"Lord, if thou wilt" - Papal Infallibility?

Around the Tsukiji Market, Tokyo

Papal Infallibility?

The Vatican doctrine cannot be always right and reasonable.  Once the Vatican blamed Judaism and Jewish people officially:

Pope St. Gregory (the Pope of the Catholic Church between 590 and 604 AD) stigmatized Judaism and the Jewish people in many of his writings. He described Jews as enemies of Christ: "The more the Holy Spirit fills the world, the more perverse hatred dominates the souls of the Jews." He labeled all heresy as "Jewish", claiming that Judaism would "pollute [Catholics and] deceive them with sacrilegious seduction."[32] The identification of Jews and heretics in particular occurred several times in Roman-Christian law.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heresy#Catholicism

The Vatican's creeds might include some mistakes.  It is not sound and reasonable that it still sticks to the ideology established in the Roman Empire.  For example, its doctrine of the Trinity might be wrong as it is wrong to stigmatize Judaism and Judaists.

Especially if Jesus is God, why should the religion based on the belief that Jesus is God be called Christianity?  Christianity must be the religion based on the belief that Jesus is the Christ or the Messiah.  To believe that Jesus is God or not should belong to an individual belief.  Nobody should force people to accept this belief.

Papal infallibility cannot be accepted.

Papal infallibility is a dogma of the Catholic Church that states that, in virtue of the promise of Jesus to Peter, the Pope is preserved from the possibility of error "when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papal_infallibility

However, Christ Jesus never clearly declared that Peter and successive Popes were free from error, which Christ Jesus guaranteed.



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Luk 5:12 And it came to pass, when he was in a certain city, behold a man full of leprosy: who seeing Jesus fell on his face, and besought him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.
Luk 5:13 And he put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will: be thou clean. And immediately the leprosy departed from him.

"all manner of evil against you falsely" - God's Direct and Major Interference in History

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God's Direct and Major Interference in History

When God interferes with the human world, there must be always an enough reason.

When God led Abraham and his clan out of Ur of Mesopotamia 4,000 year ago, the Sumerians were going to lose their independence and cultural traits.  Indeed, soon after Abraham and his clan left Ur, the Sumerian kingdom collapsed and the Sumerians were absorbed by the Semitic tribes.  Today, the Sumerians are regraded as a mysterious race.

When God led Moses and other Israelites from Egypt 3,300 years ago, traditions of Israelites were about to be destroyed as they had been slaves of Egyptians.  Indeed, soon after Moses and other Isrealites carried out the Exodus, Egyptians were engaged in battles with Hittites over Palestine.  If Moses and other Israelites had been involved in this war, they might have vanished.

When God sent Christ Jesus to Israelites in the early first century, Israelites had lost independence for centuries and some dubious royal family occupied the Jewish legal power.  The religion of Judaism was controlled by priests of the Jerusalem Temple and their clans in a manner God could not approve while other schools were selfishly competing over religious hegemony.  Indeed, decades after the Crucifixion of Christ Jesus, the Jewish-Roman War erupted and Israelites were dispersed from Jerusalem and Palestine.  However, God saved both Judaists and followers of Christ Jesus.

And then, when the Vatican and Christians fixed their religion on the creed that Christ Jesus was God through the fall of the Western Roman Empire, God gave Islam to the people in the Middle East around 600, thus allowing establishment of their creed that Christ Jesus was not God.

Since God endowed Islam to Arabs, etc. there has been no direct and major interference by God with the human world.

The point at issue in this history for us is that if we admit Islam is a product of interference with the human history by God, we have to think that the major reason for His interference is a defect in Christianity, and the most plausible defect concerned is its creed that Christ Jesus is God.

Anyway, no matter whether we may or cannot accept Islam and Muslims, the religion has survived for about 1,300 years or more.  It must be difficult without approval by God.


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Mat 5:11 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.

