T-Bone

I don't mean to put a lot of pressure on you, Dmiller - but I think your ten thousandth post should be about something significant - like the meaning of life or the next winning Lottery numbers - you know something useful like that.

CoolWaters has some good advice - why don't you just flat out ask the dog what he wants to be called? Sometimes us human folk don't give them enough credit...Okay - if your dog is a little shy and won't help you opt for our back-up plan - naming your pet after a favorite TV show...Although I warn you - you may get some funny looks from neighbors - it happens every time I call our dog in: "Come here, Who wants to be a Millionaire."

Thanks, HighWay - your post really struck a nerve for me personally! After having a large part of my personality/identity in suspended animation for 12 years while in TWI - I find it very challenging but rewarding [and re-awakening] getting back to my "roots." Life is a journey.

I think we live in a moral universe - that the way we conduct ourselves in this life has a bearing upon the next.

You had me at "free".

Abigail, thanks for sharing that interesting stuff on Sechina - and that neat website too! I'm going to check out some more of it - there's a lot of info on there - I was reading the Jewish Bible with commentary and scanned through some interesting articles - including one by Yanki Tauber entitled "6 Kinds of Perfection" of which the following quote is from there - I thought it tied into our earlier talk about perfection:

Thanks for that correction - the Tin Man wanted a heart, scarecrow wanted brains...And I agree with your point on the benefit of knowledge - we all have a different opinion of what's valid in PFAL - part of the sorting out process of what we each think is good and bad...And I agree with your saying they crossed the line with their ownership attitude...I should have had the courage of the lion to think for myself ..."put 'em up, put 'em up!"

Some great points here! And I think back to Genesis 1:27 "...God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them." [NASV] The difference in the genders [intellectually, emotionally, etc.] are different aspects of the same image of God. Viva la difference!

"They're drinking Southern Comfort... smokin' cigs with a smile... It's a more than abundant life sponsorship-style..."

"I know people who are scum - who haven't moved the Word! Why?! I'll tell you why..." Oh geeeesh Jardinaro - you have re-activated a sleeper program [then the voice getting lower, and in a very Zombie-like drone] Rhino - hand me the string - your last row is a little crooked - hurry now, before others get here - they will not be able to receive anything...

Just to clarify myself on the MOTIVE issue I suggested in my previous post. I don't think there was anything wrong in them wanting to learn - I was wondering about their motive for learning that particular thing. In my opinion it revolves around some aspect of them wanting to be like God - which I don't fault them for that - sorta like kids wanting to be like their parents. Perhaps there was an element of distrust of God brewing in the Serpent's temptation by implying God was withholding information from them...Like some soap opera drama where one person suspects another of deception and will in turn take action - even morally wrong action so as not to be caught off guard by this alleged scam.

The basement of The Rome City Indiana Campus was so damp - I'd classify myself more in the mildew category.

Chatty, on humans having some kind of built-in hunger for knowledge - I agree...In thinking about the forbidden fruit of Genesis 3, I sometimes wonder - was it going to be a permanent prohibition to eat it? I also think about the fact that the actual "fruit" is not mentioned - I'm thinking because that wasn't important...And to tread a little further into this intriguing scene - I think about the moral aspect of their choice. It says it was from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good & Evil...It leads me to think their fault in wanting to learn more was their MOTIVE in eating the fruit. In other words, there was nothing wrong with the fruit - sorta like wanting something that is morally neutral [like money, a job, etc.] but for the wrong reasons... Sushi, I read about Piers Anthony Series The Incarnations of Immortality at Wikipedia - it sounds interesting. I used to read a lot of sci-fi and fantasy when I was a teenager. I may have to check the series out at the library. Wikipedia offers a lengthy synopsis of each book and touches on the main themes. I think the series would be a good reading assignment to go along with this thread - purely extra credit for all you lifetime students out there!

