Paul's Letter to the Galatians and the Struggle for Doctrinal Purity

[Many Miles]

1 hour ago, George88 said:

Given that Aaron had already disobeyed God, I don't think he was in a position to prevent Moses' disobedience. However, it's worth noting that this is purely speculation and does not have any biblical support. As we previously discussed, it is important to scrutinize any claims with biblical evidence. Although some may agree with your perspective, it is concerning to see how many people are willing to believe without applying scripture as their guide.

George, I have not suggested that Aaron could have prevented Moses' disobedience. I have not even asked that. What I have asked is whether Aaron should have put forth an effort to check Moses' actions at Meribah.

Either you think he should have or you think he shouldn't have.

- Do you think Aaron should have acted to check Moses actions at that incident, despite Moses being anointed by God as His spokesman?

Were I to ask whether Adam should have acted to check Eve's action in Eden to eat of the tree of knowledge, my guess is you'd have a ready answer. So why not just give a good clear answer to the question of Aaron who stood in passive support of Moses at Meribah?

[George88]

2 hours ago, Many Miles said:

George, I have not suggested that Aaron could have prevented Moses' disobedience. I have not even asked that. What I have asked is whether Aaron should have put forth an effort to check Moses' actions at Meribah.

If I understand your question correctly, it essentially means the same thing.

2 hours ago, Many Miles said:

Were I to ask whether Adam should have acted to check Eve's action in Eden to eat of the tree of knowledge, my guess is you'd have a ready answer. So why not just give a good clear answer to the question of Aaron who stood in passive support of Moses at Meribah?

Essentially, you already possess the answer, without needing someone else to acknowledge your personal speculation.

[Many Miles]

18 minutes ago, George88 said:

If I understand your question correctly, it essentially means the same thing.

Essentially, you already possess the answer, without needing someone else to acknowledge your personal speculation.

Apparently you do not understand the question correctly.

I've not asked if Aaron could have prevented Moses from sinning.

My question asks if Aaron should have done anything to check Moses rash words once he had committed his act of disloyalty.

Prevent is to stop something before it happens.

Unless Aaron could know the future he had no way of preventing what Moses did, which was a sin of disloyalty.  During Moses' sin of disloyalty Aaron was standing right there. So my question goes to whether Aaron should have done something after Moses' sin to have checked his action for sake of everyone looking on.

- Do you think Aaron should have acted to check Moses actions at that incident, despite Moses being anointed by God as His spokesman?

Maybe this will help you answer the question asked:

“Aaron might have checked the intemperate words and acts of Moses but did not, and therefore he also was guilty of sin, and he was punished by being deprived of precious privileges.” (Ref https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1952684

 

[George88]

4 minutes ago, Many Miles said:

Apparently you do not understand the question correctly.

It seems that you are unwilling to comprehend my response to a rhetorical question. I shall leave you to ponder upon it. Feel free to engage in speculation with others, but personally, I have no interest in pondering what could have been.

It appears that you are denying that Aaron was anointed and that his behavior, just like Moses', was equally condemned by God. Maybe by examining scripture more closely, you will be able to reach an honest conclusion regarding your question.

 

[Many Miles]

1 hour ago, George88 said:

It appears that you are denying that Aaron was anointed and that his behavior, just like Moses', was equally condemned by God. Maybe by examining scripture more closely, you will be able to reach an honest conclusion regarding your question.

To the contrary, it has never been disputed that Aaron was condemned for his sin of disloyalty committed together with Moses. But Aaron could have acted to check Moses' words/action and thereby not have been complicit in Moses' sin of disloyalty. This was an instance where standing passively in support of the God's spokesman was wrong. Aaron should have put his loyalty to God above his loyalty to God's spokesman. 

 

[George88]

Allow me to shed light on your endeavor to seek the ultimate truth concerning your question. I am here to unveil Aaron's stance on the matter of transgressing against God in past times. What can be said about Aaron's complicity?

22 “Do not be angry, my lord,” Aaron answered. “You know how prone these people are to evil. 23 They said to me, ‘Make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.’ 24 So I told them, ‘Whoever has any gold jewelry, take it off.’ Then they gave me the gold, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!”

