Meat When is a mountain not a mountain?

[Pacman]

I would use the term for people that support the ideology and nationalist movement called Zionism.

The web defines it like so.
Zionism is both an ideology and nationalist movement among the Jewish people that espouses the re-establishment of and support for a Jewish state centered in the area roughly corresponding to Canaan, the Holy Land, or the region of Palestine.

Hmm well I guess I sort of fit this definition. I think they have a right to exist as a nation and I support the people. However I think many or even most in the government are working for the adversary. I consider many of the people my brothers and they are true descendants of Judah. I pray that they all come to an understanding of the true Messiah. I fear that most will embrace the antichrist and be cut off as a result.

 

[Joleneakamama]

I knew Australia was going to figure into this one way or another, but Afghanistan still seems to qualify as desolate.

Isaiah 49 says desolate heritages....as in plural. Christians have colonized South Africa, Australia, Canada, and the united States, after peopling Europe, but "inherit the desolate (uninhabited) heritages" is a very different picture from going back and retaking the land you started in.

 

[The Revolting Man]

Isaiah 49 says desolate heritages....as in plural. Christians have colonized South Africa, Australia, Canada, and the united States, after peopling Europe, but "inherit the desolate (uninhabited) heritages" is a very different picture from going back and retaking the land you started in.

No it’s not. Israel is Jacob’s heritage. In this sentence it’s the heritage that’s made desolate, the land was taken away from them, not necessarily the land that’s desolate.

Although the Land was desolate quite a few times over the millennia.

 

[Joleneakamama]

No it’s not. Israel is Jacob’s heritage. In this sentence it’s the heritage that’s made desolate, the land was taken away from them, not necessarily the land that’s desolate.

Although the Land was desolate quite a few times over the millennia.

So Yeshua inherits the world, and yet any followers that are actually descended from his earthly kin are limited to the land given to Jacob/Israel that they were driven out of?

What do you do with Isaiah 49 that talks about them outgrowing the land of their exile?

 

[rockfox]

This certainly does not describe most of North America and it never has.

It does if you think of waste as 'wreckage of human civilization'.

But then so does the Middle East.

After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land that is brought back from the sword, and is gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.

All those commas! Unpacking that would take a diagram.

 

[The Revolting Man]

So Yeshua inherits the world, and yet any followers that are actually descended from his earthly kin are limited to the land given to Jacob/Israel that they were driven out of?

What do you do with Isaiah 49 that talks about them outgrowing the land of their exile?

What does that have to do with anything? That is a piece of information not related to the claims your making. So they’re going to out grow the land, that has no bearing on where the land is. Also, that hasn’t happened yet, that’s a future event. What land are they more likely to outgrow?

 

[Joleneakamama]

What does that have to do with anything? That is a piece of information not related to the claims your making. So they’re going to out grow the land, that has no bearing on where the land is. Also, that hasn’t happened yet, that’s a future event. What land are they more likely to outgrow?

And futurist thinking can push literally everything off to somedayville.

So the new covenant isn't here YET because it doesn't look like you think it should. They have not yet outgrown the land if their exile, even though Brittan which was the dominant nation of the day, controlling the seas, DID outgrow that land and export prisoners. Now we have this great and dominating nation, gathered out of those.....but sure. Just divide it all into compartments where you decide what is allowed to be relavant.

The problem with the thinking that credits these nations greatness with "oh these have been the times of the gentiles" like some do, is that the gospel message went out from Israelites of Judea to the 12 tribes scattered abroad. To see these nations as non Israel is to deny their christian beginnings, ignore the fact that if the apostles did as instructed, they took the message to the scattered sheep of the dispersion.... bringing in more Israelites. Intermarriage with the believers that were Israel makes even descendants of the "strangers" Israel too... so for Gentiles to be non Israel you must ensure complete segregation....and know who is who.

Far easier to accept that these great nations are the multitude of nations prophesied to come from Ephraim.

