DiscussingTheTopic said:
Mathew 19:12 seems to have the same meaning in King James to me but 1 Corinthians 7:8 seems to have changed it's meaning to me.
There is a world of difference between the NIV and the KJV in the passage from 1 Corinthians, and simply put, it goes back to my original statement to your original post that:
mrscottyl said:
Everything has to have two or three witnesses, so where are the other witnesses to back this one up, if it was not a sarcastic comment.
There is no other witnesses in Scripture to Paul not being married. This passage is used, but was he single, did his wife refuse to follow him into Christianity, or was he a widower? None of these questions can be answered by Scripture, so anyone stating one way or the other would be simply guessing.
And also, I pointed out that in Matthew, the whole conversation could be construed as being sarcastic because the Disciples did not take well to what Yahuwshua had said earlier in the chapter. A Hebrew can use sarcasm to drive home a particular point. If you shall bear with me, I shall elaborate.
Rabbinical Hebrews have a lot of difficulty with the three passages that tell you to not boil a kid in it's mothers milk. So a Rabbi told me this story to explain how that we are to just follow His ways even when we do not understand (it was used as a definition of the Hebrew word choq). Moses had been on Mount Sinai, and had received the Law. He came back down, gave it to the people, but then a couple days later, went back up on the mount, and said, "Blessed are you YaHuWaH, for Your Law is so wonderful and we love it. We just do not understand what You mean by 'Thou shalt not boil a kid in it's mothers milk'" YaHuWaH replied, "It means what it says, do not boil a kid in it's mothers milk." Moses went back down the mount and told the people what YaHuWaH had told him. The next day, he went back up on the mount, and, apologizing, said, "O great YaHuWaH, blessed is Your name. We love and delight in Your Law, but do not understand what You mean when You say, Thou shalt not boil a kid in it's mothers milk'" YaHuWaH replied, "It means what it says, do not boil a kid in it's mothers milk." So he went down and again told the people what YaHuWaH said. When he came back up the mount the next day, he prostrated himself on the ground and said, "Forgive us YaHuWaH, for Your Law is so wonderful and precious. Please tell us what you mean by, Thou shalt not boil a kid in it's mothers milk'" YaHuWaH was very angry at this point and replied, "It means what it says, do not boil a kid in it's mothers milk. But do whatever you want because you are going to anyway."
The Rabbinic sarcasm says "do whatever you want," but even they realize that this was not what YaHuWaH would accept. He would only accept what they did if they did as He told them to, and not whatever they did. Since there is no other Scripture that tells us of a person voluntarily choosing to be a eunuch for the kingdom, then there is not two or three witnesses, which would mean that this is a sarcastic note by Yahuwshua akin to saying, "Do whatever you want because you are going to anyway." That does not justify them doing whatever they want, but just shows how their rejection of His way upset Him.
Scott
