Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere: September 2023

Saturday, September 30, 2023

Continuing with Kristi Burke

Metatron Made Some Mistakes in His Video on Historic Truth being Objective · First Half of a Video by Kristi Burke · Continuing with Kristi Burke

15:10 Exactly.
"it's what we know, all we know, it's all what we have to go off of"

I'd say exactly the same thing for the New Testament, specifically Gospels.

Unless you have a good historic counternarrative.

"I'm not dedicating my entire life and my faith ..."

1) what counts as good evidence counts as good evidence
2) what you decide to dedicate your life to is what you decide to dedicate your life to.

You know, some people have been very seriously convinced Christianity is true, and even so very unwilling to dedicate their life to Christ even in the most basic way of avoiding mortal sins after baptism (and getting baptised if one isn't already).

So, while Christianity being true kind of gives a reason for on some level or other (anything from simple Christian to monk or nun, or even to martyr) to dedicate your life to Christ, this doesn't mean evidence for it being true have to be weighted like motives for dedicating your entire life.

15:51 "people passed along orally before people wrote down"

Let's take Gospel after Gospel, traditional view.

Matthew - no, he was one of he original twelve.
Mark - heard St. Peter who was one of the original twelve.
Luke - heard many of the original witnesses.
John - was the beloved disciple whether that means the Son of Zebedee, as most have thought since Irenaeus, or a Cohen who was a lesser disciple, as Jean Colson took from some hints mainly from before Irenaeus, partly from Bible, partly from Early Church Fathers who stayed in Asia Minor.

So - if by "before" you mean "as sources" - no, no, no and no.

Futhermore, prologue of St. Luke's Gospel says the earliest attempts at writing Gospels were not all preserved.

I would say, there was deliberately a kind of experiment. St. Luke was not given St. Matthew to read. He was told to piece things together, as he was already writing Acts, and he came to a result remarkably close to St. Matthew. Indeed, one of the things said about how St. Mark heard Peter involves: Luke went to Rome to Peter to get the Gospel authorised (like kind of by the first Pope, so, St. Clement the Stromatist saying this, and he was from Alexandria, not too many decades after St. Mark went there, is an arguament for papacy), Peter held up Matthew and Luke side by side, read now from one, now from other, added some own comments, skipped some, jumped some, and Mark didn't notice, but thought Peter was dictating a Gospel, and dutifully took it down.

This means, St. Peter was very impressed by how close Luke came to Matthew.

16:00 The game of telephone is a very good model for what happens when a hysteric housewife picks up the telephone to phone a few other hysteric housewives, and each then picks up her telephone.

It's not a good model for organised oral transmission of what already happened, is much less urgent, and where you can take the time to actually ask intelligent questions and note their answers, and where those who were learning best were picked out for being the next persons to transmit it. Not a good model at all.

16:50 I agree, the argument is lousy.

It cuts both ways.

Sure, you might not have the right to conclude against believing, but most of them (and probably all who are stating that sentence) would on that principle not have a right to conclude for believing.

They could say, "but hey, we rely on Biblical scholars like" (a fav on the Protestant side you are more likely to hear about is what I gather of Lydia McGrew from her fan Erik Manning, but insert any other you have heard of).

You could argue in return that you rely on scholars like Bart Ehrmann or (a little more radical) Richard Carrier.

But right now you are not giving an extra argument against believing, you are answering an argument for believing which really isn't one, just so we are clear on that.

17:00 "it's meant for all people to read and know who God is ..."

No, it's not meant for that.

Here is another way in which doing Christian apologetics will tend to destroy Protestantism, in my own case it made me Catholic, for instance over people telling me "if you don't trust the Catholic Church" (and I didn't - I bought into silly criticisms of Catholic institutions I had really just heard of through a telephone game which might start with Erasmus for Inquisition or with Luther for Indulgences, and into stupid conspiracy thinking about Jesuits) "why do you trust the Bible, that's where the Reformers had the Bible from" - which is true.

I was hearing in history (ninth and tenth grade) on how England and on how Sweden went from Catholicism to Protestantism, each with a slightly different version, and I completed by looking for info in encyclopedias about Scotland or Germany and somewhat less about Netherlands. I knew as a fairly solid historic fact ...

"it's what we know, all we know, it's all what we have to go off of"

... that the Reformers came more than a millennium after the Apostles, and didn't have the NT from them, but from the Catholic Church.

Which, unlike your Evangelical friends doesn't tell one "you only have to read the Bible to know who God is" ...

On the contrary.

Romans 10 says oral explanation is needed:
12 For there is no distinction of the Jew and the Greek: for the same is Lord over all, rich unto all that call upon him. 13 For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, shall be saved. 14 How then shall they call on him, in whom they have not believed? Or how shall they believe him, of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear, without a preacher? 15 And how shall they preach unless they be sent, as it is written: How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, of them that bring glad tidings of good things!
II Peter - chapter 3 - says reading Bible books can be an occasion for self deception:
16 As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are certain things hard to be understood, which the unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, to their own destruction.

18:36 To get the main gist, it is enough to trust Catholic bishops, successors of the original apostles.

Yes, that is a credible claim, at least with some leeway.

Orthodox, Copts, Armenians, Assyrians also have bishops going back to the Apostles.

Sure, some of them are going to miss some things, and I just identified an Irish migrant heritage bishop in 1943 as behind a very unwise ruling on Genesis. Not just into "day age" and similar, but even into remodelling the view of Genesis 5 and 11 to suit some moderns ... but that bishop certainly would have told you correctly how to get saved.

Why is less erudition needed?

Partly because it isn't, it's just a different erudition than some modern universities. Bishops actually do consecrate lots of their life to looking into doctrine.

But partly because, the erudition you use is about reconstructing what the original intent was into a Protestant world already disagreeing on it, a Catholic only has to be erudite enough to understand and defend what he's got from tradition - from the Apostles.

19:24 I'd agree - the Bible is, in at least some passages, including certain epistles (specifically mentioned by St. Peter in II Peter 3) not a book for all people to read on their own.

21:12 Yep.

People who didn't know how to even read the Gospels had access to them from Church windows and icons.

Thank you for vindicating the Catholic Church.

22:30 There are two different things here.

The Bible itself, as confirmed by Trent Session IV, does involve the Bible being inerrant.

But it does not promise, nor is it confirmed by Trent anywhere, that nothing in the Bible can be difficult or to some insufficiently instructed misleading as it stands, when the correct understanding, due to cultural changes, is for a modern reader sometimes better conveyed by a paraphrase. Especially the Bible nowhere promises no one will be translating it wrong, and Catholic priests have sometimes burned Protestant vernacular Bible translations over this (and outside England usually not over the fact it is in vernacular as such). For instance, can one use prayer beads and repeat a short prayer like a mantra and enter a kind of light trance? Well, yes. Reading or singing the psalms will also help one enter a state of at least light trance. But some Protestants object because their translation of Matthew 6:7 involving the word "repetition" ... the Greek has "stutterspeak" (battologein), the Latin uses an equivalent "many words" - between them it conveys someone making a petition nervously (like someone stuttering), and starting over and over again in different words, because one is not sure which words the gods will be pleased with and not (perhaps on purpose) misunderstand. Which adds up to a long text, not to many repetitions of a short one.

And before you ask, as you would have back when you were a Protestant, "aren't Hindus and Muslims and Buddhists supposed to be Pagans, and don't they use prayer beads" - yes, but they were very much NOT Greco-Roman Pagans. Greco-Roman paganism involves idols, temples, altars, ritual butchery knives, vessels to get the blood and the meat, and lots of other stuff but no prayer beads. A Greco-Roman prayer to Jove would typically involve a presentation of the offering given, and a request, followed by the immolation of the offering, or if it was a promise, not immediately followed by it. That's it. Hearing the guy pray was exciting (to a certain type of man) exactly as hearing a politician make a speech or raise a toast was.

Romans had very marginal contact with Indians, whether Hindu or Buddhist, and they classified both of these, as well as both Christians and Jews, as "worshippers of Bacchus" - from their pov indulging in a religion of ritual irresponsability. What Jesus was speaking of was Greco-Roman paganism. The Centurion who saw things obey Jesus had more confidence in Jesus than he had ever had in Jove. This is why he could word his request in simple words rather than long explanations. However, Christian prayer is not always just about making requests, prayers of praise are involved in the petition "hallowed be thy name" whather they are 150 psalms or 150 Hail Mary.