25 Moses saw that the people were running wild and that Aaron had let them get out of control and so become a laughingstock to their enemies. 26 So he stood at the entrance to the camp and said, “Whoever is for the Lord, come to me.” And all the Levites rallied to him.

27 Then he said to them, “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘Each man strap a sword to his side. Go back and forth through the camp from one end to the other, each killing his brother and friend and neighbor.’” 28 The Levites did as Moses commanded, and that day about three thousand of the people died. 29 Then Moses said, “You have been set apart to the Lord today, for you were against your own sons and brothers, and he has blessed you this day.”
30 The next day Moses said to the people, “You have committed a great sin. But now I will go up to the Lord; perhaps I can make atonement for your sin.”

Could Aaron, as a wrongdoer himself, have appealed to God for atonement on behalf of Moses and his own wrongdoing?

[Many Miles]

6 minutes ago, George88 said:

Could Aaron, as a wrongdoer himself, have appealed to God for atonement on behalf of Moses and his own wrongdoing?

I supposed he could have tried.

What does this have to do with Aaron's later sin of being complicit in the disloyalty of God's spokesman, Moses?

After all, a person can by guilty of more than one sin during their life. Right? I'm happy to discuss other instances where Aaron sinned. But the question I've asked in this discussion has to do with the sin of Aaron putting loyalty to God's spokesman ahead of his loyalty to God.

[Juan Rivera]

 

@Many Miles Sorry for the delay. As you can verify, this comment runs to nearly 1,300 words; I had been working on it since this morning when I saw all your comments again this morning, but somehow life kept getting in the way. You know how that is, and sometimes ought to be. I'll only reply to two comments here and tie the rest of your points in a separate post.

On 10/31/2023 at 8:00 AM, Many Miles said:

Someone asked me recently what it means to worship. My answer was to say our worship is how we choose to live. Our life is our worship. Plain and simple. If this is true, then the only way our worship can be our own is to use our minds to decide how to live, and in my case that together with the Bible and from whatever I can learn from others. If, on the other hand, we decide to let others decide what we are going to believe then, in effect, our worship is not our own. We are just a proxy for someone else's worship.

I can see why it appears that way from your point of view. It truly required more faith to be a Christian in the first century in Galatia than what your advocating, precisely for this reason. From your perspective you only have to believe that Scripture is divinely inspired. The first century Christian had to believe not only that Scripture was divinely inspired, but also that the Congregation was divinely guided in interpreting and explicating the doctrines and teachings. So the rationalist solution it seems tried to cut out the need for a divinely appointed interpretive authority, by positing them to just allow the text to speak for itself. Such a proposal meant that in a certain sense, they didn't have to trust any human in order to exercise faith. All questions of faith could be verified or falsified to their own satisfaction, by examining the Scriptures for themselves. But, from the first century point of view, not trusting the Congregation in her divinely appointed role as steward and interpreter of Scripture, was a deficiency of faith. They were not called to trust Jehovah & Christ by trusting their own interpretation of Scripture, but to trust Jehovah & Christ by trusting the Congregation.

So there were two kinds of Christians. Those who I would call ecclesiological Christians, and those for whom being a Christian was primarily, if not exclusively, a matter of individual decision. Those whom the act of faith in Jehovah & Christ and the act of faith in the Congregation was one act of faith. And those for whom the act of faith in Jehovah & Christ was the act of faith, and the act of faith in the Congregation was secondary or somewhere down the line. If you put yourself in the time period of the first generation of Christians it is easier to understand what it meant to be an ecclesiological Christian. In order to put faith in Jehovah & Christ you would have needed to trust the Apostles and those appointed by them, who were taking the lead at that time.

I’m not suggesting in the least that anyone was violating their own conscience. As I said, I think what Paul is teaching in Galatians 1:6-8 is a middle position between a rationalism that tests all claims by one’s own interpretation of Scripture, and a mindless fideism that accepts as infallible whatever those taking the lead were saying regarding the faith.  According to Galatians 1:6-9 an individual must never go against his conscience. If someone taking the lead asked them do something that went against their conscience, they should not do it so long as it was in conflict with their conscience. But they had an obligation to determine whether their conscience was uninformed, or whether what the person(apostle, angel, overseer) was asking them to do was contrary to the teaching of the Congregation. If what the person(apostle, angel, overseer) was asking them to do was contrary to the teaching of the Congregation, then they were not to do it. But if they discovered that their conscience was uninformed, then they were to conform their conscience to the mind of the Congregation. 

