People Seeking for God 5 Bread of life

Posted on 2014/01/29 by Christadelphians

Water element of life. / Garden Tomb – sign (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In their search to live, people always had to take care to have enough to eat. Without food we can do not much. Water is the most important element of earth we need to survive. In the coming years that shall be the source where many countries shall fight for. But also the grain to make bread is going to become a problem with the global warming. Without bread people also seem not able to live.

About two thousand years ago there was a strange man, who could do special things and could talk like nobody else. Once that special preacher only had five loaves of bread and two fish but managed to feed a multitude of people. The Jews remembered that their fathers ate the manna in the wilderness and looked at this man who gave them bread from this world but where surprised there did not come an end of giving bread, like this time it also came out of heaven to eat. Jeshua, or Jesus like he is know better today, said unto them

“Verily, verily, I say unto you, It was not Moses that gave you the bread out of heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread out of heaven.” (John 6:32)

Port Charlotte,FL.,8/25/2004–Volunteers from Bread of Life load food and supplies for homeless into a truck following Hurricane Charley. FEMA Photo/Andrea Booher (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The people there where hungry like today we can still find many who are hungry and thirsty. Many of those who are in need of food are mostly concerned with their daily life and the natural elements around them. Not many of them are busy with the spiritual food.

We should know that just as natural food is vital to sustain physical health we do need even more spiritual food. Our being only exists because are brain is working. As soon as our brain does not function any more we are considered death. The region of our brain as such may be considered as the region of our being what we are. As soon as something goes wrong in the skull or a cerebral hemisphere is damaged, the person can become a total different being.

Mental training is very important for our brain. The food we do have to give it, is not as such material food. The brain-teasers, intellectual exercise is a necessary element for growing into the adult person who can think reasonably well. It does not only needs mathematics but also a daily intake of God’s word to ensure the growth of spiritual well being.

The Lord Jesus likened himself to life-giving bread:

“I am the bread of life…the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world…This is that bread which came down from heaven…he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever” (John 6:48, 51, 58).

It may sound strange to find something which came down from heaven, now not as manna or white flakes, but as somebody who could be seen, touched, bleed and have his bones broken. He spoke about his heavenly Father Who is a Spirit, can not be seen by man or they would die, has no flesh, blood or bones and Who is omnipotent. Somebody Who knows everything and can alow anything to exist or not to exist.

Egg, rye and multigrain bread loaves. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Those who heard that man telling the onlookers he was “the Bread of Life” and that their ancestors ate the manna bread in the desert and died, but that now they could see a Bread that truly came down out of heaven, made some cross. It looked madness when that man also said that anyone “eating this Bread will not die, ever”. But every decent man knew that we all shall die. So how could this man claim to be “the living Bread”! — “who came down out of heaven”?

What they did not know is that the worker’s son of Joseph and Miriam (Mary/Maria) was placed in a particular way in the womb of his mother. By the Force of God this man was born. It was decided in heaven by the Most High Creator that the young girl or virgin would be blessed with child, without intercourse. There he stood in the flesh and was speaking about presenting “bread” that came to the world so that people living in that world could eat and live of it and not die. He even saying that he is that bread that he will give to be his flesh, which he will give for the life of the world. At this, the Jews started fighting among themselves:

“How can this man serve up his flesh for a meal?”

But Jesus didn’t give an inch.

“Only insofar as you eat and drink flesh and blood, the flesh and blood of the Son of Man, do you have life within you. The one who brings a hearty appetite to this eating and drinking has eternal life and will be fit and ready for the Final Day.”

Only after he had died and was taken out of dead, his followers started to understand how the flesh of their rabbi is real food and how his blood is real drink. We to should come to understand that this man is the one who can get us to know his heavenly Father, who is the Only One God. By getting to know Christ Jesus and figuratively eating his flesh and drinking his blood we shall be able to enter into him and he into us. This becoming in Christ and like Christ shall not make us to be Christ like Jesus, who was in God was not God Himself, but stayed the son of God, Christ enabled us also to become the children of God and to be a son or a daughter of God.

In the same way that the fully alive Father sent Jeshua to the earth and Jesus lived because of Him, so the one who makes a meal of Jeshua (Jesus Christ) lives because of him and shall be able to come close to Jesus his Father, the Only One God. Jesus said such things while teaching in the meeting place in Capernaum. (see John 6:48-59)

These profound statements caused great consternation even among his followers, some of whom left, never to return. If only they had put aside their own prejudiced interpretation and listened to his simple explanation:

“The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63).