"for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" - Not Calling Christ Jesus God

In the National Diet (Parliament) Building, Tokyo

Not Calling Christ Jesus God

Some people claim that it is implied in the Bible that Christ Jesus suggested that He was God while they admit that Christ Jesus never said, "I am God." :

Question: "Is Jesus God? Did Jesus ever claim to be God?" 

Answer: The Bible never records Jesus saying the precise words, “I am God.” That does not mean, however, that He did not proclaim that He is God. Take for example Jesus’ words in John 10:30, “I and the Father are one.” We need only to look at the Jews’ reaction to His statement to know He was claiming to be God. They tried to stone Him for this very reason: “You, a mere man, claim to be God” (John 10:33). The Jews understood exactly what Jesus was claiming—deity. When Jesus declared, “I and the Father are one,” He was saying that He and the Father are of one nature and essence. John 8:58 is another example. Jesus declared, “I tell you the truth … before Abraham was born, I am!” Jews who heard this statement responded by taking up stones to kill Him for blasphemy, as the Mosaic Law commanded (Leviticus 24:16). 

John reiterates the concept of Jesus’ deity: “The Word [Jesus] was God” and “the Word became flesh” (John 1:1, 14). These verses clearly indicate that Jesus is God in the flesh. Acts 20:28 tells us, “Be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood.” Who bought the church with His own blood? Jesus Christ. And this same verse declares that God purchased His church with His own blood. Therefore, Jesus is God! 

Thomas the disciple declared concerning Jesus, “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28). Jesus does not correct him. Titus 2:13 encourages us to wait for the coming of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ (see also 2 Peter 1:1). In Hebrews 1:8, the Father declares of Jesus, “But about the Son he says, ‘Your throne, O God, will last forever and ever, and righteousness will be the scepter of your kingdom.’” The Father refers to Jesus as “O God,” indicating that Jesus is indeed God.
https://www.gotquestions.org/is-Jesus-God.html

If Christ Jesus was God and He wanted people to know it and call Him God, He should have plainly said, "Don't get a false idea of me, because I am God."

Besides, the Gospels preceding John, namely the Gospels according to Mark, Luke, and Matthew, never suggest that Christ Jesus is God unlike the Gospel according to John.

So, objectively we may say that while Christ Jesus never said that He was God, the Gospel author John and some others claimed that Christ Jesus suggested that He was God and therefore He was God.  However, the interpretation of Jesus' words by John and others could be wrong, since Christ Jesus never said clearly that He was God.

For argument's sake, if Christ Jesus had been God, He did not want people to call Him God.  Why?  And for whatever reason, calling Christ Jesus God is apparently against His will.  The Vatican and all the other Christian churches have made big mistakes for centuries.

In other word, not calling Christ Jesus God is more pious than calling Him God.  Because Christ Jesus never said that He was God if He should be God, according to His words.



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Mat 5:10 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

"at the draught of the fishes" - Literacy Rates in Medieval Europe and the Roman Empire

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Literacy Rates in Medieval Europe and the Roman Empire

It is considered that Romans and other citizens of the Roman Empire could read the Gospels more often than Europeans in the Middle Ages:

What were literacy rates in Medieval Europe? How did they compare to literacy rates in the Roman Empire? 

W V Harris wrote what's considered the definitive book on Roman literacy levels (Ancient Literacy) and he estimates that about 15% of Italians were literate under the Principate; rather more in Greece, less elsewhere in the Empire. Other historians have challenged his figures, believing them to be rather low. 

Stephen Tempest's answer to How literate would the majority of knights have been in the High Middle Ages? 

To summarise, literacy levels were probably much lower than in Roman times during most of the Middle Ages - perhaps only 6% in England in 1300 - but after the Black Death rose steadily, until by the Renaissance they were probably higher than they had been under the Roman Empire.  

Mediaeval literacy was first and foremost the domain of the Church, but the urban bourgeoisie also found great use for it, followed much later by the gentry and nobility.
https://www.quora.com/What-were-literacy-rates-in-Medieval-Europe-How-did-they-compare-to-literacy-rates-in-the-Roman-Empire 

So, when the Roman Empire adopted Christianity for its state religion in 392, many Roman citizens should have read the Gospels written in Greek or Latin and made judgment on their contents by themselves, since there must have been no Christian church system such as ones we see today.

