Deuteronomy32-39 demystified

 No Other gods/God - Deut. 32:39

Translators have different interpretations here. The usual trinitarian translation has God (YHWH) saying something like this:

“See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand.” - KJV.

Thus they say that the Word cannot be called 'a god' since God (YHWH) has no god beside Him.

But some trinitarian translators have rendered it this way:

“See ye that I alone am, and there is no other God besides me: I will kill and I will make to live: I will strike, and I will heal, and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.” - Douay.

“Now see that I, even I, am He, And there is no God besides Me; I kill and I make alive;
I wound and I heal; Nor is there any who can deliver from My hand.” - NKJV.

“Don’t you understand? I am the only God; there are no others. ….” - CEV.

“Now, see that I, and only I, am God! There is no other God! ….” - ERV.

“See, I am the only God. There are no others.” - God’s Word.

“See now that I alone am He; there is no God but Me.” - Holman Christian Standard Bible.

In these renderings there is no other God, but that would not rule out the fact that other ‘gods’ may be with Him.

…………………….

Even if you choose the “no god with [or besides] me” interpretation, it is not necessarily a trinitarian ‘proof.’ It has to do with the context of God’s statement here. Here it is in context:

32:15“But Jeshurun [Israel] grew fat and kicked— You are grown fat, thick, and sleek—
Then he forsook God who made him, And scorned the Rock of his salvation. 16 “They made Him jealous with strange gods; With abominations they provoked Him to anger.
17 “They sacrificed to demons who were not God, To gods whom they have not known, New gods who came lately, Whom your fathers did not dread. 18 “You neglected the Rock who begot you, And forgot the God who gave you birth. ….

21 “They have made Me jealous with what is not God; They have provoked Me to anger with their idols. So I will make them jealous with those who are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation, ….

39 “See now that I, I am He, And there is no god besides Me; It is I who put to death and give life. I have wounded and it is I who heal, And there is no one who can deliver from My hand.” - NASB.

……………

God (YHWH) here has been consistently speaking of Israel’s love affair with false gods. Obviously none of these are acceptable to God - none of these are “with” Him nor are anything compared to the True God. So it is probable that the verse in question is speaking of false gods only.

This does not mean that God does not call God-appointed persons (including men and angels)‘gods.’

The majority, if not all, recognized scholars (mostly trinitarian, of course) admit this. These include scholars from the early centuries of Christendom until now. Some of those I have found are:

"In the language of the OT ... rulers and judges, as deputies of the heavenly King, could be given the honorific title ‘god’ ... or be called ‘son of God’.” - footnote for Ps. 82:1.

And, in the footnote for Ps. 45:6, this trinitarian study Bible tells us: “In this psalm, which praises the [Israelite] king ..., it is not unthinkable that he was called ‘god’ as a title of honor (cf. Isa. 9:6).” - The NIV Study Bible, Zondervan, 1985

The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, Zondervan, 1986, tells us:

“The reason why judges are called ‘gods’ in Ps. 82 is that they have the office of administering God’s judgment as ‘sons of the Most High’. In context of the Ps. the men in question have failed to do this.... On the other hand, Jesus fulfilled the role of a true judge as a ‘god’ and ‘son of the Most High’.” - Vol. 3, p. 187.

The highly respected (and highly trinitarian) W. E. Vine tells us:

“The word [theos, ‘god’ or ‘God’] is used of Divinely appointed judges in Israel, as representing God in His authority, John 10:34” - p. 491, An Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words.

B. W. Johnson's People's New Testament says for John 10:34-36:

"Is it not written in your law. In Psa. 82. I said, Ye are gods? It was there addressed to judges. Christ's argument is: If your law calls judges gods, why should I be held guilty of blasphemy for saying that I am the Son of God? Sanctified. Set apart." -

And Barnes’ Notes tells us in commenting on John 10:34, 35:

The scripture cannot be broken. See Matthew 5:19. The authority of the Scripture is final; it cannot be set aside. The meaning is,

‘If, therefore, the Scripture uses the word "god" as applied to magistrates, it settles the question that it is right to apply the term to those in office and authority. If applied to them, it may be to others in similar offices. It can not, therefore, be blasphemy to use this word as applicable to a personage so much more exalted than mere magistrates as the Messiah.’ -Barnes' Notes on the New Testament

Young’s Analytical Concordance of the Bible, Eerdmans, 1978 Reprint, “Hints and Helps to Bible Interpretation”:

“65. GOD - is used of any one (professedly) MIGHTY, whether truly so or not, and is applied not only to the true God, but to false gods, magistrates, judges, angels, prophets, etc., e.g. - Exod. 7:1; 15:11; 21:6; 22:8, 9;...Ps. 8:5; 45:6; 82:1, 6;  97:7, 9...John 1:1; 10:33, 34, 35; 20:28....”




Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Abingdon, 1974 printing,

“430. [elohim]. el-o-heem’; plural of 433; gods in the ordinary sense; but spec. used (in the plur. thus, esp. with the art.) of the supreme God; occasionally applied by way of deference to magistrates; and sometimes as a superlative: - angels, ... x (very) great, judges, x mighty.” - p. 12, “Hebrew and Chaldee Dictionary.”




The New Brown-Driver-Briggs-Gesenius Hebrew-English Lexicon, 1979, Hendrickson, p. 43:

Elohim [‘gods’]: “a. rulers, judges, either as divine representatives at sacred places or as reflecting divine majesty and power.... b. divine ones, superhuman beings including God and angels.... c. angels Ps. 97 7 ...”




The trinitarian New American Bible, St. Joseph ed., 1970, says in a footnote for Ps. 8:6:

“The angels: in Hebrew, elohim, which is the ordinary word for ‘God’ or ‘the gods’; hence the ancient versions generally understood the term as referring to heavenly spirits [angels].”




Some of these trinitarian sources which admit that the Bible actually describes men who represent God (judges, Israelite kings, etc.) and God’s angels as gods include:

1. Young’s Analytical Concordance of the Bible, “Hints and Helps...,” Eerdmans, 1978 reprint;

2. Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, #430, Hebrew & Chaldee Dict., Abingdon, 1974;

3. New Bible Dictionary, p. 1133, Tyndale House Publ., 1984;

4. Today’s Dictionary of the Bible, p. 208, Bethany House Publ., 1982;

5. Hastings’ A Dictionary of the Bible, p. 217, Vol. 2;

6. The New Brown-Driver-Briggs-Gesenius Hebrew-English Lexicon, p. 43, Hendrickson publ.,1979;

7. Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, #2316 (4.), Thayer, Baker Book House, 1984 printing;

8. The International Standard Bible Encyclopaedia, p. 132, Vol. 1; & p. 1265, Vol. 2, Eerdmans, 1984;

9. The NIV Study Bible, footnotes for Ps. 45:6; Ps. 82:1, 6; & Jn 10:34; Zondervan, 1985;

10. New American Bible, St. Joseph ed., footnote for Ps. 45:7; 82:1; Jn 10:34; 1970 ed.;

11. A. T. Robertson, Word Pictures, Vol. 5, pp. 188-189;

12. William G. T. Shedd, Dogmatic Theology, Vol. 1, pp. 317, 324, Nelson Publ., 1980 printing;

13. Murray J. Harris, Jesus As God, p. 202, Baker Book House, 1992;

14. William Barclay, The Gospel of John, V. 2, Daily Study Bible Series, pp. 77, 78, Westminster Press, 1975;

15. The New John Gill Exposition of the Entire Bible (John 10:34 & Ps. 82:6);

16. The Fourfold Gospel (Note for John 10:35);

17. Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible - Jamieson, Fausset, Brown

(John 10:34-36);

18. Matthew Henry Complete Commentary on the Whole Bible (Ps. 82:6-8 and John 10:35);

19. John Wesley's Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible (Ps. 82:1).

20. Theological Dictionary of the New Testament ('Little Kittel'), - p. 328, Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1985.

