Pierrot le Fou
10-04-2005, 10:26 AM
This is a paper I wrote for one of my higher level religion classes in college called 'Jesus.' Anyway, I figured it may be fun to share, with the amount of anti-religious sentiment on the board.
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God is omniscient. One of the fundamental problems with Christian theology has been based around that premise. If God is omniscient and omnipotent, how can all these bad things happen? How can bad things happen to good people, and good things happen to bad people? So much criticism of faith has been based around the incongruity of these concepts.
Christianity has responded with heaven. Heaven is the end, whereas life is the means. God has created an end for all people to aspire to. All those bad things are the means for a good person to achieve the ultimate goal – eternal salvation.
In all His omniscience, God realized that people would have crises of faith. God created people to be rational thinking beings. God created people to have dominion over the earth and animals as detailed in Genesis. Contrary to what so many people seem to believe, God also gave a logical progression detailing entrance into heaven through the words of Jesus in Mark.
Those words are organized in the form of parables, which then constitute the basis for the laws of eternal salvation. The premise, the purpose, the causes of error, and the procedure are all detailed within those parables. The conclusion is hidden outside of the parables in the apocalyptic words of Mark 13.
Every experiment has a purpose. That purpose is supposed to outline what the rest of the experiment is all about. Jesus offers the purpose of the parable in Mark 4.3-8.
Listen! A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and it sprang up quickly, since it had no depth of soil. And when the sun rose, it was scorched; and since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. Other seed fell into good soil and brought forth grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirty and sixty and a hundredfold!
The purpose of the experiment is to grow grain. As Jesus explains in Mark 4.20, the grain represents the efforts of those that have heard the word and accept it. Those that hear the word and accept it are the chosen. Therefore Jesus is attempting to cause those to hear the word and accept it, so that they may be chosen.
The means through which Jesus is to achieve those goals is given in Mark 4.10-12, with his explanation of the parables. The word is heard and accepted through parables. As in an experiment, Jesus outlines different types of people who will be tested so as to achieve accurate results. Those types are outlined in his explanation of the purpose to the disciples from Mark 4.14-20.
The sower sows the word. These are the ones on the path where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: when they hear the word, they immediately receive it with joy. But they have no root, and endure only for a while; then, when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away. And others are those sown among the thorns: these are the ones who hear the word, but the cares of the word, and the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things come in and choke the word, and it yields nothing. And these are the ones sown on the good soil: they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.
The procedure will be for Jesus to dispense the word and then to find out which result is achieved. The hypothesis is that some will hear the word and it will be forgotten, some will hear the word and ignore it once hardship comes, some will hear the word and dismiss it for other pursuits, whereas some will hear it and then accept it.
A good experiment always has a control group – a group off of which to base all other groups. For Jesus, the control group is specified in Mark 4.10-11. “When he was alone, those who were around him along with the twelve asked him about the parables. And he said to them, ‘To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God.’” The twelve refers to the disciples, and the rest of the control group is composed of the others who were alone with him.
It is obvious that Mark understands the importance of a control group with his words in 4.33-34.
With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples.
In order to test the effectiveness of the word, he has to compare it to the results of full disclosure with another group, in this case the disciples and selective others excluded from Mark’s understanding in this passage.
Mark 4.26 details the collecting of data. As his purpose stated, Jesus is trying to grow grain with words. However, to complete his study of the effectiveness of his words in determining the chosen he must figure out where the grain has grown, and to study that grain to see if it actually did grow thirty, sixty, or hundredfold.
The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.
Therefore, once the right time has past, and the grain has grown, the grain will be collected to study the results. Some places the grain won’t grow, some places will have the head, but the grain will not grow because it could not endure, and some will decide instead to pursue other things and not grow to fruition. These will constitute the results, and therefore must all be harvested when the experiment is over.
Jesus makes observations on his experiment in the parable of the mustard seed in Mark 4.30.
With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.
Since the people in which the word is being sown are the earth in which the plant grows (as according to 4.28), Jesus makes an observation as to the mustard seed. It may be the smallest of seeds, but when attention is paid to it, it can grow bigger than seeds that may be larger to start with. His observation is that perhaps the disciples may be given the larger seed of the full truth, but perhaps with the benefit of the parables, the smaller seed will grow to be even larger than the disciples will.
