(September 3, 2012 at 10:07 pm)teaearlgreyhot Wrote:(September 3, 2012 at 9:59 pm)Lion IRC Wrote: A few pages ago you were saying that preaching to the Gentiles was started by PAUL!
Neither Peter nor Paul were confused about Jesus' explicit invocation (instigation) to preach The Kingdom to EVERYONE....(who was willing to listen.)
And this is a critical thing for strong atheists and anti-theists to note. The Great Commission is to make the effort to spread the Gospel - nothing more. If a person tries their (humble) best and fails to convince an atheist that the Christian message is true, they are not condemned for failure.
Nobody can be forced to accept evidence they claim is unconvincing.
I said "Paul or whoever." I couldn't remember. And then you said it was Paul too but I found the passage I was thinking of and it was Peter.
And now you're begging the question. You're assuming Jesus actually said to preach to everyone to prove that Jesus said to preach to everyone and that Paul and Peter were doing this because Jesus said so.
The great commission is completely anachronistic. Christianity started out as a Jewish movement. Just answer this: If Jesus really said to preach unto everyone, why was it controversial to preach unto everyone in early NT writings? Why didn't Peter just quote Jesus? Why'd he have to have a vision to legitimate what was already supposedly legitimated!?!?!
Who cares about the existence of religious controversy. (Not unheard of among Jews like the Disciples of Jesus.)
The point here is that the controversy was motivated by good intentions;
- where do we start?
- what's most important?
- who is the best person to do what?
- how do we best explain the message to new hearers?