21. The Expositor’s Greek Testament, pp. 794-795, Vol. 1, Eerdmans Publishing Co.

22. The Amplified Bible, Ps. 82:1, 6 and John 10:34, 35, Zondervan Publ., 1965.

23. Barnes' Notes on the New Testament, John 10:34, 35.

24. B. W. Johnson's People's New Testament, John 10:34-36.

25. The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, Zondervan, 1986, Vol. 3, p. 187.

26. Fairbairn’s Imperial Standard Bible Encyclopedia, p. 24, vol. III, Zondervan, 1957 reprint.

27. Theological Dictionary, Rahner and Vorgrimler, p. 20, Herder and Herder, 1965.

28. Pastor Jon Courson, The Gospel According to John.



(Also John 10:34, 35 - CEV: TEV; GodsWord; The Message; NLT; NIRV; David Guzik)

James Tour vs. Lee Cronin: yet more postgame commentary.

 

An uprising in the kingdom of the titans?

 

The true hope for our dead: the Watchtower Society's commentary.

 A Marvelous Hope

Wol.JW.org

WILL death continue for all time to claim victims and occasion expressions of grief? Or, is there any hope that death will be abolished and that those now held fast in its grip will be released?

Since Jehovah God gave life to the first human pair, Adam and Eve, it logically follows that he can also restore to life those who are now sleeping in death. This is what the ancient patriarch Job believed. On account of the intense suffering he was enduring, he directed these words to God: “O that in Sheol [gravedom] you would conceal me, . . . that you would set a time limit for me and remember me! . . . You will call, and I myself shall answer you. For the work of your hands you will have a yearning.”​—Job 14:13-15.

Basis for Hope

By reason of God’s creating Adam and Eve and endowing them with the ability to procreate, humans are the ‘work of God’s hands.’ As descendants of sinner Adam, they are imperfect and subject to death. Yet God does not want to see the human family as a whole reduced to the lifeless dust from which he created the first man Adam. He yearns or longs for the day that he has determined upon for restoring billions of dead humans to life.

That we might have confidence in his ability to resurrect the dead, Jehovah God at times empowered men to do this. He also inspired men to provide a dependable record of past resurrections. This record is contained in the Bible. What do we learn from it?

The Hebrew prophet Elijah raised the only son of a widow who lived in the city of Zarephath. (1 Ki. 17:21-23) At Shunem, in the northern part of Israel, Elijah’s successor Elisha resurrected the only son of a prominent hospitable woman.​—2 Ki. 4:8, 32-37.

Many centuries thereafter Jesus Christ brought great happiness to a number of persons who had lost loved ones in death. Jairus, a presiding officer in a synagogue near the Sea of Galilee, had the joy of seeing his daughter raised from the sleep of death. A widow at Nain, to the southwest of the Sea of Galilee, saw her only son come to life on the very bier that the bearers were carrying to a tomb outside the city. Mary and Martha of Bethany, not far from Jerusalem, had their brother restored to them after he had been dead four days.​—Mark 5:22, 35, 41-43; Luke 7:11-17; John 11:38-45.

Later, two of Jesus’ apostles were instrumental in restoring dead persons to life. The apostle Peter resurrected Dorcas (Tabitha) at the Mediterranean coastal city of Joppa. (Acts 9:36-42) And at Troas, in the Roman province of Asia, the apostle Paul raised Eutychus from the dead.​—Acts 20:6-12.

The most remarkable resurrection of all time was that of Jesus Christ. That resurrection was thoroughly established as fact. Upward of five hundred witnesses saw the risen Christ. So overwhelming was the evidence that the apostle Paul pointed out that denial of the resurrection meant denial of Christian faith as a whole. He stated: “If, indeed, there is no resurrection of the dead, neither has Christ been raised up. But if Christ has not been raised up, our preaching is certainly in vain, and our faith is in vain. Moreover, we are also found false witnesses of God, because we have borne witness against God that he raised up the Christ, but whom he did not raise up if the dead are really not to be raised up.”​—1 Cor. 15:13-15.

Kinds of Resurrections

The resurrection of Jesus Christ, however, was very different from that of all others who were restored to life during the first century C.E. and earlier. He experienced a change in nature. The Bible tells us that he was “put to death in the flesh” but “made alive in the spirit.” (1 Pet. 3:18) Only those chosen from among mankind to be associate rulers with him share in a resurrection like his​—a resurrection to immortal spirit life in the heavens. Regarding these, the Bible says: “Happy and holy is anyone having part in the first resurrection; over these the second death has no authority, but they will be priests of God and of the Christ, and will rule as kings with him for the thousand years.”​—Rev. 20:6.

Note that this kind of resurrection is called the “first resurrection.” Hence, there must be yet another resurrection involving the billions of dead humans who will come under the rulership of Jesus Christ and his associate king-priests. Describing this latter resurrection as he saw it in a vision, the apostle John wrote: “The sea gave up those dead in it, and death and Hades [gravedom] gave up those dead in them.”​—Rev. 20:13.

But where will all those dead persons be raised? They will be resurrected to life on earth, as were those whom the Hebrew prophets, as well as Jesus and his apostles, resurrected. That there will be a resurrection to earthly life is also confirmed by what was revealed to John about the changed conditions to exist on earth among mankind. We read: “The tent of God is with mankind . . . And he will wipe out every tear from their eyes, and death will be no more, neither will mourning nor outcry nor pain be anymore. The former things have passed away.”​—Rev. 21:3, 4.

But might the removal of death from humankind pose untold problems due to overcrowding of the earth? No. Why not? Because God’s original purpose was that the earth be filled, not overpopulated. (Gen. 1:28) So we can rest assured that the One who has the ability to restore the dead to life will have no difficulty in seeing to it that this earth will continue to be a delightful home for mankind.

What Will Be Resurrected?

Raising people from the dead is indeed a stupendous miracle. Since what humans are as persons appears to be inseparably linked with their physical bodies, many people find it hard to understand how resurrection is possible. In most cases, nothing remains of the dead person’s physical organism. The corpse may even have been burned or perhaps devoured by birds, fish or beasts. So how can those who are resurrected really be the same persons who died?

The creation of Adam makes it clear that what made him a person was what God did. The elements from which Adam was made had no personality. However, when Jehovah God energized the lifeless body composed from elements of the ground, Adam became a person with a distinct personality. The possession of the spirit of life that God put in the lifeless body when energizing it made Adam a living soul.​—Compare Genesis 1:21, 24 regarding “soul.”

What makes Adam’s descendants the personalities that they are is not the substance making up their bodies but the hereditary estate that is transmitted within that substance ​—an inheritance consisting of the qualities, traits and abilities that distinguish the possessors from others as persons. Furthermore, even in life the human body constantly undergoes change. The molecules making up a person’s body today are not the same ones as those that made up his body some seven years ago. Nevertheless, though his substances are different as to molecules, the person is still the same person. Why? Because the bodily organs and features are still there despite the gradual change of the molecules; even the fingerprints have remained the same.