25:32 "that in any other circumstance would be completely untrustworthy"

I'd be curious about those other circumstances.

If I don't trust Hercules actually killed a hydra, this is because I think the hydra was not a biological being, but a demonic manifestation. But I still do trust it was plaguing people passing through the Lernaean marshes before Hercules came there, and was no longer doing so after he passed. Equally, I don't trust his being Jove's son at all, but I do trust he had so much muscle force (and irascibility and domineering behaviour), probably partly from demons, as to make his pagan surroundings and himself believe that.

Were your argument that if I trusted the history of Hercules, I'd have to worship him, so, it would have been un-Christian to trust it even as history? Not how Catholics throughout lots of centuries have seen it.

Thursday, September 28, 2023

Heschmeyer Refutes "Trail of Blood"

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere: First Half of Heschmeyers Video Against Mike Gendron · Heschmeyer Refutes "Trail of Blood" · Great Bishop of Geneva! Could Anabaptists Be Right That Reformation was a Meiji Régime for the True Christians? · back to Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere: I May Feel Like Exonerating Mike Gendron, But I Won't Admire Him

Did the Catholic Church MURDER the "True Church"?
Shameless Popery Podcast, 28 Sept. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywMfhI8S4Qg

2:15 I think there are six or seven theologically consistent approaches to Matthew 28:16-20. Not saying they are consistent with other proof texts or with history, all of them.

a) Roman Catholics are the true Church (continuing since Christ founded it, understood in all the following).
b) Eastern Orthodox are the true Church.
c) Coptics Monophysites or Miaphysites are the true Church.
d) Armenian Monophysites or Miaphysites are the true Church.
e) Assyrians (Nestorians) are the true Church.
f) Baptists are, as Ruckman claimed, the true Church.
g) several denominations together, in no real schism, are in pseudo-schism, and are together the true Church.

F can be ruled out since Matthew 5 says God made the Church visible, and F leaves the "true Church" invisible over centuries, apart from a "trail of blood" which isn't one, a fully Trinitarian Baptist, which I think Ruckmanite Baptist Kent Hovind is, is not in the same Church as a Bogumil, even if Ruckman claimed it so, and a Bogumil is not a Donatist.

G can be ruled out from Christ founding one Church. Abstaining from schism being one of the orders He gave Her means pseudo-schisms within the Church are not a prevalent thing.

The five remaining can be narrowed down to either RC or EO, since a Christological golden mean, and between these, the more Papist one is preferrable, because:

Matthew 16:19 (Orthodox like Protestants, when disputing Christ gave Peter a special office like to end the pericope on verse 18)
Copts, Armenians, Assyrians are all more Papist or pseudo-papist and therefore quasi-papist than EO.

Fortunately, my Protestant background before converting was not F but G, not Ruckmanite, but Branch Theory.

7:01 Thanks for the reference to Matthew 5, verses 14 and 15 as you mention.

3:47 That interpretation is also contrary to the "all days" promise in Matthew 28:16-20.

9:55 I think the Trail of Blood theory falls flat against Matthew 5.

Suppose 100 000 "real Christians" converted Marseille from Roman Paganism and then Constantine sent in 200 000 Papist fake Christians with legions, and the real Christians were massacred, while the fake ones took over the recent converts (a scenario I think utterly ridiculous per se, but sth which I think Ruckman could have imagined), well, the 200 000 + the legions are a fine excuse for the 100 000 to be invisible, but it still leaves them invisible to us, at least in retrospect. Which again is against Matthew 5, verses 14 and 15.

Or if you suppose a case where they aren't entirely invisible, it's just invisible how they were Trinitarians believing God to be a good creator including of material things, that is clearly not visible of Albigensians. Well, the problem once again is, the enemies of the true Church would have for all future generations have manipulated their memory. This is conceivable for an individual, but not for the entire set of the true Church of a specific period even of the past.

18:56 4 000 000 killed / 100 years

40 000 killed per year

It is very impossible for as large scale a murder as this to be simply hidden.

21:40 Belloc would it be 5 000 000 people at the time of the Domesday book - key point, only the pater domus of each household was mentioned.

27:01 A possible assessment for some group within the true Church (real life example, Japanese Catholics prior to 1868).

But theologically speaking, an impossible assessment for the Church as a whole.

Matthew 28:16-20 actually does not just give an "all days" promise, but ties it to an "all truths" command.

Carroll was basically abandoning the real base line of his claim.

30:25 One of the groups now commonly added are the Culdees.

Why? Why not see them simply as RC priest? Well, they were in schism with Rome. They refused to obey Rome and the paschal calendar.

For those considering "Paul VI" was Pope, this just turned Monseigneur Lefebvre, when he died, into one of these Culdees.

Even more Culdee vibes for Écône - the idea of non-territorial bishops under a command not necessarily a bishop - when Écône was ruled by Father Schmidberger, this mirrored several bishops under a non-bishop abbot in the many monasteries of the ... Culdees.

Thought you might need a good chuckle ...

30:26 "what do historians actually believe the Donatists taught"

Historians like Carroll and Ruckman believed they taught Baptism.

There is a difference between "real history" and "historians" ... the latter can be wrong. Lots of historians these days will claim:

the Trojan War didn't happen
Ulysses didn't even roughly speaking return to Ithaca as the Odyssey claimed
Agamemnon wasn't murdered by Clytaemnestra, who in her turn was murdered by their son Orestes, with accomplice Pylades, acting on the instigation of Apollon
Hercules and Theseus are figures of fiction, much like Superman and Batman ...

That's not what the stories say, and saying the stories themselves were fiction is not how they were taken by for instance Eratosthenes. He made a chronology up to his own and Alexander's time, involving the Pelopponesian war and the war against Persia, and starting with Trojan War and Return of the Heraclides.

The problem is not that historians thought Donatists taught a definitive thing, it is how much this view is consistent with contemporary evidence or as near contemporary as possible.

32:53 When Petilian here uses "faithless" he is obviously not using it as synonym of "heretic" or (final, unrepentant) "apostate" but as a synonym of "traitor" ...

That heretics cannot perform valid baptisms because of heresy is not the main issue. St. Cyprian or Cyril (forget which, I think it's Cyprian) actually held this.

A very different question is whether certain heretics in fact do not perform valid sacraments, if in obedience to their heresy they changed the sacraments.

A Sede who holds that Novus Ordo is invalid or Novus Ordo ordinations are, is not a Donatist. At least not for that reason. If his main issue is with Clown Masses, yes, that would be Donatism.

40:17 Albigensians and Cathars only have half the evil St. Paul is talking of.

Forbidding marriage.

Note, the other half is not enjoining abstinence from meat, but forbidding it.

Yes, I know, the Greek verb can also mean enjoin. But it is just exactly one verb, it would be odd to have it used in both opposite meanings when used only once.

If you take a man, and you state - with sufficient social interactions to make this work as the social reality surrounding a man - that he is too immature to marry, you are forbidding him to marry.
If you then think that making him more desirous of sex would make him more pliable to your demands to "mature" or "grow up" and in that purpose sabotage his attempts to abstain from meat at least on days of fast and abstinence, you are also forbidding him abstinence from meats.
If you continue doing this, and continue to ridicule him for whatever scrapes not being married leads him into, you are on top of that showing how you are hypocritical and have cauterised normal reactions of your conscience.

SUCH people, not Albigensians as such, is what St. Paul is primarily talking of.

As for doctrines of demons, psychiatry and psychoanalysis are good candidates for the modern manifestation of Delphic Apollo.

43:06 A good example of double standards.

[Heschmeyer is speaking of believing a Ouija board can be unholy, but not believing a medal or a crucifix can be holy, Spurgeon believes damnation came to Adam by eating, but mocks that salvation can come by eating the Eucharist]

Other Heschmeyer, with very little to comment on, so added as appendix:

Proving that the Saints in Heaven Hear Our Prayer
Shameless Popery Podcast, 21 Sept. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2F3KoXs5Uk

My rare comment on this:

45:06 Heschmeyer "sent for to serve" and then added "on earth" ...

I find this a somewhat off topic remark, possibly a slur against sth I said. Let's check the Biblical reference:

Hebrews 1:14 has Are they not all ministering spirits, sent to minister for them, who shall receive the inheritance of salvation?