The Son of God was the figurative bread from heaven because he spoke the words of God that were the source of spiritual strength and health.

To Abraham a great nation was promised and initially only they were on the lookout for a Saviour sent by their God. Jesus at first, was sent only to the Jews, a fact confirmed by his conversation with the Canaanite woman:

“She came and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their master’s table” (Matthew 15:22-27).

Remarkably, this Gentile recognized what the children of Israel had failed to see, that here was the antitypical manna. Nothing daunted, she humbly begged for just a few crumbs to fall her way.

The world today also does not recognise that meal for our life. The heavenly bread is not known by many, but those who got to know it should share it with others.

“Bread of Life Shop” sno-Balls and food to go window shop, Jackson Avenue, New Orleans. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The world should get to know the One Who is behind all what we see around us. In the things we can see and feel we should get to see and feel the Master-hand. All the beauty of nature which science tries to come to understand is incredibly put together in a very smart way people often can not understand.

In seeing all that beauty and recognising what we all may have around us, though we do not deserve it, should make us think. Is it not special that we can have all those things. By which mercy or grace do we earn it?

From the Old Books we get to know that people have made a mess of those things which were given in their hands. god had His Own chosen people, but they often riposted against their Creator. He was so patient with them and so willing to even adapt certain regulations, not having Him the one who changed but having Him changing things for the good of the people. Many lost a good relationship with the Most High Divine Creator. In God’s mercy the Gentiles now have the opportunity to enter into covenant relationship with this God of Abraham through the blood of His son, the Nazarene Jew Jeshua, Jesus Christ or the Messiah.

The essential factor being knowledge of His Will and Purpose and a dedicated attempt at obedience:

“And this is life eternal that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent” (John. 17:3).

Yes it is important to come to know the Only True God. He also has given us many possibilities to get to know Him. There is His Word written down in the Bible or Holy Scriptures. He also has given His son who can bring us to him if we carefully listen to his words and follow his commandments. An unlimited supply of the bread of life is readily available to us but we must hungrily seek it in the word that has been miraculously preserved for our use. If we take the initiative, God immediately responds:

“Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you” (James 4 :8)

Preceding articles:

Finding God amid all the religious externals

Seeing or not seeing and willingness to find God

People Seeking for God 1 Looking for answers

People Seeking for God 2 Human interpretations

People Seeking for God 3 Laws and directions

People Seeking for God 4 Biblical terms

To be continued: People Seeking for God 6 Strategy

Please find also to read:

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Wonder Bread (ponderingtheheartofjesus.com)
Have you ever heard of “Wonder Bread?” For a time it had disappeared from grocery stores, but it is back and making many a peanut butter and jelly sandwich to feed many people! Good news! Today, though, a different kind of “Wonder Bread” that feeds many people comes to my mind. It is said in our Father’s word that there was a believer in Jesus by the name of Stephen. He was a man full of God’s grace and power and he did great “wonders” and miraculous signs among the people.
Jesus as the Bread of Life in the Book of John (the-scarlet-thread.com)
Early Christians were often accused of practicing cannibalism because they talked about eating Christ’s flesh and drinking His blood. But this refers to our communion with Him by faith. This is symbolized in the bread we eat at the Lord’s Supper.Not only is bread a staple, but Jesus spoke of Himself in this way, as “the bread that came down from Heaven”, to draw His hearers’ minds back to the wandering in the wilderness; to the manna God fed to His people.
In a Manger (sherreesblog.wordpress.com)
We know that Mary gave birth in the quiet, dark stable and, having no other option, laid the baby in the manger used to feed the animals every day.
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The word ‘manger’ is from the French word meaning ‘to eat.’ In French Bibles, the word for manger is ‘mangeoir’ or a place for eating. What do you put in a manger? Food.It occurs to me that Jesus is, on some level, food. John quoted some of Jesus’ thoughts on this in John 6. Jesus said, “I am the Bread of life.” John 6:35