 

[Keith Martin]

[Not jumping into the fray, but I just want to mention these two things: (1) these Jolene/Zec debates are mighty entertaining; and (2) it seems very much to me that why y'all so consistently butt heads is that each of you has somewhere accepted certain religious postulates (as opposed to scriptural dictates) as givens. Those givens for each of you are at this point individually unwavering -- informing and affecting everything you write to each other -- so you unwittingly but regularly batter each other as if you are arguing about the matter at hand, when what is really happening is that you are speaking entirely different languages based on those way-back-there assumptions/givens. I'm highly entertained by the dialogue, but if you're ever going to stop talking past each other, it's probably essential that you personally identify those baseline conflicts of assumptions and work to articulate them to each other. Otherwise, you will just heat the air with rhetoric about who will work a second job to pay for the ongoing damage that is currently being done as water slowly fills up your kitchen and leaks out the windows to destroy your home's siding, because you haven't even addressed that one of you thinks the flood is being caused by a stopped-up drain and the other thinks it's more a matter of not having turned off the spigot. Maybe if you get back to the spigot and the drain, the two of you could work from there to cooperate on effectively addressing the ensuing ramifications.]

 

[The Revolting Man]

[Not jumping into the fray, but I just want to mention these two things: (1) these Jolene/Zec debates are mighty entertaining; and (2) it seems very much to me that why y'all so consistently butt heads is that each of you has somewhere accepted certain religious postulates (as opposed to scriptural dictates) as givens. Those givens for each of you are at this point individually unwavering -- informing and affecting everything you write to each other -- so you unwittingly but regularly batter each other as if you are arguing about the matter at hand, when what is really happening is that you are speaking entirely different languages based on those way-back-there assumptions/givens. I'm highly entertained by the dialogue, but if you're ever going to stop talking past each other, it's probably essential that you personally identify those baseline conflicts of assumptions and work to articulate them to each other. Otherwise, you will just heat the air with rhetoric about who will work a second job to pay for the ongoing damage that is currently being done as water slowly fills up your kitchen and leaks out the windows to destroy your home's siding, because you haven't even addressed that one of you thinks the flood is being caused by a stopped-up drain and the other thinks it's more a matter of not having turned off the spigot. Maybe if you get back to the spigot and the drain, the two of you could work from there to cooperate on effectively addressing the ensuing ramifications.]

The spigot and the drain is Israelism.

 

[Keith Martin]

Forgive us, @Philip, for we know not what we do.

OK, @The Revolving Man, I'll bite: re: my metaphor, you've just asserted that, instead of an underlying, unacknowledged theological disagreement over spiritual causes for the current issues for which you and @Joleneakamama claim different solutions, you're asserting that those underlying, unspoken theological disagreements aren't even different. Perhaps this is the case, but then you are asserting that Israelism is both a left-on spigot pouring forth water and a clogged-up drain causing the water to overflow the sink: Israelism would therefore be a force that not only provides the material that becomes the problem but is the mechanism by which it becomes a problem.

This begs at least six questions:

1. I did a DDG search on 'Israelism' and found no respite from my confusion. What is your definition of Israelism? Or are you asserting that your foundational differences are rooted in different assumptions about what is the proper definition or explanation of Israelism?
2. If, on the other hand, your and Jolene's underlying assumptions are, in essence, irrelevant (and, that's a Big If, given how they come across in your disputes, but for the sake of this question, let's stipulate irrelevancy), then, of course, you're asserting that the fact that Israelism is both fodder and cause makes it irrelevant to your current downstream arguments about what to do about the ramifications of the flooding, so, if that's not far enough back to take the metaphor, what stops you from tracing it further back to find where you actually substantively diverge?
3. Id est, are you assuming that the spigot being left on and the drain being clogged have the same cause (Israelism)? Or do we need to follow the separate chains of installation of the spigot and drain (or the installation of the outflow mechanisms and inflow mechanisms of the water supply) in reverse to find the underlying source(s) of your squabble about who is going to pay for the flood damage? If so, isn't that just stretching the metaphor to look for an earlier antecedent 'open spigot' and 'clogged drain?'

 

[Sons of Issachar]

Is there another Philip here?

 

[Sons of Issachar]

Well this seems to have not been fulfilled yet:

• No longer shall they teach, each man his associate,
• And each man his brother, saying: Know Yahweh!
• For they all shall know Me,

 

[The Revolting Man]

Forgive us, @Philip, for we know not what we do.

OK, @The Revolving Man, I'll bite: re: my metaphor, you've just asserted that, instead of an underlying, unacknowledged theological disagreement over spiritual causes for the current issues for which you and @Joleneakamama claim different solutions, you're asserting that those underlying, unspoken theological disagreements aren't even different. Perhaps this is the case, but then you are asserting that Israelism is both a left-on spigot pouring forth water and a clogged-up drain causing the water to overflow the sink: Israelism would therefore be a force that not only provides the material that becomes the problem but is the mechanism by which it becomes a problem.