Does this refute the scholastic theory that angels guide the celestial bodies?

No. For two reasons. Apart from the obvious fact that scholastics had more time to scrutinise the Bible than either Heschmeyer or modern day priests.

1) Hebrew 1:14 doesn't say "on earth" ... an angel guiding the sun might never ever be anyone's guardian angel, but he would still be acting on God's appointment, and what the Sun does by moving North and South along the Zodiac is important to lots of souls, since it is important for their bodies.
2) But suppose it really meant that each angel had to serve at some time as guardian angel to a single soul or to a community, even so it wouldn't follow, since men are fewer, not vastly more numerous, than angels.

How is this relevant?

For each angel to have a man or a community to guard, they would take turns on earth. They are doing something in the meantime.

No man has lived all of the 7222 years since God created Adam, let alone even longer, if you adher to modern un-Biblical chronologies. This means, any angel who is guardian angel longer than 1000 years (for very early men) or even a shorter limit (lifespans at the end of Genesis 11 or directly modern ones) would need to be successively guardian angel of several different people.

But it stands to reason this is not the case, therefore the rest of the time, each angel has not been guarding a specific person, but rather spent some time in heaven, most of his existence in time.

Wednesday, September 27, 2023

Other on Kevin Davis's First Video with Rev. Rudolph Bandas

Archibald Sayce was no Church Father, Reverend Bandas was not Pope · Kevin Responded - On Something Else ... · Debate with Skabedab · Other exchanges under same video · Other on Kevin Davis's First Video with Rev. Rudolph Bandas

The Bible and Science
Catholic Family Podcast, 18 Sept. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99IwSns3qhU

note A
You may be friends with a man not just Geocentric but flat earth (didn't know there were RC flat earthers), but if so it is because he is not trying to get a living from writing among inter alia about this position.

A basically total boycott of a writer, because he is Geocentric and even if he writes on other topics, resulting in prolonged poverty is neither charitable, nor even just.

note B
The principle that:

what is proven science cannot be condemned by the Bible
what is proven Bible exegesis (includes but is not limited to decisions already made by the Church) is compatible with all that is correctly scientific, and any scientific pretended fact incompatible with it must be false

is obviously correct.

This doesn't mean that anyone is free to dismiss traditional exegesis, just because it is not yet backed up by an anathema, in favour of a very total remodelling inspired by what one thinks is proven science.

On the same note, while scientific facts just in general are no wise profitable for the salvation, except St. Paul, St. John of Damascus and St. Thomas Aquinas say they are, since they prove God, there are key areas where they are or where the refutation of a false idea is so (proving God by Geocentrism - yes, that's how Riccioli summarises Prima Via - or rejecting eternity of matter and energy).

note C
Traditionally speaking, the Church has been undecided between literal six days (in which case light is created on day I, sun and moon and stars on day IV) and one moment creation.

That one can say "light was not created before the sun" if one means that every part of material creation was created in one single moment, it does not follow that one can say "sun and light existed before the earth, like in Big Bang astronomy" - the decision of 1909 allowed extending days to longer periods, in a somewhat cavalier manner, but that other dispensation of allowing sun and light to be created before the earth is not specifically mentioned.

I think Rev. Rudolph Bandas mentioned natural laws as criteria of proof in relation to this subject.

BUT, it is philosophically false that God can only create or manage creation by allowing all results to be caused by secondary causes acting in the manner according to natural laws. If there were no key points at which some created fact is caused directly by divine fiat, and if the natural world did not depend on these key points, this would make miracles a kind of intrusions, and it would also destroy the argument in secunda via of God as prima causa.

note D
Outside Genesis 1, where there are traditionally two explanations possible (I'm not sharing, but also not condemning, one moment creation), Genesis is one of the historical books, there is no such "Biblical literary genre" as "myth" the Church has never remotely doubted historicity.

This is easy to check with either St. Augustine's City of God, or Historia Scholastica, or diverse histories of Germanic peoples. Venerable Bede starts off with Adam and Eve in Ecclesiastical History of the English People, as well as in In principium Genesis, usque ad natiuitatem Isaac et eiectionem Ismahelis, libros III. Gregory of Tours does it in Gesta Francorum.

Historia Scholastica was translated into Flemish and French and Rijmbijbel and Bible historiée were proposed to the laity.

When Haydock speaks of how we know Genesis 3 is true, he traces the shortest way of transmission from Adam to Moses, which in his Masoretic chronology of the Vulgate he gets to Moses being eighth from Adam in "minimally overlapping generations" - extending Genesis 5 and 11 by presuming genealogies to be not just incomplete (which on occasion they were, as I would say for ritual reasons of damnatio memoriae), but even "fragmentary" as Bandas does makes nonsense of this fairly basic epistemology.

No one pretended Moses knew more than the six days from a divine revelation to himself. For the rest of Genesis, the traditionally held epistemology is at least implicitly that Moses was to Henoch or Joseph in Egypt or Noah or Abraham as St. Luke to the visitation of Gabriel - relying on testimony from the time of the events, in the case of Genesis obviously via intermediate transmitters.

Note E
"It would not do to impose the theories of physical science as a positive norm of Biblical interpretation, and to demand that Genesis be explained in accordance with constantly changing hypothesis. All that can be reasonably demanded is that exegetes accept the established conclusions of science as a negative guiding principle, and refrain from advocatng as certain, or even as probable, any theory whcih would contradict ascertained scientific facts" (p. 10)

I suppose that this is not just the personal opinion of Rev. Bandas, but fairly closely reflects some kind of ruling from Rome at the time.

The problem is, a phrase like "ascertained scientific fact" and even worse "established conclusions of science" are pretty much weasel words, which on the one hand can cover a case like hard proof, and on the other hand can cover a case like a very persistent error within the scientific community.

Such errors are not getting corrected by Catholics who with the Bible could save science as a social venture from some disasters, and when some Protestants are doing the work we should have been doing, some of us refrain from appreciating because they are Protestants.

There is a similarity of wording with a quote from St. Augustine, but the words he chose were really only applicable to hard proof for undeniable truth. De Gen. ad litt. i. 21, 41. is the reference, meaning I cannot access it online. But anyway, part of the words were Whatever they can really demonstrate to be true of physical nature, we must show to be capable of reconciliation with our Scriptures = and that is a higher bar that "science" has to meet before it can even negatively interfere with Exegesis.

Tuesday, September 26, 2023

And "MedievalMadness" can't persuade me otherwise

I Look at the Middle Ages with Chestertonic Eyes ... · And "MedievalMadness" can't persuade me otherwise

"This guy" (James Wade) is narrating, but the thing was written by Lisa E Rawcliffe.

5:33 "1330 - 1479, average life expectancy just 24 years"

I don't believe we have that kind of stats, though the plague years were temporarily pulling them down.

Feel free to cite your sources.

Women better, 33 ... my lates sample is certainly over a privileged class and on top of that only covers married women, but the median was 48 or 49 years.

7:06 "many people died in prison due to unsanitary conditions"

Sure this was the Medieval period?

Early 19th C is more like it.

In fact, sentencing to prison, as a special punishment, seems to have been fairly rare, prison was for keeping people up to judgement, and also between judgement and execution.

7:27 "370 wars over 1000 years"

Given that most of them were pretty short and local, that was not too bad.

Between 1200 and 1700, each C. went up, starting in the 13th C. with 12 % dead in European wars, then escalating to c. 40 - 48 % in the 17th C.

Source, prologue of a book about the Thirty Years war.

7:53 "peasants had to supply military service to their liege lord on a regular basis"

You mean vassals had to do so?

Vassals and peasants are not the same thing.

Lisa E Rawcliffe doesn't know the difference between a vassal and a peasant?

Now, whether liege lord or vassal, you arguably had land and peasants, so your warriors could get recruited from the peasants, but it was not as if the peasants were to a man themselves doing military service apart from such recruitment.

8:25 30 % of the nobles died in one skirmish or another ...?

Doesn't ring quite true, and I have done some Medieval statistics from dynasties ...

8:58 The Hundred Years' War was arguably the most extensive war on European soil since the Vikings.

9:37 "cream sauces, followed by sugared desserts and fine wine"

Peacock was rare any time, on the table.

Sauces in the Middle Ages were not yet much into using cream.

Sugar was not a thing North of the Alps.