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Just as we take in food to sustain physical life, we must take in Jesus to sustain spiritual life. Feeding on Jesus, our daily bread, we fuel a life that will never die, a life that grows more abundant and blessed with every passing day and year.
A Prayer A Day – ‘The Bread of Life’ Is All We Need… 1/23/2014 (dailyprayerprayertogod.wordpress.com)
When I was in my late teens I loved to make bread. I would make cinnamon bread and cheese bread or just plain bread from scratch. I loved to knead the dough and I loved the smell of the dough with the yeast and it always amazed me when I would set it aside covered with a clean towel and come back later to find that it had risen and expanded and it smelled so good. There is nothing like the smell of bread in the oven baking. So the Lord brought all these memories to my mind this morning as I was awaking from sleep. Bread. When we look up the word bread we find that bread is nourishment, bread is provision and bread is sustenance. Bread is food or sustenance; livelihood.
Desire for Bread (levelupgeneration.wordpress.com)
Food are so important to us that we plan for it in advance. Some people buy in the market their food for one week and some for two weeks. When we get our wages, normally every 15th and 30th of the month, the first thing in our list of priorities is food.
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When typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) hit Leyte, Eastern Samar and some other part of the region, we are all witness of how important food and water is. People there is saying, money is worthless. For them everything is worthless but food and water. People there are willing to kill or be killed for the sake food to eat and water to drink.
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Jesus is saying, “I am the bread of life”. We should be hungry for Him everyday. We should desire for Him more than anything else.
A Bologna Sandwich or the Bread of Life? (easttexasaglow.net)
Sometimes I wonder if the Church has fed the world a lot of baloney (properly spelled bologna). In our efforts to be relevant to the culture in which we live, we have packaged Jesus as if He were just so much lunchmeat. We have dressed Him up, tried to make Him look cute, and diluted the Gospel. Sometimes we have even added processed cheese to enhance our presentation of Truth!
How many calories of the bread of Life are you consuming… (thewearypilgrim.typepad.com)
You see if we really want to feed on the bread of life, this Manna…first we need to pull out our maps and see how far we moved out of Egypt. Or have we just navigated lines across the page in our bibles, and in our minds convinced ourselves we’ve travelled a long way…when in reality we haven’t moved an inch.
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How much of my life, am I willing to sell? Do I really want the bread of life to be my daily diet…or is the biggest portion of my diet going to come from Egypt…while I get take out, manna, when I feel desperate. Maybe I’ll feel a twinge of guilt because the wardrobe I’ve dressed my life in won’t fit anymore…and I’ll try the God diet for a few weeks just to get them to fit again.
Jesus the bread of life (mommaandgirls13blog.wordpress.com)
Sometimes you read the bible feeling like you just read a foreign language other times it’s like woah, And just stunned all Gods done for us past present future.
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And feed on what’s eternal, not worldly!! Worldly pleasures only last a short lifetime if even that. We need to focus on our heavenly Fathers kingdom, out future home, our eternal home.
Bread of life (viktoriaveigas.wordpress.com)
My child, I sense your hunger to grow. No one who seeks My presence leaves empty. I will feed you, body, soul, and spirit. Come, sit at My feet daily, and we will share together. I’ve baked an abundance of delicious bread you’ve never even tasted. My manna is not of this world, but once you eat it, you will never be hungry again. I will fill you up with Myself.
The True Bread (cbcirwin.wordpress.com)
Jesus provided physical food supernaturally for those who were following Him and listening to His teachings.
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Jesus is the true bread. He told the crowd, “I am the Bread of Life.” (6:35) But, it requires spiritual eyes to see Him, the hidden manna. To those at Pergamus, Jesus offers the hidden manna to he who overcomes. And unlike the manna in the wilderness, His sustaining power will never cease. For all who come to Him will never hunger and he who believes in Him shall never thirst. (v. 35)

Bible containing scientific information

Posted on 2013/11/19 by Christadelphians

Does the Bible contain scientific information unknown at the time?

Answered by Jonathan Burke

Some attempts to find scientific knowledge in the Bible are misplaced. For example, in Isaiah 40:22 the ‘circle of the earth’ does not describe the earth as a sphere; the Hebrew word for ‘circle’ is used, not the Hebrew for ‘sphere’ or ‘ball’. However, the Bible does contain information which has historically been of considerable scientific value.

