Mary and Jesus, maybe? (Fair Use)
The Advent and the Doctrine of Incompletion
By Krischan
In Christian denominations, the Advent was just observed. We once again marveled at the Incarnation and what implications of it we can understand. Armstrongists reject Christmas because it has a pagan taint that nobody pays attention to any longer. But they don’t reject everything that has a pagan taint. But Christmas is politically charged and its rejection can generate drama. Within Armstrongism there should be defined a Doctrine of Incompletion. Their keeping of the Torah is incomplete. Their rejection of pagan practices is incomplete. Their belief in science is incomplete. So on. Maybe a robust, overtly stated Doctrine of Incompletion might lead to grace and faith for those in the ranks who are paying attention.
We are assailed with images of Mary and Jesus during the Advent season. These images are rejected by Armstrongists because they are seen as a violation of the prohibition of graven images in the Torah. But the Armstrongist rejection is, you know, incomplete. They should also reject the images because they are inaccurate. Mary and Jesus were First Century Jews. In my years of seeing pictures of Mary and Jesus, they have always been portrayed as Western Europeans, never Middle Eastern Jews. Or maybe one might make an argument that they appear to be Ashkenazi who have significant European heritage. But there were no Ashkenazi back in the time of Jesus so why overlay the past with the future. The woman and the baby in the photo above are Mizrahi Jews – most like the Jews at the time of Jesus. Their appearance does not fit well with British-Israelism nor is their appearance to the tastes of many White Evangelicals and Armstrongists. It makes you ask if Incompletion is an honest mistake or a strategy.
29 comments:
1 Timothy 1:4
Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions.......
Yes, after years of trying, the ACOGs have failed to come up with a coherent rationale for observing some provisions of Torah and rejecting others. Likewise, while underscoring the minimal vestiges of pagan practices surrounding modern holidays (well over 90% of our rituals/traditions associated with Christmas belong to the Christian Era), they completely ignore most of the real pagan influences on society (e.g. the names of days of the week and months, art, literature, music, etc.). In the realms of science, education, and logic, they twist and ignore facts to fit their theology. I like the designation of "incompletion," but I like the term "cherry picking" even better!
Ooooo out of touch. The pagan origins of Christmas are exposed mote and more and actually quite on trend these days. More so than years ago. Hubris is a dangerous thing even with this blog. It's actually not 1999 anymore.
Does something of pagan origin necessarily mean that it is ungodly? When Abram was told to circumcise himself, was he puzzled by the command or was circumcision a common practice? When Moses told the Israelites to create a priesthood with priestly robes, breastplate, a temple, altar, animal sacrifices, holy days, etc. were they puzzled by the meaning of all these things? Were they offended or puzzled knowing that they saw similar things in Egypt and elsewhere? Was Moses the first person to reveal to his people these religious practices? Wasn't much of what we see in the Law of Moses very similar to what was required in the pagan religions? Did God give to Moses what was familiar to them, but with new meaning attached to them?
When HWA built is auditorium, didn't he dedicate it to God? Wasn't this a place of worship, a temple? Was there any commandment given to the church to build a temple?
it appears to me that the COGs miss the simplicity that is in Christ and must then deal with incompletion.
In Pseudo-Christian denominations, the Advent was just observed.
There, I fixed it for you.
Re-exposure of the pagan origins of Christmas is like Peter's sudden consciousness of the wind while attempting to walk on the water. Saturnalia was sublimated by the early Christians when they replaced its pagan elements by making it all about Jesus Christ. They totally purified it. How do you correct or purify anything that is bad? Jesus Christ. In fact, that's the only lasting or effective way to do it.
There is virtually nothing you can say, think, or do that was not at one time misused or abused by the pagans at some point in history. It would do absolutely no good at all to remind people how the pagans misused water. Do we really have to be reminded of Neptune or Poseidon with every glass of water, bath or shower, swim session, or cruise???
It's mind-boggling that ACOG people who take Christmas weekend and turn it into Winter Family Weekend totally miss the point that Paul's gentile Christians could have taken Saturnalia and made it all about Jesus Christ.
I dare someone to say, "Oh, but that's different!" It really isn't.
Miller Jones:
I agree that the term "cherry picking" is much more vivid and understandable. The Doctrine of Intentional Incompletion is more philsophical and just might convey a bit of parody.
I do think that there is a great swathe of people in Western Civilization who are unable to worship a non-Aryan Jesus. I have no statitics - just experience and intuition. Part of their "acceptance" of the Gospel is the denial of the racial affinity of Jesus. Herman Hoeh believed that God and Jesus, in appearance, were both White men. This view attracts a certain kind of people to the Armstrongist pews. And it marries nicely to British-Israelism.