9:48 "the glazing was made from lead oxide"

For England, you have a point. Stamford Ware, since the ninth C. For 15th C Italy too.

Far from universal, though.

Monday, September 25, 2023

Rant

Stop Pretending to Be Young w/ Jeff Cavins
Pints With Aquinas, 20 Sept. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QF9PyJfPFeg

Title.

I feel very discretely talked to, but in such a way as to stop anyone not knowing about me in advance from getting a hint about me from your conversation.

I do not pretend to be young - I simply have more in common with Gen Z than with my own generation that bullied me when I was fifteen, bullied me when I was 30, and is now bullying me over my supposed "pretending to be young" - in order to have children, which is the primary goal of marriage, I very definitely need a considerably young-ER wife, in fact at best a young one, so shutting me in with the culture of MY generation, remember the one I have every reason to hate because of decades of bullying is an evil thing.

Who is putting you up to this? "Pope Francis"? Or just an underling? In either case, consider this ...

Just as it is licit to resist the Pontiff who attacks the body, so also is it licit to resist him who attacks souls or destroys the civil order or above all, tries to destroy the Church. I say that it is licit to resist him by not doing what he orders and by impeding the execution of his will. It is not licit, however, to judge him, to punish him, or to depose him, for these are acts proper to a superior. (De Romano Pontifice. II.29.)

From Did Bellarmine Condemn Sedevacantism? by Rev. Anthony Cekada.

What does Fr. Cekada answer?

Bellarmine, rather, is discussing the course of action which may legitimately be taken against a pope who upsets the political order or “kills souls by his bad example.” A king or a council may not depose such a pope, Bellarmine argues, because they are not his superior — but they may resist him.

Note here, when it comes to resisting evil orders given in discretion, I (not Bellarmine, just me) would say anyone has a right to resist them, like anyone had a right to hide Jews from the Gestapo.

I am given a list of complaints against my behaviour over and over again. One item here, I change nothing, another item here, I change nothing, and so on ... lots of the things people like you complain about would be out of the way if I had money from my writing and a wife and between them also an appartment. Others wouldn't.

You find it perhaps irksome when someone your age "acts 15" ... I was getting that sauce from some over being into Lord of the Rings, decades ago. "Come on, you are thirty plus, what's up with you acting you were still a teen?" I may prefer "always be my unicorn" over an 80's hit in glamrock ... I may for that matter prefer sth by Angelo Kelly or the Dubliners or the Pogues over either.

People have been praying for every excuse to exclude me, and last time I checked my statistics, they were a trickle in the US, an even smaller one in France, but thousands of them a day in Singapore. Where, unlike the US, I don't know youtubers, bloggers or people on FB (or perhaps just one or two) even over the internet. I don't mind having readers in Singapore, but I do mind losing readers in the US and I also very much mind being talked to over the head of the rest of those listening.

_____________________

When Catholics do this kind of thing, they seem to be offering on a golden plate opportunities to Ortlund and Cooper to reask the question "are you really sure you did right back when you left the Swedish state Church to become Catholic" ... which happened in 1988, OK.

I'd love to take them on simply as an exercise in Apologetics, but it becomes very irksome if I receive nothing for it, neither money nor the fame from which I can get money (through a paper editor), and people like you go "well, if he doesn't accept Pope Francis, perhaps he isn't Catholic" ...

There is a species of "youth" which I'd love to end - poverty with celibacy. People like you are keeping me back in it, so far ... if you are in the preparations of repairing it, fine, say so, but so far, no good news in sight.

I Look at the Middle Ages with Chestertonic Eyes ...

I Look at the Middle Ages with Chestertonic Eyes ... · And "MedievalMadness" can't persuade me otherwise

This guy [see next instalment] is a very dishnonest Marxist (or Capitalist) blacking the Middle Ages OR duped by people of that description.

Why You Wouldn't Last 24 Hours in The Dark Ages....
MedievalMadness, 22 Sept. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwqi9s2XSG8

Here is my answer to first third:

1:15 It would take perhaps a day to pick out some of the main differences, and perhaps a week to get into conversation mode, albeit a somewhat reduced one.

The plight of the timetraveller is purely hypothetic, does not apply to those who studied Middle English, and also is no bad thing the people back then endured. They had been speaking Middle English since they were toddlers, no big deal for them. OR Ancient French of the Anglo-Norman version.

2:14 By contrast, women gave birth in a sitting position, and this meant a swifter and less painful delivery (usually).

So, another thing to "pity" the "poor" Medievals for is apparently they didn't set up for an aging society where they would be dependant on old age pensions that no one would be able to pay the taxes for.

Heatwave
@Heatwave9000: That's the price you pay for giving women a choice...
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: @Heatwave9000 They had a choice back then too. Those who didn't care to have five to fifteen children or so were perfectly authorised to get into monasteries instead.

2:33 In 14th C. Florence, one in five women died during labour ... according to what statistics?

I'd love to look at the source material.

[I don't mean peruse the original paperwork from clerks back then, but getting a view on what kind of clerks they were, for how long and how they would have known or estimated.]

Unknown
@imcrazyimcrazyimcrazy: [...] ur all over the timed comments [...]
Hans Georg Lundahl: Here is the deal.

I time stamp the comments so the one reading them knows what in the video they relate to.

3:04 "one third of children died before that age in Medieval England"

Again, I'd love to look on the source material.

Unlike modern registers of people by the government, the Medieval ones just paid attention to the number of households (and perhaps the number of people in that household).

Church books also didn't exist yet.

Medieval England is arguably a much bigger area or period than you could possibly have the luck to have statistic material on. Unless it were restricted to a specific class, like the aristocrats being more well known and well documented, but I would say 1/3 dying is not what I find in them either.

If the statistic is archaeologic rather than historic, like looking in Church yards and dating skeleta, an adult's bones taking up more space are more likely to be dug up and replaced in a bone house, many of which can have disappeared for fires or for the Reformation (sorry, I misspelled R for D) or some other peripety making their bones rarer than original proportion.

Unknown
@imcrazyimcrazyimcrazy: U a teacher or something lol
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: I actually was, "@imcrazyimcrazyimcrazy", back in 1996 ... more importantly, I spent several times that time span at university studying subjects some of which are relevant for the Middle Ages.

3:15 Huge quantities of ale or wine during their pregnancy?

Larger than the zero glass policy, possibly, but hardly enough to give one alcohol fetal syndrome in any dangerous extent.

However, speaking of dangers starting in the womb, what about the abortion danger being much higher now than back then?

For 2021, the abortion rate in the UK was 343.8 abortions per 1000 live births, after Russia, but worse than Sweden or France.

3:45 As you mention diseases, those would be more of an issue in cities than on the country-side, which has less contacts right?

So, if lots more are cured now from measles, but on the other hand lots more get it, the ones who die from measles would still be fairly low in both Medieval and Modern England.

3:52 The statistics for Medieval Japan are hardly a matter for concern in Medieval Europe.

In reference to Japanophile readers and listeners, I'd wonder once again where the stats are from.

4:08 "85 % of the population were serfs"

1) That basically ceased after the plague;
2) in some cases people wanted to prove before court they were or how much they were serfs, as it meant their lord would be paying taxes and not they;
3) and as "how much" in previous illustrates, it was a gradual thing, not an exclusive thing.

For the latter two points, see Modern History TV, a very good youtube channel.

In France, while serfs became rarer, they never ceased up to the Revolution, but they were better off in the Middle Ages than after the XVIIth C. Labour for the lord of the manor started at 1 day a week, got to three days in a month, then one day in a month, back in the Middle Ages. The rest of the work was done for oneself.

Stella croía
@Stellarstellegirl: I’ve learned a lot about history mostly on my own, but one thing that stuck with me from school, is that with more technological advancement, industrial advancement, and other forms of such things to further the “work smarter not harder” mentality we as the human society prefer to live by, around the renaissance to the Industrial Revolution, THATS what finally gave birth to the “middle class” as well as a new thing many families and people knew not of, and that was leisure time/ activities, and this actually resulted in longer lifespans, AND even MORE technological advancement. Instead of it just being super rich and powerful or super poor and powerless, there was now a middle ground, a spectrum of ways of life. The more people had invented, the easier it was to get big things done to keep society going without so much manpower, and now what do we do with all this new found free time?? Well we entertain ourselves of course !! Previously only the wealthy and powerful had access to entertainment/ things to do just for funsies/ the time to indulge in such things. And after more and more people started to be able to actually ENJOY life more, the longer we lived, the less overworked we where, and that in turn allowed many the free time to invent even MORE things to allow for MORE free/fun time, as well as people having been more relaxed more often allowed all of our blood pressures to not cause us to drop dead at 50, so longer lifespans too.
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: I'm sorry, @Stellarstellegirl .

