FuglyDuck @ FuglyDuck @lemmy.world

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Show of hands.

Who here thinks this was actually an accident?

I'm not commenting on trump or even modern politics. I'm commenting on the lack of fidelity the new testament authors had in quoting what we now call The Old Testament, and specifically on Jesus saying that the law was going to exist as long as this world existed, and that nothing would be removed from from it.

Mathew 5:17-20

¹⁷“Do not presume that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish, but to fulfill. ¹⁸ For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke of a letter shall pass from the Law, until all is accomplished! ¹⁹Therefore, whoever nullifies one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Emphasis mine.

The new testament is positively replete with alterations, exemptions, and outright rejections of the Law. Many of them are even what I would consider good (for example, many of the changes are to be less legalistic, because they've gotten to be a pain in the ass). Or at least, pragmatic. but that's not really pertinent here. For example, Mary Magdalene, the law required her stoning. Pure and simple, right? Adulteresses get stoned. Other sins were atoned for in other ways ( sacrifice, ritual cleansing, etc.) but jesus says, 'yeah, fuck that.'

Or like Paul's pragmatism concerning converting gentiles and chopping off parts of their dicks. Yeah.

Mark 7, though comes expressly to mind,

verse 18 and 19 are the relevant bits here:

¹⁸And He *said to them, “Are you so lacking in understanding as well? Do you not understand that whatever goes into the person from outside cannot defile him, ¹⁹because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach, and is eliminated?” (Thereby He declared all foods clean.)

Again, emphasis mine.

the context is that the pharisees are calling out the disciples for not washing their hands. (nasty. just saying. Guys. wash your hands.) Also, 7-9, Jesus is citing a prophecy by Isiah:

⁶ But He said to them, “Rightly did Isaiah prophesy about you hypocrites, as it is written:

⁷‘This people honors Me with their lips,
But their heart is far away from Me.
And in vain do they worship Me,
Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’

⁸Neglecting the commandment of God, you hold to the tradition of men.” ⁹He was also saying to them, “You are experts at setting aside the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition.

In which Jesus is quoting Isaiah29:13:

Then the Lord said,

“Because this people approaches Me with their words
And honors Me with their lips,
But their heart is far away from Me,
And their reverence for Me consists of the commandment of men that is taught;

but, um. if you check the context in 29, the city Ariel is clearly Jerusalem... and clearly the 'prophecy' is a warning to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. It wasn't even a messianic prophecy. (in that it's pointing to signs of who might be the Messiah.) and anyone reading it in the historical context (like to whomever Isaiah was speaking to...) would have understood it as a "get back in line or else" kinda deal.

As for the prophecies in Mathew; the author literally doesn't know what he's talking about. for example, Mathew 1:22-2.

²²Now all this [u]took place so that what was spoken by the Lord through [v]the prophet would be fulfilled: ²³ “Behold, the virgin will conceive and give birth to a Son, and they shall name Him [x]Immanuel,” which translated means, “God with us.”

The author is citing Isaiah 7. . Specifically citing verse 14...

¹⁴Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the ^[k]virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and she will name Him Immanuel. ¹⁵He will eat curds and honey at the time He knows enough to refuse evil and choose good. ¹⁶ For before the boy knows enough to refuse evil and choose good, the land whose two kings you dread will be abandoned.

Okay. so I let the footnote tag in for 'virgin' because it's actually kinda important here. We'll get to that in a second.

First though: here's the more-full context. (you can read the full chapter, I linked it, if you want.) Starting with verse 10:

¹⁰Then the Lord spoke again to Ahaz, saying, ¹¹“Ask for a sign for yourself from the Lord your God; [g]make it deep as Sheol or high as heaven.” ¹²But Ahaz said, “I will not ask, nor will I put the Lord to the test!” ¹³Then he said, “Listen now, house of David! Is it too trivial a thing for you to try the patience of men, that you will try the patience of my God as well? ¹⁴Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and she will name Him Immanuel. ¹⁵He will eat curds and honey at the time He knows enough to refuse evil and choose good. ¹⁶For before the boy knows enough to refuse evil and choose good, the land whose two kings you dread will be abandoned.

Okay. So. The context: Isaiah is sent to Ahaz to console him, and Isaiah tells Ahaz to name a sign, and god will do that sign to prove that he'll be safe. Ahaz doesn't (because, like, he ain't stupid.) So, Isaiah names a sign- this kid whose suppsoed to be born, named Immanuel. Before that kid reaches certain life milestones- specifically, the age of legal/religious responsibility. So all this Immanuel guy is supposed to do is exist. By the time he reaches whatever age they viewed children as being responsible for their actions at; the next part of the prophecy will come true: The land of those two kings will be abandoned.

this prophecy wouldn't be very reassuring if Jesus was that boy... seeing as how Ahaz was like more than 700 years before Jesus was alive... Details, right?

Alright now back to this whole 'virgin' thing. English translations generally use the word 'virgin' here, because that's the way they translated the hebrew bible into greek. Don't ask me why. the hebrew word for 'virgin' is "בְּתוּלָה" transliterated as "betulah", which is also seen elsewhere (Like Rebecca was described as a virgin, not a young woman, as an example.

