Serving Zion
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Why do you take the risk of eating murdered animals?
- Thread starter Hej73
- Start date
Edward
2024 Supporter
So do you not believe the word of God? Are you of the mind that God is unable to get a good copy of His message to you and us over a period of a couple thousand years?
Wup, God can't do that, it's above His abilities...
Come on man, get real.
Edward
2024 Supporter
You too, huh? Oh ye of little faith.
Could you tell me what is it that convinced you that the word of God is unreliable?
Edward
2024 Supporter
I don't know Brother, that seems to me to be a bit short sighted.
Scripture says a young boy had the loaves and fish. Now do you think that a young boy was carrying around a 1000 LB fish and a couple super size loaves of bread? I don't, So the miracle of the food multiplication was clearly implied to me. It is very reasonable to presume that they were normal sized fish and normal sized loaves of bread.
In these end times things are bad and will get even worse. People will not be able to buy food at the market without a mark o the beast chip. So food will be thin. How do you plan to eat? They didn't catch God off guard. He has made provisions for this situation.
God is no respecter of persons, so if He fed them Manna in the desert to keep them going, and multiplied food to feed thousands....will He not feed His people in these times? Those biblical stories are telling us that He will feed us. Their examples for us for something to have faith in. Food multiplication is coming again to our people. Manna is coming again. Bring some faith to dinner, Brother!
Serving Zion
Member
I had to really give that some thought! You're more than opening a can of worms with that one!
Fact is that there's a few different things to consider: not only different answers but different ways your question can be interpreted. Say for starters, you assume the words were authentic as written in the first place and over time they have changed - or say that you think that some of the ones who wrote the bible might have been listening to an evil spirit that wasn't God. Those are two different questions but you're asking them both, because you just want to know what people think either way...
So I"m going to start with the easiest by saying that if we aren't reading the original languages, that is either Hebrew, Greek or Aramaic (because different parts of the bible are originally written in one of those three languages depending on who, when and where they were at the time), then any translation is going to involve the discretion of the translator to decide what the best way is to convey what is being said to the new language. A good example of this is Genesis 4:4. In the original language if Hebrew it says that Abel brought of the firstlings of the flock and the fat. No details are given about the fat, and as I mentioned earlier, the word for fat is sometimes used to describe richness or excessiveness - so if someone is raising a flock they know the fat ones are better than the scrawny ones, therefore to give them up for God is more of a sacrifice than to give him only the least valuable ones. But go and look at the different translators' decisions: https://biblehub.com/genesis/4-4.htm and look at the CEV version. This is what it says:
Abel also gave an offering to the LORD. He killed the first-born lamb from one of his sheep and gave the LORD the best parts of it.
But take a look at this link: Https://biblehub.com/interlinear/genesis/4-4.htm
That shows the original Hebrew words and the closest English equivalents side by side. Nowhere is is found in the Hebrew saying that Abel killed the sheep, but there you have it in the CEV saying precisely that! When you look at the other translations you will see that more than half of them have loaded that idea into their words when it isn't in the original text at all! They truly and sincerely cannot read the text without viewing it according to their preconceived bias, and that permeates to the readers who have prejudicially resolved to believe that whatever they are reading is God's very own word! That's just the nature of humans in action. The scriptures often refer to them as sheep, because sheep are just like that. So that's why we are told to not judge them for being meat eaters because God has accepted them, and in time if the conscience develops in them, they will naturally want to sacrifice their meat because they have not been pressed to cut themselves off from the truth. That's also why Ms Peterson is going crazy: although she has the greater moral position, the needs of the human to not be eternally condemned are greater than the needs of the animal to live a happy life, so the evil spirits have power to destroy her because she keeps pressing in to make the judgments that God doesn't support and then gets angry that they are not hearing her and that turns into greater rage and so forth.
I'm rambling, given you some ideas for a start. Others will have ideas too and I could come back later with more. Thanks for being here, you're really digging for gold!
