Been thinking on rebuttals for those who specifically say "its ridiculous that a Church could make laws binding its members", meaning, the whole ecuмenical enchilada of govern yourself.

My question here is:

Can I respond, and have it actually be accurate, with "you realize you could have said that 3000 years ago about Jєωιѕн law, but Christians today recognize that the Jєωs were in fact following laws set by various prophets etc. under the direct guidance of God."

My point would be that God did establish hierarchy even in the old Testament, and did not discontinue this avenue once Christ came, but simply unified it under Peter and his successors. Really, in essence, there is not much difference between the two.

My hesitation here is:

I do not know enough about Jєωιѕн laws to actually know that this is absolutely the case. I know there are many traditions that the Jєωs followed, even aside from Pasch, in their daily lives as well as throughout their liturgical year, yes?

Maybe I am off base, but it seems that if one could point out that this "Church" power is really nothing new, it might help to open their unbelieving minds to the words "what you shall bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven".
 
Thoughts or links appreciated!

Briget

I don't understand. If a society's law does not bind its members, then whom or what does it bind?

Nadir,

I am specifically speaking of Jєωιѕн law, rather than Mosaic. I "think" the Jєωιѕн law would be more appropriate, assuming it was at least in part gathered from Jєωιѕн Church fathers, rather than prophets.

Briget

The old Jєωιѕн law made a distinction between the law of god that aplied to everybody and the particular discipline that applied onl to the Jєωιѕн people. We see some of this in the New Testament when we hear about the God fearing gentiles who went to the synagogs on Saturdays in many of the Greek cities.

 The Seven Laws of Noah (Hebrew: שבע מצוות בני נח‎ Sheva mitzvot B'nei Noach), or the Noahide Laws, are a set of moral imperatives that, according to the тαℓмυd, were given by God[1] as a binding set of laws for the "children of Noah" – that is, all of humanity.[2][3]

Accordingly, any non-Jєω who adheres to these laws is regarded as a righteous gentile, and is assured of a place in the world to come (Hebrew: עולם הבא‎ Olam Haba), the final reward of the righteous.[4][5]

The seven Noahide laws as traditionally enumerated are:[6]

1.Do not deny God.
2.Do not blaspheme God.
3.Do not murder.
4.Do not engage in incestuous, adulterous or ɧoɱosɛҳųαƖ relationships.
5.Do not steal.
6.Do not eat of a live animal.
7.Establish courts/legal system to ensure law and obedience.
According to the тαℓмυd,[6] the rabbis agree that the seven laws were given to the sons of Noah. However, they disagree on precisely which laws were given to Adam and Eve. Six of the seven laws are exegetically derived from passages in Genesis,[7] with the seventh being the establishing of courts.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Laws_of_Noah

Poche, why are you writing here as if the тαℓмυd is something to be taken note of by Catholics?

Quote

The тαℓмυd Unmasked The Secret Rabbinical Teachings Concerning Christians
By Rev. I. B. Pranaitis
Roman Catholic Priest; Master of Theology and Professor of the Hebrew Language at the Imperial Ecclesiastical Academy of the Roman Catholic Church in Old St. Petersburg.
 
IMPRIMATUR
St. Petersburg,
April 13, 1892
KOZLOWSKY
Archbishop Metropolitan of Moghileff

... What Christians have thought of the тαℓмυd is amply proved by the many edicts and decrees issued about it, by which the supreme rulers in Church and State proscribed it many times and condemned this sacred Secondary Law Code of the Jєωs to the flames.

In 553 the Emperor Justinian forbade the spread of the тαℓмυdic books throughout the Roman Empire. In the 13th century "Popes Gregory IX and Innocent IV condemned the books of the тαℓмυd as containing every kind of vileness and blasphemy against Christian truth, and ordered them to be burned because they spread many horrible heresies."

