Todos esos gentiles según la carne que listé al principio, son miembros del Israel de Dios, es decir, son verdaderos Israelitas, y a ellos les fueron hechas las promesas. ¿Por qué? Porque tenían fe en Dios y creían en sus promesas. Esto es lo que hace que un iraquí se vuelva israelita, es decir, Abraham; esto es lo que hace que una prostituta pagana se convierta en una matriarca de Israel (es decir, Rahab); esto es lo que hace que un mismo cananeo, se vuelva en un principe de Judá (es decir, Caleb).
Esto es precisamente lo que nos dice Pablo:
– “NO es que la palabra de Dios haya fallado. Porque no todos los descendientes de Israel son Israel ni son todos hijos por ser descendientes de Abraham, sino que por Isaac será llamada tu descendencia. Esto es, no son los hijos de la carne los que son hijos de Dios, sino que los hijos de la promesa son considerados como descendientes” (Romanos 9:6-8).
Así que, ¿quienes son el Israel de Dios? Ciertamente no aquellos que se jactan de su linaje, ascendencia y bandera nacional; este es, según la Escritura, el falso Israel. Los tales, están tan perdidos como cualquier gentil pagano en su pecado, sin importar de cuánta religiosidad se jacten.
¿Quiénes son, entonces, los verdaderos hijos de Abraham y el verdadero Israel de Dios?
Los que caminan como Abraham, el padre de la nación santa, es decir, los que viven por fe, habiendo creído en el Mesías prometido, y puesto su confianza en Él y en su obra de redención.
– Romanos 10:12-13: “Porque no hay distinción entre judío y griego, pues el mismo Señor es Señor de todos, abundando en riquezas para todos los que le invocan; porque: Todo aquel que invoque el nombre del Señor será salvo”.
Estos, y solamente estos, son los miembros del Israel de Dios, gentiles y judíos unidos como un solo pueblo, en el cuerpo del Mesías, el Hijo de Dios encarnado, “y así, todo Israel será salvo” (Romanos 11:26).
Entienda quien pueda …
–
– El Cristianismo fue el primero en abolir la exposición (la práctica pagana del aborto).
– El Cristianismo fue el primero en abolir la esclavitud (un constante universal de nuestra especie humana, muy practicada aún hoy, en tierras no cristianizadas).
– El Cristianismo fue el primero en abolir el sacrificio humano (una macabra práctica común en las religiones paganas).
– El Cristianismo fue el primero en erradicar la concepción de que la mujer es un sexo inferior en valor (lean lo que realmente escribieron los antiguos filósofos paganos sobre el sexo femenino, entonces te darás cuenta de cuán verdaderamente liberador es el Cristianismo para la especie humana en su conjunto, pero en particular, para el sexo femenino).
- Fue el Occidente Cristianizado el que nos dio la ciencia moderna.
- Fue el Occidente Cristianizado el que nos dio mercados libres.
- Fue el Occidente Cristianizado el que nos dio las bases teológicas y filosóficas para nuestra concepción moderna de los derechos humanos universales.
- Fue el Occidente Cristianizado el que nos dio sociedades verdaderamente libres en las que los reyes y los déspotas no estaban por encima de la ley.
Escupe, chilla y engáñate de que no es así: pero la historia ha reivindicado la Cristiandad. Ese Hombre crucificado por los poderes verdaderamente tiránicos de Su tiempo, con una Cruz conquistó el mundo: lo que era la ignominia por excelencia, se ha convertido en el símbolo de la gloria suprema.
===
– “Porque la palabra de la Cruz es locura a los que se pierden; pero a los que se salvan, esto es, a nosotros, es poder de Dios. … porque en verdad los judíos piden señales y los griegos buscan sabiduría; pero nosotros predicamos a Cristo crucificado, piedra de tropiezo para los judíos, y necedad para los gentiles; mas para los llamados, tanto judíos como griegos, Cristo es poder de Dios y sabiduría de Dios” (1 Corintios 1:18).
Todas las demás religiones doblarán la rodilla y los reyes besarán los pies de nuestro Señor Jesucristo.
¡Cristo es Rey sobre todas las naciones de la tierra!
–
Apocalipsis 6:9 podría relacionarse con Génesis 4:10 y lucas 16:19 con jueces 9:8
The Lamb broke the fifth seal.
The Lamb who broke the fifth seal (Rev 6:9) was not a literal lamb but symbolizes Jesus Christ (Rev 5:6).
Neither are the book and its seven seals literal. The book symbolizes a crisis in heaven (Rev 5:3). Through His death, Jesus earned the right to solve that crisis (Rev 5:9). He does that by breaking the seals. For a discussion, see – The sealed book in Revelation 5.
John saw.
