The Upper Room

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8:38 AM

Why was this question closed for lacking a guiding doctrine? Isn't "in the bible" sufficient?

Q: Does Jesus (in the Bible) ever claim to be God, or the son of God?

Putting aside his claims to be a messiah (which I understand means "annointed") or a king or one through whom it is necessary to know God, and taking the Bible as a reliable record of what he said (for the sake of this question), does Jesus ever claim to be God, God-like or God-related, or is thi...

I guess I read the question as 'Did Jesus ever plainly state "I am God" or "I am the son of God"?' which seems pretty straight forward...

1 hour later…

user2334

9:59 AM

@Flimzy None of the answers provided actually have a quotation from the Bible of Jesus literally saying "I am God" or "I claim to be God." They're interpretations of passages that certain doctrinal traditions use to claim Jesus believed He was God. Which is fine, except I can quote passages all day and make a claim that that's where Jesus said He was God

Flimzy

@MarkTrapp: Yeah, I think that means the answers don't actually answer the question... not necissarily that the question is bad.

Although perhaps the question needs to be more explicit if that's what it wants.

user2334

Right, that's what the doctrinal scope comes in. If I want to know what Catholics say is the passage where Jesus says He's God, there's a correct answer and an incorrect answer. If there is no testable scope, there is no correct answer.

user2334

We can say the answers are bad but the question isn't, but if the question is only attracting bad answers, it's six of one half dozen of another. The question is not inviting good information.

Flimzy

What I mean is, I think the question is asking "Does Jesus outright say this?"

And that alone is enough of a doctrinal scope...

IOW, only a direct quote of Jesus saying "I am God" would be a "yes" answer

and anything else would be a "no"

If what the OP means is "Does X doctrine/tradition think Jesus claims to be God, and why?" then yes... the dotrinal scope is absolutely necessary.

user2334

If the question just wanted to know if Jesus ever literally said "I am God", that would be a pretty trivial question but I would agree that's probably enough to satisfy any testability criteria

user2334

10:03 AM

But it didn't ask that:

user2334

> does Jesus ever claim to be God, God-like or God-related, or is this something that we infer?

user2334

Is it something we can infer according to whom?

Flimzy

I think the answer then is "It is something many denominations infer"

user2334

Which denominations?

user2334

Who counts as part of the many?

Flimzy

10:04 AM

That would be a good question, too :) But I think that's a separate question.

What I think the OP is asking is "Does Jesus ACTUALLY say this? Or do we just infer this?" And the answer is "we just infer it" (we meaning anyone who actually does infer it)

I think that's a valid question... I think it's also a simple one, as you pointed out.

But I don't think that makes it a bad question

Well, it might be bad in the sense that it doesn't attract experts

But it's not bad in the sense that no sane person whould ever wonder it

user2334

Closing isn't a judgement on whether the question is bad. It's a way to prevent a question from attracting bad answers so it can be revised.

Flimzy

Fair enough.

And I agree that the answers it has attracted aren't good answers... even for my narrow interpretation of the question.

user2334

If it was revised to just ask for places where Jesus literally said "I am God", it'd probably be enough.

user2334

Wonder if it's just better off reasked with that scope instead of changing the question in such a way that invalidates all previous answers given

Flimzy

I suppose the fact that the OP accepted the "before Abraham was, I am" answer may mean that my interpretation is wrong... or that he took that statement more literally than some do.

Well I'll comment on the question, and let it rest :)

the OP doesn't seem too upset by his question being closed anyway

user2334

10:10 AM

Yeah, looks like he got his answer regardless

Flimzy

Christianity's traffic has gotten slower than History's

that's pretty bad

user2334

I don't think it was served well at all by the BH.SE launch.

user2334

Instead of one site with modest traffic you now have two sites with really low traffic

Flimzy

I agree... I was afraid that would happen.

6 hours later…

JustinY

4:09 PM

Q: What happens to people who have never heard about Jesus?

There seems to be general consensus inside Christianity that in order to be saved, you must have faith, and that this faith has to be in Jesus Christ. Here is one verse sometimes cited for the necessity of having faith: Hebrews 11:6 (ESV) And without faith it is impossible to please him, fo...

faith soteriology evangelism missions

Would anybody care to share the Catholic position on this issue? Someone attempted to, but they did a pretty poor job. I would be very interested in the answer.

user2334

4:50 PM

@JustinY The question is way too open ended. If there was a version of that question that asked for the Roman Catholic position, it'd probably fare much better

JustinY

5:26 PM

@MarkTrapp I thought about a question that was focused on the Roman Catholic position, but I wasn't sure if it was okay since there was already a question that included the issue in its scope. I guess I might as well try.

user2334

@JustinY To be honest, I think that question ought to be closed: doesn't meet the doctrinal tradition requirement of the new guidelines

JustinY

Q: What does the Roman Catholic church teach about those who die having never heard of Christ?

What does the Roman Catholic church teach about those who die having never heard of Christ? Is there any possibility of salvation for them? Related: What happens to people who have never heard about Jesus? This question has too broad of a scope according to the new guidelines, and it doesn't ha...