The Library

Dan O'Day

4:06 AM

@MonicaCellio ahh ok, I thought you were saying I asked a doctrinal question here and needed to edit it. Gotcha now ;)

@JonEricson thanks for rejecting this edit - that definitely would not have added to the post!

Monica Cellio

4:40 AM

@DanO'Day no no, I was holding you up as a good example! :-)

@DanO'Day wow. boggle

Jon Ericson

6:41 AM

@DanO'Day No problem. Not the sort of edit we should allow by any means.

2

Monica Cellio

5:22 PM

This answer needs work. I've never heard of "snakeskin disease". There is a form of "leprosy" that applies to houses that this answer refers to, but note that (a) in that case priests don't clean, they inspect, and (b) it has to be done by a priest, i.e. kohein, i.e. descendent of Aharon in a direct male line.

(My flag was declined so rather than commenting to that effect, per previous discussion here, I'm bringing it here for attention.)

Jack Douglas

6:49 PM

@MonicaCellio I think that question really needs another answer

(without meaning any offense to yours)

Jon Ericson

@JackDouglas Is the question any good? I somewhat biased. ;)

Monica Cellio

7:07 PM

@JackDouglas none taken!

Jack Douglas

@JonEricson yes I just think the answer would be difficult

swasheck

@DanO'Day we arrived at the same conclusion. i keep forgetting that you guys have the translator's notes :)

Jon Ericson

@DanO'Day I'm not sure why your answers are drawing so much fire.

Monica Cellio

@JonEricson whoa. What's that about?

Jon Ericson

@MonicaCellio Most scholars believe that all the early Christian texts were written in Greek and translated to other languages. Some folks believe they were written in Aramaic and translated into Greek (and other languages).

The editor's answers haven't gotten much traction here, so I guess vandalizing the opposition seemed like a good choice.

swasheck

7:20 PM

@DanO'Day made the SoBa angry

@JonEricson she's not really vandalizing, just making pointless edits

swasheck

7:32 PM

i'm about to VtC this nonsense

3

Q: Contextually, which English translation/ Greek text is more probable in Rev. 5:10?

In the King James Version of Rev. 5:10, we find the following phrase, And hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth. If we examine the immediate context, the antecedent of the pronoun "us" appears to be "the four beasts and twenty-four elders" who "fell d...

it's like trying to nail jello to the wall.

Jon Ericson

@swasheck Is the OP changing the question?

swasheck

@JonEricson read his question (and subsequent edits), read the comments on my answer. what am i not getting? he originally asked which was more probable. both Dan and I gave an answer that answered the probability, but he really seems to want to do this in a vacuum.

Jon Ericson

@swasheck Got it. Both answers are excellent. We should encourage the OP to self-answer if they don't like the responses. I don't think the question needs to be closed.

swasheck

here's my response:

It seems like doing this with a textual variant is doing it in a vacuum. "Which is more probable" is a very different question than "what are the implications of accepting the weaker variant(s)?" We could go into biblical and systematic theologies of the redemption of all of creation, or the symbolism of things in Revelation, but that's a separate question altogether. — swasheck 22 secs ago

Soldarnal

@swasheck Both you and Dan gave answers based on manuscript evidence. He's specifically not looking for manuscript evidence.

Basically: if all we had was NA27 and Textus Receptus as our two manuscripts and knew nothing about their origin, how would we settle the textual issue?

swasheck

7:42 PM

@Soldarnal but that just seems ... well ... odd. i would almost certainly VtC the question.

@Soldarnal with systematic/biblical theology

Soldarnal

@swasheck Right, so he's asking following a biblical theology of Revelation, which of these two words makes sense.

swasheck

@Soldarnal which is why i'm going to VtC. that's not the question he's asking ... it's the question behind the question.

@Soldarnal also, that's the the reality so we don't have to worry about it

Soldarnal

@swasheck The question behind the question seems to be whether Textus Receptus can be shown to be unorthodox and therefore it becomes unorthodox to accept that tradition as orthodoxy.

swasheck

meh

i should probably leave. i'm starting to get irritated again.

Jon Ericson

@Soldarnal Interesting. I don't necessarily see that in the question, but I assumed it was a textual criticism question. I see now that it leans on the "context" button instead.

As a TC question, I wouldn't close it, but if it really is asking which reading fits with "orthodoxy", it should be closed as off-topic. (Or edited.)

Soldarnal

8:01 PM

@JonEricson I don't see why it should be closed. Not everyone accepts the superiority of the critical text over the received text. Questions that assume the superiority of the critical text are just as dogmatic as ones that do not.

The person asking the question even states his priors ("I'm usually more lenient toward the Greek text of the Textus Receptus")

Jon Ericson

@Soldarnal I couldn't figure out what that means.

@Soldarnal I guess my thought is that TC starts with the texts (various copies of it, at least). But the question as you word it, starts with orthodoxy. The question vanishes if you don't have a preconceived notion of what the text ought to mean.

I don't mind someone asking from the point-of-view of the TR being "better", by the way.

