Board index ‹ The End of the World

[Blatt]

Why is a large section of Modern Christianity a doomsday cult? I'm talking of course about people who want to literally end the world, such as American Evangelicals.

[jimwalton]

I have no idea what you're talking about, and I'm an American Evangelical. I don't any evangelicals who want to literally end the world. Possible you could point me to some references or links that substantiate your accusation?

[Blatt]

It always comes up in discussions about events in occupied Palestine. Westerners promote a literal genocide because they think it will end the world faster

[jimwalton]

OK, so that helps a little bit to clarify. So you're not talking about "literally end the world" but rather about Palestinian genocide? Help me, because those are very different things.

And I'll still say that as an American evangelical, I've never heard ANYONE propose to slaughter the Palestinians. It's just not an idea I've ever come across.

Secondly, it's pretty ridiculous. The Bible indicates that, though God doesn't determine every piece of our lives, the events of the end are set as to how and when they will roll out. It's silliness to think that by slaughtering a people group (1) that would please God, and (2) we can make the end come faster.

I still don't know what your source is for these thoughts, but I've never heard them anywhere from anyone. If somebody out there has them, I could guarantee they are not the Christian mainstream.

[Blatt]

Western Christians want to genocide the Palestinians so that Satan's children (John 8:44) can rule over occupied Palestine to commence the end times.

[jimwalton]

Again I'll be perfect frank and honest. I have never heard anything like this anywhere, in any of the places I've lived, in any of the churches I've attended, from anyone I've heard speak, or in any conversation I've had. So I would disagree that "Western Christians" as a generalized group want this. Do you have ANY substantiation of this opinion?

As for John 8.44, Jesus was reaming out the Jewish religious leaders for rejecting him. The text uses this language to suggest that Satan is behind human hostility to Jesus. It is thought by some that the verse is anti-Semitic, but that's not possible. That would require the author himself to be a Gentile, or he would be condemning himself. In fact, the text is more anti-Jewish if it is not historically accurate. If it reflects something the Jewish Jesus actually said, it cannot be anti-Jewish by definition. Moreover, nothing in John, or anywhere else in the NT for that matter, condemns every last Jewish person to ever live, nor even every Jew in Jesus’s day. The strong language that does appear is precisely the kind of generalized condemnations of the majority of people in a particular context that one often finds in the OT prophets, and they can scarcely be accused of being anti-Jewish when they were canonized in the Jewish Scriptures!

So John 8.44 is definitely not anti-Semitic, and it is certainly not anti-Gentile. It's not anti-Palestinian, and it doesn't imply genocide as a productive strategy.

What Jesus is saying is, "I know this is hard for you to understand, but there are only two choices here: life and death. If you are not following me on the path of truth and life, you are on the path of the deceiver, your father is Satan himself, and you are on the path to destruction." These are shocking things for Jesus to say, but the way to get someone to change their mindset and lifestyle is often to confront them with a harsh truth.

[Blatt]

Jesus said that Jews are Satan's children

[jimwalton]

This is incorrect. Read carefully. In John 8.31, he said to the Jews who believed in him that anyone who holds to his teaching is really a disciple—a true son who belongs to the family forever (v. 35). They know the truth and have been set free. But the ones who reject his word (v. 37) are false sons, children of the devil (v. 44). Anyone who sincerely believes in Jesus has the right to become children of God (Jn. 1.12). Anyone who opposes Jesus/God is in the devil's camp (Jn. 8.44). Those who follow the will of God are children of God (Jn. 8.31); those who follow the will of the devil are children of the devil (Jn. 8.44).

Jesus is not anti-Semitic. Jesus is Jewish, and so are his disciples. If, as you say, all Jews are (according to Jesus) Satan's children, then Jesus is a son of Satan and his disciples are sons of Satan. He summarizes what he's saying in John 8.47: If you hear and follow what God says, you belong to God. If you do not hear and follow, then you do not belong to God. He is making a distinction between those who follow Him and those who do not. He is not saying that Jews are Satan's children.