You were pretty misinformed in school.

After the plague, 1348+, things got better for serfs for a century or two, simply because they were in demand. From the Renaissance to beyond the Industrial Revolution, it became worse and worse for farmers.

The Renaissance also didn't invent all that much compared to late Middle Ages or Baroque. But serfs in the Middle Ages were probably as well off as the middle class in some of these days. Free farmers (and they existed) certainly were. 100 + days per year were free, and lots of the rest was fairly relaxing work (outside sowing and farvesting cereals), like picking fruit or doing preparations during winter.

4:20 "not only for yourself and your family, but for the lord too"

85 % grow food for 100 % of the population?
100 : 85 = 1.176

You grew food for 1.176 times your own family.

4:27 "or even get married" - you forgot to mention "without his permission" ... serfs certainly did marry, but when they married between two lords of different manors, they were supposed to equalise, a bride going the other way too
"you might as well have been a slave" - technically you kind of were, but in practise you were far less exploited and not remotely as mistreated compared to black slaves in the South States prior to 1865.

The latter were obviousy not growing cotton for just 1.17 times their own consumption within the places they exported cotton to.

4:34 "failure of crops"

You know there was a kind of security measure, growing wheat and rye together, meaning the weather would favour the one or the other - right?

5:24 "with no central heating, lighting or running water"

People were outdoors in the day, and went to the well with a bucket to get water.

Sounds like healthy exercise.

"no wonder lives were so short"

Except you have given no credible statistics for them having been so.

Sunday, September 24, 2023

Neither Gay, Nor Gay Friendly

First a warning - this channel is associated with Alpha & Omega ministries. Heavily un-Catholic. This does not preclude the channel owner from sometimes making good stuff — like this video:

Patrick Bet David CONFRONTS Graham Stephen on LGBT!
Fight For Truth, 23 Sept. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPYjb5V8rj4

Vivat Austria (at least back in my time).

A compulsory subject (in normal government run schools) was Catechism.

Your parents (or sometimes single parent) choses whether you take Catholic or Calvinist Catechism (Lutheran Catechism wasn't offered that school and my mother chose Catholic over Calvinist), or presumably Jewish and by now Muslim as well, but one or other catechism you must have.

As I was partly transbullied simply for wearing long hair (fan of Samson back then), I highly doubt there was any LBGTQ stuff being taught even in higher grades than mine.

2:51 You were influenced into being a realtor ...

Wonderful.

Chesterton would have laughed out loud ... he was highly aware of the links between sodomy and the taking of interest (confusion between the fertile and the infertile, "transfertility" if you like).

Not sure if Graham does take interest, but I suppose many do (with martgages), or are involved when people who can't pay interests are forced to sell houses ...

5:32 I am now pausing the video, simply because another video caught my eye.

"25 % of gay people were groomed"

I would say sth like:
25 % (roughly) were groomed by LGBTQ friendly people
75 % (roughly) were groomed by ultra-machism (and gender typicality on the other side too) denying them self confidence as their own sex and meant to attract the other one.

Presuming of course that "25 %" stat was correct.

Romans 1
23 And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of the image of a corruptible man, and of birds, and of fourfooted beasts, and of creeping things. 24 Wherefore God gave them up to the desires of their heart, unto uncleanness, to dishonour their own bodies among themselves.

What exact idolatry are we talking of here?

The first thing mentioned is (actually in Greco-Roman myth) "corruptible man", and it stands to reason Hercules worship could very well be meant.

Take a look at Argonautica, how the author treats the relation between Hercules and Iolaus, and remember that Hercules was supposed to be both worshipped and a role model for real men.

No, Argonautica was not my own field of study when I studied Greek, never came that far, but the man who rent me a room those years did a thesis on Apollonius of Rhodes and how he treated Eros. As he was very disdainful of Christianity, any sort, and particularly Catholicism, perhaps, not very well regarded by his older non-apostate relatives, you can imagine what he would tease me with. I didn't like it, I was not groomed. Still hetero to this day.

Your point about LGBTQ is excellent, and it is also the inverse of some "LGBTQ positive" Atheists' view on giving Christian education. A war is coming on, and an essay collection I just printed was called the French Equivalent to "innocent diversions in the doldrums waiting for Armageddon"

7:18 Zero percent were born with an innate preference for sodomy over the correct sexual act (correct within marriage or relatively correct in sins outside marriage that are not against nature).

Some were born less masculine than what the people raising them considered masculine, and became gay because of lack of confidence.
Some were born with hormonal mix-ups, making dating the opposite sex less easy for them.
The closest to being "born gay" I can imagine is being born with that, with high homoaffaction, with oversexuality. But even these three together don't necessitate becoming gay. If you add a propensity for risk-taking, the likelihood of someone becoming gay is higher, because usually doing so is taking a risk, even subjectively and socially, not just for eternity - but even the propensity of taking risks can be used in other ways.
And some were a) unlucky in a dating game that's set up against them in coeducation and delayed marriage, b) groomed into taking homosexuality as a "solution" ... perhaps because LBGTQ circles offer them a dating strategy.

7:29 no, no, no ... normal people (including normal homosexuals, i e homosexuals who aren't like Caligula or Nero in everyday reactions) are socially attracted to both sexes in different ways outside the sexual question.

The ones who become gay or bi have been taught to sexualise situations which he shouldn't do so with. Or have put up too little fight when hypersexuality forces them to sexualise over the brink so to speak ...

A very interesting take on how forbidding some to abstain from meat can be connected to forbidding them to marry, if you recall 1 Tim 4 ... since abstinence from meat is one of the medicines against hypersexualising.

The LBGTQ groomers also have an interest in forbidding marriage, since marriage would give a normal and licit outlet for enhanced sexual drives.

And they do, and England just raised marital age from 16 to 18 ... as it already was in Australia, while Canada is on the fence, a court or a parent can allow from 16 - which is already too high.

8:46 "get your kids out of public schools as fast as you possibly can"

As a preliminary move, I refuse to go back to Sweden even if right now I am homeless in Paris.

In Sweden, taking children out of public schools is highly illegal by now.

pastor brian
@pastorbri: yes stop kids being educated
Hans-Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: or miseducated @pastorbri - I know what Swedish schools tried to do to me ... and what they did, when I didn't comply.
pastor brian
@pastorbri: @hglundahl yes catholic schools did this
Hans-Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: No @pastorbri - there were no Catholic schools in Sweden, by now there is just one, but it didn't exist back then.

Municipal schools in Sweden are very secular, and so was (in a somewhat more mellow way, from the adult side, but not totally) the half state owned, half private SSHL. It very obviously cannot have been a Catholic school, when HMtK went there as a boy, since he is constitutionally required to be a Lutheran.

Stop making up stories about me from your incomplete information and wild fantasy and generally, when you lose an argument against me, stop saying to yourself "Hans Georg Lundahl must be very indoctrinated" just to hide from yourself the fact that you lost an argument.

Saturday, September 23, 2023

Art Dorety refused to debate a Creationist linking to his own material, because he was linking to a Creationist's material ... a Creationist who had presumably duped him ... self ... (I know, bc the Creationist is Myself)

Q: Creationists have a solid image of the Flood. It is known that bodies of water can affect radiocarbon dating. Why has there been no attempt to replicate the Flood in a laboratory setting?
https://www.quora.com/Creationists-have-a-solid-image-of-the-Flood-It-is-known-that-bodies-of-water-can-affect-radiocarbon-dating-Why-has-there-been-no-attempt-to-replicate-the-Flood-in-a-laboratory-setting/answer/Art-Dorety
Art Dorety: Free Lance Paleoartist and digital artist (2005–present)
3 years ago: Regardless of what creationists believe, never in the last 300 million years was the entire Earth covered with water with no land mass, let alone in the last 15,000 years.