Soldarnal

@JonEricson Any question involving interpretation vanishes if you don't have a preconceived notion of what the text means

How do you explain what Shakespeare meant if you don't come with priors of what words ought to mean in the English language?

Jon Ericson

@Soldarnal Ah. True.

But I think the way you interpret the question would make it fail our new guideline.

@Soldarnal It's especially tricky since he practically invented modern English!

Dan O'Day

@JonEricson because it isn't supporting her pet theory as tidily as she'd like I suppose. Thanks again for rejecting the edit.

@swasheck SoBa?

Soldarnal

@DanO'Day Guessing SoaB

Dan O'Day

8:12 PM

@Soldarnal what is SoaB?

swasheck

@DanO'Day southern baptist

Soldarnal

@swasheck Oh good

Thanks for clarifying

Sorry I read you uncharitably there.

Jon Ericson

@swasheck I was afraid you meant SOB.

swasheck

@Soldarnal @JonEricson i appreciate the benefit of the doubt

Jack Douglas

I got "Service-Orientated Business Applications" ;)

Soldarnal

8:19 PM

Interpretation is hard

Jack Douglas

but I also owe you an apology @swasheck

swasheck

make no mistake ... in some circles, Southern Baptist is also a pejorative

i was trying to be humorous and was going to follow up with some hellfire and brimstone, but then got distracted by what i thought was TC question but was actually just a biblical theology (at best) or a shopping/vendetta (at worst) question.

which apparently was a dissatisfactory experience for hebrewhammer and others

also, i accidentally VtC this one

1

Q: What does it mean when it says that Christ is "the head of the body"?

In Gen. 2:23, we see that Chavva (Eve) was taken out of Adam, built from his rib, and concerning her, Adam said, "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called "Woman" (Ishah), because she was taken out of man (Ish). What I understand from this is that, since Chavva was...

body-of-christ

so pay no attention to it

Jack Douglas

it'll age away (you probably know that though?)

if you are worried, a mod can close and reopen?

swasheck

@JackDouglas no i didnt know that. but i'm not too worried. just wanted to make it clear to all so that i dont catch flak for that one too.

thanks everybody. appreciate it.

swasheck

8:40 PM

i'm going to stop wasting my time here. i invested 45 minutes doing some text criticism only to be told that's not really not what he was asking (only after doing 45 minutes was the question changed from "Based on the context, which Greek text seems more likely?" to "Based on the context, which English translation/ Greek text seems more likely?" to ultimately, "read this variant in a vacuum and tell me why it makes sense or why it is superior or inferior. also, talk about beasts.")

Jon Ericson

@swasheck Please ignore askers who don't appreciate your answers. That one was very good.

Dan O'Day

8:52 PM

@swasheck ahh gotcha

@JackDouglas :P

Monica Cellio

@JonEricson yeah, what he said @swasheck

Dan O'Day

@swasheck @JonEricson I went back and added a contextual response to my answer. I did my best to remain doctrine-free (even though his updated question specifically asks for doctrine now)

@swasheck @JonEricson but it's a stretch for sure. I think the manuscript evidence makes the reading clear.

Jon Ericson

10:05 PM

@DanO'Day I think I finally have my head around this question. Even using the TR/KJV reading, it's not obvious who the pronoun refers to. It seems to me that the quoted words could be the prayers of the saint and not spoken by the four beasts. (But that's reading in English, not Greek. Can the TR be read that way?)

Dan O'Day

@JonEricson good question. It seems that contextually the ones singing would have to be the beasts and elders, not the saints. But let me look more carefully

Jon Ericson

@DanO'Day I think I should ask it on the site! But I have another in my queue that I need to get out first.

Dan O'Day

10:29 PM

@JonEricson I think I'm done answering Sarah Noll's questions

@JonEricson waste of time

Jon Ericson

@DanO'Day I can understand why you feel that way...

@DanO'Day but don't forget our primary audience is future visitors, not the asker themselves.

Please ignore people who are causing you grief. And flag when people cross the line.

Monica Cellio

@DanO'Day I can understand that. :-( If you think your effort on an answer will serve the internet well, even if the asker doesn't want to hear it, I'd urge you to answer anyway. But if you think it's too localized and won't have benefits to match the effort, then punt. And if someone ever changes a question in a way that invalidates existing answers, that should be rolled back so please flag.

Dan O'Day

@MonicaCellio @JonEricson true true, I just hate spending time on something if it goes to waste

Monica Cellio

@DanO'Day so that's the thing -- if you think it will go to waste if it doesn't satisfy the asker, then you should ignore the question. But if you think it will do some good despite the asker, that's a different matter. Doesn't mean you have to sign up to engage with annoying people, of course!

Jon Ericson

@DanO'Day Did you notice the answer that was deleted? I think you are challenging some assumptions if nothing else.

Dan O'Day

10:44 PM

@JonEricson indeed

Monica Cellio

11:16 PM

BTW, Sarah also brought her sabbath/seven question to Mi Yodeya. She didn't mention the BH question there but I linked it.

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