Clearly, then, resurrection does not depend upon the preservation of the same molecules. The resurrected person can, in fact, even be of a different substance, as is the case with those raised to spirit life in the heavens. Of the heavenly resurrection, the apostle Paul wrote: “What you sow is not made alive unless first it dies; and as for what you sow, you sow, not the body that will develop, but a bare grain, it may be, of wheat or any one of the rest; but God gives it a body just as it has pleased him, and to each of the seeds its own body. . . . And there are heavenly bodies, and earthly bodies; but the glory of the heavenly bodies is one sort, and that of the earthly bodies is a different sort. . . . So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption, it is raised up in incorruption. It is sown in dishonor, it is raised up in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised up in power. It is sown a physical body, it is raised up a spiritual body.” (1 Cor. 15:36-44) However, for the resurrected ones to be the same persons, they must bear the personal identity of their former life.

That intangible thing​—the traits and qualities making organized matter a distinct person—​rests with God, and he is able to put that identical personality within the resurrection body. That is why the resurrected person is not merely a copy. He is the identical person, possessing every mental and emotional trait that made him what he was before his death.

This explains why Jesus said to his disciples: “Do not become fearful of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; but rather be in fear of him that can destroy both soul and body.” (Matt. 10:28) True, men can take away life, causing the body to become lifeless. But they cannot take away a person’s God-given title to be a living soul. They cannot blot out anyone from God’s provision for them to be awakened from the sleep of death. Only God can cancel a person’s opportunity of living again as a soul. When that is the case, the person is totally destroyed. Even if the identical molecules making up a person’s body could be assembled, these would be of no value without the God-given title for one to live again. God alone can supply that needed life-force.

Accordingly, the raising of the dead is possible only because God exists. While not spelling out the details, the Bible provides enough information for one to have a basis for solid faith in the resurrection. You can personally benefit from this marvelous hope both now and in the future. How?

2Corinthians4:4 demystified.

 2 Cor. 4:4 "Christ, who is the image of God"

First, an image, likeness, reflection (no matter how perfect) is still only an image - - it's not the real thing. It's not even equal to the real thing! 
2 Cor. 4:4 - "Christ, who is the image [eikon] of God". 

Notice, this is no longer the fleshly Jesus on earth. This is the resurrected, glorious, heavenly Christ. But he still is not God. He is the image of God! He is seated (or standing) beside God (Acts 2:33-36; Ro. 8:34; Heb. 10:12, 13; 1 Pet. 3:22). He is not God. The Father alone, beside whom Jesus is seated, is Jehovah God (Eph. 1:17, 20; Rev. 3:21; Ps. 110:1). In fact God (the Father alone) is the God of Jesus (Eph. 1:3, 17; Rev. 3:12; Micah 5:4, ASV).

Yes, Jesus is the image of God. And how should we consider the worship of an image of God as being God? (Ex. 20:4, 5; Lev. 26:1)

In spite of a man (and the heavenly Christ) being in the image of God, we don't know exactly what God looks like. ("No man has seen God at any time" [but many men have seen Christ, even after his resurrection] - Jn 1:18; 1 John 4:20). We know, however, that the man created by God to be in God's image and likeness (Adam), the son of God (Luke 3:38), was a single person. He could have easily been created as three separate persons. He could have been created with three faces. But God expressly made him (in his image) with one body, one head, one face, one mind, one personality: one person.

"...it is the whole of man, rather than some part or aspect of him, that is the image of God. The whole man, body and soul, is the image of God." - p. 508, New Bible Dictionary, Dr. J. D. Douglas, Ed., (Editor-at-large, Christianity Today), Tyndale House Publ., 1984. 

Jesus, too, being an image of God, had those very same qualities. Surely God, the one in whose image we are, is one person. Surely the God who Jesus perfectly reflects, then, is one person. (In spite of numerous rationalizations designed to show the "plurality" of God. Using such "evidence" we could even find many trinitarian-like generalizations and allegorical "proofs" to show that Christ himself is actually composed of many persons: a 'three-in-one' Christ, for example - See the TRIN-TYPE study.) 

The fact that a man is in God's image tells us (1) that a man cannot possibly be
that God, and (2) that God is a single person also (to correspond with a man being in His image). In the same manner, but more perfectly, we see (1) that Jesus, the image of God, cannot be God, and (2) that, again, as represented by the single-person Christ himself (God's perfect image), God must also be one, single person (the Father alone, Jehovah). 

It is highly significant that we never see Jehovah (or the Father, who alone is Jehovah) described as being in the image of God. He is
God (alone)! 

Would the inspired Bible writers (who knew the scriptures and knew that an image of God was not to be worshiped as God) really call Jesus an "image
of God" if they believed he actually was God? Would those same inspired writers who tell us to worship the Father in truth really believe we should worship Jesus as God and then call him the image of God?

- You must not worship an image of God. - Lev. 26:1, NIV.
- Jesus is the image of God. - 2 Cor. 4:4
- The Father is the only true God. - Jn 17:3 
- We must worship the Father in truth. - Jn 4:24


Posted by Elijah Daniels 

Norway's targetting of JWs: the minority report

 Jehovah’s Witnesses in Norway: Why the Oslo District Court Decision Is Wrong

Massimo Introvigne

On March 4, 2024, the Oslo District Court ruled against the Jehovah’s Witnesses and upheld the decisions of the government and the State Administrator of Oslo and Viken who denied the Jehovah’s Witnesses the state subsidies they had peacefully received for thirty years based on Section 16 of the Norwegian Constitution (“All religious and philosophical communities must be supported on an equal footing”). Registration as a religious organization of the Norwegian Jehovah’s Witnesses under Law No. 31 of April 24, 2020, was also denied.The District Court is aware that this was a difficult decision with serious consequences. It observes that at least, under Law No. 31 the lack of registration would not prevent the Norwegian Jehovah’s Witnesses to continue their activities and to teach what they teach everywhere in the world (except in a few totalitarian countries that have banned them, including Russia). The consequences of the non-registration are that they will not be eligible for state subsidies, nor will they be able to celebrate legally valid marriages.

       State subsidies in Norway are not a gift. Since the Church of Norway, a Lutheran denomination, is a state church supported by the government with transfers of money proportional to the number of its members, the Constitution mandates that to respect the principle of equality other religions should receive the same proportional subsidies. The judge himself acknowledges that not being able to celebrate legal marriages within one’s religious community may be perceived as discriminatory. He also agrees that the decision may have a broader “stigmatizing effect.”Yet, the judge believes that all these admittedly important factors “are not weighty enough” when compared to the fact that the Jehovah’s Witnesses, by practicing shunning, violate in his opinion their members’ freedom to change their religion. Shunning is the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ teaching recommending that members do not associate with those who have been disassociated as unrepentant of serious sins or have publicly disassociated themselves from the organization (as opposed to simply becoming inactive). Cohabiting relatives are not shunned, although they are excluded from the family’s religious activities.Here, I find the decision slightly confusing. At times, it seems that the judge regards the shunning both of adult and minor ex-members as grounds for his decision. In other passages, however, he seems to acknowledge that Law no. 31 includes a note that “if adult members of their own free will follow rules that restrict their rights and freedoms, they cannot be considered violations… Essentially, this also applies even if the obligations can be considered harmful.” In its conclusion, the decision cautiously focuses on the alleged violation of the “right to opt out” of children.The decision notes that the European Convention on Human Rights also guarantees the right to leave a religious organization. The judge is persuaded that Jehovah’s Witnesses in practice are prevented from leaving since they know that, if they leave, they will be shunned.