Demythologizing the cosmos

Aristotle (Photo credit: Lawrence OP)

Unlike every other Ancient Near East cosmology, the Bible describes the universe in naturalistic terms. The sun, moon, and stars are inanimate objects rather than gods, the universe was not created from the recycled body parts of divine beings, and the universe operates according to fixed laws. Early Jewish and Christian commentators understood that nature is regular and orderly, since everything in nature takes place according to fixed laws which God has instituted, which never change. [1] [2]

This concept of the universe, which we take for granted, was revolutionary in the Ancient Near East and was not even approached by the Greeks until around the 4th century BCE. In fact the inadequacy of Greek science led to a complete dead end. [3] Unable to free itself completely from mythology, Greek science finally stagnated and failed to advance any further. [4] Western science was not revived until the 6th century CE Christian philosopher John Philoponus challenged the pagan cosmology inherited from the Greeks. [5]

“Expositio et quaestiones” in Aristoteles De Anima by Johannes Buridanus, 1362?.

A pagan Greek philosopher, Proclus, had written a massive polemical commentary explicitly criticizing the Biblical description of the universe and its origin, on the grounds that it was scientifically unsupportable. Philoponus destroyed Proclus’ arguments in his reply, demonstrating the many flaws in Proclus’ work. [6] He also wrote numerous commentaries on Aristotle’s works which identified their errors, using the Biblical cosmology as his tool. [7] This breakthrough was instrumental in the formation of Western science as we know it. [8] Philoponus’ work was used by later scientific investigators such as such as Bonaventure, Gersonides, Buridan, Oresme, Gianfrancesco Pico della Mirandola, Galileo Galilei, and Isaac Newton, all of whom made significant scientific progress as a result.

The universe had a beginning

Philoponus had defended the Christian cosmology, deriving powerful arguments from observations of the universe that it must have had a beginning, and that it was finite in duration. He singlehandedly debunked the greatest pagan philosopher and cosmologist in recorded history (Aristotle), as well as burying Proclus’ criticism of the Christian cosmology. Later Jewish and Christian cosmologists throughout the medieval era made similar arguments, based on the same observations. Christian scientists from Francis Bacon to Isaac Newton all understood this, for centuries.

Incredibly, some of the greatest 20th century scientists such as Eddington and Einstein claimed it could not be true (apparently Einstein later said it was possibly the greatest error in his career). Eddington even admitted he didn’t want it to be true, for philosophical reasons. [9] It was only recently that scientific evidence for the ‘Big Bang’ proved that the universe did indeed have a beginning and would have an end, contrary to what many scientists had believed.

Health & hygiene regulations

Examples of cleansing rituals (and other commandments), carried out under the Law of Moses with excellent hygiene benefits include:

Carrion is not to be eaten (Leviticus 7:24)
The examination and cleansing of objects known to have come into contact with infectious persons, and their destruction if they are unable to be cleansed (Leviticus 13)
The quarantine and routine inspection of those suffering from infectious diseases, and the washing or destruction of objects touched by that individual while infected (Leviticus 13, 14)
Dwellings known to be infected with mold are to be repeatedly cleansed and examined until the mold has been completely removed, persons in the dwelling to wash themselves and their clothes, any physical material in the house which carries the mold is to be disposed of outside the residential area (and replaced with new material), and if the dwelling cannot be cleansed or if the mold keeps reoccurring the entire dwelling is to be destroyed and the debris disposed of outside the residential area (Leviticus 14)
Men and women with abnormal genital discharges were to wash themselves and their clothes, if they touched anyone or anything without washing their hands that person or thing had also to be washed (Leviticus 15)
Cleansing rituals involved washing with running water, avoiding the danger of stagnation and the transmission of infection by contaminating a static body of water with unclean material (Leviticus 15)
Those in contact with a dead body to wash themselves and their clothes, and any open container which was in a room where a person had died was to be considered unclean, together with its contents (Numbers 19:11-20)
Latrines to be dug well clear of residential areas (Deuteronomy 23:12-13)

Historical, medical, and scholarly commentary on these passages has noted the value of these instructions. [10] [11] [12] [13] George Washington actually used and enforced the hygiene rules in the Law of Moses to improve the health of his troops, and to give them a significant advantage over their English enemies, who were not so aware. [14]

Egyptian medical science was crippled by its belief in the supernatural cause of many illnesses. [15] The Law of Moses never attributed sickness to supernatural evil such as demons (unlike the nations around them). This gave them a tremendous advantage when approaching the issue of health and medicine. [16] [17]

References

[1] Sirach chapter 16, verses 26-28, 180-175 BCE.