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Serving Zion
Member
Corn Pop
Member
You are correct. I didnt know John had an account and i only read the other 3. And so had another look at all accounts. So in John it gives a bit more information a boy had small loaves of bread and 2 small fish.
I stand humbled and corrected.
I dont know if all words in the Bible are immune against manipulation etc. But it is just not smart to bet your soul for a steak. I see manipulation of humanity everywhere. From getting us into wars and now Covid to take away human rights.
Edward
2024 Supporter
You missed the point. Scripture says, study to show thyself approved (2 Timothy 2:15)...not, study unless you have not confidence in the text. In Acts, it says,
Acts 17:
11 These were more [d]fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so. 12 Therefore many of them believed, and also not a few of the Greeks, prominent women as well as men.../
We are charged to do what we can with what we have. The Holy Spirit is the real teacher and His job is to unlock the scriptures for us when we sit down to read. Those who seek, find. Those who knock, it shall be opened for them...and so forth.
So those who wont read the scriptures or search the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so...well, that's a defeatist perspective Brother. The Lord doesn't drop the ball, so pull a NIKE on them and, just do it.
Maybe some books have been taken out (Constantine), or maybe only a bunch of specific verses taken out (NIV), or lame out of context interpretations...but God wont let you die in ignorance because the mistranslations and so forth...So God also has already given you (us) additional tools to offset that. It's called a Concordance and is a study tool which has the text's in their respective original languages for your use.
No way in the world can anyone be misled and be doomed to hell for it because the Holy Spirit will not allow it. Some may wind up being doomed because (for whatever reason) they do not study and try. Our cooperation and obedience to the Lord's words is required, therefore we can not fall if we ARE doing our part.
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Edward
2024 Supporter
Nothing is immune to manipulation, but don't let that stop you from your due diligence.
I love me a good steak. I am of the mind to think that, if eating a steak is wrong or sinful then certainly the Lord would convict my heart for it and let me know. He has not even one time.
The only thing He ever really said about it to me is, don't consume the blood, pour it out onto the ground. So...rare, but not too rare that it's still bleeding.
Tessa
Member
I agree with you Dan. You are a true fisherman releasing the ones you are not going to eat.
I feel healthier when I don't eat meat.
We are all free to choose our food.
Wow what a huge variety God has given us.
There are probably a few but I do not believe the mortality rate is as high as some would suggest.
I live in one of Minnesota's most notorious lakes areas. There is a lot of C&R (Catch & Release) fishing that is done around here. I live about 2 miles from Lake Osakis in central MN. Lake Osakis is a very popular fishing destination for walleye, bass, and panfish and on any give time of day during the summer, along with the recreational boaters, one could expect fishing boats to number in the 100's. During the winter there are typically over 2,500 fishing shelters on the lake at any given time. Here's a link to details about this lake. Scroll to the bottom of the page to read about this fishery.
Largemouth bass are not a favorite fish for the dinner table around here but there are plenty of fishermen and women seen casting lures for them along the weed lines and there are a few tournaments held on this lake every year.
Lake Osakis also has a special regulation with regard to walleyes. All walleyes under 15" in length must be immediately released. From my own personal experience fishing this lake will require releasing plenty of fish under 15" before bringing anything home for the dinner table. There are also a number of walleye tournaments held every year with most of those fish released.
With all those fish caught and released, one would expect the shoreline to be littered with dead fish but this is not the case. In fact, I think the last time I saw a fish floating on the surface was probably five years ago or longer.
Or, manipulate the Bible to do just the opposite.
Serving Zion
Member
Beggars cannot be choosers. What choice do the fish have? Even the seagulls now live as scavengers inland because of the humans' devastation of the oceans.
I feel sorry for the fish, I really do. They were blessed by God in the first place. I don't think there's any way to say that it is godly behaviour to go around laying traps in order to destroy those that are legitimately hungry, and furthermore there's no natural way for steel to get stuck in the fish's mouth and tearing it from the earth. The human has decided all these things in order to take the peace and joy out of God's beautiful creation to feed his insatiable lusts.