As mentioned earlier, it is at times unclear whether in the end the objection only concerns the shunning of minors or also extends to adults. In the second case, the decision is patently absurd and runs counter to dozens of decisions on shunning by jurisdictions in other countries, including supreme courts. They have noted that religious organizations have the right to self-organize themselves as they deem fit. Christian groups also have the right to interpret the Bible in their own way. The interpretation by the Jehovah’s Witnesses in this case is not even particularly original. Clearly, something similar to the shunning they practice today is taught in 1 Corinthians 5:13 (“Expel the wicked person from among you”) and 5:11 (“Do not even eat with such people”), and 2 John 10–11 (“Do not take them into your house or welcome them. Anyone who welcomes them shares in their wicked work”). Others may suggest a non-literal interpretation of these passages, but it is not for secular courts of law to second-guess religious organizations on their interpretation of the Bible.The main objection is, however, another. All human organizations have what sociologists call exit costs. By leaving a demanding but well-paid job I may gain more freedom but lose a good salary. The loss of the salary is my exit cost. Shunning is a typical exit cost. A spouse that decides unilaterally to divorce and to marry a different partner may be shunned by the abandoned ex-spouse, perhaps even by children. Members of a political party who quit and join a political organization with the opposite ideology may be shunned as traitors by their former comrades. Several religions, including Islam and branches of ultra-orthodox Judaism, treat “apostates” in a less charitable way than the Jehovah’s Witnesses.The Norwegian judge’s argument is that to avoid the exit costs we are compelled to remain in a religious organization we may no longer believe in and are thus denied our right to leave it that is enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights. But by applying the same argument, one can argue that marriage or political parties are also institutions that violate the rights of those who want to divorce or change political affiliation, since the exit costs may make them reluctant to leave.Sociologists know that eliminating exit costs is not possible. They are an unavoidable feature of organized social life. Sometimes, one has the impression that the enemies of the Jehovah’s Witnesses are precisely asking courts of law to compel those who do not want to communicate with their former co-religionists to do it, which is not only unfair but impossible. More often, opponents argue that what they want is that judges would prevent the organization of the Jehovah’s Witnesses from teaching shunning. But that would put the judges in the strange position of interpreting 1 Corinthians and 2 John and substitute their opinion to the one of a religious organization in determining what these venerable Biblical texts “really” mean.In the end, the Oslo judge found it safer to focus on minors who are first baptized and then, if they become unrepentant sinners, shunned. One can measure the cultural distance of the judge’s own feelings from those of any conservative religious group, not only the Jehovah’s Witnesses, when he wrote that he finds it “reasonable to expect” that most minors would engage in “sexual relations with their boyfriends or girlfriends.” Apart from the cultural problems of the judge in understanding conservative religion, he accepts the opinion of an “apostate” ex-member that minors are baptized and become Jehovah’s Witnesses when they are not mature enough to understand their obligations. But surely this is a drastic conclusion one cannot arrive at on the basis of one witness or a few anecdotical examples. What would be required is a quantitative study of those baptized as minors. Nothing similar is quoted in the decision. Although Norway has introduced a system of “youth punishment” with more lenient penalties for them, minors can be tried from criminal offenses from age 15. If they are mature enough in Norway to stand a trial before a criminal court, perhaps they are also mature enough to make informed religious decisions.Once they have been baptized, minors run the risk of being shunned. Again, some opponents may have told the judge that this is not rare but among his numerous witnesses he found only one woman, now 40, who was disfellowshipped for a sexual offense and shunned as a minor, when she was 14, thus 26 years ago. She testifies that after a “short time” she was allowed to return to the fold by writing a “letter of regret” and attending a “short meeting.” There is simply no evidence that disfellowshipping minors, with the consequence that they are shunned (but not by cohabiting relatives), is more than a rare occurrence.It may be objected that a rare injustice would be an injustice, nonetheless. The answer is that, as the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) stated in cases about the dissolution of organizations of the Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia in 2010 (Jehovah’s Witnesses of Moscow and Others v. Russia) and 2022 (Taganrog LRO and Others v. Russia), denial or cancellation of registration of a religious organization is a serious measure with dramatic consequences for its members that states can adopt only in case of frequent and obvious crimes or misdemeanors. Shunning minors is not frequent, and the “principle of proportionality” between the fact and the sanction mentioned by the ECHR in its decisions about Russia would not be respected even if this was a crime.

But is it a crime? The judge himself admits that Jehovah’s Witnesses, in good faith, perceive shunning as a “loving and meaningful arrangement,” a painful medicine (painful, it should be added, for those who shun and not only for those who are shunned) that in many cases helps restoring family harmony and morality, as those shunned end up understanding their mistakes and repenting.According to the decision, the violation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child would be in the fact that to minors, just as to adults, would be denied the freedom to “opt out” of the organization. Afraid of being shunned, minors who would want to quit in the end are dissuaded from leaving the Jehovah’s Witnesses, which the judge thinks violates their right to change their religious affiliations. However, if the minors are mature enough to understand their obligations when they are baptized—and no evidence has been offered that this is not the case—they are aware of the exit costs just as the adults are. It is also false that a young boy or girl does not have experience of exit costs: he may decide to break a relation with a boyfriend or a girlfriend, quit a group of friends, leave a sport club, in extreme cases even leave the family and go live elsewhere. All these experiences have painful exit costs.The decision argues that, because youth are especially fragile, the experience of shunning is more traumatic for them. This is possible, but youths also have greater flexibility in socialization than adults. Young Jehovah’s Witnesses attend public schools, where after disfellowshipping they can continue to attend or newly enter into circles of friends who are not part of their former religion. The judge insists on the pain of not being able to communicate with grandparents who are Jehovah’s Witnesses. However, grandparents may cut ties with their children and grandchildren for a variety of reasons, none of which courts of law can really correct. And even outside the Jehovah’s Witnesses, minors who do something that is perceived by their relatives as a betrayal of the family or an expression of moral corruption may find themselves, for all practical purposes, “shunned.”It is difficult to disagree with professor of religious history, Dag Øistein Endsjø, who told the leading Norwegian Christian daily newspaper “Vårt Land” that the verdict is against numerous decisions rendered in other countries, as well as against the case law of the European Court of Human Rights where it would have limited chances to survive. It is also against simple logic. Perhaps a higher Norwegian court will acknowledge it even before the court in Strasbourg.

Isaiah42:8 demystified.

 Will Not Share Glory:

Is. 42:8 - "I am the LORD [Jehovah - ASV]: that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images" - KJV.

Heb. 1:3 - "[Jesus] being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person...sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high" - KJV.

After quoting the above two verses, some trinitarians will claim that they prove that Jesus is Jehovah.  They claim that if Jehovah will not share his glory with anyone else, then Jesus must be Jehovah because he shares Jehovah's glory.

Well, first we should note that others have "shared" or reflected Jehovah's glory.  For example, the angel at Luke 2:9 appeared with "the glory of the Lord."  God was not physically present, but the angel He personally sent to represent him was there with God's reflected glory to identify him as being from God and representing God.  This particular angel was not even Jesus since Jesus had already been born on earth (verse 11).  We see a similar thing at Rev. 21:10, 11 where the city of holy Jerusalem has descended from God and has the glory of God!  That is how it can be identified as being from God:  It has the glory of God!