This article does the job to explain what we know today about the glacial retreat from the last ice age glacial maximum. Sea Level Rise, After the Ice Melted and Today

In a brief summation at one point between 11,500 years ago and 11,000 years ago there was a rapid “pulse” of melting that over the course of 500 years the ocean level rose by 28 meters, that’s almost 100 feet in a geological short time. This pulse is likely the cause for “flood stories”. While 100 feet over 500 years does not sound like much that kind of sea level rise would drastically affect coasts, bays, rivers near the sea and so on. You would even likely have back flooding up riverways as the sea rose. Bad and extreme weather affected by rising climate temperatures would enhance this period as well.

Despite what early 20th century archaeologist declared, modern discoveries have been consistently pushing a civilized, building and settling human race back further in time.

During the last glaciation it appears many small tribes or early small civilizations settled along coasts from Mesopotamia to eastern Asia and along what would become the Mediterranean as well. These people appear to have settled enough to build temple like structures and possibly other types of buildings. Coastal people are obviously going to be the first to be affected by sea level rise. Even some north and south American tribes have flood stories too. The North American ice sheets seem to be the prime culprit in the sea level rise pulses.

Research ships formerly using sonar and now lidar are finding temple like and stone structures off coasts and underwater. These were likely built when the sea was lower at the end of the last glacial maximum. The sudden sea rise and climate change led to flooding. Probably catastrophic in some years and gradual in others. One can speculate that during this time, some 11,000 + years ago, there may have been a year or two of excessive sea rise causing notable catastrophic flooding that locals would remember in oral tales handed down until written in clay by the Sumerians. By then after 3000 to 5000 years of oral tradition the stories became exaggerated and molded to fit the culture who is telling the story. Thus you have the flood in the tale of Gilgamesh becoming Noah’s flood (e.g.) and so on.

As far as radiocarbon dating goes, that has nothing to do with any of this, especially dating fossils. Radio carbon dating dates organic matter and is accurate, at best, up to 50,000 years. Fossils are rock essentially. They are made from minerals and sediments that saturate flesh (if lucky) and bone, replacing the cells and bone structure with minerals and sediment. A fossil is a rock replication of what used to be bone and flesh if it fossilized before decaying. Radiometric dating is used to measure the age of rock. There are various methods, but basically, known radiation decay of particular rocks is used to get a close estimate for the age of a rock bed or line of strata.

I also just wanted to add, that any recreation of a flood or flooding by glacial melt would be done using computer modeling these days. That would take data of climate at that time and of course accurate sea level measurements per year (something very difficult to obtain) to get an accurate model. An approximate measure and model could probably be made and hypothetical models of flooding due to sudden sea rise could be made also. That would at least offer some picture of a possible scenario.

A scenario might be that during that 500 year period, maybe a large chunk of glacier broke off and into the sea causing massive tsunamis as well as an increase in sea level. That would be quite a catastrophe for anyone along the coast almost anywhere in the world.
Hans-Georg Lundahl
3 years ago: “never in the last 300 million years was the entire Earth covered with water with no land mass,”

Because the water covered periods one can trace are assignated to different parts of these.

“let alone in the last 15,000 years.”

Meaning carbon dated time and for carbon date 15 000 BP or 13 000 BC I’d set a post-Flood date close to Noah’s death 350 years after the Flood.

Very correct, since Noah died there has never been a Flood again, like God had promised Noah around 350 years before that, close after the Flood.

Here is a table of mine putting real (Biblical) post-Flood dates against carbon dates in the area you mentioned:

2780 BC / 22.169 pmc, 15 230 BC
Eber * 2690 BC / 2691 BC / 32.584 pmc 11 941 BC
Noah + 2607 BC
Babel begins 2602 BC / 42.89 pmc, 9600 BC

Table for St Jerome as per Preliminary Conclusion
Art Dorety
3 years ago: Interesting. Would make an interesting background for a fantasy novel involving a parallel or alternate Earth.
Hans-Georg Lundahl
3 years ago: Do one.

Then check out how you know that that is not where we are living.
Art Dorety
3 years ago: I know because I trust facts time tested and vetted by hundreds, if not thousands of scientists and copious amounts of real data that can be tested by anyone who wants to know the truth.
Hans-Georg Lundahl
3 years ago: “hundreds of” or “copious amounts of” is not mentioning one.

Can you test that my views on geological layers used to back “300 million years” are wrong?

Can you test that my view on carbon dating of last carbon dated “15 000 years” are wrong?

If so, what is the actual test criterium you use?
Art Dorety
3 years ago: Here’s a link to wikipedia. Radiometric dating - Wikipedia

That is not the usual route preferred here, but this link gives the basic on how rock and the planet is age dated. There’s no secrets, deflections or mystery about this. You will see that as far back as 1907 scientists have been using these methods and they have only gotten better and more accurate with current technology.

Frankly your info makes no sense as I only see citation from people that speculate from writings that are also speculation or derived very old and misguided knowledge based on guesses rather than actual physical testing. If you don’t want to believe science and tried and true time tested measures, I just think that’s a shame and I’m saddened when this ignorance is passed on to others, especially children.
Hans-Georg Lundahl
Fri 22.IX.2023: Take a look at my discussion with an actual carbon dater:

Radiocarbon and Tree Rings with Ken Wolgemuth

“and I’m saddened when this ignorance is passed on to others, especially children.”

So, ignorance about carbon dating is terribly saddening … what about some really important knowledge, like the Catholic faith?

No, frankly, I am not “ignorant” I am giving an alternative reading of the data provided by scientists, I am not ignoring them.

New Tables
http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2020/08/new-tables.html

For testing the applicability to archaeology, see:

What Project?
https://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2023/04/what-project.html
Art Dorety
Fri 22.IX.2023: You continually use citations from creationist pushers who have a certain agenda. Here I offer some citation found on reputable sites on the internet. A library is also valuable.

How the Earth was made:

[six links, leaving them out]

Flood Information

[four links, leaving them out]

This last link below is probably the most important to read for you.

How Should we Interpret the Genesis Flood Account? - Common Question - BioLogos
https://biologos.org/common-questions/how-should-we-interpret-the-genesis-flood-account

Happy reading.
which I answered: twice, I and II
I
Hans-Georg Lundahl
Sat 23.IX.2023: “You continually use citations from creationist pushers who have a certain agenda.”

You didn’t bother to look at the names, did you?

The creationist pusher with a certain agenda is named Hans Georg Lundahl. Now take a look at my own name here.

It’s SO very kind of you to warn myself against my own work, isn’t it?

“Here I offer some citation found on reputable sites on the internet.”

I am interested in argument, not in a bibliography to people with a certain OTHER agenda, adversarial to my own - is that remotely understood, even by yourself?
Art Dorety
Sun 24.IX.2023: It seems we’ve reached in impasse. I love the irony of using you against you. I know you will never change your mind nor will I, so have a nice life.
Hans-Georg Lundahl
Sun 24.IX.2023: Thank you, I think showing this to some readers may be one way of having it …

[Link] Art Dorety refused to debate a Creationist linking to his own material, because he was linking to a Creationist's material ... a Creationist who had presumably duped him ... self ... (I know, bc the Creationist is Myself)
II
Hans-Georg Lundahl
Sun 24.IX.2023: As you recommended one of above more, I can tell I have already made a thorough debunking of one BioLogos material:

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere: Ussher III · Φιλολoγικά / Philologica: Numeric Symbolism in Genesis 5 Patriarchs? · HGL'S F.B. WRITINGS: Number Symbolism in Genesis 5? · Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere: Ages or Names Symbolic?

In honour of Tolkien Week

Heroism of Hobbits - Building a World | Hobbit Day 2023
Men of the West, 22 Sept. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2qWCsrpDD8

9:41 I don't work out like a ton (tun?), but I was in a fight ... with a fairly well trained police man.

His goal:: getting me to mental hospital as the doctor had said
My goal:: taking his pistol to take him hostage to get out of there
Outcome:: he took his pistol back, but before he did, I had shot him in the hip. First trial "putative defense" and second trial "aggravated assault, alternatively attempted homocide, 3 and a half years" ....

I have no real problem living with the three and a half years behind me.

My problem is when people so empathise not with the policeman as much as with the people he was doing the bidding of, that they go "oh no ... giving him prison and releasing him in 2000 was a huge mistake, we need to watch him the rest of his life" ...