Regarding my reference to Ezekiel 28:14, I have always assumed it referred to Lucifer [linking it with the more obvious reference to him in Isaiah 14:12-15] but today I read a couple of references that say Ezekiel 28:12-19 refers to Adam – one is Keil & Delitzsch's Commentary on the Old Testament: Volume 9 Ezekiel, Daniel, commenting on Ezekiel 28:15, page 415, "In ver.15, the comparison of the prince of Tyre to Adam in Paradise is brought out still more prominently. As Adam was created sinless, so was the prince of Tyre innocent in his conduct in the day of his creation, but only until perverseness was found in him. As Adam forfeited and lost the happiness conferred upon him trhough his fall, so did the king of Tyre forfeit his glorious position through unrighteousness and sin, and cause God to cast him from his eminence down to the ground." The other reference is The NET Bible in a note on Ezekiel 28:13 "The imagery of the lament appears to draw upon an extrabiblical Eden tradition about the expulsion of the first man…from the garden due to his pride…" After thinking about that for awhile I became fascinated by The NET Bible version of Ezekiel 28:13-17: 13. You were in Eden, the garden of God. Every precious stone was your covering, the ruby, topaz, and diamond, the beryl, onyx, and jasper, the sapphire, turquoise, and emerald; your settings and engravings were made of gold. On the day you were created they were prepared. 14. I placed you there with an anointed guardian cherub; you were on the holy mountain of God; you walked in the midst the stones of fire. 15. You were blameless in your behavior from the day you were created, until sin was discovered in you. 16. In the abundance of your trade you were filled with violence, and you sinned; so I defiled you and banished you from the mountain of God, the guardian cherub expelled you from the midst of the stones of fire. 17. Your heart was proud because of your beauty; you perverted your wisdom on account of your splendor. I threw you down to the ground; I placed you before kings, that they might see you. With the possibility that the above is comparing the fall of the king of Tyre to the fall of Adam – I re-read the Genesis 3 account of the temptation and the fall – and something stood out to me – I never noticed this before – here's how it reads in The Net Bible [but even KJV has it very similar], Genesis 3:6 [the part I noticed I put in bold red] "When the woman saw that the tree produced fruit that was good for food, was attractive to the eye, and was desirable for making one wise, she took some of its fruit and ate it. She also gave some of it to her husband who was with her, and he ate it." I guess I never realized how this whole scene played out. I don't know if Adam was there from the beginning of the temptation in verse one or he came along near the end – I tend to think he was there for about the whole time – silent – doesn't say a whole lot for men does it?!?! Hmmmmmmm…I Timothy 2:14 says Adam was not deceived [he ate willingly when Eve gave him the fruit] but Eve was deceived…I guess we all try to be a good judge of character when we're dealing with people [whether on a personal or professional basis] – I tend to be forgiving of someone that makes an unintentional mistake or operates under misinformation – but someone who full well knows what they're doing – no deal!!!...Anyway – sorry to get way off topic but I thought it would be interesting on this thread about Eve. Sushi, Abigail - thanks for sharing the different perspectives on this stuff - it gets me thinking.

Sorry George, this is the best I can do for something that sounds Asian.

Happy Birthday to my favorite non-Japanese Japanese speaker

Psssssssssssst CoolWaters, remember the first rule of Chat Club - there is no talking about Chat Club!

That's a good question! I don't know! Perhaps we need to explore what "perfection" is...I think of Lucifer who was also "perfect", rebelled; Ezekiel 28:15 "You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created, until unrighteousness was found in you." [NASV] Definitions from The Hebrew-Greek Key Study Bible by Spiros Zodhiates are as follows: blameless from Hebrew tamiym - without blemish, complete, full, perfect, undefiled, whole...unrighteousness from Hebrew evel - a moral evil, iniquity, perverseness, unrighteousness...I've always thought of this "unrighteousness" as the act of choosing to rebel against God - and specifically with both Lucifer and the humans a choosing to be like God...This verse in Ezekiel is puzzling - isn't it? ...But in considering the other part of your post "there was learning that still needed to be done" I think of how our kids will sometimes rebel and do things their way - and sometimes we have to let go and let them do it - even though we see it will hurt them...I think they were perfect - but not like a machine, computer or Superman. They still had the capacity to grow intellectually, emotionally, creatively, etc.

Yeah - the nature of man is a deep/complicated subject...I see the distinction you're making over born in or with sin, being sinful and being human - - I think...Maybe this is one of those two viewpoints passing in the night...The way I see it [my point of view, interpretation of Genesis data]: Adam and Eve were created perfect, fully human; through their rebellion sin entered their being - as a corrupting virus - - somehow detracting or marring their humanness/perfection...I don't know about feeling unclean - with me it's more like a longing to feel normal - but I ain't got a clue of what normal is... :blink:

Thanks Kit - the updated Noah thing is funny!!!