Why, even some Christians will reflect God's glory: 2 Cor. 3:7-18.  And Jesus himself said that the glory which the Father had given him he had also given to his followers! - John 17:22.

So it certainly appears that God allows his glory to be with others who represent him as a sign of the authority He has given them and who do not represent that glory as being their very own.

But there is something else that makes the trinitarian argument incredibly poor (if not downright dishonest).  That is the actual meaning of "glory."  You see, "glory" meant, even as it does today, two different things.  Often it meant "honor" or "praise" which a person has earned.  On occasion, however, the same word  meant the visible, brilliant light radiating from something or someone.

So we can see that Isaiah also uses this meaning at Is. 60:1-3 where "shine," "light," "brightness" are used in conjunction with God's "glory" and that glory (`kaw-bode' in the Hebrew) will be seen.  We find this same meaning at Acts 7:55 (where the glory was seen), Luke 2:9 (where the glory `shone' all around them).  Obviously, a visible light-radiating type of glory is intended at these places.

But at Is. 42:12 and 43:7 we can see that the same Hebrew word "kaw-bode" clearly means "honor" or "praise."  In fact, that same Hebrew word ("kaw-bode") is even translated as "honour" at Ps. 66:2 (and 30 other places in the KJV).

Even today in modern English we have those same two meanings for "glory." 

(1) "Praise, honor, or distinction accorded by common consent; renown," and (2) "Brilliancy; splendor." - Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, ("Glory").

For example, we might say that the Nobel Prize winner did not want to share the glory with another scientist who had merely copied some of his scientific work.  "Glory" in this sense is not a visible brightness or radiance he gives off but the recognition, honor, and praise he will receive.  The glory of a beautiful sunset, however, is a visual brightness or beauty which others receive or observe.

So which meaning was intended at Is. 42:8?  (1) A shining visible "glory" given off by someone or (2) "praise" and "honor" owed to someone?

Well we can see from how it's used at Is. 42:8 that it clearly means "praise" or "honor" -  "I am [Jehovah]: that is my name [see Ps. 83:18] and my glory [`kaw-bode'] will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images."  This style of writing is very common in the Holy Scriptures.  It is called parallelism because similar (or parallel) meanings are written (in different words) beside each other.

For example: the familiar verse at Is. 9:6 begins "For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given."  You can easily see that the second clause ("unto us a son is given") is parallel (similar in meaning) to the first clause ("unto us a child is born").

We can see, then, that the entire verse at Is. 42:8 is about the honor that is due God alone.  Jehovah starts the verse by declaring his name (to which he has said honor is due forever - Ps. 83:18; Ps. 86:9; Ps. 113:1-3; Ps. 145:21; Ezek. 39:6, 7).  He then follows that with the parallelism: (1) "my glory [`kaw-bode'] I will not give to another" and (2) "neither my praise to graven images."  Clearly the word "glory" (paralleled by "praise" in the next statement of this verse) here means "praise" or "honor." - see Is. 42:12, 17. 

And just as clearly, we can see that the word "glory" at Heb. 1:3 means the visible radiance given off by him (as with the angel of Luke 2:9 who reflected God's glory). - see Heb. 1:3 in TEV, NIV.  In fact, some modern trinitarian Bibles even translate Heb. 1:3 as "He reflects the glory of God"   - RSV (compare NAB; MLB; GNB; and Moffatt's translation). 

Therefore, if God said "I shall not share the praise or honor due me" at Is. 42:8, what kind of "evidence" is it to point out that Jesus reflects God's visible radiance at Heb. 1:3?


John 17:5 
John 17:5 is also used by some trinitarians to show that Jesus had the glory of God:

“And now, Father, glorify me in your presence [para] with the glory I had with [para] you before the world began.” - NIV.

The key here is the Greek word para. This word literally means “beside,” “by the side of” (W.E. Vine, pp. 112 and 1040). So the first use of para in the NIV rendering above is clearly understood. 

But the second use in the NIV quote (“with”) is ambiguous. It could be understood (wrongly in this case) as Jesus shared the glory with God (which trinitarians want to be true). Whereas, it more honestly means Jesus asks to receive from God the glory he used to have when he was by the side of God.

That is why these trinitarian Bibles and scholars have rendered John 17:5 as:

“In xvii. 5 [Jesus] speaks of ‘the glory which I possessed at thy [God’s] side (para soi) before the world existed’, and in xvii. 24 of ‘my glory which thou gavest me because thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world’.” - p. 260, The Interpretation of the Fourth Gospel, C. H. Dodd.

“By the side of thyself.” - A. T. Robertson, p. 275, Word Pictures.

“what is involved [in John 17:5] is the glory that Jesus possessed before the foundation of the world in the presence of God” - p. 151, John 2, Ernst Haenchen.

“So now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.” - NRSV.

“Now, Father, do such honor to me in your presence as I had done me there before the world existed.” - An American Translation (AT), Smith and Goodspeed. 

“now, Father, glorify me in thy presence with the glory which I enjoyed in thy presence before the world began.” - Moffatt.

“So now, Father, glorify me up there in your presence just as you did before the world existed.” - C.B. Williams.

“now glorify me in turn, Father, alongside yourself with the glory that I did have alongside you before the world was.” - Byington.

John 17:5 - “5. WITH,] lit. ‘along-side of thyself .. along-side of thee.’” - Young’s Concise Commentary.

I don’t think anyone would deny that the Son of God had a glory of his own in heaven, as do the heavenly host. So this verse merely shows Jesus asking God that he be returned to the glory he previously had (which had been given to him by God - 17:24.)

John10:33 demystified.

 John 10:33 "a god" or "God"?

John is the only Gospel writer who used the word theos in all its meanings. It should not be surprising, then, that he is also the only Gospel writer who clearly applies the title theos directly to Jesus!  John, like some of those ancient Hebrew Scripture writers of the Old Testament who used elohim in all its various meanings, used it to mean the only true God over 90% of the time.  But in a few scriptures he used it to mean "a god" in its positive, subordinate, secondary sense.  A clear instance of this is found at John 10:33-36 where Jesus quotes from and comments on Psalm 82:6.

It is certainly better to use the trinitarian-translated New English Bible (NEB) here because it obviously translates theos correctly at John 10:33 ("a god") whereas the King James Version and many other trinitarian translations do not. 

The context of John 10:33-36 (and of Psalm 82:6 which is quoted there) and NT Greek grammar show "a god" to be the correct rendering. Young's Concise Critical Bible Commentary, p. 62, by the respected trinitarian, Dr. Robert Young, confirms this: 

"`makest thyself a god,' not `God' as in C.V. [King James Version or `Common Version'], otherwise the definite article would not have been omitted, as it is here, and in the next two verses, -- `gods .. gods,' where the title is applied to magistrates, and others ...."

It is also admitted that this is the meaning of Jn 10:33 by noted trinitarian NT scholar C. H. Dodd:
"making himself a god." - The Interpretation of the Fourth Gospel, p. 205, Cambridge University Press, 1995 reprint.

A Translator's Handbook on the Gospel of John by trinitarians Newman and Nida insists that "a god" would not be "in keeping with the theology of John" and the charge of blasphemy by the Jews, but, nevertheless, also admits: 

     "Purely on the basis of the Greek text, therefore, it is possible to translate  [John 10:33] 'a god,' as NEB does, rather than to translate God, as TEV and several other translations do.  One might argue on the basis of both the Greek and the context, that the Jews were accusing Jesus of claiming to be `a god' rather than 'God.' "- p. 344, United Bible Societies, 1980.