John wrote that he “saw” the “souls” under the altar. But John did not see anything; at least not with his physical eyes. Neither did the Spirit give John a visual image of these souls. This article argues that, in vision, through the Spirit, John simply knew about these souls and that they “had been slain because of the word of God.“
Under the Altar
John saw the souls “underneath the altar” (Rev 6:9) but John did not see a literal altar. In the Old Testament, the “life” (literally the “soul” – nephesh) of the flesh is said to be in the blood (Lev 17:11). In the sacrificial rituals, the priest poured out the blood of the animal sacrifices at the base of the altar (e.g., Exo 29:12) where it would soak into the ground “underneath the altar.” The fifth seal uses this ritual as a symbol to say that God’s people are symbolically sacrificed on a symbolic altar; just like their Master was. Since the altar is not literal, the souls under the altar are also not literal.
Slain
The “souls” are said to be “those who had been SLAIN because of the word of God” (Rev 6:9). But “slain” is also a symbol. They symbolize ALL of God’s people; also those who have not literally been “slain.” In Revelation’s symbolism, all of God’s people are “slain.”
Cry for Revenge
The souls cry out to God for revenge (Rev 6:10) but God’s people would not seek revenge. Rather, like Jesus and Stephan, they would ask the Father to forgive their murderers (Luke 23:34; Acts 7:60)!
This call for revenge must be understood as similar to Abel’s blood that cried out from the ground to God (Gen 4:10-11). It is the injustice they had suffered that cries out to God; not living beings. The cry symbolizes God’s awareness of the suffering of His people and His promise to set things right.
White Robes
Contrary to the idea that these are disembodied spirits, these souls are given white robes (Rev 6:11), implying that they have bodies. They could also cry out, implying that they have mouths.
But all of these are symbols. The white robes symbolize “the righteous acts of the saints” (Rev 19:7-8) and serve as God’s guarantee that they will be resurrected to eternal life. As Jesus said, “be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life” (Rev 2:10; cf. Rev 3:5).
REVIEW Number Completed This is not discussed below but another article shows that “the number of their fellow servants … would be completed” (Rev 6:11) is also not literal but really is the same as the sealing of the 144,000 (Rev 7:3), meaning that the end-time remnant will be completed QUALITATIVELY in character; not numerically to a specific number.
READ
Luke 16:19-31 is perhaps a difficulty for proponents of the soul sleep theory, but it is not an outright contradiction of the theory for a number of reasons.
Scripture, in both old and new testament, makes frequent use of literary personification. The ‘blood of Abel’ cries out in Gen 4:10. A prophecy in Ezek 32 uses the visual of leaders speaking from the realm of the dead (Ezek 32:21.) Floods clap their hands and hills sing together for joy in Psalm 98:8. Thistles talk in II Chron 25:18, etc. A parable in Judges 9 begins, “Once upon a time the trees decided to choose a king. First they said to the olive tree, ‘Be our king!’ But the olive tree said to them, ‘Shall I leave my fatness with which God and men are honored, and go to wave over the trees?’…'”
While the use of personification in some places does not mandate that it is being used in all possible places, that it can be used is important to keep in mind when facing scriptures that seem to ‘contradict’ on the surface. Just as the tree parable shows trees discussing a monarchy (when all would agree that trees do not speak) it is possible that the Parable of Lazarus and the Rich man show the dead speaking figuratively, not literally.
Proponents of soul sleep will likely point to many verses on death that seem to concretely say that the dead have no thought or consciousness:
“For the living know they will die; but the dead do not know anything, nor have they any longer a reward, for their memory is forgotten.” Ecc 9:5
“And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.” Dan 12:2
John 5:28-29 “…An hour is coming, in which all who are in the tombs will hear His voice, and will come forth; those who did the good deeds to a resurrection of life, those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment.”
Etc. Any theory (not just soul sleep) is faced with reconciling verses that seem to imply that there is no conscious thought in death with verses that imply the spirit is conscious.
No one verse or passage, such as Luke 16:19-31, is going to ‘prove’ the case definitively one way or another on its own.
Another thing to keep in mind is that the story of Lazarus and the Rich man is a parable – a moral story using elements from life or culture that would be readily understood on the surface, but hid a deeper spiritual meaning. With parables, the story itself was not necessarily always based on a true occurrence. Did a good Samaritan help a man beset by thieves? Did a specific woman really lose one of her coins? We don’t know.
The main spiritual point of the Lazarus parable is that there is no second chance for salvation after death, and that some won’t be convinced even if someone rises from the dead (like Lazarus or Christ). The state of the dead is a setting – but not the main spiritual point. As such, it is hard to be 100% dogmatic that the setting is speaking of an actual occurence vs. pulling from imagery that would be understandable to the culture.
Beyond the possible use of personification and the literary style of the parable, there is a third reason that the parable of Lazarus and the Rich man would not directly contradict the theory of soul sleep. Note that the rich man is in ‘Hades,’ but is in fiery torment. Yet usually,’Gehenna’ is used in the new testament when describing fiery torment (such as Mk 9:47-48.) Hades is equivalent to the OT term ‘Sheol’ and simply means the grave, or abstractly, the realm of the dead. Yet here, in this one instance, Hades is described as a place of fire.