Hey Abigail thanks for sharing The Curse of Eve article - very interesting stuff! Sometimes I think I have that whipped-pup attitude about our fallen nature - but I find the attitude expressed in the above quote inspiring.

While listening to a few of the Grease Spot Radio episodes lately – I was impressed with how important it is for anyone that comes to GSC to sort things out for themselves – and that's a big project, an on-going process - needing courage, strength, and a gazillion other things – but most notably [in my humble opinion] tapping the creative and critical resources of our brains. To sort things out for ourselves – is my shorthand for the overall healing/strengthening process - which has a lot of sub-processes. Listing those [which list is by no means exhaustive or in a certain order] which I think are a big deal: figuring out your own viewpoint in life [your philosophy], analyzing TWI doctrine and practices to determine validity, determining the extent of TWI's impact on the way you process information and function [socially, emotionally, etc.], reviewing personal experiences of TWI – identifying positive and negative aspects and suspect areas, assessing damages/weaknesses/needs and forming solutions. "…Oz never did give nothing to the Tin Man that he didn't already have…" by America. Besides that verse having the classic double-negative no-no - I think it describes one aspect of my experience with TWI. I've always had a brain – for as long as I can remember - before, during and after TWI…Last night in Chat we talked a little about Momentus. I said "Why does the next great truth always have to be in a class?" Maybe this is a little too broad to assume but I think most people want to experience life – to enjoy living. I don't think you can learn that in a book [even the Bible – eeeeessssh oh my – don't believe I said that!], or a class, organization, etc. Reading a book will not enable you to ride a bike. I learned to ride on a girl's 28 inch bike – the sloping V frame let me get on/off and stand while pedaling. I'm a Christian – was before TWI and afterwards remain so. The one good aspect I can think about PFAL was that it got me into reading the Bible. In keeping with my above analogy – PFAL was like putting training wheels on my thinking. Looking back I now view some of PFAL as being screwed up. What if – after taking PFAL, I used my critical thinking skills – identified the good and the bad – and then moved on with my own self-directed study of the Bible – sans the training wheels. PFAL isn't a shortcut to experiencing life or learning the Bible – it can shortchange your thinking-power if you let it. I love to read, love to learn and enjoy experiencing life! And I don't believe it can be handed to you on a silver platter – like in a class, or by direct revelation [whatever that is]. If I may refer to Proverbs 2: 3 & 4 [The NET Bible] which talks about finding a knowledge of God – even in such a lofty and intellectual endeavor as that - hard work is implied, "indeed, if you call out for understanding, and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver, and search for it like hidden treasure…" I notice if my calling out for understanding does not get it – I'm to raise my voice – increase my efforts. I am to take a very active role in the process of learning. Anyone else want to share their thoughts on the healing/strengthening process or as I call it "sorting things out" after you left TWI.

Great pictures - thanks Abigail !...Now I want to go somewhere...Mackinaw looks like a great place!