However, in the Middle Ages, as the literacy rateslower than that in the Roman Empire suggest, Europeans were a kind of forced to believe in the interpretation of the Gospels written in Greek or Latin by the church and accept creeds established by the church.

Since around 1500 when typography was introduced into European societies by Gutenberg and translation of the Greek and Latin Gospels into local languages was started by Martin Luther and so on, much more Europeans came to read and study the Gospels by themselves.  However, the authentic interpretation of the Gospels and other New Testament documents by the Vatican was not critically challenged by the general public.  This condition has continued even to today.

Nonetheless, there is no reason why we should not review and examine the contents of the New Testament and challenge old authentic interpretation of them.  For example, we may find that three of the four Gospels were not written on the assumption that Christ Jesus was God.

  

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Luk 5:8 When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord.
Luk 5:9 For he was astonished, and all that were with him, at the draught of the fishes which they had taken:

"for they shall see God" - Love vs Seven Deadly Sins

Tokyo Bay

Love vs Seven Deadly Sins

There is an ethical teaching in Christianity called the seven vices.

The seven deadly sins, also known as the capital vices or cardinal sins, is a grouping and classification of vices of Christian origin.[1] Behaviours or habits are classified under this category if they directly give birth to other immoralities.[2] According to the standard list, they are pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth,[2] which are also contrary to the seven virtues. These sins are often thought to be abuses or excessive versions of one's natural faculties or passions (for example, gluttony abuses one's desire to eat).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_deadly_sins

However, there are no nations or societies that have laws or regulations to forbid pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth, since they are matters inside the human mind.

No matter how much you have pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth, you are not arrested and judged by governmental authority in any countries.  Especially in Western, modern, or democratic countries, religion belongs to the domain of human freedom.  You are not punished if you don't believe in God in such countries.  By law, none can be punished if he or she believes in Satan and loves evil unless he or she commits crimes specified in laws or regulations.

However, Christ Jesus did not count these sins so openly.  But He ordered to love God as much as one can and love one's neighbors as one loves oneself.  And it is apparent that one will naturally lose one's pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth while he or she is following this order.  In other word, these seven deadly vices come to appear when one loses love to God and one's neighbors.

The environment around rich men is full of pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth.



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Mat 5:8 Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.

"thou Son of the most high God" - Judaism, Christianity, and Rule by Money

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Judaism, Christianity, and Rule by Money

How do Judaists regard Christianity?

Some of them think that Christianity was given a mission by God to prevail among non-Judaists the teaching and words of God that Judaists had already known before the emergence of Christianity.   And, Christianity needs Judaism to remember characteristics of God in the context of monotheism with ethical God.

But at the core of their view on Christianity, there is a cynical view on Christ Jesus: a failed Messiah or someone who failed to become a true Messiah.  Accordingly, they cannot totally accept the Christian creed that Christ Jesus is God.

But can Judaists blame Christians for their creed that Christ Jesus is God?  Can Judaists openly criticize Christians for their belief that Christ Jesus is God?  Can Judaists openly challenge the creed, thus ridiculing Christians, saying that they revere the failed Messiah, Jesus, as God?

If they did it, they would be regarded as great enemies of Christians and the Vatican.  They should face the danger of facing attacks by Christians and the Vatican.

And if they did not, they have still a potential to do so, so that they can be regarded as potential enemies of Christians and the Vatican.  

However, if Christians lose true faith and come not to think much about religion, Judaists might facially look safer.  But it is a situation where Judaists are surrounded by godless people who do neither respect Christianity nor Judaism.

In this context, even today when money has become a de facto global religion or rule by money takes a position of global religion, Judaists cannot be safer, since nobody minds and respects God of Judaists as much as Christians might do.




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Mar 5:7 And cried with a loud voice, and said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the most high God? I adjure thee by God, that thou torment me not.
Mar 5:8 For he said unto him, Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit.