I said
>Is one of the posts about which you said:...??
Insert "this" after "Is"
Russell said
>Or consider the following quote: "The Son of man [Jesus himself] shall send
>forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that
>offend, and them which do iniquity; And shall cast them into a furnace of
>fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth." (Matthew 13:41-42)
I responded
Again, a figurative account of what will befall the rebellious at the hands
of God (and only at the hands of God) in the hereafter.
A better description would be that this is a prophecy of what will happen
at the last judgment when Christ returns. In any case it's not a license
for any humans to decide they are going to "help" God by wiping out his
putative enemies.
There of course are other passages in both the Old and New Testaments in
addition to the ones Russell brought up that document the wiping out of
entire nations -- commanded by God -- or can be construed to condone
violence against those who are perceived to be God's enemies. However, the
Bible also teaches mercy and nonviolence. I don't want to make light of
Russell's criticisms. I'm not proud of what some of my ancestors have done
-- while believing they were doing the will of God -- but the best I can do
about that is to strive to live according to Christian principles as I
understand them today, in the hope that that will help ensure past abuses
don't happen again.
Bill Hamilton
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William E. Hamilton, Jr, Ph.D. | Staff Research Engineer
Chassis and Vehicle Systems | General Motors R&D Center | Warren, MI
William_E._Hamilton@notes.gmr.com
810 986 1474 (voice) | 810 986 3003 (FAX) | whamilto@mich.com (home email)