This begs at least six questions:

1. I did a DDG search on 'Israelism' and found no respite from my confusion. What is your definition of Israelism? Or are you asserting that your foundational differences are rooted in different assumptions about what is the proper definition or explanation of Israelism?
2. If, on the other hand, your and Jolene's underlying assumptions are, in essence, irrelevant (and, that's a Big If, given how they come across in your disputes, but for the sake of this question, let's stipulate irrelevancy), then, of course, you're asserting that the fact that Israelism is both fodder and cause makes it irrelevant to your current downstream arguments about what to do about the ramifications of the flooding, so, if that's not far enough back to take the metaphor, what stops you from tracing it further back to find where you actually substantively diverge?
3. Id est, are you assuming that the spigot being left on and the drain being clogged have the same cause (Israelism)? Or do we need to follow the separate chains of installation of the spigot and drain (or the installation of the outflow mechanisms and inflow mechanisms of the water supply) in reverse to find the underlying source(s) of your squabble about who is going to pay for the flood damage? If so, isn't that just stretching the metaphor to look for an earlier antecedent 'open spigot' and 'clogged drain?'

My, possibly simplistic, definition of Israelism is any of the groups who believe both that they are the lost tribes of Israel AND that current Jews are all impostors, usually Edomites.

The most famous of these groups right now are the Black Hebrew Israelites who run the gamut from the benignly intense Pastor Dowell all the way down to some truly despicable sects with murderous hatred for Jews.

The movement started with British Israelism, a movement that claimed the Lost Tribes all migrated to the United Kingdom. Most of British Israelism was fairly low key. They didn’t add in the key ingredient of stripping modern Jews of legitimacy although some did and of those many ended up being sympathetic to some of Hitler’s claims.

American Israelism is a refinement of British Israelism, claiming that now the tribes have moved on from the UK, some claim completely and exclusively to America and some claim to wider Commonwealth.

I am unaware of any branch of American Israelism that is not heavily influenced by thinkers and leaders that even unflinchingly conservative thinkers like you and I wouldn’t be uncomfortable with.

In truth you are picking up on some unstated tension, my prior exposure to Israelism which has all been very negative. In the case of myself and @Joleneakamama it all gets a little complicated because of how much I literally lover her views on womanhood, motherhood and marriage. On the right topics she elevates herself up to the very rarified company of women whose opinion I value. Then she’ll say something related to Israelism and I’ll want to claw my own eyes out. I don’t understand how someone who is so right on so many of the most important things can be so wrong on this one.

Furthermore, I find the Israelisms dangerous. They are quite seductive to certain kinds of people and they will complete discredit the entire movement, and we don’t need anymore challenges on that front.

My goal with these interactions has been to make sure that every time something related to Israelism comes up that a countervailing voice is some where nearby for the casual readers and the infiltrators looking to harm us.

 

[FollowingHim]

@Joleneakamama, what has "been always waste"?

Maybe I missed you saying that. I read you saying that Israel has not, and others have obviously pointed out the USA has not been always waste either. So what is your answer to the riddle you have proposed? You've only said what the answer is not.

 

[Joleneakamama]

@Joleneakamama, what has "been always waste"?

Maybe I missed you saying that. I read you saying that Israel has not, and others have obviously pointed out the USA has not been always waste either. So what is your answer to the riddle you have proposed? You've only said what the answer is not.

Well, it would sure be great for mormons trying to prove the book of mormon if they could find remains of cities here.... but they don't.

Because the term is used in contrast to "gathered out of the nations....is brought forth, ....they shall dwell safely" it seems obvious that the "always waste" in the verse means desolate (which is one of the words in the strings dictionary) which means uninhabited.

Yes there were native people here, but in the vastness of this land they were few.

Given the other descriptors I know of no other land that has them all. The united States is recently brought forth, gathered out of the nations, was always waste, is a land of unwalled villages, the people all dwell safely, are recovered from war (brought back from the sword) they have cattle and goods and dwell in the midst of the land. Below us is called south America, and Canada is above and further north.

 

[Keith Martin]

My, possibly simplistic, definition of Israelism is any of the groups who believe both that they are the lost tribes of Israel AND that current Jews are all impostors, usually Edomites.

The most famous of these groups right now are the Black Hebrew Israelites who run the gamut from the benignly intense Pastor Dowell all the way down to some truly despicable sects with murderous hatred for Jews.