As the story in Mark continues, Jesus monitors his experiment to see what is happening (as any good scientist would). As the experiment is ongoing, and Jesus begins to think about the results of the experiment, he makes a realization. The parable of the wicked tenants in Mark 12.1-11 describes sources of error with his experiment on the effect of parables as the key to entering the kingdom of God.
A man planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a pit for the wine press, and built a watchtower; then he leased it to tenants and went to another country. When the season came, he sent a slave to the tenants to collect from them his share of the produce of the vineyard. But they seized him, and beat him, and sent him away empty-handed. And again he sent another slave to them; this one they beat over the head and insulted. Then he sent another, and that one they killed. And so it was with many others; some they beat, and others they killed. He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ So they seized him, killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard. What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others. Have you not read this scripture: ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes’?
Jesus has realized what will become of this experiment to cause a source of error. He will not be able to collect the crops to formulate results. Just as the prophets were not taken seriously throughout the Old Testament, Jesus realizes that the tenants will not take him (as the heir, the Son of God,) seriously. Since the tenants will kill him because of the belief that they will gain his inheritance, in this case the Kingdom of God, the father will have to collect the data himself by destroying the tenants. The tenants in this case represent those out to kill Jesus in order to prevent themselves from losing power over the crops (i.e. the people). Therefore, Jesus realizes that he will be unable to compile results as to the effectiveness of parables, and will have to rely on the father to avenge his son’s death to reap the benefits of the harvest.
Since he cannot complete the experiment due to the lack of results, Jesus moves on past data and analysis directly into the conclusion of the next chapter. In Mark 13 is hidden Jesus’ final message to his control group as to how the experiment will be concluded without him and without having the experiment fall apart in his absence. Jesus tells them that the time that is coming will be full of hardships and lies, people proclaiming themselves to be prophets when they are not. He tells his disciples clearly to beware, and to stay awake for every moment, for it may come at any time, and that they should not be sleeping.
In Mark 13.20 Jesus states that were it not for the Lord, then no one would be saved, but because there were some elect, then they will be saved. Jesus states that angels will come down to collect these elect, which implies that he knows there will be some successful results from his experiment. He also admits that there will be many false prophets and false messiahs who will try to lead astray the elect, implying that there will be the expected unsuccessful results as well.
In his conclusion to the disciples, Jesus believes that the experiment will work as he observed and hypothesized. He believes that there may be some who grow more grain than the disciples may. Since he lends such stern warnings to his control group about the punishment they will endure, and how to combat it, he thinks that it may be possible for them to err. In Mark 13.22 he states “False messiahs and false prophets will appear and produce signs and omens, to lead astray, if possible, the elect.” Since ‘if’ is a conditional word implying that they may try and not succeed, and the if is being applied to a group, it is logical to believe that some elect may be unable to be led astray. Therefore, Jesus believes that some of his test group may be more at risk than some of the elect who have learned through the parables of his experiment.
It can also be assumed that Jesus spread his conclusion to the people. In Mark 16.8 [The Shorter Ending], Mark states that “Jesus himself sent out through them [those who entered his tomb], from east to west, the sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation.” Although the parables through which he spread this word are not written down, it can be assumed that he did not go through so much care to maintain the integrity of the experiment without giving the rest of his words to his test group in parable.
Were Jesus to have written this all out in a formal lab report, it would have looked something like this:
Purpose:
To determine if the use of parable is a more effective venue of gaining quantity or quality of elect passage into the Kingdom of God.
Procedure:
To use parables to describe the method through which one can effectively gain passage into the Kingdom of heaven, as well as ways in which some can fall short.
Control Group:
The disciples will be used a test group which will be given the exact method with which to enter the kingdom of heaven told in plain speech.
Observations:
Although the test group is given less to go on than the disciples are (e.g. the mustard seed vs. an fig pit), the test group may achieve better results despite its unexpected nature.
Collection of Data:
The data will collected when the people have heard and understood the word, while the rest have given up all hope – that time is currently unknown.
