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Originally Posted by
pandora
Sorry, but I really think I have given you answers both here and other threads where you have demanded them of me... And my friend.. You have NOT answered all my questions. You have been very selective with your answers. To be honest, I'm not prepared to play these games of yours.. It's bad enough being restricted to only three threads at a time for reasons I do not understand. That you continue to waste time going over the same points.. Even having been given answers (which I have done to the best of my ability) you are still prevaricating!! I will leave it to readers to make up their minds... I find my face is increasingly not bothered.
I have Already addressed all your questions
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Originally Posted by
; pandora
Based on their understanding, their understanding of the scriptures, which has to be based on something. Which I would take as an authority over your own...
What something!!!! and what about the different understanding of this passage such as the understanding of the Samaritans !!! Is their understanding based on something!!!!
This is speculation there is no proof here
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Originally Posted by
;pandora
just read Genesis in its entirety and see what conclusion it leads you to... Or Kings..or Ezra or any of the others mentioned in the article. As to what the Samaritans may have believed then that's all fine.. As a Christian I have faith in the Bible and the accounts within. As it's primarily the Bible is what you have issue with surely that should be of primary consideration.
I did so as the Samaritans who also belief in Genisis and the first five books which composes the Torah and still reach to the conclusion that Moriah is not in the temple mount rather it is mountain Jerzeem .
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Originally Posted by
;pandora
Yes your response on this matter I found unsatisfactory. Your pondering on what God should or should not have said is immaterial.. We have to deal with what we have when God was giving Abraham the sign of the covenant, namely circumcision, Abraham asked God that the covenant would be placed on Ishmael.
Not on what god said rather what is written in the text
Second this was not the section I was talking about which you did not answer rather it was what you quoted in response number 38
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Originally Posted by
;محمد سني 1989
First god blessed Abraham and told him he would be a great nation :
Now The Lord said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you.
And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing
. I will bless those who bless you, and him who curses you I will curse; and by you all the families of the earth shall bless themselves." (Genesis 12:1-3 RSV)
So Abraham's blessing and greatness comes from his decendents by blessing Abraham and blessing themselves (this is what muslims say five times a day during prayer : the prayer goes like this God bless Muhammed and his family as you have blessed Abraham and his family .....)
So a great nation blesses Abaraham , also they :
6 Observe them carefully, for thus will
you give evidence of your wisdom and intelligence to the nations, who will hear of all these statutes and say,
'This great nation is truly a wise and intelligent people.'
7 For what great nation is there that has gods so close to it as the LORD, our God, is to us whenever we call upon him?
8 Or what great nation has statutes and decrees that are as just as this whole law which I am setting before you today?”
Deutronomy 4: 6-8
So a great nation in the bible is one which worships god alone and has the law of god and glorifies Abraham and blesses him which applies to the arabs in the prophecy of genesis
Going to see how this applies to Ishmael from what you said :
"But God said to Abraham, "Be not displeased because of the lad and because of your slave woman; whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for through Isaac shall your descendants be named. And I will make a nation of the son of the slave woman also, because he is your offspring." (Genesis 21:12-13 RSV)
Also :
Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac. I will establish My covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him. As for Ishmael, I have heard you; behold, I will bless him and make him fruitful and multiply him exceedingly; he shall be the father of twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation." (Genesis 17:19-20 RSV).
It is not me who is nitpicking from the bible , you need to read the passage carefully and compare it together
The same phrase used by god to Abraham is used to Ishmael .
However I will still address what you said here
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Originally Posted by
;pandora
Genesis 17:17-18 Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed, and said in his heart, “Shall a child be born to a man who is one hundred years old? And shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?” 18 And Abraham said to God, “Oh, that Ishmael might live before You!”
Abraham knows the difficulty that it will be for he and Sarah to have a child... Their age was against them. This is what brought about his impatience in the first place, leading him to sleep with Hagar, which gave him Ishmael. Remember that God had told Abraham that he would be blessed and a father of many nations. Abraham got impatient, and took matters into his own hands.
Yes we believe the miracle birth of Isaac but what has this to do with anything , god blessed both and brought both to this world to bring prophets from their dicendents and to bring their followers too from their linage. Ishmael is still Abraham's son and he was blessed. This still does not show any superiority remember Moses and Aron were not Joseph's decendents.
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Originally Posted by
;pandora
The covenantal blessings are not to be upon Ishmael, but Isaac, whom Sarah will give birth to. When Abraham asks God to allow Ishmael to be the one in which those covenantal blessings flow, God rejects his request.
Genesis 17:19 Then God said: “No, Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his descendants after him.”