‘When the Lord created his works from the beginning, and, in making them determined their boundaries, he arranged his works in an eternal order, and their dominion for all generations. They neither hunger not grow weary, and they do not abandon their tasks. They do not crowd one another, and they never disobey his word.’

[2] Basil of Caesarea, ‘Hexamaron’, chapter 5, sections 10, 370 CE.

‘It is this command which, still at this day, is imposed on the earth and, in the course of each year, displays all the strength of its power to produce herbs, seeds, and trees. Like tops, which after the first impulse continue their evolutions, turning upon themselves, when once fixed in their center; thus nature, receiving the impulse of this first command, follows without interruption the course of ages until the consummation of all things.’

[3] John McKenna, article ‘John Philoponus, Sixth Century Alexandrian Grammarian, Christian Theologian and Scientific Philosopher’, Quodlibet Journal, Volume 5, Number 1, January 2003.

‘The Greek concept of God caused a deep confusion between cosmology and theology and was a dead-end to science, as we know it in our time.’

[4] Wilderberg, ‘John Philoponus’, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

‘Reading Philoponus as well as the writings of his great adversary Simplicius, one gets the sense that in the 6th century CE, traditional pagan Greek learning had become desperately insular.’

[5] Dan Graves, ‘Aristotle’s Earliest Creationist Critic’, 1998.

‘A widespread religion of Philoponus’s time was pantheism, a belief system that sees God as equivalent to nature. In his rejection of this, Philoponus argued that the Creator transcends nature rather than being within it. Having been created, nature exists without constant intervention by God. This radical conception shocked the pagans who believed the gods were imbedded within the material universe.’

[6] Wilderberg, ‘John Philoponus’, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

‘The Athenian Neoplatonist Proclus (c. 411-485), the teacher of Philoponus’ own teacher Ammonius, had written a defense of the pagan Greek (Aristotelian, Platonist) belief in the eternity of the world. His aim was to show that Christian creationism was intellectually untenable.’

‘Like the polemic against Proclus, Against Aristotle is mainly devoted to removing obstacles for the creationist. If Aristotle were right about the existence of an immutable fifth element (ether) in the celestial region, and if he were right about motion and time being eternal, any belief in creation would surely be unwarranted. Philoponus succeeds in pointing to numerous contradictions, inconsistencies, fallacies and improbable assumptions in Aristotle’s philosophy of nature relating to these claims. Dissecting Aristotle’s texts in an unprecedented way, he time and again turns the tables on Aristotle and so paves the way for demonstrative arguments for non-eternity.’

[7] John McKenna, article ‘John Philoponus, Sixth Century Alexandrian Grammarian, Christian Theologian and Scientific Philosopher’, Quodlibet Journal, Volume 5, Number 1, January, 2003.

‘However, of greatest important is Philoponus’ cosmology, based upon his monotheism. Believing that heaven and earth were both created by God ex nihilo he vehemently attacked Aristotle’s assumptions with regard to the eternity of the universe and its dichotomy into a heavenly and sublunary region.’

[8] Dan Graves, ‘Aristotle’s Earliest Creationist Critic’, 1998.

‘Philoponus’s application of Christian theology to physics prefigured a new era in science. The Alexandrian scholar was the first to combine scientific cosmology (the study of the nature of the universe) with monotheism and the Christian doctrine of creation. In doing so, Philoponus anticipated not only the findings but also the methods of modern science.’

‘Philoponus’ replies anticipated the great Renaissance scientists Galileo (1564-1642) and Simon Stevin (1548-1620).’

[9] Arthur Eddington, ‘The End of the World: From the Standpoint of Mathematical Physics’, Nature, volume127 (1931), p. 450.

‘Philosophically, the notion of a beginning to the present order is repugnant to me.’

‘I should like to find a genuine loophole.’

Eddington also acknowledged that the theory of the universe expanding, as proved by Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity, was a powerful argument for the truth of the Biblical description of the universe as having a beginning (Eddington, ‘The Nature of the Physical World’).

‘Religion first became possible for a reasonable man of science in the year 1927’

[10] C. Singer and E. A. Underwood, ‘A Short History of Medicine’, 1962.