Conclusion:
The test group will reap good and bad results, although overall there will be exceptional specimens who will exceed the control group as expected.
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God is omniscient. One of the fundamental problems with Christian theology has been based around that premise. If God is omniscient and omnipotent, how can all these bad things happen? How can bad things happen to good people, and good things happen to bad people? So much criticism of faith has been based around the incongruity of these concepts.
Christianity has responded with heaven. Heaven is the end, whereas life is the means. God has created an end for all people to aspire to. All those bad things are the means for a good person to achieve the ultimate goal – eternal salvation.
In all His omniscience, God realized that people would have crises of faith. God created people to be rational thinking beings. God created people to have dominion over the earth and animals as detailed in Genesis. Contrary to what so many people seem to believe, God also gave a logical progression detailing entrance into heaven through the words of Jesus in Mark.
Those words are organized in the form of parables, which then constitute the basis for the laws of eternal salvation. The premise, the purpose, the causes of error, and the procedure are all detailed within those parables. The conclusion is hidden outside of the parables in the apocalyptic words of Mark 13.
Every experiment has a purpose. That purpose is supposed to outline what the rest of the experiment is all about. Jesus offers the purpose of the parable in Mark 4.3-8.
Listen! A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and it sprang up quickly, since it had no depth of soil. And when the sun rose, it was scorched; and since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. Other seed fell into good soil and brought forth grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirty and sixty and a hundredfold!
The purpose of the experiment is to grow grain. As Jesus explains in Mark 4.20, the grain represents the efforts of those that have heard the word and accept it. Those that hear the word and accept it are the chosen. Therefore Jesus is attempting to cause those to hear the word and accept it, so that they may be chosen.
The means through which Jesus is to achieve those goals is given in Mark 4.10-12, with his explanation of the parables. The word is heard and accepted through parables. As in an experiment, Jesus outlines different types of people who will be tested so as to achieve accurate results. Those types are outlined in his explanation of the purpose to the disciples from Mark 4.14-20.
The sower sows the word. These are the ones on the path where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: when they hear the word, they immediately receive it with joy. But they have no root, and endure only for a while; then, when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away. And others are those sown among the thorns: these are the ones who hear the word, but the cares of the word, and the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things come in and choke the word, and it yields nothing. And these are the ones sown on the good soil: they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.
The procedure will be for Jesus to dispense the word and then to find out which result is achieved. The hypothesis is that some will hear the word and it will be forgotten, some will hear the word and ignore it once hardship comes, some will hear the word and dismiss it for other pursuits, whereas some will hear it and then accept it.
A good experiment always has a control group – a group off of which to base all other groups. For Jesus, the control group is specified in Mark 4.10-11. “When he was alone, those who were around him along with the twelve asked him about the parables. And he said to them, ‘To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God.’” The twelve refers to the disciples, and the rest of the control group is composed of the others who were alone with him.
It is obvious that Mark understands the importance of a control group with his words in 4.33-34.
With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples.
In order to test the effectiveness of the word, he has to compare it to the results of full disclosure with another group, in this case the disciples and selective others excluded from Mark’s understanding in this passage.
Mark 4.26 details the collecting of data. As his purpose stated, Jesus is trying to grow grain with words. However, to complete his study of the effectiveness of his words in determining the chosen he must figure out where the grain has grown, and to study that grain to see if it actually did grow thirty, sixty, or hundredfold.
The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.
Therefore, once the right time has past, and the grain has grown, the grain will be collected to study the results. Some places the grain won’t grow, some places will have the head, but the grain will not grow because it could not endure, and some will decide instead to pursue other things and not grow to fruition. These will constitute the results, and therefore must all be harvested when the experiment is over.
Jesus makes observations on his experiment in the parable of the mustard seed in Mark 4.30.
With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.
Since the people in which the word is being sown are the earth in which the plant grows (as according to 4.28), Jesus makes an observation as to the mustard seed. It may be the smallest of seeds, but when attention is paid to it, it can grow bigger than seeds that may be larger to start with. His observation is that perhaps the disciples may be given the larger seed of the full truth, but perhaps with the benefit of the parables, the smaller seed will grow to be even larger than the disciples will.
