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Originally posted by FMFJust because something happens, does it mean that it is God's will?
So [in terms of your own religious belief] it's God's will?
All I can say scripturally is that it was God's will to judge Israel more than once because of thier wickedness. I look at it as chastisment, as where those forces opposing God are trying to kill them all off at the same time. It is definately not a good place to be, and I dare say if it were not for God's continual intervention they would have ceased to be a very long time ago.
Originally posted by FMFGod brought salvation first to the Jew and then the Gentile. It is said that those Gentiles were "grafted in".
So, "God's chosen people" here refers to the Jews? Another Christian posted earlier that the Jews are not "God's chosen people" anymore because they "did not accept Jesus who is God's son as the Messiah and was actually behind his death...". Do you concur?
Does this mean that all Jews will go to heaven? I don't think so, rather, it simply means that God has his hand on them as a people as others are grafted in spiritually.
God made a convenant long ago with a man named Abraham and his descendents. God will not give up on them because he has an obligation to keep. God will continue to shape and mold them until they are someday reconciled back to him.
Originally posted by whodeyWell you yourself claim that it was God's will to judge Israel more than once because of thier wickedness. Was - according to your religious perspective - allowing the Holocaust to claim 4 or 6 or 10 million members of His "Chosen People" an example of God judging Israel "because of thier wickedness"?
Just because something happens, does it mean that it is God's will?
Originally posted by whodeyAnd what does this have to do with the Holocaust?
God made a convenant long ago with a man named Abraham and his descendents. God will not give up on them because he has an obligation to keep. God will continue to shape and mold them until they are someday reconciled back to him.
Originally posted by FMFI never said that I knew for sure that the Holocaust was a direct judgement from God. As I said, there is God's judgement coupled with the evil forces that wish to destroy them. It is my guess that the Holocaust was the later.
Well you yourself claim that it was God's will to judge Israel more than once because of thier wickedness. Was - according to your religious perspective - allowing the Holocaust to claim 4 or 6 or 10 million members of His "Chosen People" an example of God judging Israel "because of thier wickedness"?
Originally posted by FMF'According to theology'. To unpack the assumptions that phrase implies, you'd need recourse to a library of books as numerous as the victims of the Holocaust.
Why didn't the prayers of Jews save them from the Holocaust?
According to theology, what could God's purpose have been in allowing his purportedly 'Chosen people' to suffer the partially successful attempt to exterminate them in the mid-C20th?
Originally posted by Bosse de NageI now look back on it as a complete waste of my time so perhaps my recollection would be coloured by that. I suppose it was broadly 'meditation' of a sort, and perhaps asking for 'understanding' and 'strength' etc. etc. I think I knew it was bogus and irrelevant to me for years before I finally thought better of the pretense and stopped.
What was the intention of those prayers?
Originally posted by FMFDo you meditate at all now?
I now look back on it as a complete waste of my time so perhaps my recollection would be coloured by that. I suppose it was broadly 'meditation' of a sort, and perhaps asking for 'understanding' and 'strength' etc. etc. I think I knew it was bogus and irrelevant to me for years before I finally thought better of the pretense and stopped.