‘Among the physicians of classical antiquity we find no consistent view of transmission of infection by contact. Indeed the whole idea of infection was effectively absent from them, so that preventive measures based upon them could not be developed. It was reserved for the Middle Ages to conceive serious official measures against spread of epidemics. These measures were constantly derived from the leper ritual of the Bible with its fundamental concept of isolation.’

[11] Kim Taylor, ‘Toxic Mold Assessment: Mitigation, and Prevention’, Federal Facilities Environmental Journal (Summer 2004), p. 60.

‘The first documented residential mold assessment and remediation was reported in the Old Testament (Leviticus 14) in which identification, evaluation, and cleanup methods were described. The cleanup methods described in Leviticus have not significantly changed in the present day.’

[12] Peter M Baldwin, ‘Contagion and the State in Europe, 1830-1930′ (1999), p. 5.

‘The ancient Jews had been the first to develop not only the rules of contagionist prophylaxis detailed in Leviticus, but had also formulated other pertinent aspects of public hygiene: a weekly day of rest, protection of the food and water supply, concern with abnormal discharges of the genitals and more general bodily cleanliness, including perhaps (if one is willing to attribute also functional motives to religious rituals) circumcision.’

[13] T Thulchinsky & E Varavikova, ‘The New Public Health: An Introduction for the 21st Century’ (2000).

‘The Hebrew Mosaic Law of the five Books of Moses stressed prevention of disease through regulation of personal and community hygiene, reproductive and maternal health, isolation of lepers and other “unclean conditions”, and family and personal sexual conduct as part of religious practice.’

‘It also laid a basis for medical and public health jurisprudence. Personal and community responsibility for health included a mandatory day of rest, limits on slavery and guarantees of the rights of slaves and workers, protection of water supplies, sanitation of communities and camps, waste disposal, and food protection, all codified in detailed religious obligations.’

‘Food regulation prevented use of diseased or unclean animals, and prescribed methods of slaughter improved the possibility of preservation of the meat.’

‘The Mosaic Law, which forms the basis for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, codified health laws for the individual and for society, all of which have continued into the modern era as basic concepts in environmental and social hygiene.’

[14] Colonel Robert Anderson, Office of the Surgeon General Department of the Army of Washington, ‘The Evolution Of Preventive Medicine In The United States Army, 1607-1939′ (1968).

‘Like Pringle, Brocklesby, Tilton, and others, Washington invoked the Mosaic sanitary code, as stated in the Fourth and Fifth Books of Moses in the King James Version of the Old Testament, Numbers 5: 1-4 and Deuteronomy 23: 12-14. This is shown in the facsimile reproduction (fig. 7) of the broadside of his general orders for the Army under the command of Brigadier General McDougall, issued at Head Quarters, Peeks-Kill [in October? 1777]. A copy of this broadside (43) is reprinted as appendix A, p. 189. In this broadside, Washington refers to Moses as “the wisest General that ever lived, for he was inspired.” He might also, with good reason, have referred to him as “the Founder of Preventive Medicine,” as proclaimed by Wood and others (44).’

[15] The Eber Papyrus (a collection of Egyptian medical texts).

‘When thou meetest a large tumour of the God Xensu in any part of the limb of a person, it is loathsome and suffers many pustules to come forth; something arises therein as though wind were in it, causing irritation. The tumour calls with a loud voice to thee: it is a tumour of the God Xensu. Do nothing there against.’

[16] Ashland Theological Journal, (29:170), review ‘Powers of Evil: A Biblical Study of Satan & Demons’ (1997).

‘In contrast to contemporary Ancient Near-Eastern texts, the OT makes no reference to demon possession or exorcism, nor do the people exhibit undue fear or fascination with these spirits.’

[17] Richard Hess, ‘Review: A Reassessment of the Priestly Cultic and Legal Texts’, Journal of Law and Religion, Volume 17, #1/2 (2002), p. 378.

‘Milgrom argues that there is a basic distinction between the religious understanding of spiritual forces in the ancient Near East and in Israel. In the former, priests used rituals and incantations to thwart the evil powers and intentions of demons. P eliminated the world view that held demons responsible for the evil in the world. In its place, people were to be held responsible for the wickedness. In this sense, people replaced demons.’