As the story in Mark continues, Jesus monitors his experiment to see what is happening (as any good scientist would). As the experiment is ongoing, and Jesus begins to think about the results of the experiment, he makes a realization. The parable of the wicked tenants in Mark 12.1-11 describes sources of error with his experiment on the effect of parables as the key to entering the kingdom of God.
A man planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a pit for the wine press, and built a watchtower; then he leased it to tenants and went to another country. When the season came, he sent a slave to the tenants to collect from them his share of the produce of the vineyard. But they seized him, and beat him, and sent him away empty-handed. And again he sent another slave to them; this one they beat over the head and insulted. Then he sent another, and that one they killed. And so it was with many others; some they beat, and others they killed. He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ So they seized him, killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard. What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others. Have you not read this scripture: ‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes’?
Jesus has realized what will become of this experiment to cause a source of error. He will not be able to collect the crops to formulate results. Just as the prophets were not taken seriously throughout the Old Testament, Jesus realizes that the tenants will not take him (as the heir, the Son of God,) seriously. Since the tenants will kill him because of the belief that they will gain his inheritance, in this case the Kingdom of God, the father will have to collect the data himself by destroying the tenants. The tenants in this case represent those out to kill Jesus in order to prevent themselves from losing power over the crops (i.e. the people). Therefore, Jesus realizes that he will be unable to compile results as to the effectiveness of parables, and will have to rely on the father to avenge his son’s death to reap the benefits of the harvest.
Since he cannot complete the experiment due to the lack of results, Jesus moves on past data and analysis directly into the conclusion of the next chapter. In Mark 13 is hidden Jesus’ final message to his control group as to how the experiment will be concluded without him and without having the experiment fall apart in his absence. Jesus tells them that the time that is coming will be full of hardships and lies, people proclaiming themselves to be prophets when they are not. He tells his disciples clearly to beware, and to stay awake for every moment, for it may come at any time, and that they should not be sleeping.
In Mark 13.20 Jesus states that were it not for the Lord, then no one would be saved, but because there were some elect, then they will be saved. Jesus states that angels will come down to collect these elect, which implies that he knows there will be some successful results from his experiment. He also admits that there will be many false prophets and false messiahs who will try to lead astray the elect, implying that there will be the expected unsuccessful results as well.
In his conclusion to the disciples, Jesus believes that the experiment will work as he observed and hypothesized. He believes that there may be some who grow more grain than the disciples may. Since he lends such stern warnings to his control group about the punishment they will endure, and how to combat it, he thinks that it may be possible for them to err. In Mark 13.22 he states “False messiahs and false prophets will appear and produce signs and omens, to lead astray, if possible, the elect.” Since ‘if’ is a conditional word implying that they may try and not succeed, and the if is being applied to a group, it is logical to believe that some elect may be unable to be led astray. Therefore, Jesus believes that some of his test group may be more at risk than some of the elect who have learned through the parables of his experiment.
It can also be assumed that Jesus spread his conclusion to the people. In Mark 16.8 [The Shorter Ending], Mark states that “Jesus himself sent out through them [those who entered his tomb], from east to west, the sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation.” Although the parables through which he spread this word are not written down, it can be assumed that he did not go through so much care to maintain the integrity of the experiment without giving the rest of his words to his test group in parable.
Were Jesus to have written this all out in a formal lab report, it would have looked something like this:
Purpose:
To determine if the use of parable is a more effective venue of gaining quantity or quality of elect passage into the Kingdom of God.
Procedure:
To use parables to describe the method through which one can effectively gain passage into the Kingdom of heaven, as well as ways in which some can fall short.
Control Group:
The disciples will be used a test group which will be given the exact method with which to enter the kingdom of heaven told in plain speech.
Observations:
Although the test group is given less to go on than the disciples are (e.g. the mustard seed vs. an fig pit), the test group may achieve better results despite its unexpected nature.
Collection of Data:
The data will collected when the people have heard and understood the word, while the rest have given up all hope – that time is currently unknown.
Conclusion:
The test group will reap good and bad results, although overall there will be exceptional specimens who will exceed the control group as expected.