I am willing to go along with this. After all (for example), I don't think that Lev. 9:1-4 is addressed to me or has any immediate relevance. (I suppose it does help set the stage for Lev. 9:23-24 though, a passage which definitely stirs me up on the inside!)
According to Acts 7 he was still in the clouds: When they heard these things, they became enraged and ground their teeth at Stephen. But filled with the Holy Spirit, he gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. “Look,” he said, “I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!” But they covered their ears, and with a loud shout all rushed together against him. Then they dragged him out of the city and began to stone him, and the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul. While they were stoning Stephen, he prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Then he knelt down and cried out in a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” When he had said this, he died.
Many years ago I found Malachi 3:10 the most challenging verse God had ever presented to me to do. It was my failure to take God up on that challenge, my lack of courage and faith that led me to the understanding that it is not by assiduous keeping of the law that we gain God's approval. It is by trusting entirely in Jesus Christ for our salvation and seeking through the Holy Spirit to know and follow HIS direction, daily, as a disciple of The WAY, that we find happiness in this life and eternal life in the next. I believe that result for me personally, was the purpose of His challenge. .
No one else saw. But I have no doubt Stephen "saw" this, though not necessarily with natural optical receptors. Don't you think this was a supernatural vision given by God to a man about to be martyred?
You’re reading into the text, including inserting ideas from modern science fiction like “dematerialized bodies” to save the appearances. In other words, you are (selectively) interpreting the text according to your own, modern context rather than according to the ancient context of the original readers. There’s no reason to think the text means anything other than exactly what it says, because that’s precisely what we know people from that era believed based on other written sources. It says Jesus rose up into the clouds, implies that he is hidden there unless or until he reveals his presence there, and that he will return from the clouds at the end of this age. We know today that the sky is not the divine realm (and, of course, that human beings cannot fly without assistance from technology), so it’s perfectly natural that modern readers would want to interpret these texts while taking such advances in knowledge into account. But the simple fact is that doing so removes us from the world of the original intended hearers and causes us to force a meaning on the text that its author did not and could not have intended. The Ascension story itself also isn’t multiply attested (it occurs only in Luke/Acts); Paul and the authors of Mark, Matthew, and John knew nothing of it. So the question faced by the modern interpreter who believes in Jesus is, if the plain sense of the text of the Ascension account does not cohere with reality (viz., it wasn’t written by an eyewitness, it’s comparatively late, it isn’t well attested, and it’s intrinsically implausible), what abiding theological or devotional value may we or should we ascribe to it, and on what grounds?
The writers of the Bible, (and I'm talking about the men to put pen to parchment or papyrus or dictated the words of it). wrote, spoke and thought a great deal in symbols, metaphor and figures of speech. Two words in Greek were used in Luke's accounts of the ascension which are translated into English using the words lifted up. The self same two words are also often used by Luke in phrases such as 'he lifted up his hands', and 'they lifted up their eyes'. Luke 6:20, 11:27, 16:23, 18:13, 21:28, 24:50. In Luke 24:50 we have "and lifting up his hands he blessed them, ( epairō )" - "While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven. ( anapherō ) - "And they worshiped him ( proskyneō; meaning to kiss, like a dog licking his master's hand ); to fawn or crouch to, i.e. (literally or figuratively) prostrate oneself in homage (do reverence to, adore): — worship. AV (60) - worship 60; ἐπαίρω epairō; to raise up (literally or figuratively): — exalt self, poise (lift, take) up. AV (19) - lift up 15, exalt (one's) self 2, take up 1, hoisted up 1; to lift up, raise up, raise on high metaphor. to be lifted up with pride, to exalt one's self. ἀναφέρω anapherō; to take up (literally or figuratively): — bear, bring (carry, lead) up, offer (up). AV (10) - offer up 3, bear 2, offer 2, bring up 1, lead up 1, carry up 1; to carry or bring up, to lead up men to a higher place, to put upon the altar, to bring to the altar, to offer to lift up one's self, to take upon one's self. It is perfectly possible, (with the Greek words used to describe their experience), that Jesus was taken into a cloud upon a mountain top while his disciples were prostrating themselves with their faces to the ground, and