In its simplest form, it is the belief that God's chosen people are white and the non-chosen are brown and black because God himself is white. Color sorted to make it simple for us. Some White people need that self-adulation in order to be religious - though not Christian, mind you. It is paradoxy. I have wondered in the past how the WW2 era Germans, with the exception of a few Otto Schindlers, could hate the Jews so intensely yet ardently sing "Stille Nacht" about a Jewish baby in a manger. The heart finds devious ways. There are some powerful lessons for Armstrongists in what the Germans did but they are obscured by all that bogus Assyrian stuff.
But one day, we are promised, everyone will see Jesus (Rev 1:7). And they will see that he looks like a Middle Eastern Jew. (Some will bring up that old saw about how his hair will look like pure wool and his skin like brass as if he had been through some kind of sanitation process so he does not look Jewish any longer.) And when most people see him, they will rejoice. But for some, their tight little, self-affirming world will collapse.
Krischan
Sure there are things like the days of the week names, planetary names, car names like a Saturn, and even in the New Testament we have someone named Apollos.
We are told in scripture to not bring in pagan elements into the worship of God. That is where the line is. That is also why it is not evil or wrong to have something like the Winter Family Weekend, which is a social event, where kids and parents have time off and can have the logistics of such an event. Just because something coincides with Xmas, does not make it a Xmas event. I wonder if some people believe that you should just hunker down in a bomb shelter or something on Xmas.
It is all "meat before idols", and Id have no problem eating such (especially a nice NY steak). As long as we do not incorporate pagan elements into our worship and understanding of God, those things are simply empty meaningless icons that the world , in its non understanding and depth, participate in. I am not polluted by those things, nor "fearful" of them, and I will eat all the chocolate Santa Clauses that you will give me. As a person who does not get wrapped up in common holidays, I will not go into the other ditch of "superstition" , magic thinking, or paranoia.
I'm always amused by Bob Thiel going to great lengths to "prove" that Jesus wasn't black. Because, you know, thats a really important thing to spend time on.
5:48
You're right. Labels can be bandied aboug easily enough. And labels do nothing to determine which organization is Christian and which is Pseudo-Christian.
What I like to do is lift the hood and look at the Doctrine of God asserted by any denomination. It is the chief doctrine which subsumes all the others. And what we have with Armstrongism is a God who is Bi-theistic - that is there are two separate Persons. This is a form of polytheism found among pagan religions. I believe even the Church of God Seventh Day, from which HWA got some of his theology, is Binitarian rather than Bi-theistic.
My guess is that you believe Christmas is a pagan celebration observed by pagan churches. The irony is that you believe in a Doctrine of God that is pagan and Christmas is observed by actual Christian Churches because it celebrates the Advent of Christ.
Krischan
Tonto:
Good points. The classical case I use is whether Armstrongists can participate in post-Christmas sales. I believe that by their standards, they cannot but they do anyway. If they do, they are directly participating in commerce that is inspired by paganism. The only reason the sale is there is because of Christmas. You cannot tease Christmas and the sale apart. Purchased sale products are tainted forever. Repentance would require that you discard what was purchased.
But that is facetious. First, Christmas itself is not tainted by meaningless past associations. It is what it is as practiced. Christmas does not have a genome with bad genes in it. Second, products purchased in a post-Christmas sale serve no religous purpose in the lives of the purchasers. A pair of jockey shorts is a pair of jockey shorts. They are not priestly vestments for pagan rites.
Oh, well.
Krischan
Armstrongism claims to be the keeper of all knowledge on the "Plan of God". Their absurdity is exposed by their exclusion of The Incarnation in their defining of the Plan of God.
Armtronism does not preach on the wonder, merriment, and divine joy of the First Advent. Armstongism denies the biblical instruction that all Heaven celebrated the Incarnation.
Armstrongites are free to celebrate whichever days they find meaningful. However, the heresy of Armstongism is revealed in their tradition of labeling Christians as being pagans for celebrating the same Advent that Heaven celebrated/celebrates!
The long game of Armstongism failing to acknowledge the Incarnation, yea even vilifying the celebration of the event, plays out in their history of minimizing Jesus in their doctrines and preaching.
The Incarnation is an essential part of the Plan of God - as such, it is worthy of celebration!
As Holy Scripture informs, Jesus was slain from the foundation of creation. Thereby, Holy Scripture also instructs that the Incarnation was likewise planned prior to creation. Therefore, I reject all Armstrongite, and other claims, that any Christmas customs are really pagan. Jesus and His Planned Incarnation predate all paganism, making all pagan customs mere counterfeit vestiges stolen from the worship of the true God and deceptively bestowed on false gods.
I believe that even Armstongite lore depicts Satan cheaply counterfeiting the things of God. Truly, evergreen trees, gilded fruits, holly sprigs, suspended orbs, and multicolored lights belonged to God long before they may have been co-opted by merry-making pagans, or condemned by sour Armstongites.
