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The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

kiwihellenist.blogspot.com

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Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#91

Post by Nathanba »

monlockandkey wrote: post #78
Galacta7 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I perhaps agree in principle, I think it's also fair to say that while Islam isn't strictly based on Christianity or Judaism, it was strongly influenced by both, to the extent that the Qu'ran borrows quite a bit from the New Testament, which in turn borrows heavily from the Hebrew Bible. The overlap is not accidental, but rather intentional in order to provide a sense of credibility in their teachings. In that…

The Qur'an didn't borrow anything, nor was it influenced by the previous religions. The Qur'an is a revelation from God, as was the original Torah to Moses and the Injeel to Jesus. The same accounts of history and messages would be told to the prophets from God. The claim where Muhammad ﷺ copied from the previous books is simply not possible. An unlettered man narrating and correcting the histories/traditions of the…

This is of course wrong, Mohammed as an illiterate man can copy things because he grew up in a christian and jewish influenced society and no doubt heard the stories of biblical characters and then decided to incorporate them into his own retelling, including various historical errors that make his retelling impossible to be true. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_in_Islam#:~:text=Accordin....

It is also false to say that gaining followers through appeasement is the way to go, there is not a single sect in christianity that doesnt change vital parts of the bible or how to be saved. It is far easier to obfuscate and pretend to follow christianity and then make changes later.

Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#92

Post by citizenpaul »

Nition wrote: post #70

This is a bit of a meta-comment but, there are a great deal of of comments in this thread that say something that's already covered in the article. I've noticed that Hacker News comments do seem to be trending more over time to being from people who only read the title, or at best only skimmed the article. If you go straight to the comments on any news post on Reddit, the discussions usually seem relatively insightfu…

Its a known effect of the popularity of online social networks.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September

Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#93

Post by acdha »

DebtDeflation wrote: post #85
Zanni wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rope and needle are close enough in scale that passing the one through the other is merely improbable. Consider a thin rope and a large needle, for example. You could also unbraid a rope and pass it through a needle, strand by strand, and reconstruct it on the other "side." Much harder to do with a camel.

Except that the rope in question here is a "seafaring" rope used by sailors. If you're familiar with nautical rope, it has no more possibility of passing through the eye of even the largest sail needle than a camel does.

This is true but I don’t think this was aimed at people who were going to deeply contemplate it as a serious metaphor. It seems more along the lines of effective altruism, designed to let people sleep comfortably while enjoying the pleasures of wealth now while saying that they would thin the rope with a massive donation later (why do you even need to ask?), which the church could very conveniently help receive.

Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#94

Post by hot_gril »

Nition wrote: post #70

This is a bit of a meta-comment but, there are a great deal of of comments in this thread that say something that's already covered in the article. I've noticed that Hacker News comments do seem to be trending more over time to being from people who only read the title, or at best only skimmed the article. If you go straight to the comments on any news post on Reddit, the discussions usually seem relatively insightfu…

I've repeatedly noticed an even worse practice on anything news-related on Reddit: Top-rated comments saying "the title is misleading" when it actually isn't. I don't know if they skimmed the article way too quickly or were just trying to call it fake news because they didn't like it.

Anyway, deleted my account there and haven't gone back in a few months.

Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#95

Post by hprotagonist »

Zancarius wrote: post #42
hprotagonist wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mammon is an easy idolatry.

I like this. I literally just caught that word in a commentary I was reading on Sunday. Sadly, English translations sometimes don't convey the force or cultural context of the passage.

You might like William Stringfellow's "Impostors of God:Inquiries into Favorite Idols". It's part of a long intellectual tradition that is absolutely wrenching.

Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#96

Post by Zancarius »

andsoitis wrote: post #63
Zancarius wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trinitarianism isn't necessarily a strictly Christian construct—or rather the idea of a godhead comprising multiple parts. "Two Powers" theology (a transcendent, unseeable Yahweh; and Yahweh-as-man) was accepted by Jewish thinkers until about the First Century AD, largely due to Christian influences. It's visible in passages like Genesis 19:24 (two Yahwehs) and most "angel of the Lord" language (e.g. Judges 6:11ff).…

From https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/trinity/trinity-history.h... : Divine threesomes abound in the religious writings and art of ancient Europe, Egypt, the near east, and Asia. These include various threesomes of male deities, of female deities, of Father-Mother-Son groups, or of one body with three heads, or three faces on one head (Griffiths 1996). However, similarity alone doesn’t prove Christian copying or ev…

I think I tend to agree with the conclusion—namely that it was predominantly a Jewish influence on Christology. Part of my opinion is shaped by changes in and around the First Century in Judaism which, ultimately, culminated in the Masoretic Text evicting certain parts of the text that could remotely suggest anything akin to polytheism. Deuteronomy 32 is particularly one of the most affected chapters, but curiously "two powers" theology was largely left intact.

This is a particularly interesting period in Christianity, because you had numerous influences (including what would later become gnosticism around the same time), the term "trinity" wouldn't appear in extant works until sometime in the Second Century, then the Council of Nicaea in or around the latter half of the Fourth Century establishing it as doctrine.

So, I think the evidence of a decidedly Jewish influence is quite strong and would date at least to the Babylonian captivity.

I believe Dr. Robert Alter leans toward an evolution from polytheism -> monotheism in Jewish thinking (I highly recommend his The Hebrew Bible: A Translation with Commentary); but I think the evidence for a sort of henotheism is a bit stronger and more sensible, which would better fit the sources you shared here, alongside the biblical texts.

Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#97

Post by DontchaKnowit »

deadbabe wrote: post #81
Nition wrote: post #70

This is a bit of a meta-comment but, there are a great deal of of comments in this thread that say something that's already covered in the article. I've noticed that Hacker News comments do seem to be trending more over time to being from people who only read the title, or at best only skimmed the article. If you go straight to the comments on any news post on Reddit, the discussions usually seem relatively insightfu…

Comments are at least more guaranteed to be human, articles could be AI summary garbage.

What? Wouldnt comments be equally likely to be AI?

Why would comments be any less likely to be AI?

Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#98

Post by Zancarius »

hprotagonist wrote: post #95
Zancarius wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like this. I literally just caught that word in a commentary I was reading on Sunday. Sadly, English translations sometimes don't convey the force or cultural context of the passage.

You might like William Stringfellow's "Impostors of God:Inquiries into Favorite Idols". It's part of a long intellectual tradition that is absolutely wrenching.

Presently reading through a review—looks like a great recommendation! The charges he levies against modernity are pretty damning but not at all untrue.

We're not all that dissimilar from the Israelites who were repeatedly condemned to the status of remnant, to be ruled by unjust kings, conquered and displaced by other nations, yet forever snubbing the will of the Most High. We've just swapped more obvious idols (on occasion) for ones less so (except money).

Thanks!

Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#99

Post by trhway »

timbit42 wrote: post #22

In Aramaic, the language Jesus spoke, the word for camel is gamlo (ܓܐܡܠܐ) while the word for rope is gamla (ܓܐܡܠܥ). Mixing these up would be an easy mistake to make. Matthew and Luke both took some info from Mark but also took some info from the Q source and their own sources. Since all three have this same wording, it is likely the error came through Mark.

I just googled, and the things are even less clearer - looks like it isn't just a rope, it specifically means thick rope made out of camel hair.

Re: The camel, the rope, and the needle's eye

#100

Post by jknoepfler »

tines wrote: post #14
OscarCunningham wrote: post #11

I've never really understood the sentences following this quote. > '[…] It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.' They were greatly astounded and said to one another, 'Then who can be saved?' Jesus looked at them and said, 'For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.' Why do the apostles seem to think that…

Because it was thought that being rich meant you were close to God. If the people they thought were closest to God could scarcely be saved, then how could anyone else be? So the thinking goes. It's an argument a fortiori. Of course Jesus' point was that the poor and sinners are much closer to the kingdom of God than the rich, hence their astonishment.

That isn't the natural reading of the passage. The listeners express surprise when Jesus says "rich folks won't enter the kingdom of God". They then ask "well if not the rich, then who?" indicating that they think rich folks were the most likely to get in. If not them, then who?

Jesus then says "no mortal person," explaining that only God makes it possible to enter the kingdom of heaven.

He doesn't say poor people. He says "nobody".

The point is that there is no material means to enter heaven. Rich and poor are identical in this regard.

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