The highly respected (and highly trinitarian) W. E. Vine indicates the proper rendering here:
"The word [theos] is used of Divinely appointed judges in Israel, as representing God in His authority, John 10:34" - p. 491, An Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words.
So, in the NEB it reads: 

" 'We are not going to stone you for any good deed, but for your blasphemy. You, a mere man, claim to be a god.'  Jesus answered, 'Is it not written in your own Law, "I said: You are gods"?  Those are called gods to whom the word of God was delivered - and Scripture cannot be set aside.  Then why do you charge me with blasphemy because I, consecrated and sent into the world by the Father, said, "I am God's SON"?' "

Not only do we see John using theos in its positive alternate meaning here, but we also see Jesus clarifying it.  When some of the Jews were ready to stone him because they said he was claiming to be a god (Jesus' reply about men being called gods in the scriptures would have been nonsensical if he were replying to an accusation of being God), Jesus first pointed out that God himself had called judges of Israel gods (Ps. 82:6)!

Posted by Elijah Daniels

The ego that cogitates is beyond the grasp of the physical sciences?

 “Lived Experience” Is Science’s Blind Spot

Denyse O Leary

Seriously, last month we noted an article by University of Rochester astrophysicist Adam Frank at Big Think. There he protested the use of the term “hallucinate” to describe absurd chatbot glitches: “Its mistake is not a matter of making a false statement about the world because it doesn’t know anything about the world. There is no one in there to know anything about anything.”

In that short essay, he mentioned that he and two colleagues — Dartmouth College theoretical physicist Marcelo Gleiser and philosopher Evan Thompson — would publish a book this month, The Blind Spot: Why Science Cannot Ignore Human Experience offering a bigger picture. Now that the book is out, they talk a bit more about it:

Cosmology tells us that we can know the Universe and its origin only from our inside position, not from the outside. We live within a causal bubble of information — the distance light traveled since the Big Bang — and we cannot know what lies outside. Quantum physics suggests that the nature of subatomic matter cannot be separated from our methods of questioning and investigating it. In biology, the origin and nature of life and sentience remain a mystery despite marvelous advances in genetics, molecular evolution, and developmental biology. Ultimately, we cannot forgo relying on our own experience of being alive when we seek to comprehend the phenomenon of life. Cognitive neuroscience drives the point home by indicating that we cannot fully fathom consciousness without experiencing it from within. 

ADAM FRANK AND MARCELO GLEISER AND EVAN THOMPSON, THE “BLIND SPOT” IN SCIENCE THAT’S FUELING A CRISIS OF MEANING, BIG THINK, MARCH 7, 2024

The Heart of Science

What about the grand narratives of science? “At the heart of science lies something we do not see that makes science possible, just as the blind spot lies at the heart of our visual field and makes seeing possible.”

The tragedy the Blind Spot forces on us is the loss of what’s essential to human knowledge — our lived experience. The Universe and the scientist who seeks to know it become lifeless abstractions. Triumphalist science is actually humanless, even if it springs from our human experience of the world. This disconnection between science and experience, the essence of the Blind Spot, lies at the heart of the many challenges and dead ends science currently faces in thinking about matter, time, life, and the mind. 

FRANK, GLEISER AND THOMPSON, A CRISIS OF MEANING

What Gets Ignored

They are right about the dead ends. But is it true that the dead ends result merely from ignoring human experience? Surely, what’s ignored (or, more usually, denied or forbidden for discussion) is the immaterial nature of the human mind. Also off the table are questions like whether a cosmos where some beings (ourselves) clearly have immaterial intelligence can be created if an Intelligence does not underlie the universe. It’s quite likely that some fundamental questions cannot be answered within the allowed materialist framework.

But it’s interesting to see that these three thinkers are posing the questions — at least in this essay — in an open-ended way, almost as if they sense that dredging up pat materialist answers that don’t really work won’t help much.

The language of engineering proves superior to Darwinese in describing molecular biology.

 Is It Becoming Acceptable to Speak of Biological Systems and Processes in Terms of Design?

David Coppedge

To the question posed in the headline, the answer is: It seems that way sometimes. And can speaking about design in such a context be done without getting hammered by the press, censored, or ridiculed? Perhaps. We’ll see. In the following example, think of the Darwinese as packing peanuts that can be removed to get to the important items inside.

A remarkable paper was published in BioEssays in January, with three authors from the University of Washington, Steven S. Andrews, H. Steven Wiley, and Herbert M. Sauro. None has any known sympathies for intelligent design. And yet much of their paper, “Design patterns of biological cells,” could have been written by any one of the PhDs presenting ideas at the Conference on Engineering in Living Systems (CELS).

Design patterns are generalized solutions to frequently recurring problems. They were initially developed by architects and computer scientists to create a higher level of abstraction for their designs. Here, we extend these concepts to cell biology to lend a new perspective on the evolved designs of cells’ underlying reaction networks. We present a catalog of 21 design patterns divided into three categories: creational patterns describe processes that build the cell, structural patterns describe the layouts of reaction networks, and behavioral patterns describe reaction network function. Applying this pattern language to the E. coli central metabolic reaction network, the yeast pheromone response signaling network, and other examples lends new insights into these systems.

Taken for Granted

The authors do not question Darwinian evolution, taking it for granted some 14 times in the paper. They speak of “the evolution of complex life” and convergent evolution, even speculating on whether life on other planets would evolve the same way as it has on Earth. Such talk is common in biomimetics literature as well: e.g., one writer spoke of an ingenious solution that was “refined over more than 420 million years of evolution,” as if natural selection gave an organism a head start. We can safely dismiss such statements as either poetic license or a misunderstanding of evolution in its usual unguided sense.

The important items are these: a catalog of 21 design patterns presented as solutions to engineering problems that cells have solved. Here’s one example:

Pores and pumps

Problem

Cellular components, from ions to proteins, typically need to be localized to the correct sides of membranes, including the plasma membrane, nuclear membrane, and other organelle membranes.

Solution.

Trans-membrane pores and pumps that use either active or passive transport. These pores and pumps are typically quite selective about what molecules they transmit and are often gated by external signals.

Cell membranes are quite permeable to oxygen, carbon dioxide, and other small nonpolar molecules but are effectively impermeable to larger and more charged species, a property that is essential to establishing and maintaining cell organization. Transport of these latter species occurs via transporters and channels, including ion channels, passive and active transporters for ions or other small molecules, proton pumps, ABC transporters, photosynthetic reaction centers for electron transport, and ATP synthase proteins for mitochondrial proton transport. The nuclear pore complex is a particularly large pore, which enables passive transport of small molecules and performs active transport on proteins that carry nuclear localization or nuclear export signals.

Readers can enjoy all 21 of these design patterns at their leisure in the open-access paper. The key takeaway is that the authors are looking at cells not as poorly designed conglomerations of haphazard parts that some blind tinkerer cobbled together from whatever pieces of stuff were available, but as collections of elegant solutions to real problems familiar to engineers. It represents a noteworthy step toward design thinking in biology from an unexpected source.

Motivation for the Paper

In a video within the paper, Dr. Sauro from the Bioengineering Department explains what motivated the paper. He begins his answer by holding up a copy of Bruce Alberts’s textbook Molecular Biology of the Cell, a thick tome with 1,500 pages. 