Later, they were condemned by many other Roman Pontiffs - Julius III, Paul IV, Pius IV, Pius V, Gregory XIII, Clement VIII, Alexander VII, Benedict XIV, and by others who issued new editions of the Index of Forbidden Books according to the orders of the Fathers of the Council of Trent, and even in our own time.

.....

The тαℓмυd teaches that Jesus Christ was illegitimate and was conceived during menstruation; that he had the soul of Esau; that he was a fool, a conjurer, a seducer; that he was crucified, buried in hell and set up as an idol ever since by his followers.

....

They (the Jєωs) say that they (Christians) are idolaters, the worst kind of people, much worse than the Turks, murderers, fornicators, impure animals, like dirt, unworthy to be called men, beasts in human form, worthy of the name of beasts, cows, asses, pigs, dogs, worse than dogs; that they propagate after the manner of beasts, that they have diabolic origin, that their souls come from the devil and return to the devil in hell after death; and that even the body of a dead Christian is nothing different from that of an animal.

Check out http://www.biblebelievers.org.au/тαℓмυd1.htm

Because the original post was;

Been thinking on rebuttals for those who specifically say "its ridiculous that a Church could make laws binding its members", meaning, the whole ecuмenical enchilada of govern yourself.

My question here is:

Can I respond, and have it actually be accurate, with "you realize you could have said that 3000 years ago about Jєωιѕн law, but Christians today recognize that the Jєωs were in fact following laws set by various prophets etc. under the direct guidance of God."

My point would be that God did establish hierarchy even in the old Testament, and did not discontinue this avenue once Christ came, but simply unified it under Peter and his successors. Really, in essence, there is not much difference between the two.

My hesitation here is:

I do not know enough about Jєωιѕн laws to actually know that this is absolutely the case. I know there are many traditions that the Jєωs followed, even aside from Pasch, in their daily lives as well as throughout their liturgical year, yes?

Maybe I am off base, but it seems that if one could point out that this "Church" power is really nothing new, it might help to open their unbelieving minds to the words "what you shall bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven".

Thoughts or links appreciated!

Also because the discipline of the Catholic Church is rooted in the old Jєωιѕн law.

Bringing it up when talking apologetics... Someone gave a great example about other associations a person could belong to, and their rules etc, but  this concept almost always goes over peeps heads for various reasons. I think the heart of the matter is that the idea of a church having some kind of power to make laws is so foreign to most Christians today (with good reason, they are all "feel your way through the gospels" led) that they refuse (refuse) to even consider the idea.

The problem is, indeed, as you note, the concept that a Church has any authority.  The Freemasonic view, which is simply how life is seen by the great majority of people today (in the West, anyway) is that religion is for Sunday.  Religion is fine but must be confined to personal beliefs and cannot truly form one's ideas, life, actions, or anything else outside of the church building on Sunday.

It is most frustrating to talk with an individual who, after discussion clearly shows he is factually wrong on some issue, say, "Well, we'll just have to agree to disagree," or, "Well, that might be true for you but it's not true for me."  Such comments are perfectly acceptable when discussing personal opinions (e.g., whether on thinks baseball is more or less exciting that football), but not about facts (e.g., the very existence of God).

Many of the apologetics of the past simply don't work today because so many people simply cannot grasp the concept that mutually exclusive "truths" cannot both be true.  When it comes to the issue of religion, the concept of "religious liberty" is so ingrained upon the Western psyche that it is very difficult to convince a person that his liberty is not absolute.  People cannot grasp the concept that his liberty only a choice between accepting or rejecting the True God and that any exercise in his liberty that is contrary to the commands of the True God is an absolute rejection of Him.

Until one can punch a hole through that bubble that surrounds most people's intellect so that he can really see that they've swallowed, hook, line, and sinker, the Orwellian doctrine of Double Think, it is futile to argue doctrine and morality.  The fact that people today can read Orwell's 1984 and imagine it a good story that has no relevance to the way they think is most disturbing.  Why God gives a few of us the grace to see while the vast majority are blind is truly a mystery, but one should always thank Him for giving that most singular grace.