So I’m speaking at the level of how they informed their conscience regarding what was false. Were they to go by their own interpretation of Scripture, or was there an authority to which they were to submit their interpretation? If they went by their own interpretation, then false teachings just meant any theological position that differed significantly from theirs, as determined by them. So these terms would become relativized.  Part of informing one’s conscience was determining the rightful ecclesial authority and its basis, and what doctrines had been taught by the Congregation. 

On 10/30/2023 at 5:57 PM, Many Miles said:

In his letter to Galatia Paul said "...even if we..."

With that language Paul included the very ones with authority to teach Christians as being subject to his declaration that if anyone declared something beyond what they had learned, something that was actually a different teaching to hold them as accursed.

This doesn't mean we should attempt to dislodge authority. It only means that our obedience to authority among men (no matter who those men are) is not and should never be absolute. This does not mean we apply personal interpretation. It means we examine what's taught to make sure of all things and then hold fast to that which is fine. To avoid personal bias and/or interpretation we use accepted conventions of logical construction. We have the Bible. We have our Brain. Both are God given. We use them both, and we do so as objectively as we can and make ourselves overcome personal bias by keeping to conventions of logic.

Remember that Moses was given such tremendous authority over Aaron that Moses was told he was "God" to Aaron! But, in the incident at Meribah, Aaron made the mistake of putting loyalty to Moses ahead of loyalty to the One who appointed Moses in the first place. Aaron passively supported Moses ("God") during that incident when he could have acted to check Moses' actions. It was an inappropriate act of passive obedience. He went along when he shouldn't have. There's a strong lesson in that for us today. It's the same thing Paul was trying to convey to Galatia. Obedience to authority has a limit.

Better examples than Meribah that Illustrate what Paul was saying in Galatians is Aaron and the Levites.  The task of teaching the people from the law belonged especially to the priesthood of Aaron and his sons through every generation. After Moses wrote the law, he "gave it to the priests, the Levites, who carry the ark of Jehovah’s covenant, and to all the elders of Israel. (Deuteronomy 31:9) The Levitical priests had stewardship or “charge” over the law (Deut. 17:18). And when Moses gave his final blessing over each of the tribes of Israel, when he came to the tribe of Levi he prophesied: “Let them instruct Jacob in your judicial decisions, And Israel in your Law.” (Deut. 33:10) The Levitical priests were not only stewards of the scrolls, they were stewards of the proper understanding and explanation of what was written upon them. Jehovah told Aaron that throughout the generations of his sons, they were to “teach the Israelites all the regulations that Jehovah has spoken to them through Moses.” (Lev 10:11) When there were questions about the interpretation of the law, the people were to go up to the place that Jehovah would choose, where the Levitical priests were “ministering before Jehovah,” and they were to inquire the Levitical priests (Deut. 17:9), and the priests would hand down their decision. And in these cases the people were to do according to all the direction of the priests. “The man who acts presumptuously by not listening to the priest who is ministering to Jehovah your God or to the judge must die.” (Deut. 17:12) Moses exhorted the people to “be very careful to do according to all that the Levitical priests will instruct you” (Deut. 24:8) The Levites were to “answer every man of Israel with a loud voice” the curses of the law (Deut. 27:14).

The author of 2 Chronicles connects having the law, with having a “priest to teach,” precisely because the exposition of the law belonged to the Levitical priests. The author writes, “For a long time Israel had been without the true God, without a priest teaching, and without law.” (2 Chronicles 15:3) It wasn’t as though the scrolls were missing. But, without a teaching priest, it was as if there were no law. And when Jehoshaphat set out to restore the people to true worship, he did not simply make copies of the scrolls and have them each read them. Instead, he sent authorized teachers (including a group of Levitical priests) to the cities of Judah, to teach the people from the “the book of Jehovah’s Law.” (2 Chronicles 17:9) Likewise, it was no accident that Ezra the priest and the “ the Levites, were explaining the Law to the people... And they continued reading aloud from the book, from the Law of the true God, clearly explaining it and putting meaning into it; so they helped the people to understand what was being read.” (Nehemiah 8:7-8)