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Picture of Isaac Newton, Galileo Galilei and Albert Einstein (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Replies:

Russell Hamner

your looking for the wrong kind of science, it is indeed political science and social science that has been hidden from you. do some research and reasoning. moses came down the mountain with two tablets, leviticus for the oganization of religion for social science, and deuteronomy for the oganization of political science, seperated by numbers which tells you to count all who are able to go to war i.e. government, and not to count the levites i.e. religion. in effect separation of church and state, so.. the covenant of god demonstrates the seperatio of church and state, the constitutionalist formed the united states, and the constitution on the seperation of church and state or in other words they formed them on the covenant of god.

look out into your world and watch… it is coming to and end as you know it, soon the kingdom will come upon you as a thief in the night, for god has revealed his purpose, the wheel she is big and she turns very slowly but yet it comes, and yet it is upon you. repent for the kingdom of god is upon you lest the wheel crush you under its heel.
Brandy Williams

Oh my did you all do your home work, however, I have a slightly different outlook. I think that the Bible is full of many different types of sciences; social, medical, governmental, and personal. Even archeologicly. While being the written word of God the practical uses for everyday life was amazing and the governmental applications the best ever displayed. If we all followed them now maybe we wouldnt be in these messes. Socially all the knowledge you need is to love thy neighbor as thy self and it is a magor undertaking to do so at times. I call that art a science! Personally why would you follow Gods order for all the different types of tithing its built to make you prosper and geez at the amount of training it takes to do that! Another science to me. We dig stuff up out of the dirt all the time that proves that the people of biblical times had to be smart ie the babylonian light bulb! I think we tend to over think things instend of practality, we need to focus on what is at hand. Why should any of us care how we make it to the other side as long as Jesus is our center. All we should do is focus on making the time we are given a type of heaven on earth and seek His kingdom first, treat others as we would be treated and watch a move of God spring from the works of our faith and hope. You know those things unseen. What good is it to be a believer is waiting to die some horrible death? Even though I may give myself up to be burned my life now is so much more important than how I leave this life and enter the next. Focus boys focus! Who is our focus?! Nothing but Jesus!
Michael

Russell, I’m not sure where you came up with this perspective but I see several errors you might want to resolve. God was to be the King of the Jews, the same God that inhabited the Temple, the same God that will rule with “a rod of iron.” The Jews did not obey the “separation of church and state” proscribed in the tablets, they rejected God in doing so. (1 Sam. 8:7) God appointed the kings, all the way to the Messiah through the same line. The two tablets don’t separate “church and state,” we don’t even know how many words were on each. The logical split, however, first reveals our relationship with God (commandments 1-4) and then reveals our relationship with each other (commandments 5-10). Leviticus vs. Deuteronomy? Deuteronomy, literally, means “second law,” but practically it is the second “telling.” Those that were present at the time of the first reading had perished, judged for doubting God and His character. Those who had grown up or been born during those forty years then received the same law. “it is indeed political science and social science that has been hidden from you. do some research and reasoning”??? Considering what you wrote, I would encourage you to do the same. “the wheel she is big and she turns very slowly…lest the wheel crush you under its heel”??? Mixed metaphors doesn’t come close, there is no heel on a wheel, oh my! Read Genesis over again, and once you understand who the “seed of the woman” is and the references to bruising, move on, but slowly.

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Galileo Galilei. Portrait by Ottavio Leoni. Detail. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Additional reading:

