Jesus and Judas
- Thread starter Gary K
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This begs the question that manipulation of one's enemies is evil, and/or that manipulation is always evil.
Question: had Judas instead not sold Jesus to the Jewish leaders, and repented of his evil, and asked Christ to forgive him, would Jesus have forgiven him?
I see you do not accept scripture as it is written. That makes me sad.
As to Jesus forgiving Judas if he had repented that's not even a question. Of course He would have. Scripture demonstrates this very clearly.
Right Divider
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Don't lie about others here. It won't go well for you.
Calling your opinions "scripture" does not bode well for your position...
Because that's what I was talking about, not scripture.
As RD said, don't bear false witness.
You said, "I find [X] premise . . . to be directly contradicted by scripture.
X = that Jesus manipulated Judas into betraying Him"
Then you quoted scripture that tells us that God doesn't tempt people, nor can He be tempted with evil.... as if either manipulating ones enemies, and/or all manipulation in general, is evil. Hence why I said that you were begging the question
First you must show that either A) manipulating ones enemies is evil, OR B) that manipulation is always evil.
Until you do that, we cannot discuss whether premise X is contradictory to scripture.
Bearing false witness is a sin.
Question: Was Judas Jesus' enemy?
What is the question?
If Judas had resisted the temptation, there would have been nothing to forgive.
The assertion was that Jesus manipulated Judas, and in my mind, that is tempting Judas to sin by betraying Jesus for money. As Judas was a thief his betrayal was motivated, at least in part, by his greed.
Jesus did not need to "manipulate" Judas, and in fact that is not what actually happened. When Christ chose Judas to be one of the twelve, He already identified him as "a devil". Jesus knew well in advance that Judas would betray Him for money. This betrayal was already revealed prophetically.
And that is exactly what happened. Therefore Christ simply sent him on his way. And the Bible says that Satan entered Judas. So the allegation that Christ manipulated him is false.
Yes, Manipulative behavior is always wrong for several reasons. First and foremost because it is one of the devil's attributes. The devil is so manipulative he deceived 1/3 of the angels in heaven who had lived in the presence of God for who knows how many billions of years.
Manipulation always uses deception to manipulate the target/s. My older brother is very manipulative and has been since he was a kid. His behavior destroyed all trust between us and created hatred in me. One of the miracles God has worked in me is that I have now put him on my prayer list. I went from hating him to loving him and desiring to see him in heaven in a period of a couple of months.
Idolater
"Matthew 16:18-19" Dispensationalist (Catholic) χρ
Mr. Miagi manipulated Danielsan into learning karate with "wax on, wax off."
I'm not sure what you mean by that. Jesus was fully aware of who Judas was, what he would do, and why he would do it.
I'll see if I can explain what I'm saying more clearly.
Jesus came to earth to redeem all of humanity who would accept Him. He had known for an eternity that the Jews would reject Him and His sacrifice of Himself even though He had given them a sacrificial system that pointed directly to Him as the Messiah. Plus He had sent prophets to them to point to His birth, life, death, and resurrection since the days of Abraham. They knew all this and still turned away from Him because they wanted personal aggrandizement and political power in the world. They wanted to rule over Rome and His kingdom was spiritual not physical. If Jesus had offered them worldly goods, and power over their enemies they would gladly have accepted Him. Instead He pointed to their leaders and told the common man that their righteousness must exceed the righteousness of the Pharisees or they could not be saved. He was a huge blow to the ego of their religious leaders.
Jesus is self sacrificing, kind. loving and righteous. He came to show us who the Father is. Can you imagine asking God to forgive those who are nailing you to a cross and mocking you while you are hanging there naked for all the world to see? That is the character of God. It is who Jesus is.
Does this make my comments clearer?
While all that is true, the issue was whether Christ manipulated Judas. Obviously He did not.
"in your mind"?
You mean, "in your opinion", right?
Your opinion isn't scriptural...