The  priests had their teaching authority not fundamentally because of any academic training they had received, but fundamentally because of their appointment from Aaron, whom God had divinely chosen to be the high priest, and to whom and to his descendants God had given the task of teaching and interpreting the law for the people. In this respect the Levitical priesthood was like the first century Governing Body, because the teaching and interpretive authority of the Levitical priests was not in virtue of their intelligence or academic training, but in virtue of their divine calling as descendants of Aaron. Same with the Apostles. Divine teaching authority in the Congregation is not reducible to academic authority. God chose the weak and foolish, fishermen and tax collectors, to be the foundation stones of the Congregation (Ephesians 2:20, Rev 21:14).

[Many Miles]

17 hours ago, Juan Rivera said:

It truly required more faith to be a Christian in the first century in Galatia than what your advocating, precisely for this reason. From your perspective you only have to believe that Scripture is divinely inspired. The first century Christian had to believe not only that Scripture was divinely inspired, but also that the Congregation was divinely guided in interpreting and explicating the doctrines and teachings. So the rationalist solution it seems tried to cut out the need for a divinely appointed interpretive authority, by positing them to just allow the text to speak for itself. Such a proposal meant that in a certain sense, they didn't have to trust any human in order to exercise faith. All questions of faith could be verified or falsified to their own satisfaction, by examining the Scriptures for themselves. But, from the first century point of view, not trusting the Congregation in her divinely appointed role as steward and interpreter of Scripture, was a deficiency of faith. They were not called to trust Jehovah & Christ by trusting their own interpretation of Scripture, but to trust Jehovah & Christ by trusting the Congregation.

I'm not even sure where to start responding to this. It completely overlooks so much of what I've presented, going contrary to much of it.

1) I do not believe it required more faith to be a Christian in the first century. Why? I've said this before. The early Christians had men among them who were working miraculous feats. Curing sick people. Feeding thousands with a few fish and loaves. Raising the dead. It's not hard to put faith in teaching coming from such men. In large part this is what led to Jesus having followers in the first place. Though a very loving man and excellent speaker and teacher, he turned water wine, he healed the sick, he raised the dead. This was enough to draw anyone's attention. After the Christ's resurrection and ascension Christ's apostles had similar supernatural power. You can't really refute that if it's real and you're there to witness it, which means you're doing well to listen and accept what they teach.

2) Though the early Christians could easily accept teaching from men working supernatural miracles, Paul warned not to accept even what they ("we") say if it departed from what they had already taught them and began teaching something different than they had accepted from prior teaching. I don't see how you can dispute this latter point. Paul said it point blank. To deny this is to deny the legitimacy of what Paul said, or to read a preferential interpretation into the text. Notwithstanding all that, what was to happen when the men with supernatural power to work miracles disappeared in death? Their very presence presented a restraint of false teachings and teachers. The answer is that they left behind their own inspired written works (miracle workers with supernatural power can be assumed to be inspired to also write a legitimate record of events and teachings). The earliest Christians had the inspired words available up to that time, which Paul spoke of to Timothy. But the new witness of words that we call the Christian scriptures today was left by inspired men for sake of Christians to come.

3) I've studiously avoided suggesting that any Christian should, as you say, 'trust in their own interpretation of scripture'. To say this is to totally misunderstand what it means to form a logical conclusion. Logical conclusions are not the result of personal interpretation. It's to the contrary. Logical conclusions drive bias to the side and puts what can be proven sound to the front.

17 hours ago, Juan Rivera said:

In order to put faith in Jehovah & Christ you would have needed to trust the Apostles and those appointed by them, who were taking the lead at that time.

4) Yes, I agree with that for the early Christians with exposure to teachers with miraculous supernatural powers. These men were walking and talking tangible evidence that they were teachers of truth. But when these men were gone Christians needed to take great care that they were not mislead by new teachers, and they needed to remember which loyalty is priority, which is to God and not men (no matter what position they may hold as teachers/leaders). They also needed to guard against following they own interpretations. The answer was learning to reason from the scriptures. I have to believe that the biblical notion of reasoning from the scriptures was sound reasoning (logical) and not unsound reasoning (fallacious).