If you would appreciate a lesson in empathy I can offer you this: consider: you see someone handing out free tasters: you take one, suddenly it pierces your hand and tears you into outer space kicking, screaming, struggling to hold on for dear life but you cannot win because they are strong and they have done this before. You're in a world now that you have never seen before. There are giant alien creatures throwing you round from one to the next and holding you up to show off how good you look. Then what? Will they toss you back to the jungle or the desert to fend for yourself with a bleeding hand, or is he going to smack your head against the side of the moon because he thinks that's the most humane thing to do? Maybe he'll just slice your guts out while you writhe and splash around in your own blood.
As a Christian we come to know what the true love of God is like, and it is written by those who had known it best: "love does no harm to a neighbour". So I guess the real issue that Hej73 is asking about is how do we go on from saying that God is love and we claim to be grand examples of love to the world, if we are also saying that God somehow expects us to, (or even as some seem to believe: that He designed us to), be doing that?
Serving Zion
Member
Serving Zion
Member
We who are not prejudiced also need to ask why the words were put into the bible before we even get to that stage. It means that we need to trust that Moses was reliable. What makes a person do that? Is it not only because that is what everyone else is doing in the church they belong? But Jesus didn't refer to Moses as being His representative. He said to the Jewish people "I will not condemn you on the day of judgment, it will be Moses in whom you have put your trust!". He refered to the scriptures as being "your scriptures" and the writings of Moses as "the scriptures testify of me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life!". God is bigger than the scriptures and the Word of God was with God in the beginning, before the scriptures were written.
So it's a valid question, an important question. We cannot simply say "because it is God's Word", it needs to have solid grounds to show that it isn't just circular reasoning. (By saying this I am not saying that there aren't solid grounds, I am only saying that a person deserves a well-reasoned answer when they ask).
Tessa
Member
As I said before I did not realise that fish felt pain intol I googled it. I also googled about plants and found out that when you cut plants they let off the same chemicals as we do when we are in pain. I am not joking when I say what can we eat then.
But thank you for the lesson on empathy.
Serving Zion
Member
Yes I understand that feeling! It's really hard to be vegan because people literally are unable to cook without thinking "it must have meat" and "it must have milk" - so everything is basically made with meat and milk products. But you know, it's only a lack of creativity and awareness of the options. When you start getting into the vegan culture there's heaps of really delicious food. There's a vegan cafe in Auckland that I like, they literally have stacks of cookbooks: https://www.revive.co.nz/collections/cookbooks/products/revive-cookbooks-super-set-1234567-c30-c30-2
I know it's really sad how ignorant people are about others' point of view. Once you break free and you are able to see the screams and agony, it really does come to life and you realise why Hej73 is convinced that their eternal souls are in danger.
Tessa
Member
I was vegan for years before I started eating fish. I brought my children up vegan, one still is.
But if plants feel pain we are still doing the same to them. What food dies not feel pain? Every food comes from animals or plants. If a.mts feel pain we should have empathy for them too.
Even bread is made from wheat - a plant. Wheat is a living plant.
Serving Zion
Member
Yeah I know, and that's the whole matter of morality summed up: "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" - but why does it need to be stated? It is because we do not naturally see others as being equivalent to ourselves, but inferior to ourselves. That is because everyone outside of us is separate to us, we are all independent things. But remember this: nobody is born eating plants or animals, those things are introduced to us even before we can remember any of it, so they become normal to us before we come to an age of reasoning the difference between "another sentient being" and "a food resource" - so we are trained to see sheep as a food resource but dogs as a sentient being (according to culture). Then as you say, the ability to feel pain is not really taken into account because it doesn't matter if we aren't treating them as our equal.
Did you see my post to WIP earlier in the thread? There I have mentioned that there is a type of vegetarianism that does respect the natural rights of plants. I think that the fruitarian diet is probably the most morally justified, but I don't know about whether wheat feels pain. Could you tell me more about that?