The movement started with British Israelism, a movement that claimed the Lost Tribes all migrated to the United Kingdom. Most of British Israelism was fairly low key. They didn’t add in the key ingredient of stripping modern Jews of legitimacy although some did and of those many ended up being sympathetic to some of Hitler’s claims.

American Israelism is a refinement of British Israelism, claiming that now the tribes have moved on from the UK, some claim completely and exclusively to America and some claim to wider Commonwealth.

I am unaware of any branch of American Israelism that is not heavily influenced by thinkers and leaders that even unflinchingly conservative thinkers like you and I wouldn’t be uncomfortable with.

In truth you are picking up on some unstated tension, my prior exposure to Israelism which has all been very negative. In the case of myself and @Joleneakamama it all gets a little complicated because of how much I literally lover her views on womanhood, motherhood and marriage. On the right topics she elevates herself up to the very rarified company of women whose opinion I value. Then she’ll say something related to Israelism and I’ll want to claw my own eyes out. I don’t understand how someone who is so right on so many of the most important things can be so wrong on this one.

Furthermore, I find the Israelisms dangerous. They are quite seductive to certain kinds of people and they will complete discredit the entire movement, and we don’t need anymore challenges on that front.

My goal with these interactions has been to make sure that every time something related to Israelism comes up that a countervailing voice is some where nearby for the casual readers and the infiltrators looking to harm us.

OK, thank you, @The Revolting Man. I do wonder what "entire movement" you fear will be discredited, but let me return to my metaphor: it would appear that you weren't equating the spigot and the drain but indicating that Israelism is where you and Jolene part ways. Now that you've articulated that so fully, I can see that (except for when it's been nearly front and center) that conflict has clearly been running in the background throughout your joustings. I'm not sure my metaphor is sufficiently analogous to address that particular type of conflict, but I'm going to stick with it until I discover (on my own or through someone else pointing it out to me) that it simply breaks down into uselessness . . .

Mixing metaphors, the two of you lunge at each other over various manifestations of who is going to work the extra job to pay for the damage to the siding, the damage to the sidewalk below, the damage to the flooring, etc., but what you're really jousting about is your disagreement about Israelism (Jolene is pro; you are anti). Given that Israelism is a system of theological suppositions designed to make sense of Scripture that in all likelihood has not been fully revealed and/or fully implemented, we have to introduce another step in the metaphor: we've already established that much of what you joust about is merely a reflection of what your real beef with each other is, but Israelism is neither the drain nor the spigot -- Israelism is Jolene's method for dealing with the underlying dilemma created by the spigot being on and the drain being clogged. In the metaphor, Israelism for Jolene is her solution for dealing with the symptom of flooding; you are opposed to Israelism and in all likelihood have your own organized religious tenets that provide you with what you believe is a better outcome for handling the symptom of unresolvedness in Scripture. In the metaphor, there are more than two potential solutions for diminishing the symptom: not only could we unclog the drain or turn off the spigot, we could also (a) start mopping (a senseless exercise if the water is still running and the drain remains clogged), (b) use a wet vac to suck up the water spilling over the edge of the sink (also not a complete solution, but commercial wet vacs could suck up water faster than it was coming out of the spigot, even in the face of having to occasionally dump out the wet vac in the bathtub, and thus eventually take up all the water on the floor and begin sucking down the water in the clogged sink, at which point it would become even more obvious that one should both turn off the spigot and unclog the sink), or (c) turn off the water at some point before it gets to the spigot (putting an end to the increasing problem and perhaps even preventing much of the potential damage and thus eliminating the need for anyone to get a second job).

I'm not going to demonstrate the hubris of labeling Jolene's Israelism or your Anti-Israelism as sink-unclogging, spigot-attenuation, mopping or wet-vacuuming, but I will suggest that neither represent turning off the water source, because the evidence is that neither position has demonstrated prevention of the need to haggle about who gets the second job.

In the metaphor, I originally presented the spigot and the drain as being the source of your arguments, but I believe you need to look even further back, to search for antecedents that create the necessity for turning off the water supply. You each have suppositions that are characterized by a desire to explain that which has not yet been fully revealed. You have also both demonstrated as fully as you're ever going to be able to demonstrate that you consider the other person's worldview about these matters to be predominantly illegitimate. What stops you from just agreeing to disagree? Because of the manner in which you started that first thread in which you requested that everyone else just sit in the stands while the two of you joust, I don't believe it is the paramount intention for either of you to just stab each other to death over this. I know that you have profound respect for each other, and it is probably this profound respect that creates enough cognitive dissonance to generate frustration along the lines of, "How can s/he, of all people, come to such an absurd set of conclusions?" I believe your respect for each other reflects both fear and hope that you can actually learn something from each other, but it's not going to be accomplished by jousting about who is going to get a second job while you ignore even dealing with the symptoms of your disagreement about whether it's the spigot or the drain. Going out on a further limb here, I'm wondering if you both may be consciously attempting to sell your point of view to the other but unconsciously hoping that the other person has missing puzzle pieces that will create a more beautiful mosaic (no pun intended) out of a synthesis of your seemingly-incompatible points of view.