 

17 hours ago, Juan Rivera said:

According to Galatians 1:6-9 an individual must never go against his conscience. If someone taking the lead asked them do something that went against their conscience, they should not do it so long as it was in conflict with their conscience. But they had an obligation to determine whether their conscience was uninformed, or whether what the person(apostle, angel, overseer) was asking them to do was contrary to the teaching of the Congregation. If what the person(apostle, angel, overseer) was asking them to do was contrary to the teaching of the Congregation, then they were not to do it. But if they discovered that their conscience was uninformed, then they were to conform their conscience to the mind of the Congregation. 

5) I agree with everything you say here with one exception, which I've underlined. It's a false bifurcation here to say if a) they found their own conscience was uninformed then b) they were to conform to the mind of the congregation. This argument wrongly presumes two things, 1) that there is no alternative other than a or b (which is why it it's a false bifurcation) and 2) that "the mind of the Congregation" is "informed". Here's my question to you on this point: What if your mind is uninformed and the Congregation's mind is also uninformed? What then? Think about that. There is an good solid answer to that question.

 

17 hours ago, Juan Rivera said:

So I’m speaking at the level of how they informed their conscience regarding what was false. Were they to go by their own interpretation of Scripture, or was there an authority to which they were to submit their interpretation? If they went by their own interpretation, then false teachings just meant any theological position that differed significantly from theirs, as determined by them. So these terms would become relativized.  Part of informing one’s conscience was determining the rightful ecclesial authority and its basis, and what doctrines had been taught by the Congregation. 

6) In the presence of inspired biblical text and the testimony of God creation all around us, no one should form belief based on "their own interpretation", meaning how they prefer to see things. That would be no more than believing what you want to believe solely because that's what you want to believe, something I categorically reject.

7) You ask "was their an authority to which they were to submit their interpretation". For early Christians who had the testimony of miracle workers with supernatural power, my answer would be yes, unless (or when) they changed their testimony. This latter point is what Paul warned against. This is why obedience to teachers and teaching has a limit. For Christians that came after the men with supernatural power, they had the testimony left behind in the new witness which we call the Christian scriptures. Any teaching asserted based on the bible since the men with supernatural powers would have to conform to sound (logical) conclusions based on the testimony already given and codified as the Bible.

17 hours ago, Juan Rivera said:

Better examples than Meribah that Illustrate what Paul was saying in Galatians is Aaron and the Levites.

If the question is whether God expects us to obey Him ahead of whomever He may have placed in an appointed position, then we have to look to examples that test that question. This is why the incident of Aaron standing in passive support of God's appointed spokesman (Moses) is important. It succinct fashion it provides a very important object lesson. If we want to worship God then we have to obey Him no matter what anyone else tells us, even if that other person has, or is thought to have, divinely appointed authority. 

 

17 hours ago, Juan Rivera said:

The  priests had their teaching authority not fundamentally because of any academic training they had received, but fundamentally because of their appointment from Aaron, whom God had divinely chosen to be the high priest, and to whom and to his descendants God had given the task of teaching and interpreting the law for the people. In this respect the Levitical priesthood was like the first century Governing Body, because the teaching and interpretive authority of the Levitical priests was not in virtue of their intelligence or academic training, but in virtue of their divine calling as descendants of Aaron. Same with the Apostles. Divine teaching authority in the Congregation is not reducible to academic authority. God chose the weak and foolish, fishermen and tax collectors, to be the foundation stones of the Congregation (Ephesians 2:20, Rev 21:14).