Just in case anyone wonders, no, it was not like this:

22 Minutes of Karens VS Cops...
Mr Discovery, 6 Sept. 2022
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGpIfj4wpDY

I had tried to ask police for protection against psychiatric slave hunting.

I did not consider myself above the law, I saw psychiatry thought itself above the law in relation to any patient.

19:03 "how you get out forges you"

If people who think they are decent to you are the guys who want to help you out, it need not very much forge you.

If people who think they are decent to you are the guys who think you need forging, as long as they continue, it doesn't help you out to be forged.

Debate with Skabedab

AA AA
@nomorelies7755: Kevin is saying the geneologies are incomplete and is entertaining the idea there used to be humans before Adam and Eve. First parent means exactly first parent. In addition, if there was lots of death and decay of humanoids before the fall, we have to admit that death was not a consequence of the fall and admit God designed the world for decay, disease, and death from the get-go. I can't reconcile this with the creation being "good".
Catholic Family Podcast
@catholicfamilypodcast5501: To clarify, these are not Kevin's words but those of Reverend Rudolph Bandas, with an Imprimatur from 1943.

These writings do not bear the mark of Infallibility, but they do bear the mark of the Church's approbation and should be accepted as such.
AA AA
@nomorelies7755: Vatican II never happened overnight and there was a lot of modernism in the church in the 20th century. Having lots of experience in the Novus Ordo, I know for a fact this would shake the faith. This writing contradicts previous councils and statements.

This is essentially admitting to the fact God could have originally designed the world to be full of death, disease, and decay and there was no fall so to speak. Adam would not be the first man at all in this instance.
skabedab
@skabedab: I think the books is supposed to be an apologetic work against people who make it seem like science equals knowledge and faith equals blind obedience without reason.

Reverend Bandas merely states that if there were men before Adam and Eve, they would be dead by the time of the creation of man. Upholding the doctrine of all men descending from this one pair and in the process, the doctrine of original sin. Though it becomes apparent that the Reverend is not in favour of such hypotheses. Since he clearly states that these kinds of hypotheses are only brought forth by people who deny a spiritual soul and who believe in a strictly material evolution from animal to man.

While I am in no way a propoent of the theory that there was men before there was Adam, I do not think that decay is irrenconcilable with a good creator. St. Thomas teaches on that matter:
"I answer that, ... God wills no good more than He wills His own goodness; yet He wills one good more than another. Hence He in no way wills the evil of sin, which is the privation of right order towards the divine good. The evil of natural defect, or of punishment, He does will, by willing the good to which such evils are attached. Thus in willing justice He wills punishment; and in willing the preservation of the natural order, He wills some things to be naturally corrupted." (Summa, First Part, Q19 A9)
Fr. Timothy Geckle
@fr.timothygeckle1119: Be patient and don't make rash assumptions. The book specifically says that it cannot be accepted that there were human beings before Adam and Eve. Man is a special creation of God.
Fr. Timothy Geckle
@fr.timothygeckle1119: The genealogies obviously come after Adam and Eve. How are you gathering that this is saying that there were people before Adam and Eve?
AA AA
@nomorelies7755: @fr.timothygeckle1119 Thank you. I can see it was trying to refute the atheists but also entertaining these ideas at the same time. It looked like it was entertaining the idea of the humans before Adam and Eve all dying out before Adam and Eve were a single pair. There were no humanoids either because then it would be death, disease, decay, and survival of the fittest before the fall for intelligent beings (meaning there was no fall) and wouldn't explain how Eve came from Adam (Eve came from Adam in the narrative, not from another set of parents) or how Adam was first parent. Since Adam's life began with his first breath, it's also safe to say he did not have parents. If so, we're denying life in the womb as well.
skabedab
@skabedab: @fr.timothygeckle1119 I think he is referring to 2 distinct topics. One being men before Adam and Eve, the other being that the geneologies being incomplete.
AA AA
@nomorelies7755: @skabedab
This.
skabedab
@skabedab: @nomorelies7755 The problem with the geneology of Christ is that they differ in Luke and in Matthew. So one can not at the same time maintain that the purpose of the geneology is to give an exhaustive account like you would do in genealogy and that God is the Author. Because then, God would contradict himself.

We do know through our faith that God is the Author. So the purpose must be something else. The author of the book gives a reasonable explanation that is consistent with jewish customs, namely to make groups of symbolic numbers and to skip some people, so it fits that number.

On the part of God, the purpose is clear: It is to prove that Christ is descendant from Adam, from Abraham, from Juda and from David. Because it was to them that God gave his promise. It is just to prove that Christ is the promised messiah.

So I would argue that the explanation given in the book is not so much as to comrpomise with modern sciences as much as it is to give an explanation to what might be perceived by many as a logical flaw in Holy Scripture, when in fact, they miss the point of Scripture: To give an account of salvation history, not to give an accurate account of material things.
AA AA
@nomorelies7755: @skabedab
There's a theory that one may be Mary's genealogy and the other Joseph's genealogy. When you deny the accurate account of material things, you start denying things like the Exodus or Noah's flood or denying that different people in the scriptures were actually real. Novus Ordo modernists like to call everything metaphor. For example, saying Adam had parents denies that he was alive at first breath and saying Eve had parents denies she was made from Adam.
AA AA
@nomorelies7755: @skabedab And I agree the purpose of the genealogy is to connect Christ, the new Adam but the redeemer, to the genealogy of the old Adam who plunged us into the fall and to connect Him to the line of King David and to the line of Father Abraham and also prove he was from the line of Judah. Christ was from the line of kings but had humble beginnings.
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: @catholicfamilypodcast5501 "Reverend Rudolph Bandas, with an Imprimatur from 1943."

By what bishop?

Did he or the bishop participate in Novus Ordo afterwards?
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: @skabedab "if there were men before Adam and Eve, they would be dead by the time of the creation of man."

Dead for what sin, before Adam sinned?
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: @skabedab "The problem with the geneology of Christ is that they differ in Luke and in Matthew."

Not a problem.

They do not give the same lineage.

Matthew gives Joseph his physical lineage, Luke a steplineage, which is also physical lineage for the blessed virgin.

This was explained very long ago, and not in terms that can be used to justify lineages of Genesis 5 or 11 or both giving just a tiny part of even one lineage.
skabedab
@skabedab: @hglundahl I do not find the argument compelling at all. Where is St. Joachim, the father of Mary in this lineage? He was of the House of David as well.
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: Leaving the answer to Father Haydock @skabedab !

His commentary on Luke 3 includes:

Remarks on the two Genealogies of Jesus Christ.

To make some attempt at an elucidation of the present very difficult subject of inquiry, we must carry in our minds, 1. That in the Scripture language the word begat, applies to the remote, as well as the immediate, descendant of the ancestor; so that if Marcus were the son, Titus the grandson, and Caius the great-grandson of Sempronius, it might, in the language of Scripture, be said, that Sempronius begat Caius. This accounts for the omission of several descents in St. Matthew. 2. The word begat, applies not only to the natural offspring, but to the offspring assigned to the ancestor by law. 3. If a man married the daughter and only child of another, he became in the view of the Hebrew law the son of that person, and thus was a son assigned to him by law. The two last positions shew in what sense Zorobabel was the son both of Neri and Salathiel, and Joseph the son both of Jacob and of Heli, or Joachim. ...

In other words, he is there under another name.
skabedab
@skabedab: @hglundahl "This accounts for the omission of several descents in St. Matthew."

This is what is claimed in the book: That some immediate descendants are omitted. So Father Haydock says the same thing, that in the geneology, not every person is listed.
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: @skabedab the word "several" does not have the same meaning in his English as now, it means more than one or two.

There is a very far cry between "not every" and "only few out of the whole" ...
skabedab
@skabedab: @hglundahl This is from the online ethymology dictionary: "Compare Anglo-Latin severalis, a variant of separalis. The meaning "various, diverse, different" (as in went their several ways) is attested from c. 1500; that of "more than one" is from 1530s, growing out of legal meanings of the word, "belonging or assigned distributively to certain individuals" (mid-15c.), etc. Also used by mid-17c. as "a vague numeral" (OED), in which any notion of "different" appears to have been lost."

When Haydock lived, the word "several" was used as either "more than one" or even "a vague numeral". That means several is not at all defined as a "only a few". That means it could be that only a few people are omitted in the geneology or it could mean that quite a big number is ommited in total. And it would make sense to omit everyone that does not have a major part in salvation history, except for continuing the lineage.

