A quarter of British Christians do not believe in the resurection

[Angrboda]

I don't know what this was supposed to mean. I don't see anything wrong with those writings--which are consistent with the NT.

Yo, S2, did you just change someones post?

That was me. I got interrupted while composing the post.

[SteveII]

I don't know what this was supposed to mean. I don't see anything wrong with those writings--which are consistent with the NT.

Yo, S2, did you just change someones post?

No, she edited the post.

---

I hear this line of thinking often repeated here. I just don't see how the interpretation of NT scripture has changed since the beginning. Do you have examples of where the Apostolic Fathers' writings on doctrine differed from Nicea, to Augustine, to Luther, to Calvin, to Wesley to today?

It is readily discovered that the theologians of the primitive age disagreed regarding the soul's immortality.1 Several of them "were persuaded that the soul was mortal by nature but could become immortal by good works, or, as others preferred to stress, by union with the Spirit of God, a teaching they thought to find in St. Paul" (Brady, p. 465). Specifically the teaching of innate immortality is absent from the Apostolic Fathers, those Christian writers who lived nearest to or whose lives partly paralleled the last of the apostles. The trend toward the view of inherent immortality, it will be shown, developed with the subsequent Ante-Nicene Fathers.

http://www.truthaccordingtoscripture.com...O_iJWdw-Uk

As I said, constantly changing.

I don't think that article comes any where close to "constantly changing" For the first 200 years, we have writings of people going back and forth whether everyone's soul is immortal or just the Christians'. I think the NT canon is pretty clear on the subject. How many of them would have had the entire NT at their disposal in a language that they understood enough to do detailed exegesis?

This particular topic also does nothing to support the argument that the definition of Christianity has changed since the beginning (or can be changed by consensus). At best, it is tangential to the core teachings which define Christianity.

[vorlon13]

um . . .

I think the Nicene Creed is 'widely' regarded as the litmus test for conferring 'Christian' status on an individual.

[Angrboda]

I don't think that article comes any where close to "constantly changing" For the first 200 years, we have writings of people going back and forth whether everyone's soul is immortal or just the Christians'. I think the NT canon is pretty clear on the subject. How many of them would have had the entire NT at their disposal in a language that they understood enough to do detailed exegesis?

This particular topic also does nothing to support the argument that the definition of Christianity has changed since the beginning (or can be changed by consensus). At best, it is tangential to the core teachings which define Christianity.

First off, I never said anything about "core doctrine" (whatever that is) being changed from the views of the Apostolic Fathers. That's a double goalpost shift on your part, and you can take that straw man and put him back where you found him. The fact is the Judeo-Christian tradition is one of interpreting and reinterpreting texts. From the "finding" of Deuteronomy to Matthew retconning numerous passages from the Septuagint and turning them into prophecies to the Christian reinterpretation of the meaning of the Messiah to the early schisms among the Gnostics, Marcionites, Ebionites and so forth to the Christological battles of the early church to the modern apologetic redefine of slavery in the bible to the Catholic church's "rethink" on Galileo and evolution to a little thing called "the Protestant Reformation" -- the church history through its ages has been a long trail of interpreting and reinterpreting texts to fit emerging demands. At one time things like the Exodus and the global flood were considered literal truths; it's telling that two popular AF Christians, Wooters and Catholic_Lady, consider them less so. Your inviolate doctrinal truths have been the whore of theologians from the very beginning. But even if this were not so, the fact is that Christianity at its heart is the interpretation of a text, and that has consequences. Far from being slave to some inviolate doctrine, you are its unwitting masters, and you will remain so until the end of time. No Apostolic Father can gainsay the consensus of collective individual believers upon the meaning of the text. Their "authority" only exists in your mind, subjectively, along with all the rest of the interpretations of "core doctrine" which you currently hold. The true determinant of the texts' meaning is individual Christians. And there's nothing you can do to change that.

[SteveII]

I don't think that article comes any where close to "constantly changing" For the first 200 years, we have writings of people going back and forth whether everyone's soul is immortal or just the Christians'. I think the NT canon is pretty clear on the subject. How many of them would have had the entire NT at their disposal in a language that they understood enough to do detailed exegesis?

This particular topic also does nothing to support the argument that the definition of Christianity has changed since the beginning (or can be changed by consensus). At best, it is tangential to the core teachings which define Christianity.