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Evidence from science, philosophy and history against Mormonism, the Church of Latter Day Saints (LDS) (winteryknight.wordpress.com)
“In contrast to the self-sufficient and solitary absolute who creates ex nihilo (out of nothing), the Mormon God did not bring into being the ultimate constituents of the cosmos — neither its fundamental matter nor the space/time matrix which defines it. Hence, unlike the Necessary Being of classical theology who alone could not not exist and on which all else is contingent for existence, the personal God of Mormonism confronts uncreated realities which exist of metaphysical necessity.
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Mormons believe in an eternally existing universe, such that matter was never created out of nothing, and will never be destroyed. But this is at odds with modern cosmology.The Big Bang cosmology is the most widely accepted cosmology of the day. It is based on several lines of evidence, and is broadly compatible with Genesis. It denies the past eternality of the universe. This peer-reviewed paper in an astrophysics journal explains. (full text here)
Mathematical Cosmology – Math, Physics, Cosmos (mountainviewranchstore.com)
Mathematical cosmology seeks to explain the often complicated theories of our universe.
Jerry Coyne’s Twisted History of Science and Religion (forbes.com)
In his latest post on the topic, he promotes the false belief that there is a fundamental conflict between science and religion, and he even makes the wild (and admittedly unproven) claim “that had there been no Christianity, if after the fall of Rome atheism had pervaded the Western world, science would have developed earlier and be far more advanced than it is now.” (For some thoughts on that theory, see this post.)Historians have long realized that the great conflict between science and religion is a myth. But it continues to be an article of faith among the New Atheists. In contrast to his views on evolution, Dr. Coyne thinks that he can ignore the evidence from history and disregard the settled view of experts in the field. But, being a scholar and a rational man, we’re sure that he will change his mind if shown to be wrong.
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Steven Weinberg said it best, ‘science is a corrosive to religion .. and it’s a good thing too’. The church fought hard and long to keep the earth as the centre of the universe, to keep mankind as a result of ‘special creation’, to keep disease and natural disaster as a product of god’s wrath due to the evil of mankind. Anything that might damage the ‘faith and morals’ of the common folk was forbidden regardless of it’s truth .. not exactly a pro-science view. (Edward MacGuire)
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Enter Copernicus. His book caused a massive change in the way people thought about the universe. If you think this was a problem for the church: It was even more of a problem for the universities. Copernicus actually delayed the publication of his book, not because he was worried about the church, but because he worried about the academics! If I recall the history correctly, this was more than just a new model: It was “experimental” mathematics. (Izak Burger)
‘Less Than 1 in 479 Million’: Mathematician Calculates Impossibility of Contriving Creation Account (christiannews.net)
A mathematician with a historical timeline organization has calculated that there is less than a 1 in 479 million chance that Moses, the author of Genesis, made up the Biblical creation account.Margaret Hunter is owner of Bible Charts and Maps: an organization that produces the Amazing Bible Timeline. The timeline is a circular chart that portrays Biblical events—based on the scholarship of Bishop James Ussher—alongside other significant historical happenings. According to Bible Charts and Maps’ website, over 50,000 people have purchased the Amazing Bible Timeline.
+Hunter quoted a letter from the Smithsonian Department of Anthropology, which says “the Bible, in particular the historical books of the Old Testament, are as accurate historical documents as any that we have from antiquity and are in fact more accurate than many of the Egyptian, Mesopotamian, or Greek histories.”

Ultimately, says Hunter, “The Bible is not a book of mythical stories of made up people fighting made up enemies, but a factual history confirmed by archaeological evidence at least as far back as archaeology has been able to take it.”
How to falsify a religion using scientific or historical evidence (winteryknight.wordpress.com)
I notice that a lot of new atheists seem to think that “I don’t like it” can refute a religion. What I often see among atheists is this tendency to set up expectations of how God would have acted and then complain that he doesn’t met those expectations. I don’t think that this is a good way to argue against a religion, because it’s subjective. God isn’t obligated to comport with atheist expectations.So in this post, I wanted to show how a reasonable person can evaluate and reject different worldviews using evidence.
With Lines and Angles – Euclid – Changed the World – One Person (onepersonchangedtheworld.wordpress.com)
In the Elements, Euclid deduced the principles of what is now called Euclidean geometry from a small set of axioms. Euclid also wrote works on perspective, conic sections, spherical geometry, number theory and rigor.
What Caused the Big Bang? A Master Mason and Knight Templar Offers a Unique New Approach to Multiverse Cosmology (prweb.com)
“In the pages of “What Caused the Big Bang?, I introduce a striking new cosmology that transcends the models of Divine Creation and a spontaneous Big Bang that had no cause.””My book is written for people who are spiritual but not religious, who respect science but are not atheists,” Augustine noted. “If you have no use for the creation story in the Bible and likewise find the claim that the Big Bang just ‘spontaneously happened’ to be unconvincing, then you may indeed like what my book has to offer.”
Rare edition of the Bible on display in the Quad Cities (radioiowa.com)
A very rare edition of the Bible is now on display in the Quad Cities. It’s a copy of the first hand-written and hand-illustrated Bible in more than 500 years, that was commissioned by Saint John’s University in Minnesota, and took 15 years to complete.

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