T-Bone post #47 June 26 2006 9:19 PM: "…I wonder how much of what I saw was self-directed instead of coming from God? I remember my twig leader's wife always saying the same five or six words in a tongue but the interpretation was at least two or three sentences long. I never gave this linguistic oddity much thought until I brought my friend Steve to Twig – and he pointed that out to me. Every week, the same five or six words – with a different interpretation each time. Maybe each word had multiple meanings and functions – a diagram of the sentence would probably look like a complicated map of the NY Subway System." GeorgeAar post# 65 June 27 2006 11:29 PM: "…in fact, I never heard a "tongue" that really sounded like a language at all. In 15 years of doing the nonsense, it never happened. I heard quite a few that sounded incredibly similar, though." Oakspear post #67 June 28 2006 2:53 AM: "I can go along with that. While allowing for the possibility that there might have been a structure or linguistic pattern in a "tongue" that I didn't perceive, most, if not all, tongues that I have heard in TWI and in churches, were just a string of the same sounds repeated over and over." In Systematic Theology: Volume Four, Church, Last Things by Norman Geisler, Appendix Two, Were Tongues A Real Language?, Geisler makes the point that the speaking in tongues mentioned in the Bible was a real language because I Corinthians 14:10-19 states it must be interpreted for the church – thus logic demands it is a meaningful, translatable language. Concerning "tongues of angels" I Corinthians 13:1, Geisler says, "is probably a figure of speech meaning 'to speak most eloquently.' Even if this is to be taken literally, every time angels spoke in the Bible they did so in actual language that people could understand." In the previous appendix [Appendix One Only the Apostles Spoke in Tongues At Pentecost, page 663] Geisler concludes, "If tongues were only a sign gift to apostles and only apostles had the gift or could give it to others, this would be confirmation of its temporary nature in laying the foundation of Christ's apostles. Thus, once this basis was established, it would be natural that the gift of tongues would cease – there being no more need for it. Indeed, this seems implied in the phrase "whether there are tongues, they will cease" , since it is in the middle voice and can be translated "They will cease of their own accord." Getting back to Appendix Two Were Tongues a Real Language?, Geisler doubts [as do GeorgeAar, Oakspear and myself] if today's "tongues" are real languages; Geisler quotes extensively from a book by Samarin – any page references to Samarin's book I will put Samarin's text in bold with the page reference as the following [TMA, page X]: "William Samarin, professor of anthropology and linguistics at the University of Toronto, wrote the first comprehensive book-length study of speaking in tongues [Tongues of Men and Angels, New York: Macmillan, 1972]. In this work he takes Christian charismatic glossolalia – the common contemporary practice of speaking in unknown and unintelligible speech, which Samarin distinguishes from what he calls xenoglossia [the miraculous gift of tongues in which the speaker communicates in an unlearned human language] – and the "tongues" of other religions [including healers, occultists, and shamans] and compares them with known human languages. He concludes from his linguistic analysis that "glossolalia is a perfectly human, perfectly normal [albeit anomalous] phenomenon" [TMA, page 235]. If this is the case, then "speaking in tongues" as commonly practiced today is a creation of the human mind and not the miraculous, divine activity recorded in Scripture… When Samarin and other linguists attempted to transcribe recorded glossolalia, they found that they continually came up with different results due to the difficulty of finding thoroughly distinct words in the utterances: "On analysis these transcriptions will always expose the linguistically deviant nature of a glossolaic discourse…notwithstanding a charismatist's claim that glossolalia is neither repetitious nor meaningless banality, no "jabber-babble or twattle-twaddle," but clear, distinct, precise, and uncluttered speech." [TMA, page 78] Samarin concludes from his analysis: "The illusion of word-structure is destroyed when one tries to dissect all the breath-groups of a text…So it is not surprising that a linguistically trained respondent was no more successful in "breaking down" her [the subject's] speech than I was." [TMA, page 81] This is not the case with a real language, and these results were not limited to the investigators. In a similar experiment with another "tongues-speaker," Samarin noted: "When his [the subject's] own prayer was played back several hours later, he was unable to fulfill the function of the normal speaker of language. In other words, he could not, listening to his own speech, repeat for me what he had just said." [TMA, page 81] The reason for this linguistic defect is that "there is no grammar for glossolalia, because it is a phenomenon, like a human language in general, and not like a specific language" [TMA, page 73]. Thus, when it comes to these supposed tongues, "nobody can learn a set of rules that would enable him to speak a 'language' that is the same as someone else's. Even what one speaks on different occasions is not the same in the linguistic sense" [TMA, page 73]. Native Speech Patterns Even in light of these apparently random "word salads," we discover an interesting trend, When glossolaic verbal patterns are analyzed regarding the use of consonants, vowels, and other features, they are revealed as strikingly close to the speaker's native language. "The explanation for this similarity, to put it simply, is that [the subject] is "doing what comes naturally!" In other words, he and every other