Not much time this morning. Breakfast post.
The trader team have been made prisoners and are about to be interrogated:
"Falkayn gripped his spirit as if it were a wrestler trying to throw him." (p. 97)
That reminds me of something. Jacob was renamed "Israel" when he struggled with God. This is also described as wrestling with the angel. But a Jesuit informed me that, Biblically, an angel just means the presence of God. The Hebrew Bible is a dialogue between a deity and a people. Dialogue can involve conflict. More generally, we struggle with spirit, God, something within and outside us.
21 comments:
Hmmm... angels are often described as "messengers" and with separate personalities.
Indeed. But my Jesuit guy thought he was getting closer to the meanings of the Biblical passages - or at least of some of them. Jacob struggles with "a man," "an angel" or "God."
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
And as centuries passed the Scriptures do show the angels as clearly distinct beings, as in the Book of Tobit. And the theophany granted to Isaiah shows the prophet seeing the Lord in glory attended by the cherubim in Isaiah 6.
And there has been many reports since Christ's time of angels appearing to various persons.
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Ad astra! Sean
Paul: I think your Jesuit was 'ret-conning' the Bible to be more monotheistic. Even Jewish monotheists regarded the world as full of spirits -- just that there was only one creator-God.
I think ur probably right. Religions are reinterpreted all the time, anyway.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
Of course there are many spirits. God, being the Creator, can make non-corporeal beings, the angels, if He so wished. That is one of the things gradually revealed in the OT and confirmed in the NT--and reaffirmed and defined as dogma by the Catholic Church.
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Ad astra! Sean
But religions change. I met another Catholic who said, "People thought of God as a king. A king has courtiers. Therefore, people thought that God had courtiers, angels. This was anthropomorphism."
Kaor, Paul!
And God is the King and Creator of the universe, so I see nothing odd in the angels being His courtiers.
More fundamentally, God created other beings capable of knowing they exist, and to love Him as God loves them.
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Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Nothing odd about it! Just that I met an intelligent practicing Catholic who thought that it was anthropomorphic. Ideas and beliefs change.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Then that makes me wonder if that other person denies the angels are real beings. If so, he is falling into error.
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Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
He denies they are real beings. Religions change.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Then this person is wrong and in serious error, denying a defined doctrine of the Catholic Church. Additionally, it also means he denies the fallen angels, demons, are real beings.
It has long struck me as very odd, and contradictory, that there are those who say they believe in God but deny angels are real. Why believe in a Supreme Spirit, God, but boggle at lesser created beings, the Angels?
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Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
For the reason stated. He thought that it was anthropomorphic to think of God as a king with a court and courtiers. After all, there is no palace, throne, particular place where God is located and others can gather around Him etc. Surely you have to think of something entirely different.
Someone who believes differently on a particular point is "wrong...in serious error"? Then a lot of people are. That strikes me as entirely the wrong way to discuss such issues. I think that the whole monotheist concept is incoherent but I try to discuss it instead of telling all those people that they are wrong and in serious error. That does not really get us anywhere.
Paul.
Sean,
If you don't understand someone disagreeing with you, then there is a communication problem.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
But anthropomorphism is inevitable when people try to think about God. Moreover, I believe such language can lead to genuine insights or statements about God. E.g., if God is the Creator of the universe it's natural to think of Him as its King. And so on with beings like the angels being God's ministers, courtiers, and messengers.
Orthodox Christianity, Catholicism, bases its faith on what it believes to be divine revelation originating from the Scriptures, the Tradition of the Church, and the ex cathedra definitions on disputed points made by the popes and ecumenical councils. Doctrinal declarations binding on all Catholics, which has to be assent to remain truly members of the Church. It's not a roll your own theology, anything goes matter!
And what this person you know insists on as regards the angels is still an error, in Catholic eyes as Paragraph 328 of the CATECHISM OF THE CATH0OLIC CHURCH says: "The existence of the spiritual, non-corporeal beings that Sacred Scripture usually calls "angels" is a truth of faith. The witness of Scripture is as clear as the unanimity of Tradition." Nos. 329-36 of the CCC gives a longer discussion of the angels.
This gentleman who denies the angels seem to be insisting that his interpretation of the Scriptures, his mere private judgement, is correct, not that of the Church. And that is another error because only the Church has the authority to infallibly interpret the Scriptures in matters of faith/doctrine.
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Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Eastern Orthodox Churches have never accepted Papal supremacy.
You pose two antitheses: dogma or "anything goes." In matters like these, the truth has to be somewhere between such extremes.
We must each seek the truth and that does not mean just asserting some doctrine that we have made up. When I argue against church teachings, I give reasons. I don't just say, "Anything goes!" And I rely on experience and reason, not on any external authority, not even that of the Buddha. I think that his "rebirth" teaching reflected his philosophical milieu. A more thoroughgoing analysis of "atman" would have resulted not only in "anatta" ("no soul") but also in no rebirth. I think. What else can I do?
Paul.
Sean,
The guys that I quote, a Jesuit and a Dutch student, were intelligent and informed men. How they would respond to the doctrinal definitions that you quote I do not know. That is their problem. Can they reinterpret their tradition or must they diverge from it? I do know that different people take both of these courses all the time. As a student of religions, I merely note such phenomena.
Being and consciousness are mysteries. We seek understanding. Defining doctrines, holding to them and telling other people to hold to them seem to me to be counterproductive. Is someone's relationship to God seriously wrong if he does not believe that God created angels?
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
First, a correction, it is not true to repeatedly insist the Eastern Churches never accepted Papal primacy and authority. Many times, before the schism of 1054, the Eastern Patriarchs and theologians acknowledged the unique authority only the Popes hold. A point we see being made over and over in works like Fr. Philip Hughes' THE CHURCH IN CRISIS, a history of the General Councils from First Nicaea to First Vatican.
Moreover, one Eastern Church, the Maronites (based in Lebanon), an Eastern rite in communion with the Holy See, denies ever being in deliberate schism from Rome. They were sometimes cut off from Rome due to being surrounded by hostile Muslim empires--but that was no wish of theirs.
You also persist in overlooking an important point: orthodox Christianity, Christianity that means and believes what it teaches, is a dogmatic religion, asserting that truths revealed thru divine revelation/Tradition, has to be accepted or rejected in toto, no picking or choosing what to believe or not, including even "minor" things like the angels. So these gentlemen you keep citing are in error if they deny defined, binding doctrines of the Church. If they are unwilling to assent to such doctrines the honest thing to do is to leave the Church.
I prefer to cite not mere private persons, but official, binding declarations of the Church, like the CCC or Papal encyclicals.
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Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
But I do know that orthodox Christianity is dogmatic. That is why I disagree with it. And I agree that my friends would be better off out of it.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Can you at least concede that if there is such a thing as divine revelation it is right and logical of the Church to insist on the need to assent to such doctrines if you want to be Catholic?
Your friends would be better off assenting to all defined Catholic doctrines.
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Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
"If..." Many logically consistent arguments begin with that word. Of course the conclusion follows from the premise.
My friends would be better off continuing to think for themselves.
Paul.
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