they, upon looking up ASSUMED that HE had "Gone up with a merry noise" just as it says in the Psalms. Whereas, he may have simply been taken from their sight as they bowed in obeisance before him, as the cloud enveloped them all. When the cloud cleared Jesus was gone and two angels then informed them that Jesus would return in the same fashion. i.e. quite suddenly, without warning. I have had a similar experience of briefly losing all visual contact with my surroundings, when a fog bank / cloud completely enveloped me in Scotland, while I was meditating upon a passage of scripture, sitting on a hillside at Inverness, on retreat, previously, only minutes before, bathed in warm, bright sunshine at 10:00 am in the morning. epairō : No one's eyes actually lifted off the earth and sailed off into heaven, neither did anyone's hands 'take off' heavenward, so context is very important here when the words epairō or anapherō are translated 'lifted up'. In addition to this the words can also mean 'elevated' in rank or status into a 'higher' position of authority or state of being. He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.” And when he had said this, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” Acts 1:7-11. That was written by Luke shortly after he became a travelling companion of St. Paul. This was also written, but years later, by Luke and (to my knowledge at least), is the only other actual account of the ascension in the canon of scripture. "You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you; but stay in the city, until you are clothed with power from on high.” Then he led them out as far as Bethany, and lifting up his hands ( epairō ) he blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them, and was carried up ( anapherō ) into heaven. And they returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple blessing God.
Not really. I'm drawing a reasonable inference from the entirety of scripture. One important bit of evidence is the fact that Jesus appeared to the disciples in a locked room; that implies a materialization. Another important piece of data is the fact that God is Creator and Master of the Universe, and He created all the matter of the universe out of nothing; any such Being is perfectly capable of manipulating the matter of a physical body, dematerializing and rematerializing at will. For God, transposing Philip from one location to another in the blink of an eye is child's play. This has nothing to do with "modern context", but it has everything to do with Biblical context (interpreting a scripture in light of, and in harmony with, the whole of divine scripture). Indeed, considerable portions of the Gospels and Acts probably were written by people who did not eyewitness the events firsthand, but who were told about it. On what grounds do we ascribe lasting theological value to them? My grounds are (1) by faith, (2) by the high credibility accorded to these writings by the fledgling church, and (3) by the fact that the church eventually canonized them. Unlike you, I come to the written word of God with the belief that it is free from errors and falsehoods, even the parts to which only one person attests. I also come to it with the belief that things which appear hard to believe from a scientific standpoint are better viewed from a supernatural standpoint, as opposed to assuming they are either a mistake or a falsehood. I certainly do not assume that everything God does must be explainable in non-supernatural terms so as to meet the test of modern scientific knowledge. God is God. He who makes fire upon a bush without consuming it, splits the Red Sea in twain, makes water turn to blood, causes good drinking water to gush out of solid rock, calms storms, catches away prophets like Ezekiel, heals the blind and the lame, and raises the dead back to life is perfectly capable of lifting His own incarnate body into the air and sailing into the clouds and to go wherever and however He thereafter wishes.
So, your 'explanation' is that Jesus was standing on a mountain and a cloud bank came in...gee, maybe Jesus merely "slipped away" down the backside of the hill, like a magician who uses sleight of hand, to make His disappearance seem amazing ). I wonder how you interpret the healings and miracles attributed to Jesus? I wonder how you explain scientifically the raising of Lazarus? Do you also offer a scientific explanation for the account of Jesus' resurrection? What I mean is, if you feel that you must "explain away" the miraculous nature of Jesus' ascension (which has been taught by the church since for two millennia), then I don't see how you can tolerate any Biblical account of a miraculous nature without assigning a scientifically rational explanation to it! Act 1:9 And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. Act 1:10 And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; Do you see? There's no way it happened the way you propose. It doesn't say the disciples had their faces to the ground or turned away. It specifically states that Jesus "was taken up" while they watched, while they looked steadfastly (i.e., without looking away)!
You’re missing the point. In order to avoid the attribution of ancient (false) assumptions to the biblical authors, conservatives have been reading modern scientific assumptions back into their biblical interpretation for decades. Your own valiant and admirable but ultimately futile attempt to wiggle out of the plain sense of Acts 1 regarding the ascension via a science fiction-inspired interpretation that is completely divorced from the ancient context is just one of many examples that could be cited. The difference between conservatives and liberals on this topic, then, is that conservatives have simply been selective about their modernism. Liberals apply it consistently, but only with regard to application of the text to the problems of contemporary life, not with regard to its plain sense meaning, which is controlled by the original context. But the initial impetus for the reevaluation of traditional interpretation within Anglicanism was not liberal theology as such, but rather the renewed study of the biblical text itself and the cultures that produced them. It had nothing to do with “inerrancy;” that was a later development, the fights over which during the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy in the early 20th century largely bypassed the Church of England and the Episcopal Church.
Nothing of the sort actually. Jesus could easily have left the mountain top in the same physical way he left the upper room or the house at Emmaus, a third fourth or fifth, ’disappearance’, or dematerialisation would not be unreasonable as an explanation. In any case such a vanishing need not imply the sleight of hand you have scurrilously implied here. The manner of Jesus’ actual departure could be simply down to the way the evangelist decided to word his account of what he perceived to have happened. there are differences between his two accounts anyway. One mentions a cloud, the other does not. Had Luke forgotten about that part of the experience between writing Acts and writing his Gospel? He wrote them both some years apart. If both accounts are to be taken quite literally with no allowance given to the way people might have naturally thought about and viewed sudden and unexplained disappearances back then, which one do you think is the account that is literally and absolutely infallibly accurate in every detail? There are other accounts written by Luke which honestly recorded what the disciples perceived to have happened or which had merely been reported to them, rather than what might have literally, actually happened in exactly the way described, you know. Acts. 1:16-20. Matt. 27:5. I find the literalist biblical fundamentalists explanation of the Judas anomaly spectacularly unconvincing, don't you. If Judas bought a field with the money, how was it that he still had it on him to throw into the sanctuary and go and hang himself on his new property, additionally haemorrhaging his bowels into the bargain? (He'd only got the money the previous or even the same day, it would seem). .
To what “fantasy” do you refer? I have insisted on nothing as the “plain sense” in the discussed passages but what is actually there. You’re still missing the point.
Perhaps you should read your Bible more often. It says the religious leaders were the ones who took the money Judas threw back and used it to buy the field. Your memory appears to be slipping.
You presume to tell me what is in my mind, that the source of my reasoning is modern science or science fiction. I'd already told you that you were mistaken, but you've persisted in ass-uming that you know my thoughts better than I do. That is your fantasy.
Luke, in my and your Bible, says nothing of the sort actually. "For he was numbered among us and was allotted his share in this ministry.” (Now this man (meaning Judas, not the priests), acquired a field with the reward of his wickedness, (the 30 pieces of silver), and falling headlong he burst open in the middle and all his bowels gushed out. And it became known to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the field was called in their own language Akeldama, that is, Field of Blood.) Acts 1:17-19. You must be thinking only of Matt.27:3-10. I don't think it is me that does not seem to have read or understood Luke's report in the scriptures or me whose memory seems to be slipping. It's someone else who needs to go back to his studies perhaps and reconcile satisfactorily the two contradictory accounts if one or the other is infallibly true. My own view is that the writers of scripture honestly recorded what they understood they had witnessed or heard but had not always understood it accurately or perceived it with a full understanding. .
An actual literalist's understanding of the scriptures about this circumstance is more sensible and harmonious than what you came up with. I think there is a misunderstanding of what literalist Bible interpretation really means and entails, because some people who oppose literalism (at least when it suits them ) seem fond of making up a twisted caricature of it.
The accounts of Judas in Matthew and Acts differ in enough details that they probably cannot both be true, and it’s entirely possible that neither account is historical. Neither account claims to be written by an eyewitness, so the story is the product of oral tradition, existing side-by-side with other oral traditions that have Jesus saying that all twelve disciples (including Judas) would sit on thrones when his kingdom was established. We can be confident, I think, that Jesus had a disciple named Judas, and that this disciple betrayed him to the authorities, but we may never know for sure what ultimately happened to this disciple and when.