The major truth behind the geneology of Christ is that he is truly a descendant of the Patriarchs and of the house of David. By legal adoption through Joseph and by blood through Mary. This truth is not at all denied in the book, so there is no objection from a theological point of view.
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: @skabedab you are presuming the older meaning had been replaced by the other one in Haydock's time - no, they were concurrent.

I know "several" needs to mean "more than one" because I have counted the omissions in Matthew, they are 4 generations.
skabedab
@skabedab: @hglundahl No I am not presuming that. I say that we can not say if only a few are ment, like for example 3-4 direct offspring, or if in some cases it is even more, like 10. The word "several" is not so exact and leaves room for interpretation.

The point I am arguing against here is that you make it seem like the Author is some kind of modernist, when his interpretation is not against the Catholic faith at all. I understand your interpretation and you have every right to believe it that way. But to attack a different theological position and make it seem like it is quasi heresy is not a good thing to do.
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: In some cases, @skabedab word meanings are determinable from factual context.

The people who have perused the genealogies and genealogy relevant material in the OT, have concluded that between King Solomon and Joseph, 4 generations are missing.

4. Not 10. Three generations after queen Athalia + one more at the Babylonian captivity. That's it.

"or if in some cases it is even more, like 10."

Not a shred of evidence for that being the case in either of the genealogies.

Haydock is not allowing for anything missing from that of St. Luke. The one exact reason why Haydock concludes these four generations are missing is, he knows of the places in the OT where these generations are mentioned.
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: @skabedab "This accounts for the omission of several descents in St. Matthew."

So, he is not admitting to any omission of generations in St. Luke.
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: @skabedab "and make it seem like it is quasi heresy is not a good thing to do."

Unless one has seen it lead to precisely heresy.
skabedab
@skabedab: @hglundahl This might be. And I respect Haydocks conclusion. I myself favor that explanation. I myself am for the literal meaning whenever it is in any way possible.

But on the other hand, I do not condemn other interpretations, as long as they are consistent with Catholic teaching and neither does the Church.

I just found this. Another decision from the Bible Commission in 1911 (still under Pius X.):
"2153 VI. Whether from the fact that the author of the first Gospel pursues especially the dogmatic and apologetic aim, namely, of demonstrating to the Jews that Jesus is the Messias foretold by the prophets, and descended from the lineage of David, and from the fact that when arranging the deeds and words which he narrates and sets forth anew, he does not always hold to the chronological order, it may be deduced that these matters are not to be accepted as true; or, also, whether it can be affirmed that the accounts of the accomplishments and discourses of Christ, which are read in the Gospel itself, have undergone a kind of alteration and adaptation under the influence of the prophets of the Old Testament, and the status of the more mature Church, and so are by no means in conformity with historical truth?--Reply: In the negative to both parts" (Denzinger 2153)

So the purpose of the Gospel of Matthew is to dogmatically and apologetically demonstrate to the Jews that Jesus is the Messiah foretold by the prophets and descended from David. It is also stated as a fact, that the Gospel does not always hold to a chronological order, to achieve that purpose. But from this fact it can not in any way be deduced that it is not true.

On the same occasion, the Bible comission taught the following:
"2154 VII. Whether in particular the opinions of those persons should be rightly considered as devoid of solid foundation, who call into question the historical authenticity of the two first chapters, in which the genealogy and infancy of Christ are related; as also of certain opinions on dogmatic matters of great moment, as are those which have to do with the primacy of Peter [Matt. 16:17-19], the form of baptizing, together with the universal mission of preaching handed over to the apostles [Matt. 28:19-20], the apostles' profession of faith in the divinity of Christ [Matt. 14:33], and other such matters which occurred in Matthew announced in a special way?--Reply: In the affirmative." (Also from Denzinger)

So it is not allowed to doubt or call into question the authenticity or historicity of the genealogy of Christ nor his infancy. The same is true for the primacy of Peter and other truths contained in the Gospel of Matthew. If Matthew leaves out 4 generations, the authenticity of Christs genealogy is not questionable. The truth that Christ is of the lineage of David is not affected by the omission of some minor characters in the lineage. And even if most of the characters in the lineage would be left out, like: Adam begot Noah, Noah begot Abraham, Abraham begot Juda, Juda begot David, David begot Joseph; the truth would still be there: Jesus is of the lineage of David.

So the author of the book above is not in any way attacking Catholic teaching at all, or calling it into question. He rather says that we do not have to stress too much about if all these people were direct descendants in the way that one is the literal son of the other. It could be that even the majority in the list is omitted. This still wouldn't affect the truth that Christ is of David.

If you hold that the earth or at least humanity is very young, then of course, omitting a vast majority of people might be a problem. But if you hold that humanity is older, then not having this kind of explanation is a bigger problem for you. The Church has not decided on this question. Yes, the ancient exegetes were mostly of the opinion that the numbers presented are to be taken literally and earth as well as humans are very young. But to take another aproach has never been condemned. After all, it does not really matter nor does it take away from salvation history if something takes a shorter or a longer period of time.

Again: I myself am in strong favor of a literal interpretation. I believe that the numbers presented in genesis are literal numbers and humanity is not older than 5000 years. But at the same time, since the Church did not rule on that particular matter, it is not okay to attack the other standpoint.

To close here, I am going to quote Pius XII. on biblical exegesis:

"The Catholic exegete, impelled by an active and strong love of his science, and sincerely devoted to Holy Mother Church, should by no means be kept from attacking difficult questions as yet unresolved, again and again, not only to refute what is raised in opposition by adversaries, but to strive also to find a solid explanation which is in faithful accord with the doctrine of the Church, namely with what has been taught about Sacred Scripture free of all errors, and also satisfies in due measure certain conclusions of the profane sciences.

But let all the other sons of the Church remember that the attempts of these strenuous workers in the vineyard of the Lord should be judged not only with an honest and just heart, but also with the highest charity; indeed, these men should beware of that zeal, which is by no means prudent, whereby it is thought that whatever is new, for this very reason should be attacked or brought into suspicion" [Encyclical "DIVINO AFFLANTE SPIRITU", AAS 35 (1943), 319]
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: @skabedab "It is also stated as a fact, that the Gospel does not always hold to a chronological order, to achieve that purpose."

No. It is stated as a fact that - in fact elsewhere - the chronological order is not always observed in the Gospel, not that this is involved in the genealogy.

St. Matthew's passages may not always follow the chronological order between them, but in each passage, and a genealogy is one, the chronology would be good.

"If you hold that the earth or at least humanity is very young, then of course, omitting a vast majority of people might be a problem. But if you hold that humanity is older, then not having this kind of explanation is a bigger problem for you."

If you hold that humanity is so old that Genesis 5 and 11 between them, for the span between Adam and Abraham, not only omits 5 % (as Matthew) but more like omits 95 %, then you have overturned historicity of Genesis 3.

That's a much huger problem than stating "heresy" is "heresy" before the Church has decided so.

Pope St Agathon lauded the men who had - before the council of Ephesus and before his own intervention - called Nestorius a heretic.

"and humanity is not older than 5000 years."

It was 5199 years when Christ was born, see the Christmas Proclamation (traditional form, obviously).

Your quote from Divino Afflante could be due to Pius XII's involvement in a Honorius-like abandonment of truth condemning error in favour of the error of Adam having physical ancestry, of leaving it uncondemned.
skabedab
@skabedab: @hglundahl "No. It is stated as a fact that - in fact elsewhere - the chronological order is not always observed in the Gospel, not that this is involved in the genealogy."

I never claimed that this passage is aimed at the genealogy.

And I think it is quite uncharitable to compare Pius XII. and Honorius in that way.

I said my piece. Agree to disagree
Hans Georg Lundahl
@hglundahl: Ah, @skabedab - I am uncharitable to Pius XII?

I think I am less that, than any other Sede to pretended Popes between Pius XII in Humani Generis 1950 and John Paul II in the early 1990's.

These Popes or Antipopes cannot usually be tied down to universalism. They cannot be tied down to hyperecumenism, to extending non-Feeneyism into making non-Catholic religions ordinary means of salvation. But Pius XII can be tied down to refusing to condemn "Adam had biological ancestors" and John Paul II to directly favouring the thesis.

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere

Pages