The priest at the ancient tabernacle in the wilderness had something standing above them that was unmistakable. It was a supernatural phenomena of a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. This made it pretty clear that what was coming from the priests should be followed because that supernatural phenomena demonstrated God's approval of what they were doing there. If you want to look to the priesthood to examine the question of whether a worshiper should passively support a wrong teaching or sin (like in the instance at Meribah) then you need to find and share an incident that tests that question, which you haven't done. We know Jews were told to obey the priests. But what about when those priests told somebody to do something wrong, or wanted someone to support them in wrongdoing? Were they supposed to obey them then?  Ultimately, though, Israel insisted on having a king like the nations around them, and God appointed a King over Israel. The first one was Saul. Saul went bad. Though he was the anointed of God, he went bad. David would not act to remove Saul from his position because God had installed him as king. But David did not obey Saul because he knew Saul could not be trusted. This, too, was another incident demonstrating that our loyalty/obedience to God appointed authority has limitations. If it was true of Moses, whose was "God" to Aaron, then it was also true of the priesthood of Israel.

There is too much here so that time does not allow me to proof read. If something is misspelled or you have a question of anything please just ask. I have yet to see anyone post a thing suggesting that there is not an appropriate limitation to our obedience toward leaders we look toward as teachers. You recognize that somewhat, and I respect that. But I'd recommend you spend some time honing your skills of logical construction. Learning how to reason soundly helps a person avoid the trap of falling for their own bad ideas, preference and/or biases, and it also helps us recognize unsound teaching coming from others.

[George88]

2 hours ago, Many Miles said:

Logical conclusions are not the result of personal interpretation. It's to the contrary. Logical conclusions drive bias to the side and puts what can be proven sound to the front.

Who determines the logical conclusion, and how? Not everyone is a scholar, and without in-depth study like dedicated linguists, we might lack the capacity required. So, why should we unquestionably accept the interpretation of those who claim their logical understanding of scripture is superior? After all, the Pharisees had their own logical interpretation of the ancient scrolls, but were they truly correct?

[Many Miles]

32 minutes ago, George88 said:

Who determines the logical conclusion, and how? Not everyone is a scholar, and without in-depth study like dedicated linguists, we might lack the capacity required. So, why should we unquestionably accept the interpretation of those who claim their logical understanding of scripture is superior? After all, the Pharisees had their own logical interpretation of the ancient scrolls, but were they truly correct?

Logical conclusions are ideas/teachings/notions that are, among other things, falsifiable. Logical conclusions are not the result of personal interpretation. To the contrary, logical conclusions drive bias to the side and put what can be proven as sound to the front.

The biblical account shows it proper to reason from the scriptures. I confess to an assumption that this means sound reasoning (which is logic) and not unsound reasoning (which is fallacy). Logic is employed to help people learn valid information. Fallacy is employed to persuade toward a preferential view (a bias). Fallacy is a distraction from valid information.

There are well known and accepted conventions of logical construction. It works a lot like math and is very objective, which is why it's dependable to examine any idea, including one's own idea(s).

If you're unfamiliar with this discipline then I'd recommend you undertake a study of it. It's not really hard. But if you want to reason soundly then you have to learn how to form logical conclusions.

As for "who determines the logical conclusion, and how" anyone who understands conventions of logical construction can examine a conclusion to see if it's logical. The person would look at the argument's form to see that it is logically valid. If the form is logically valid the person would then examine each premise in the argument for veracity. If the form is valid and the premises are supported by evidence then the conclusion of the argument is as strong as the evidence in support of the premises.

 

[George88]

37 minutes ago, Many Miles said:

If you're unfamiliar with this discipline then I'd recommend you undertake a study of it. It's not really hard. But if you want to reason soundly then you have to learn how to form logical conclusions.

Understanding intelligence is indeed crucial, but it is important to recognize that individual perceptions of intelligence may not always be accurate or comprehensive, regardless of how well they are articulated. Relying solely on one's own understanding can be a significant mistake and should not be promoted by any religious authority. True wisdom, according to religious beliefs, emanates from a higher power rather than from human beings. Therefore, our understanding of logic and fallacy is limited by our individual interpretations. Religious texts often urge us to be discerning of those who possess a mindset similar to that of the Pharisees rather than questioning those chosen by God to guide and oversee his followers.

The fallacy, therefore, rests on our limited comprehension of scripture and our reluctance to pay attention to God's message as conveyed through the deeds of others.

What motived Christ, the apostles, and his followers? Christ was the only human being who was perfect in every way. Did that undermine the actions and abilities of the others? If you're not familiar with the concept, I strongly suggest you pursue its study.