First off, I never said anything about "core doctrine" (whatever that is) being changed from the views of the Apostolic Fathers.  That's a double goalpost shift on your part, and you can take that straw man and put him back where you found him. The fact is the Judeo-Christian tradition is one of interpreting and reinterpreting texts.  From the "finding" of Deuteronomy to Matthew retconning numerous passages from the Septuagint and turning them into prophecies to the Christian reinterpretation of the meaning of the Messiah to the early schisms among the Gnostics, Marcionites, Ebionites and so forth to the Christological battles of the early church to the modern apologetic redefine of slavery in the bible  to the Catholic church's "rethink" on Galileo and evolution to a little thing called "the Protestant Reformation" -- the church history through its ages has been a long trail of interpreting and reinterpreting texts to fit emerging demands.  At one time things like the Exodus and the global flood were considered literal truths; it's telling that two popular AF Christians, Wooters and Catholic_Lady, consider them less so.   Your inviolate doctrinal truths have been the whore of theologians from the very beginning.  But even if this were not so, the fact is that Christianity at its heart is the interpretation of a text, and that has consequences.  Far from being slave to some inviolate doctrine, you are its unwitting masters, and you will remain so until the end of time.  No Apostolic Father can gainsay the consensus of collective individual believers upon the meaning of the text.  Their "authority" only exists in your mind, subjectively, along with all the rest of the interpretations of "core doctrine" which you currently hold.  The true determinant of the texts' meaning is individual Christians.  And there's nothing you can do to change that.

The whole phrase was "core teachings which define Christianity". This is the topic we are discussing--for instance, you mentioned the resurrection --this is a core doctrine and an essential part of the definition of Christianity. You can claim that Christianity interprets and reinterprets texts but what texts? The words of Jesus are really clear and not open to interpretation and that is what the definition of Christianity rests on. Even if you think Jesus never existed or said those things, it does not matter--the definition is set.

[Brian37]

First off, I never said anything about "core doctrine" (whatever that is) being changed from the views of the Apostolic Fathers.  That's a double goalpost shift on your part, and you can take that straw man and put him back where you found him. The fact is the Judeo-Christian tradition is one of interpreting and reinterpreting texts.  From the "finding" of Deuteronomy to Matthew retconning numerous passages from the Septuagint and turning them into prophecies to the Christian reinterpretation of the meaning of the Messiah to the early schisms among the Gnostics, Marcionites, Ebionites and so forth to the Christological battles of the early church to the modern apologetic redefine of slavery in the bible  to the Catholic church's "rethink" on Galileo and evolution to a little thing called "the Protestant Reformation" -- the church history through its ages has been a long trail of interpreting and reinterpreting texts to fit emerging demands.  At one time things like the Exodus and the global flood were considered literal truths; it's telling that two popular AF Christians, Wooters and Catholic_Lady, consider them less so.   Your inviolate doctrinal truths have been the whore of theologians from the very beginning.  But even if this were not so, the fact is that Christianity at its heart is the interpretation of a text, and that has consequences.  Far from being slave to some inviolate doctrine, you are its unwitting masters, and you will remain so until the end of time.  No Apostolic Father can gainsay the consensus of collective individual believers upon the meaning of the text.  Their "authority" only exists in your mind, subjectively, along with all the rest of the interpretations of "core doctrine" which you currently hold.  The true determinant of the texts' meaning is individual Christians.  And there's nothing you can do to change that.

The whole phrase was "core teachings which define Christianity". This is the topic we are discussing--for instance, you mentioned the resurrection --this is a core doctrine and an essential part of the definition of Christianity. You can claim that Christianity interprets and reinterprets texts but what texts? The words of Jesus are really clear and not open to interpretation and that is what the definition of Christianity rests on. Even if you think Jesus never existed or said those things, it does not matter--the definition is set.

Ok, if you want to believe a man survived that act of torture and manor of death, you can believe that crap till you are blue in the face, but in reality, THAT DOES NOT HAPPEN. 

If you murder a human like the bible claims, THEY DIE AND STAY DEAD.

"Doctrine" is a bullshit word to make a fantasy myth sound lofty and true. It is a claim, not a reality. It is a naked assertion and science says nobody survives the manor of death as claimed in the bible. Nobody has magic super powers.