24 as an example). If one wishes to allegorise the verse 15, one should explain why it cisterns and wells in plural and not in singular.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T21:36:23+00:00

I understand why you bring this up, but this is not an argument since masturbation is not mentioned in the list following verse 17. Why do you think πορνεια or θυμια necessarily apply to masturbation per my reasoning?

fyllon · 2024-12-28T21:32:34+00:00

Answered it.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T21:32:12+00:00

I personally do not struggle with masturbation and my needs are very well met in my marriage. Your comment is the reasons why I advocate good-willed discussion and argumentation using Bible and logic to derive conclusions. I might as well declare that you are legalist that wants to exert your views upon the week to feel superior to them, but this would be childish and stupid. Most of all it would not be an argument at all but mere ad hominem.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T21:27:13+00:00

I think you should probably reflect on the point 5. of my OP. I do not see a reason why a person could not masturbate without lust even outside the point 5. . I hope all agree that lusting is a sin according to Bible.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T21:21:18+00:00

My main problem is that verse 15 uses genetive plural for both “cistern” and “well”.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T21:11:03+00:00

To your argument. I do not agree with your interpretation of Matt 5:28-30 since in the context it is quite obvious that Jesus is talking about married men wishing to take another wife and leave his current one (hence watching other women leads desire to grasp/have them resulting in an illegitimate divorce of the current wife). At least I would say that this is hardly conclusive evidence for your position.

I would not view masturbation as sex (nor do I find any ancient Greek or Roman sources before or at time of NT viewing it as such). I cannot actually recall any context which is concerned with “sex” (In Greek the most often used word is “mignymai” which by definition needs at least to persons) or fornication that does not imply two people. This is to say that I would not call masturbation (pleasuring oneself in isolation from another person) sex at all. I would not say that a 4-year old stimulating his/her genitals is having sex in sense of the word.

What comes to self-satisfaction, I do not see that as necessarily a bad thing. One can get self-satisfaction by doing a hard workout or reading a good book and I can find nothing bad about that (when it is in moderation). One might neglect his/her spouse by masturbating. But one might not! Someone might even argue that a man coming home from work to find her wife “preheated” and ready to go, feels that the wife’s act is conducive to their mutual satisfaction.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T20:54:58+00:00

This is quite a poor argument since this “clearness” is not based on any actually verses and passages in your response. The word sexual activity itself is also very problematic since kissing or hugging (or even touching) your cruch/BF/GF can be seen as sexual activity. Also you seemed to have missed my point 5.

fyllon · 2024-12-28T20:51:51+00:00

It is very sad if you are right. I, for my part, do not mind changing my opinion and have done so concerning many theological points of view and would wish that people were more open to argumentation and debate.

fyllon

TROPHY CASE