Is Jesus in Danger of Hellfire?

[Guest]

No. It's definitely not unreasonable, Derek.

I just think it's unlikely that Jude didn't get it from The Book of Enoch.

If a person wishes to believe that the Bible (or any other book) is infallible ---- without error, then no matter what apparent error is brought up, there always seems to be a way in which one can get around it, and try to show that it is not a genuine error.

The Mormons do it with The Book of Mormon. The Muslims do it with the Koran. The Catholics do it with the Apocrypha (as well as with oral tradition).

I think it gives people a sense of security to hold to some writing or group of writings with total confidence. I am not going to try to upset that sense of security for anyone.

One might presume for my own stance, that I just "pick and choose" what I want to believe. That is not the case. Indeed, I believe some things mentioned and/or taught in the Bible that few believe today.

1. I believe in a literal 6-day creation which occured 6-10 thousand years ago.

2. I believe that unicorns existed.

3. I believe that the phoenix bird (there is only one) existed, and perhaps still exists.

I tend to take the words of the Bible at face value, unless they are clearly set out in figurative language, or in parables, or descriptions seen in visions (such as Revelation, or the vision of the transfiguration). I guess that's the main reason I interpret Matthew 24 and 25 futuristically. I cannot see them as having happened in 70 A.D. without re-interpreting most of the statements.

[Guest]

Paidon,

you wrote:

Modern experts are convinced that the book of Enoch was written after the time of Christ. Much of its language, and many of the ideas it contains parallels many passages in the New Testament.

I am curious as to why you are focusing on 1 Enoch as being written after the time of Christ? Everything I have found has the book written prior to Christ (though one source says parts of I Enoch might have been added later).

1 Enoch is commonly referred to simply as the Book of Enoch. It survives in the Ethiopic language, with small portions also extant in Aramaic and Greek. It is considered canonical by the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, and dates to the second century B.C. or earlier.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_En ... guation%29

A: Great questions!! The Book of Enoch is a book written between the Old and New Testaments. Probable date of writing was between 150-80 B.C. Copies of the Book of Enoch have been found among the Dead Sea scrolls. If this date is accurate, obviously the Book of Enoch was not written by the real Enoch who lived before the flood.

http://www.new-life.net/faq013.htm

James Charlesworth writes: "This pseudepigraph has evoked divergent opinions; but today there is a consensus that the book is a composite, portions of which are clearly pre-Christian as demonstrated by the discovery of Aramaic and Hebrew fragments from four of the five sections of the book among the Dead Sea Scrolls. One of these fragments, moreover, Hena, was copied in the second half of the second century B.C. The main question concerns the date of the second section, chapters 37-71, which contains the Son of Man sayings. J. T. Milik (esp. no. 755) has shown that this section, which is not represented among the early fragments, is probably a later addition to 1 Enoch; but his contention that it was composed around A.D. 270 (no. 755, p. 377) is very speculative.[emphasis added] If, as most specialists concur, the early portions of 1 Enoch date from the first half of the second century B.C., chapters 37-71 could have been added in the first century B.C. or first century A.D. The original language of 1 Enoch appears to be Aramaic, except for the Noah traditions, which were probably composed in Hebrew. The earliest portions display impressive parallels with the nascent thoughts of the Jewish sect which eventually settled at Qumran." (The Pseudepigrapha and Modern Research, p. 98]

http://www.earlyjewishwritings.com/1enoch.html

Not sure if you were trying to be misleading, but I hope not.


Resting in Christ,

Haas