I also fully agree with the other Christians on this blog who've eloquently proclaimed how Jesus purifies all., including pagan customs.
Our hope is in Jesus redeeming us from our sinfulness! Christmas depicts Jesus, Light of the World, breaking the darkness of our world, to redeem all things, even pagans, and eventually Armstrongites too!
If I could make one observation here without offending anyone, it's that Jesus being black actually makes a heck of a lot of sense in terms of the abundance of the harvest. Black people are the most imitated people on the face of the earth, setting all the major trends that go viral, and innovating all the styles. If Jesus had been black, most likely everyone would be Christian! But that would be too easy, so God had to pick another race.
This verse is very contradictory to evergreen trees being a pagan symbol. The irony being that evergreen trees were originally decorated with fruit during December 24, representing the tree of life in the garden of Eden.
““Ephraim shall say, ‘What have I to do anymore with idols?’ I have heard and observed him. I am like a green cypress tree; Your fruit is found in Me.””
Hosea 14:8 NKJV
Trooisto
I am in agreement with your basic observations. It has been a long time since I have looked at the Armstrongist rationale for not observing Christmas. So I may be lacking some detail. Of course, at the top of the stack is the associations with the timing of the Saturnalia, as if nearness in time meant anything. Everytime Armstrongists keep a holyday, it almost certainly coincides with some pagan festival somewhere in the world. Are we to make an argument that one cannot keep the Feast of Trumpuets because if falls on Tibetan Prayer Wheel Day and is thereby tainted?
Armstrongists do point out the lack of any Biblical observation of the birth of Jesus. Yet, as Miller Jones pointed out, there was celebration - in fact more than we might expect. An angel appeared to some sheperds with an announcement and then there was an angelic host singing. We have the Magnificat of Mary, the Prophecy of Zechariah and other surrounding miracles. Just as profound as anything anywhere else in the Bible. As profound as Sinai. What we do not have is a particular day in the holy day cycle where we can see a direct, detailed connection to the birth of Jesus. But then again, Armstrongists connect the Feast of Tabernacles with the Milennium and there is no incontrovertible exegesis for that either.
(Yes, spending second tithe can make the Feast period appear to symbolize the affluence of the Milennium but second tithe was spent for all the holydays not just FOT. In fact, the ancient Hebrews kept the DULB in the same way as they kept the FOT and nobody is claiming the DULB are a symbol of the Milennium. This FOT-Milennium connection is all a facile concoction of early Armstrongists.)
There is the issue that John and Mark, in their gospels, did not mention the Nativity. And the observance of the Advent was not institutionalized by the Christian Church until the Fourth Century. But why are we to interpret this as a condemnation of the idea of celebrating the Advent? Jesus fulfilled the Torahic holydays and did not institute any new days. He did observe The Lord's Supper, as we call it, instead of the Passover. But it is not accompanied by a command to make it annual. Its observation is left to the Ekklesia. And I believe it is the same with the observation of the Advent. It is left to the Ekklesia.
Krischan
When Bob does it I'm just like... why? He didn't walk the earth with Jesus. He doesn't know if any of those men and women in his genealogy had any blood from anywhere other than Palestine. And isn't Jesus' impact more important than his appearance anyway? Is Bob just a very fragile white man who can't not get defensive about the notion, or is he just writing something about anything he can think of?
There are two Messiahs presented to the world today. Which is the One to actually follow and imitate?
1. There is the Messiah of the Bible, saying He did not come to do away with the law.
2. There is the Messiah of the religious and non-religious world. It is said about Him that He did away with the law by hanging it to the cross. In other words, “He is the Lawless person” with all its ramifications.
Which One do you think has the most followers?
Just think of it.,
He didn’t come to do away with the law but to fulfill the law and the prophets, which He did on the cross. He fulfilled the prophecies pointing to Him and satisfied the righteous requirements of the Sinai covenant. He had to die in order for the force of that covenant to end, as He is the Lord. As a party to the covenant with Israel, the agreement could only be ended by His death. Without the death of a party member, an irrevocable agreement remains in force. Like the marriage covenant. Only death releases the spouse from that agreement. It’s important to read the whole verse, not just the first half. It’s also important to review context, timing, audience and look at what happened before and after the cross.
If we are still under the law, then keep all 613 commandments or you are still lawless.
Tonto: don't eat chocolate Santa Clauses-have sugar. Try 2 cups cream, 4 tablespoons cocoa powder, 1/2 cup honey, mix/whip with beater 3-4 minutes so it won't get hard, to satisfy your need for chocolate. It satisfies mine.
It was the curse of the law, not the law, that was nailed to the cross. The curse is the penalty of the law, not the law.