You're going to have to put this conflict into reverse gear and head back beyond the water shut-off valve. In this case, that is probably going to mean having to avoid arguing about Israelism and instead identify what it is about Scripture (and even perhaps the entire post-Abrahamic history of mankind) that unsettles each of you enough to have latched onto Israelism or Anti-Israelism as your unified field theory to make sense of it all.

Now that is something I'd really be entertained and enlightened by!

 

[MeganC]

Well, it would sure be great for mormons trying to prove the book of mormon if they could find remains of cities here.... but they don't.

God may have removed the ancient LDS cities from America in the same way He obliterated Sodom and Gomorrah.

At least I tease my LDS friends with this when they try to convince me that Joseph Smith was a real prophet!

Because I go on to say that if God obliterated every last trace of evidence of the ancient LDS cities while His wrath still left behind some traces of Sodom and Gomorrah...then what does that say God thinks about the LDS?

 

[FollowingHim]

Yes there were native people here, but in the vastness of this land they were few.

As I understand it, there have been many different people groups settled all over the Americas at different times, but in the modern political climate the current tribes want to claim to be the sole long-term occupants of the land so they can claim to be the "first nations" and receive preferential political treatment. So all remains that are discovered (e.g. skeletons and structures) are considered to belong to the ancestors of the modern tribe, and any research that contradicts that (e.g. genetic studies) is near-impossible to even conduct, let alone publish.

We have exactly the same problem in New Zealand - all the early researchers, both archaelogists and recorders of oral tradition, stated that there were markedly different people here before the Maori arrived, and they were defeated and/or absorbed into the Maori tribes. But politically active Maori have found it more beneficial to be considered the first occupants of the land, not the people who ate the first occupants. So we have since then been subjected to so much historical revisionism that all remains are now considered to belong to the modern tribe, and genetic studies etc are impossible to conduct because they might contradict the modern political narrative.

In both cases, the modern accepted history is that the lands were essentially desolate until the "native" peoples populated them (American Indian and Maori). But that's probably not actually the truth.

I'm not saying there were massive cities in the USA, I've never read the book of Mormon and have no idea what crap it invents. But I do know that there are historical sites that indicate long-term occupation of the Americas.

People spread and occupy places - just like animals do. You don't end up with a large area of good quality land sitting for thousands of years with no animals in it - animals move in. And likewise, you don't end up with a large area of good land sitting idle for thousands of years with no people moving in either. Asserting that North America was essentially desolate for most of history defies all logic and sounds like a product of modern political historical revisionism.

 

[FollowingHim]

Note that I'm not saying that you're a politically motivated historical revisionist! However, your understanding of the history may have been strongly influenced by educational materials that were written by such people...

 

[Joleneakamama]

So this was said of me.....

You've only said what the answer is not.

Yet no one has really offered a serious comment, or suggested any OTHER land. So where is it?

The revolting man said in the other thread that even Antarctica could be it... because he accused me of fixating on the large bodies of water. The scripture doesn't say large bodies of water....it says the East Sea, and Great Sea are the eastern and Western borders of this land.....wherever it is.

So, I can't say my view has not been influenced by ideas political or otherwise, but suggesting Antarctica, or Afghanistan, or Siberia smacks of affirming a land, um....as it wishes it was ....like if Siberia chose to "self identify" as the "Mountains of Israel."

It still boggles me. Europeans called Jews while rejecting Yeshua? They are Judah! Europeans accepting Yeshua? Gentiles....that can NOT "replace the Jews!!"

People from back east like my nephew in law from PA are literally uncomfortable with all the open space out here in the west.....and consider the land wasted because so much of it is untouched....unused except for running a few head of cattle.
And a couple hundred years ago this whole land was wilderness.

Too bad those political revisionists did a magic trick and vanished those former populations and civilizations. It woulda been so much easier crossing the prairie by road....stopping at quality inns along the way.