You have to read it within the whole context :
15Then God said to Abraham, "As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. 16"I will bless her, and indeed I will give you a son by her. Then I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of peoples will come from her."17Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed, and said in his heart, "Will a child be born to a man one hundred years old? And will Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?"18And Abraham said to God, "Oh that Ishmael might live before You!"19But God said, "No, but Sarah your wife will bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him 20"As for Ishmael, I have heard you; behold, I will bless him, and will make him fruitful and will multiply him exceedingly. He shall become the father of twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation.…
The context of the passage clearly shows god telling Abraham I have heard you meaning heard your prayer and accepted , So god blessed him and made him a great nation and as I described a great nation before from the bible is one which has a law and worships god and blesses Abraham. This same term god used on Abraham before :
Now The Lord said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you.
And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing
. I will bless those who bless you, and him who curses you I will curse; and by you all the families of the earth shall bless themselves." (Genesis 12:1-3 RSV)
Another discription falls into Ishmael too:
"But God said to Abraham, "Be not displeased because of the lad and because of your slave woman; whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for through Isaac shall your descendants be named. And I will make a nation of the son of the slave woman also, because he is your offspring." (Genesis 21:12-13 RSV)
This is within the same meaning as above God hears Abraham's request with Ishmael because he is simply the offspring of Abraham
Genesis 18:11-12 Now Abraham and Sarah were old, well advanced in age; and Sarah had passed the age of childbearing. 12 Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, “After I have grown old, shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?”
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Originally Posted by
;pandora
The text is telling us that Sarah no longer had the ability to have children. A miracle will have to be performed in order for her to have children. God will have to take something that is dead and make it alive. He will have to bring her womb to life again for her to have a child. God is the One that gave Sarah and Abraham the ability to have Isaac. Again, it is His plan that will be carried out in His way, not Abraham’s supplemental plan. God has a purpose and a plan for His chosen at all stages, and no, mankind cannot thwart that plan... No matter what you think to the contrary.
The text never said anything about a plan , this is your personal interpritation. As I have showed above God still according to the biblical writers still told that he has heard Abraham
However there is a very big important point which I need to clarify here :
The original King James bible DOES NOT have the word "No" in it the text is simply :
And God said, Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son indeed; and thou shalt call his name Isaac: and I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him (GENESIS 17:19)
What is really ironic too is that in the new international version you got the word "Yes" instead of "No"
Then God said, "Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.GENESIS 17:19
New International version
You could check for your self :
http://biblehub.com/genesis/17-19.htm
So your whole argument which was based on No cannot have an accurate basis
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Originally Posted by
;pandora
Genesis 17:21 But My covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you at this set time next year.”
Continue the passage :
22When He finished talking with him, God went up from Abraham.23Then Abraham took Ishmael his son, and all the servants who were born in his house and all who were bought with his money, every male among the men of Abraham's household, and circumcised the flesh of their foreskin in the very same day, as God had said to him 24Now Abraham was ninety-nine years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin. 25And Ishmael his son was thirteen years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin.26In the very same day Abraham was circumcised, and Ishmael his sonGenesis 17: 22-26
Genesis 17 which talks about the covenant of circumcission ends here
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Originally Posted by
;pandora
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Originally Posted by
;pandora
Also consider... that when God initially tells Abraham of the coming child, He says that Sarah will be the mother of kings and many nations.
Genesis 17:16 And I will bless her and also give you a son by her; then I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of peoples shall be from her.”
Whereas Ismael will father twelve princes and one nation, Sarah will be the mother of many nations and many kings, showing covenantal supremacy in God’s election of them. So...While Ishmael is blessed, he is NOT of the chosen line of God. It is through the line of Isaac that the covenant blessings pass. This is what God’s word says and we need to rest upon it. The Samaritans were rejected because of their revisionist history, As I must reject your revisionist ideas of what you feel God should have said to make things clearer for yourself. It's clear... It's there... The fault is not with The Lord but within yourself because you don't choose to understand it. It has to come down to choice.. Because really it is not difficult to understand.
Again you are claming that my objection is to god rather it is to the writers of the bible. AS I said before we believe your scripture is corrupted so when I say that I am objecting somehow it is not on God , God forbid rather on the Jewish writers of the bible . such establishment of covenant only to Isaac seems very doubtfull based on the fact that Abraham also cried for his son Ishmael and that god responded by saying he has heard it and he has blessed his son Ishmael and he will have a great nation plus the idea and the contradiction still places itself when it is stated take your ONLY SON , this no matter what explanation is provided does not remove the contradiction for God did not say take your only son whom I have established the covenant with!!!
As for the number of nations well God said :
16And I will bless her, and give thee a son also of her: yea, I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of people shall be of her.
So god said kings of people , meaning who rule . This refers to actual kings ;
and she shall be a mother of nations; of the twelve tribes of Israel; of the two nations of Israel and Judah:
kings of people shall be of her; as David, Solomon, and others, and especially the King Messiah.
Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible
Great nation supresedes many nations since there were no mention of greatness one can say so !!!
peace
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