I Kings 22:20 And the Lord said, ‘Who will persuade Ahab to go up, that he may fall at Ramoth Gilead?’ So one spoke in this manner, and another spoke in that manner. 21 Then a spirit came forward and stood before the Lord, and said, ‘I will persuade him.’ 22 The Lord said to him, ‘In what way?’ So he said, ‘I will go out and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.’ And the Lord said, ‘You shall persuade him, and also prevail. Go out and do so.’ 23 Therefore look! The Lord has put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these prophets of yours, and the Lord has declared disaster against you.”
It is NOT immoral for a righteous person, including God Himself, to manipulate an evil enemy.
This is no doubt true. It is, however, not contradictory to the notion that God was orchestrating the events of Calvary, including the part that Judas played.
Do you think that it was mere coincidence that it was thirty pieces of silver? Where the events in Matthew 27 not a parallel of Zechariah 11:13?
Do you not think that was on purpose?
Clete
No, it really doesn't.
First of all, the idea that God had known for eternity that the Jews would reject Him is not in the bible. That's your doctrine but it isn't biblical. You learned that from your Pastor or Sunday School teacher but they didn't get it from the bible either and neither did whoever it was that taught it to them. It comes from Aristotle and Plato, not scripture.
Second, they did NOT understand the passages of the Old Testament that pointed to the suffering Messiah. Not even the Twelve understood that! The Apostles all refused to believe Jesus when He Himself told them that He would be killed.
Third, if Jesus had offered them worldly goods and power, etc, He would have proven Himself to not be the Messiah.
Fourth, it was Jesus' undeniable miracles that caused the Jewish leaders to want Jesus killed, not their hurt feelings caused by Jesus' words.
Lastly, Jesus' forgiving those who were participating in the crucifixion wasn't some exceptional example of selfless kindness. It was a legal matter. Jesus' death was sufficient to cover the sins of the entire world but what those who were killing Jesus were doing was literally deicide (the murder of God), an act that would clearly fall outside the normal sort of sin that Christ's sacrifice was intended to deal with. Not only that, but it was an act that God Himself was orchestrating, which offers additional complications regarding the guilt of those involved. Christ, therefore, being infinitely wise, absolutely just and yes, amazingly kind, dealt with that issue by issuing a blanket forgiveness to all those involved in the act of killing Him, which only He had the right to do.
Clete
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That may be what you think since I said nothing about "lucky coincidences". You seem to be forgetting that Christ knew what was in each man's heart, and he deliberately chose Judas so that prophecy might be fulfilled. Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? He spake of Judas Iscariot the son of Simon: for he it was that should betray him, being one of the twelve. (John 6:70, 71)
As we see in the Gospel narratives, Judas made all his choices on his own, and no one manipulated him. God had already seen Judas doing what he did, thus all the prophecies regarding the betrayal of Christ.
It was a question, SKC, not an accusation.
The idea was that if you didn't think it was a lucky coincidence, then what was it and how is it possible that God wasn't orchestrating the events of Calvary, including the ones that Judas had a hand in?
This is my line. You are the one who is saying that Judas wasn't being manipulated by God. He very clearly was, albeit willingly so.
False dichotomy.
Unbiblical, Greek philosophy based nonsense that is not only false but contradicts the claim you just made in the previous sentence. Explicit foreknowledge and free will are mutually exclusive.
T = You answer the telephone tomorrow at 9 am
- Yesterday God infallibly believed T. [Supposition of infallible foreknowledge]
- If E occurred in the past, it is now-necessary that E occurred then. [Principle of the Necessity of the Past]
- It is now-necessary that yesterday God believed T. [1, 2]
- Necessarily, if yesterday God believed T, then T. [Definition of “infallibility”]
- If p is now-necessary, and necessarily (p → q), then q is now-necessary. [Transfer of Necessity Principle]
- So it is now-necessary that T. [3,4,5]
- If it is now-necessary that T, then you cannot do otherwise than answer the telephone tomorrow at 9 am. [Definition of “necessary”]
- Therefore, you cannot do otherwise than answer the telephone tomorrow at 9 am. [6, 7]
- If you cannot do otherwise when you do an act, you do not act freely. [Principle of Alternate Possibilities]
- Therefore, when you answer the telephone tomorrow at 9 am, you will not do it freely. [8, 9]
Clete