tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post7867591669486480301..comments2024-03-27T17:15:37.606-04:00Comments on Triablogue: Enslaved to passionRyanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809283662428917799noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-62265320336584898862008-04-26T07:13:00.000-04:002008-04-26T07:13:00.000-04:00Thanks, Steve.Thanks, Steve.Matheteshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13527032591499860552noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-68801409335387649372008-04-26T03:09:00.000-04:002008-04-26T03:09:00.000-04:00“Some argue that the term ‘world’ here simply has ...<I>“Some argue that the term ‘world’ here simply has neutral connotations—the created human world. But the characteristic use of ‘the world’ (ho kosmos) elsewhere in the narrative is with negative overtones—the world in its alienation from and hostility to its creator’s purposes. It makes better sense in a soteriological context to see the latter notion as in view. God loves that which has become hostile to God. The force is not, then, that the world is so vast that it takes a great deal of love to embrace it, but rather that the world has become so alienated from God that it takes an exceedingly great kind of love to love it at all”</I><BR/><BR/>This text is on my list for posts this year. <BR/><BR/>My take is right down the middle. I think the key to understanding this text is the preceding narrative about the cleansing of the Temple.<BR/><BR/>In short, the use of "world" here is a reference to cosmic redemption, with the world as God's Temple.<BR/><BR/>Jesus is the light of the world, the Shekinah that came down to fill the Temple.<BR/><BR/>Jesus is the Lamb that takes away the sin of the world. The image is that of the Temple sacrifice on the day of atonement and the consecrating sacrifice for the Temple itself. <BR/><BR/>Jesus cleanses the temple. The sacrifice cleanses the temple.<BR/><BR/>The cleansing of the temple leads the reader to wonder, "Does God love the Temple? The Jews' conceit was that God loved the Temple and consequently could not do without its keepers, the Jewish nation.<BR/><BR/>John's answer is "Yes," God does love His Temple, but the Temple is not a building (John 4). It's nonspatial. Jesus is the True Temple, and yet so are His people.<BR/><BR/>The world is not "the elect" it is, rather, the place God loves, the cosmos, which is His ultimate temple. <BR/><BR/>Jesus in the cleansing of the Temple did not condemn the Temple. Rather, he chased out the moneychangers and told them that it was a house of prayer for all nations. He never denies God cares for His temple.<BR/><BR/>So, in the same way, God loves the world. Jesus is chasing out the money changers in it by dying for all the ones believing (the true priesthood of the Temple). The Temple has become alienated from God on account of the riff raff in it in John 2, and so has the world due to sin (John 3). Jesus did not come to condemn the Temple in John 2, neither did He come to condemn the world. Rather He came to cleanse the Temple, and in John 3, He has come to do the same to the world. Moreover, the world is a house of prayer for all nations, not just the Jews, but Gentiles also.<BR/><BR/>So, IMO, the world here, embraces all the views Calvinists generally offer, when properly understood in light of the narrative of the Temple's cleansing and John's overall theme of the replacement of the physical building of the Temple with Jesus, the Church under the Spirit's guidance, and, in Revelation, the coming of the final cosmic temple, ala Beale's thesis.<BR/><BR/>Arminians, by isolating John 3:16 from the rest of the trajectory of the Gospel and by defining it as "everybody" miss all of this.GeneMBridgeshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10504383610477532374noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-70355262181668422722008-04-25T20:16:00.000-04:002008-04-25T20:16:00.000-04:00Roughly speaking, folk Hinduism is polytheistic wh...Roughly speaking, folk Hinduism is polytheistic whereas Indian philosophy is pantheistic. <BR/><BR/>You do have personal gods in Hindu mythology, but they are finite gods. They are not omniscient or omnipotent. So their revelations would be unreliable.<BR/><BR/>There is also the question of how Hindus interpret Hindu mythology. Sophisticated Hindus regard their "gods" as psychological projections. As I recall, this goes all the way back to the Upanishads.stevehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16547070544928321788noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-7262190008793871502008-04-25T18:03:00.000-04:002008-04-25T18:03:00.000-04:00As a side note, you said:"Hinduism, which is panth...As a side note, you said:<BR/><BR/>"Hinduism, which is pantheistic, can’t even underwrite a doctrine of divine revelation, for that presupposes a personal agent"<BR/><BR/>I've seen Bahnsen make this claim too, but I, not knowing much about Hinduism don't know where this comes from. The Bhagavad Gita after all, has Krishna "revealing" knowledge to Arjuna, which seems like an example of personal revelation to me. Is the pantheistic element perhaps a later development?Matheteshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13527032591499860552noreply@blogger.com