Ahaz certainly would have understood it to mean 'a young woman', as would basically anyone who was around at the time Isaiah gave the prophecy. Context is incredibly important and words have meanings.

For another example of context, Mathew 2 uses Micah 5 to explain why jesus was supposedly born in Bethlehem. The reality is that if Jesus is supposed to be the Messiah, then he'll have to come from Bethlehem. But prophecy in Micah 5 was a message of hope and divine protection to a people facing the Assyrians coming in; and in the context of assholish kings. (well, as painted by the scriptures. They just maybe got away from the Law of Moses and weren't as obedient as they were supposed to be.)

Imagine if some asshole showed up in france just ahead of the Nazis invasion and said, "you know what? don't be too worried. Cuz like 700 years from now, some jackass is gonna be born in Arles and he's gonna deal with it." Not exactly the most... relieving of messages.

Most likely the ruler mentioned in Micah 5 was already alive at the time and already starting to do their thing. particularly because most prophecies are written after the events happened (or just before them). Probably Hezekiah, as a way to bolster Hezekiah's perceived authority. (which fits, because Hezekiah was known for being a reformer, particularly bringing people back to religious observance. Details.)

So, like, you’re acting like you’re being persecuted here.

this is not that.

It’s a simple fact that the majority of people using some form of “jesus” as an exclamation are Christians and they’re not being prejudicial towards themselves.

I am not going to obey your religious proscriptions. I’m certainly not going to be too bothered by it when you’re proscriptions are particularly rare, even among people who broadly share your faith.

If you want to be offended, that’s your problem. Insisting others modify their behavior is not appropriate. Especially since you’re equating it to “Christian’s are being killed.”

Fucking hell. You’re not being persecuted here. Probably not even wherever you are. And I’d be willing to bet you don’t know anyone who’s been killed because they were a Christian. Take a beat and chill.

Could be worse.

Ryker could have lost his censor. Nobody wants to see that.

Nobody.

Because apple only maintains phones on an individual level?

And probably literally everyone who writes apps for iOS, as they would now need to account for everyone’s potential behavior.

It’s not “only”. Especially if you had to account for every possible variation in hardware. It’s more complexity and that means more opportunity for bugs.

Seriously.

we now live in Nazis America. And everyone whose like 'no we're not'... yes. we are, and I will tell you I told you so to the die I die.

Wil Wheaton makes me almost not hate Wesley.

Poor guy. I wanted Wesley to get killed off soooo many times.

This may seem pedantic. But it was after they had been asked to leave.

Said another way, they were trespassed and left to leave on their own recognizance and instead of leaving they vandalized school property, publicn urination I’d also usually some type of crime… and they potentially exposed their genitalia to children.

Seriously. Lock these idiot fucks and slap on a sex offender label.

It’s also weird because his father was Indian, so yeah. He is in fact of asian descent….

And his mother was Ugandan. Which is where he was born.

It’s. Not his fault Columbia failed to have a write-in option.

Because everyone always goes out and gets the new phone?

Yes. It’s an issue.

ETA: some quick searches and it seems the most common phone in the 13, with around 60% being the fourteen or older.

Ironically, the reason she can’t is because it’s a physical switch.

If she turned it off for you , then the physical indicator on the switch would be wrong, but she has no ability to move the switch.

Tan dirt.

So it works. Maybe. Try squinting at it.

Nature’s sunscreen!

You realize, of course, that you’re complaining about a use of language that is in fact most commonly used by Christian’s?

Well, something to consider is that as an exclamation, “Jesus” etc started among Christians as an invocation of protection, not as an expletive. Same as “oh my god!”. We’ve kind of dropped the second part for brevity, (“save me!”)

In the way we use it, it’s usually more of an exclamation than an expletive, but, eh, as far as which is more offensive, it’ll always depend on who you’re talking to- even between Christians

Christians have a long history of skipping things.

none of the prophecy's in Mathew were about jesus; oops. or things like jesus saying "I didn't come to abolish the law but to fulfill it"... violating the law by adding to (and removing from) it... (but that's not allowed. oops.)

We should wall off Florida and call it America’s cock ring. After getting all the fascist to move there.

Dildos bring pleasure to people every day. Lots of people.

Stephen miller probably hasn’t.

The thing is… arch…. You can actually fix. Most times.

Unlike the proverbial him.

(Not that you should have to.)

First… yes, as far as it goes. That said there’s some problems with it on the whole.

Keep in mind, this is a thought terminating cliche saying by Vulcans to explain “the logic” of self sacrifice.

The thing about logic is it can be used to justify all sorts of horrific things. (For example, the us nuking of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.)

It’s also important to note that, in general, I don’t really disagree with it here. That doesn’t make it any less of a cliche or problematic when applied to things like social policy.

Consider Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Some needs are themselves more weighty than others.

that guy’s need to get to work on time doesn’t outweigh my need to dress safely, even if there’s a dozen of them behind me- and never will.

Similarly, if the needs of the many (say, to feel safe) are juxtaposed against the few, whose need is to stay alive…. The needs of the few outweigh the many. One might say “but that doesn’t happen”… but we do. All the time.

Right now, the most extreme example are all the people that defend Israel’s right to genocide by insisting that Israel has a right to defend itself.

That said. Billionaires don’t need to make money. And they don’t even need to exist, for that matter.