So, Messiah paid the penalty (the curse) for all past sins. Does that mean we can now freely commit new sins without worry?
Go ahead, post your cherry picked verses showing the law is done away, along with the typical misinterpretation of them. We’d love to see those that justify lawlessness, I.e. no law.
9:22
That is an utterly false comparison created by people of limited understanding in the Armstrongist realm. Jesus established a new law - Paul refers to it as the Law of Christ.
It consists of the principles brought by Jesus to humankind in the Sermon on the Mount and any other principles encompassed by the NT authors. The idea that this view of the NT is lawlessness is either a lie or represents very dull understanding.
The idea that Jesus did not do away with the OT law has some traction. Some parts of that law were carried forward into the NT. Some parts were transformed like circumcision and the Sabbath. But the law as a complete corpus become obsolete. For instance, you don't have you teenaged daughter, if she has acne, when she approaches people in public, yell "Unclean!" Think about what you are saying. Don't just repeat lame sound-bites you picked up from the Armstrongist pulpit.
Krischan
12:10
Don't just repeat lame sound-bites you picked up from the law is done away pulpit, it doesn’t work.
Besides, the Bible itself is quite clear.
11:16
Colossians 2:14 does not refer to the cancellation of the law that Paul has in mind. It refers to the cancellation through forgiveness of the indebtedness generated through transgression of the laws. I do think there are Christian writers who assert that it is a cancellation of the law but that is a minority view from what I have seen.
In any event, there is not enough information here to know exactly what law Paul is referring to. This scripture cannot be pivotal for any exegetical analysis concerning whether or not the Torah has ben cancelled - it must be considered in conjunction with other scriptures in the NT that bear on the status of the Torah where it can be identified.
Krischan
At least in part it looks like law that came with the Levitical Priesthood (Heb 7:11) is now removed (Heb 7:12 - Greek for "change" of the law is same for "removing" in KJV Heb 12:27).
Not this tired old fake dichotomy again!
I'm not a Christian by any means, but I've never known one that takes "not being under the law" as license for hedonism AS DOCTRINE. Ever. Maybe a couple of cult figures, that's about it.
That nonsense needs to be buried with the dodo.
Now, in America at least, there is such a thing as the nominally-adherent Protestant. They inherited it from their parents and grandparents. Grew up in it, but never really explored it. They might pay lip service to their Christianity but generally don't have any interest in it. That's not the same thing at all - WCG had its second- and third-generation kids who were JUST LIKE THAT.
Trooista,
I agree with you and particularly appreciate several of your statements:
"Armstrongites are free to celebrate whichever days they find meaningful. However, the heresy of Armstongism is revealed in their tradition of labeling Christians as being pagans for celebrating the same Advent that Heaven celebrated/celebrates!"
"As Holy Scripture informs, Jesus was slain from the foundation of creation. Thereby, Holy Scripture also instructs that the Incarnation was likewise planned prior to creation. Therefore, I reject all Armstrongite, and other claims, that any Christmas customs are really pagan. Jesus and His Planned Incarnation predate all paganism, making all pagan customs mere counterfeit vestiges stolen from the worship of the true God and deceptively bestowed on false gods."
In as much as the holy days point to "the plan of salvation" according to the COGs, it is strange that the Climax of History (the 1st advent) is not focused on. There is to my mind no doubt that Immanuel would fulfill His coming as a pure sacrifice for the sin of man, so the great joy of His arrival shouldn't be ignored. Everything that comes later from a literary aspect is falling action and resolution.
Basically, the COG plan of salvation can't even begin until the Savior comes into the world...and the COGs purposefully ignore that.
Yep, RSK. Another stupid Armstrongist dichotomy as from my experience sincere Christians outside the COGs have better behavior than those within the COGs.
Anonymous Tuesday, January 2, 2024 at 9:22:00 AM PST said...
There are two Messiahs presented to the world today. Which is the One to actually follow and imitate?
1. There is the Messiah of the Bible, saying He did not come to do away with the law.
2. There is the Messiah of the religious and non-religious world. It is said about Him that He did away with the law by hanging it to the cross. In other words, “He is the Lawless person” with all its ramifications.
Which One do you think has the most followers?
Just think of it.,
----------
Indeed so does this mean Paul was an apostate and false apostle or his words have been grossly misinterpreted and twisted to teach lawlessness.
Note that, although the finger is many times, and justifiably so, pointed at Christian churches for "chang[ing] times and laws" (Dan 7:25) the Talmudic Jews are just as guilty of doing the same (eg changing Jubilee from 50th year to 49th year; changing brit milah circumcision to brit periah; changing the definition of one's Judahite lineage from patrilineal to matrilineal; changing the main OT Bible version in use by Diaspora Jews (and Greek speaking Christians) from the LXX to MT; etc).
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