creator of extemporaneous pseudo language tends to use what is common in his native language…What makes a person's glossa different from his native language is how he uses its sounds" [TMA, page 83,87]. This is to be expected if tongues are the product of an intentional speaker. Because the speaker is making some form of syllabic selection, "Glossolalia, even though it is lexically meaningless, is not a randomized collection of sounds and sound sequences. It is a derivative phenomenon. Its basic features depend on the linguistic competence and knowledge of each speaker. This will surprise no one who came to this study already convinced that glossolalia was some kind of gibberish. However, now he knows that it is not simply that…It is on looking closely at glossas that their artificiality becomes apparent. This is as true of their construction as it is of their function" [TMA, page 127,121]. Artificial Function and Construction As to function, "Glossas and natural languages are responsive to the world outside the speaker in different ways. In normal speech it is content, and not merely manner of delivery, that changes constantly in response to topics, person, setting, time and so forth…In construction as well as in function glossas are fundamentally different from languages…If glossas do not have grammatical structure, we might nevertheless expect them to be like languages phonologically, because they sound so much like languages. Even here we are deceived. The total number of different sounds appears to be smaller than one finds in most languages. Glossas are strikingly unlike natural languages in the rank frequency curves of the sounds…This cannot happen in normal language, because the occurrence of sounds is determined by the words in which they occur" [TMA, page 122-126]. "When the full apparatus of linguistic science comes to bear on glossolalia, this turns out to be only a facade of language – although at times a very good one indeed. For when we comprehend what language is, we must conclude that no glossa, no matter how well constructed, is a specimen of human language, because it is neither internally organized nor systematically related to the world man perceives" [TMA, page 127,128]. "[Linguists] know enough to declare what is and what is not a language. We know as much as a mathematician, who can tell the difference between a real formula and a pseudo-formula – one that looks like mathematical language but does not say anything…The glossolalist must grant this, because one of his proofs for the existence of God is orderliness in creation. A hodge-podge of DNA produces biological nonsense just as much as a hodge-podge of syllables produces linguistic nonsense" [TMA, page 234]. To argue [as some do] that these are coded forms of language fails; codes have meaningful linguistic patterns and can be broken, while tongues do not and cannot. Any other so-called code-without-pattern places a tongue out of the realm of the intelligible and into the unverifiable domain of the mystical." The following is from The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language by Steven Pinker [Pinker is the Johnstone Family Professor in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University. Until 2003, he taught in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT], pages 168,169: "An inventory of phonemes is one of the things that gives a language its characteristic sound pattern. For example, Japanese is famous for not distinguishing r from l. When I arrived in Japan on November 4, 1992, the linguist Masaaki Yamanashi greeted me with a twinkle and said, "In Japan, we have been very interested in Clinton's erection." We can recognize a language's sound pattern even in a speech stream that contains no real words, as with the Swedish chef on The Muppets or John Belushi's samurai dry cleaner. The linguist Sarah G. Thomason has found that people who claim to be channeling back to past lives or speaking in tongues are really producing gibberish that conforms to a sound pattern vaguely reminiscent of the claimed language. For example, one hypnotized channeler, who claimed to be a nineteenth-century Bulgarian talking to her mother about soldiers laying waste to the countryside, produced generic pseudo-Slavic gobbledygook like this: Ovishta reshta rovishta. Vishna beretishti? Ushna barishta dashto. Na darishnoshto. Koraphnosha.... darishtoy. Aobashni bedetpa. And of course, when the words in one language are pronounced with the sound pattern of another, we call it a foreign accent, as in the following excerpt from a fractured fairy tale by Bob Belviso: GIACCHE ENNE BINNESTAUCCHE Uans appona taim disse boi. Neimmese Giacche. Naise boi. Live uite ise mamma. Mainde da cao. Uane dei, di spaghetti ise olle ronne aute…" In my 12 years of being with TWI - I have never witnessed an unbeliever [or anyone for that matter] exclaiming "wow - that person speaking in tongues just spoke in my native tongue or a language I also know." And the more I think about some of the accounts given in Acts of speaking in tongues - the fact that some indication is noted of the language being understood by others present leads me to think it was a way for them to verify it was genuine...Perhaps, some charismatic group would record their speaking in tongues and interpretation and submit the tape to a panel of linguistic experts - I figure if it's from God the test results will blow the minds of the language experts. For that matter - In my opinion, anything God does can stand up to the most stringent scrutiny. I figure doctors could have examined the blind man healed by Jesus and said "yup, this guy's got 20/20 vision."

Socks, I really enjoyed your rendition of I Know Who Holds Tomorrow. That song was never one of my favorites - maybe too slow - or rather dreary or melancholy. But I get a more upbeat or hopeful feeling from your version. Thanks