We started thinking: Is there any way we could abstract this information at a higher level, to help us comprehend what’s going on in a cell? And we were struck by this other book, which is totally different, Design Patterns. It’s a famous book in computer science by a so-called Gang of Four. It’s an interesting book because it describes how to solve complex problems in a sort of simplified way. And we thought: Is there was any way to marry this book with the Alberts book? That’s basically what motivated us to write this paper.

Following the order of the Design Patterns book, the authors divided systems in molecular biology into the same three basic categories: creational (such as the synthesis of a protein), structural (such as a phosphorylation cascade with inputs and outputs), and behavioral (such as a relaxation oscillator). 

From this outline, the authors correlated the computer scientists’ design patterns with their actual implementations in cells. The implementations look like logic diagrams in circuit design. Mechanisms can be quite different, Sauro explains, and yet the underlying design pattern can be the same when examined at a higher level. 

Importance of the Paper

Dr. Sauro feels the paper is important for a number of reasons. It provides a new way of communicating ideas in molecular biology, so that computational theorists and experimentalists can understand each other. Another benefit of the approach is to motivate other biochemists to build on their scaffolding of design patterns. This assumes many more engineering solutions can be identified; indeed, Sauro hopes others will help construct a searchable database of design patterns. Machine learning, then, could recognize patterns in newly identified networks in living organisms, expanding our understanding cellular networks. This would be very helpful for complex signaling networks, for instance, when it is hard to determine what is going on. Machine learning could compare known design patterns with the input/output behavior of the components, leading to an “Aha!” moment that untangles the complexity into a recognizable logic diagram.

Sauro credits primary author Steven Andrews for the clear and readable form in which the paper was presented. He hopes many scientists will read it, because it covers a wide range of biology and should interest all biologists — and, we would add, engineers. It is a springboard for ideas that also might interest those preparing for the next CELS conference.

Design patterns are recurrent solutions to commonly encountered problems. All biological cells encounter the same problems of how to construct the biochemical components that they are built from, how to connect those components together into useful reaction networks, and how to use those reaction networks to animate life.

The authors are quick to acknowledge certain predecessors in biological design thinking. 

The idea of understanding cellular systems in terms of functional parts is of course not new. For example, Hartwell et al. argued for a modular view of cell biology, Del Vecchio et al. emphasized the central roles of control mechanisms, and Khammash’s group has focused on mechanisms that provide integral feedback control. In contrast to these and other works, our focus is larger, covering a wider swath of cell biology mechanisms. Also, our perspective is subtly different. Rather than focusing on a particular biological topic, our emphasis is on the development of a catalog of the solutions that cells have evolved to solve specific problems. This design pattern concept is useful for abstracting a broad range of cell functions into a manageable set of distinct patterns, enabling one to better see parallels and

Future of the Design Pattern Approach

Clearly, design thinking is a fruitful heuristic for discovery. But what about the “interlinked and hierarchical design patterns” mentioned next? Could those evolve? In the Illustra film Darwin’s Dilemma, such hierarchical patterns (exemplified in the body plans of the Cambrian fauna), are shown to resist Darwinian approaches because they require top-down design, as with a blueprint or logic diagram before assembly begins. Is this not the case with all “design patterns”?

The authors grant too much creativity to the neo-Darwinian mechanism. They assume that problems motivate their own solutions in biology:

Going even farther afield, one can speculate about life on other planets, where again the same problems would likely arise, and again would necessarily be addressed with many of the same solutions. This suggests that the design patterns listed here, along with others not addressed, could be reasonably considered universal principles of life.

Most likely this kind of speculation will wither on its own as the successors of Bruce Alberts add more pages to molecular biology textbooks. If, as the authors conclude, those involved in simulating cells will refer to a database of design patterns in their multiscale modeling, it should become increasingly clear that cells resemble engineered masterpieces. Darwinese would then decline as superfluous words in future research projects focused on design patterns.

The tech of muscles vs. Darwin

 

OOL researchers may have tossed the answer in the trash?

 Aliens in the Garbage

Daniel Witt

Garry Nolan is the Rachford and Carlota A. Harris Professor of Pathology at Stanford University. He is a productive and respected immunologist who has published more than 330 research articles, and is a pioneering inventor of laboratory tools for his field.  

He also believes in extraterrestrials — that is, intelligent non-human visitors to Earth. Though Nolan admits that the publicly available evidence has not yet reached the standard of scientific proof, he says that he has been personally convinced by the evidence he has examined. More importantly, he is adamant that whether extraterrestrial visits have actually happened or not, scientists should be exploring the possibility rather than ignoring it.

Not Everyone Agrees

Some people — whether they would put it in so many words or not — believe that certain types of answers are simply off-limits in a scientific inquiry. Nolan has no patience for this notion. He says: 

That’s not how a scientist operates. If you take a potential solution off the table and you throw it in the garbage, you could spend the rest of eternity searching around on the table for the answer, and you threw it in the garbage. 

That’s very well-put. There’s no harm in keeping a potential answer on the table, and there could be harm in tossing it in the trash. Without saying anything about the evidence itself, the philosophical principle underlying Nolan’s investigation is sound. And it’s a principle with much wider applications. 

By investigating the possibility of intelligent, non-human causes for certain phenomena, Nolan is, in fact, working as an intelligent design researcher — whether he would embrace that label or not (and I see no reason to think he would). The underlying logic of an argument for alien design in mysterious artifacts or conditions is the same logic underlying the arguments for design in the origin of life or the laws of the universe. 

Nolan seems to be aware of this. Asked in a recent interview what he considered the most fascinating aspect of biology at the cellular level, he had this to say:  

The micromachines and the nanomachines that proteins make and become. That to me is the most interesting: the fact that you have this, basically, dynamic computer within every cell that’s constantly processing its environment, and at the heart of it is DNA, which is a dynamic machine, a dynamic computation process. People think of the DNA as a linear code. It’s codes within codes within codes, and it is the, actually, the epigenetic state that’s doing this amazing processing. I mean, if you ever wanted to believe in God, just look inside the cell.

He goes on to say that the appearance of design goes all the way down to the laws of physics and the fabric of the universe itself. 

Yet as far as “wanting to believe in God” goes, Nolan isn’t sure that he does. He prefers to posit alien intelligences and remain agnostic, for the time being, about their natures. Within the bounds of pure science (not getting into philosophy), that’s a perfectly valid stance to take, since examining an artifact can’t tell you everything about its designer. Whether you personally think that God or a non-God extraterrestrial is the more credible explanation, the design inference is the same. 

Since he is making that inference in his research, it is not surprising that Nolan is running up against the same objection that other ID researchers do: the objection that certain types of explanation should be rejected a priori because they are (by definition) unscientific.

This Is All Well and Fine 

That is, as long as scientists happen to be investigating something with a true explanation that belongs to the set of approved options. But suppose it doesn’t? Suppose the real explanation lies in the “off the table” category of answers? (If you don’t think that’s possible, suppose.) Should any scientist spend his or her whole life looking for a type of answer that doesn’t exist? At what point do we start considering the off-limit options? That’s Nolan’s point about throwing a potential solution in the garbage — once you do that, you could be doomed to an eternity of futile searching.  

The pressure to dig around in the garbage for discarded explanations is growing in many scientific disciplines. It is probably strongest, at the moment, in the field of origin of life (OOL) research. The difficulty (read: impossibility) of crafting a coherent explanation for how self-replicating structures could arise through deterministic processes has led some scientists, such as Richard Dawkins and Francis Crick, to admit that alien intelligence is a possible cause. (So Dawkins and Crick join the ranks of intelligent design theorists, albeit unwillingly.) 