This discrepancy seems unusual, but not perhaps in light of Rev 20:14, “Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death.”
Hades will be thrown into the Lake of Fire at the judgment. As such, it is possible, even probable, that the Parable is presenting Lazarus and the Rich man as having already faced the judgement. (Lk 16:26 also hints at the two having already been judged.)
This would not conflict with the soul sleep theory and actually supports it.
[My personal opinion is that both the soul sleep and concious-between-death-and-judgment theory have seeming support from scripture as well as difficult passages to reconcile. However, Luke 16:19-31 is not a direct impediment to the soul sleep theory.]
John’s Bible Version in John 19:37?
by John Meade at 08:00 24
See the update to this post below.
I continue my series of highlighting places where a NT author cites the Old Testament but does not use the Old Greek/Septuagint (see 2 Cor 11:3; 1 Cor 15:54). In addition, I would propose that the NT author in these cases probably does not give his own ad hoc rendering of the Hebrew, since there was a perfectly good revision of the older Greek translation at his disposal. My assumption, therefore, is that the NT author simply used and modified an already existing Greek translation of which he and his audience were aware. Here, I list the Hebrew, OG, and the readings of the Three for the part of Zechariah 12:10 that John quotes in 19:37 including some context:
Hebrew: וְהִבִּ֥יטוּ אֵלַ֖י אֵ֣ת אֲשֶׁר־דָּקָ֑רוּ וְסָפְד֣וּ עָלָ֗יו
“and they will look to me whom they pierced and they shall mourn for him.”
Greek: καὶ ἐπιβλέψονται πρός με ἀνθ᾽ ὧν κατωρχήσαντο καὶ κόψονται ἐπ᾽ αὐτόν
“and they will look to me because they danced triumphantly, and they will mourn over him.”
John 19:37: καὶ πάλιν ἑτέρα γραφὴ λέγει· ὄψονται εἰς ὃν ἐξεκέντησαν
“and again another scripture says, ‘They look at whom they pierced‘.”
Aquila: α’ σύν ᾧ ἐξεκέντησαν καὶ κόψονται αὐτόν
“[they will look to me(?)] whom they pierced, and will mourn for him.”
Theodotion: θ’ …πρός με ὃν ἐξεκέντησαν καὶ κόψονται αὐτόν
“[they will look] to me whom they pierced, and they will mourn for him.”
Symmachus: σ’ ἔμπροσθεν ἐπεξεκέντησαν καὶ κόψονται αὐτόν
“[they will look to me(?)] before/in whose presence they pierced, and they will mourn for him.”
The OG’s κατορχεῖσθαι “to dance triumphantly” is a hapax legomenon in the Greek Old Testament’s corpus and probably resulted from reading a form of the verb רקד “to leap about, dance” Piel, which metathesized ד and ר due either to ד/ר confusion or exegesis.
The readings of the Three were originally incorporated into Origen’s Hexapla but come down to us via Ra 86 (image from DigiVatLib). John clearly depends on Theodotion’s version for his quotation of Zechariah 12:10, not the Old Greek. However, John has also modified it slightly by using a different preposition than Theodotion (but see the Syrohexapla for the Th fragment which could be retroverted as εἰς which would mean that Th’s version equal’s John’s form of the quotation in this respect). In any case, John has certainly not read with the Old Greek in this place but rather the revision of it.
The apostles (at least Paul, John, and Matthew) were aware of not only the older Greek version but also other forms of the Greek scriptures, for they cite and quote them too. What factors led to their choice? The Hebrew source? The texts at their disposal in any given situation? We don’t know. But what seems clear is that these Jewish followers of Jesus had not declared an exclusive preference for the older Greek version. At one point, they are quoting from the ‘LXX’ and at another point they are quoting from one of its revisions. We would do well to bear this phenomenon in mind as we continue to read the NT’s use of the OT and also how these matters develop in the second century and beyond.
UPDATE 12/8/2018
I’ve now had the chance to look at Syrohexapla (Syh fol. 112r) for the Theodotion reading in Zach 12:10 (ܒܗܘ), and no doubt, the translator rendered an equivalent for a Greek preposition before the relative pronoun ὅν. The beth is often used for εἰς in this tradition thus Ziegler’s εἰς in the second apparatus is probably correct.
In my mind, then, John removes πρός με (contextual to be sure) and modifies the verb from ἐπιβλέψονται to ὄψονται. But εἰς ὃν ἐξεκέντησαν seems to be the original reading of Theodotion and that would give three words of correspondence. Even Ra 86 agrees with John on the choice of the relative pronoun for two words of correspondence.
When compared with Aq, Sym, and OG, we see that not all come to the same rendering of the Hebrew which makes agreements between Th and John all the more interesting. Lastly, for the key word “pierce,” John had several lexical options in Greek but landed on Theodotion’s equivalent. It could be coincidence. But presuming that version is already around, I don’t think we need to argue along those lines in this case.
κατωρχήσαντο κατορχέομαι dance in triumph over aor ind mp 3rd pl
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