Honest OOL researchers admit that they reject ID arguments not because those arguments lack all merit, but simply because they are off the table, out-of-bounds. For example, take some interview comments by OOL researcher Joana Xavier (also discussed by David Klinghoffer in a recent post). She said:  

I read Signature in the Cell by Stephen Meyer… and I must tell you, I found it one of the best books I’ve read in terms of really pointing, putting the finger on the questions. What I didn’t like was the final answer, of course. But I actually tell everyone I can, “Listen, read that book. Let’s not put Intelligent Design in a spike and burn it. Let’s understand what they’re saying and engage.” And it’s a really good book that really exposes a lot of the questions that people try to sweep under the carpet. It’s just … I think we must have a more naturalistic answer to these processes. There must be! Otherwise I’ll be out of a job. [laughs]… I like to see myself as a very open-minded person in terms of metaphysics, but that’s not to say that the molecular study of the cell should just end. I don’t even think that the ID people want it to end — it’s just the pressure to accept that there’s no answer through naturalistic means that I’m a bit against.  

To her credit, Xavier is upfront about her reasoning. Not everyone is; some scientists would prefer to pretend that the case for ID is pure rubbish, rather than admit that they are simply working in a framework that cannot accept a conclusion of intelligent design. 

Xavier, by contrast, makes it quite clear that she does not believe in accepting a non-naturalistic answer to a scientific question. (I’m not sure whether she would apply this to the idea that a “natural” intelligent being, such as an extraterrestrial, created the first life.) It’s great she acknowledges that her community’s philosophical commitments don’t justify sweeping the arguments of ID proponents under the rug. But is it really practical to engage with an argument while giving yourself the rule that you cannot accept it? 

“This Appears Designed”

Xavier’s fear is that to say, “This appears designed,” would be to give up on the quest to find a natural cause: there might be one, but scientists would never find it because they ended their quest by shrugging their shoulders and saying, “I guess God did it.” 

Her fear is justified. It’s a real danger. Sometimes, things that at first glance appear designed turn out to have purely natural causes. We shouldn’t close our minds to naturalistic explanations just because an intelligent designer could have done it. 

But OOL researchers such as Xavier should realize that the opposite danger also exists. If you begin by saying, “Unguided natural causes did it,” then if unguided natural causes didn’t do it, you will miss the true explanation. You might, as Dr. Nolan said, “spend the rest of eternity searching around on the table for the answer, and you threw it in the garbage.”

Intelligent design theory is not opposed to naturalistic explanations. It is merely open to non-naturalistic explanations. You don’t have to throw any explanation in the garbage: not natural processes, not intelligent mind, not God, not aliens. The deeper purpose of science is not to find a naturalistic explanation, but to find the true explanation. Every possibility must remain on the table in the search for truth. 

Out of a Job?

Will that lead to OOL researchers being put “out of a job,” as Xavier fears? Well, it’s certainly true that once you find a definite answer to a problem, you may have little work left to do on that problem. So maybe one day (probably pretty far off) origin-of-life researchers will settle the question once and for all, and have nothing left to do. 

But is that the worst thing that could happen? Scientists work themselves out of a job all the time. Normally, when they do, they just move on to another question. Isn’t that better than throwing the answer in the garbage, just to ensure you can keep searching for it forever? 

The on again off again machine uprising is on again?

 

Isaiah43:11 and 2Peter3:18 demystified.

 Isa. 43:11 / 2 Pet. 3:18 Jehovah only Savior; Jesus Savior

Isa 43:11 "I, I am Jehovah; and there is no Saviour besides Me."   

2Pe 3:18 "But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and for ever. Amen." 

Since Jehovah said that there is no Saviour besides him and since Jesus and Jehovah are both called "Saviour", does that mean that they are both God?

There have been many saviors or deliverers (yasha – Hebrew, and soter – NT Greek) found in scripture who saved others through appointment by or commandment of God.  But there is only one most high source of salvation (or only one savior or deliverer [yasha/soter] in the highest sense of the word) – Jehovah, the Father.

Acts 4:10-12 actually says about Jesus, "whom God raised from the dead":  (12) "There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by [or `through'] which we may be saved." - NRSV.

"For of all names in the world given to men, this is the only one by which we can be saved." – JB & NJB.

"There is salvation in no one else!  Under all heaven there is no other name for men to call upon to save them." – LB.

Yes Jesus is our savior and king, but he is our only savior in the sense of being the only one (excluding God in heaven, the source of that salvation who sent him for this purpose) who gave us the opportunity for eternal salvation.  This is explained in John 3:17: "Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him." - NRSV. 

God is the source of salvation, Jesus was the instrument.

The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology also tells us: "Because God is the initiator [source] of salvation, both he and Christ are called soter, saviour ..." - p. 78, Vol. 2, Zondervan, 1986.

Notice what the very trinitarian NIVSB has to say in its introduction to the book of Judges:

  

"Title - The title ['Judges'] describes the leaders Israel had from the time of the elders who outlived Joshua until the time of the monarchy.  Their principal purpose is best expressed in 2:16: `Then the LORD [Jehovah] raised up judges who saved them out of the hands of ... raiders.'  Since it was God who permitted the oppression and raised up deliverers [saviors], he himself was Israel's ultimate Judge and Deliverer [Savior]."

This is well-illustrated at Judges 6:14 where Jehovah commands Gideon to save Israel.  But later, the saviour, Gideon, says it is Jehovah who is saving Israel (Judges 6:37).

Those who look for great "mysteries" in every Bible statement and those who look for revelations of a multiple-persons-in-one God could well take these scriptures to "prove" Gideon is Jehovah.  But it should be obvious to any objective student that Jehovah saved Israel through Gideon!

With that understanding in mind look at Jude 25.  Modern translators correctly render this verse:

"To the only God, our Savior through Jesus Christ [compare John 3:17]" - RSV.  Also see The Jerusalem Bible and William Barclay's Version.

  

(Notice the careful distinction at Jude 25 between "the only God" and "Jesus Christ our Lord" - compare John 17:1, 3.)  It might be worthwhile to examine Heb. 5:7 also - "Jesus offered up prayers ... unto Him that was able to save him."

It is clear that, as Ehud, Othniel, and Gideon were saviors because Jehovah was providing salvation through them, so Jesus, in a much larger sense, is also savior because Jehovah ("the only God") has provided salvation through him! - Compare 1 Thess. 5:9; 1 Peter 2:2 (modern translations); Rev. 7:10.

But what if we take the narrow meaning of spiritual savior?  Well, if Jehovah alone is savior [spiritual], and Jesus is savior [spiritual] because he saves (Greek: sosei - Matt. 1:21 and soso - John 12:47) men, then Jesus "must" be God.  But by this same reasoning, since some followers of Jesus also [spiritually] save (Greek: sosei - James 5:20 and soso - 1 Cor. 9:22) men, then they (the saviors of Obadiah 21?) 'must' also be God!

The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology also tells us: "Because God is the initiator [source] of salvation, both he and Christ are called soter, saviour ..." - p. 78, Vol. 2, Zondervan, 1986.

It might also be interesting to examine the meaning of Jesus' personal name.  Like the names "Joshua" and "Isaiah," Jesus' name literally means "Jehovah is salvation"!  And as the OT tells us Jehovah is the Father!

Posted by Elijah Daniels