Pudgy

Is it possible Noah knocked out some bad people and kept them penned up to feed the meat eaters on the ark:P

KEY POINT: 
This was BEFORE the Laws were given to Moses.  I personally believe Able was cooking up lambchops or some tasty animal on a homemade fireplace grill and sharing part of it withJehovah.
The Scripture quoted above means to me that 5 out of the 7 unclean animals brought aboard the Ark WERE FOOD FOR THE MEAT EATING ANIMALS!
THINK about it!
Why would Jehovah have over THREE TIMES as many “unclean” animals rescued as “clean” animals?
HE DIDN’T !!
They entered the Ark (the 7s) but they LEFT the Ark by 2s.
Like it or not, accept it or not … but Planet Earth has been populated by predator animals, and prey animals that are eaten for BILLIONS OF YEARS.
THAT IS THE ONLY REALITY THERE IS.
If it offends your delicate sensibilities Please know that it also offends my delicate sensibilities as well, but I realize THAT’s The Way The Real World Works!
Suck it up and don’t be such a pansy!
If you want to be a professional wimp, choose another topic, because EVERYTHING that lives has to EAT.
The dynamic aboard the Ark followed that pattern, as did Able’s lifestyle, and all persons and animals before the Flood, up until now.
All else is Disneyland fantasy.

Of what? Abel eating meat? Can you think of a reason why he wouldn't?
- Vegetation can be just a lethal to humans as meat, depending on what you eat and when.
- Vegetation can spoil just as meat can.
- Meat can be stored by basic methods just like vegetation can.
So, if what you find improbable is the notion of Abel eating meat, why?

THAT is one heckofa STRETCH.
I give it a probability … and that’s how  I view  EVERYTHING … how probable is it! … of zero.

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.

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. 
 

Abel’s sacrifice
Among us there are some who feel that since the Bible does not rule out transplantation of human organs that accepting or rejecting such a transplantation should be left to personal conscience. And so it is among us.
With that in mind we have the biblical account of Abel’s sacrifice. The author attributed to this account is Moses. How Moses describes Abel’s sacrifice is of interest because of what he does and does not say about it. (Of course, what is unsaid could be endless, but there is an item or items of omission that are of particular interest to this subject)
Moses was very familiar with the various sacrificial offerings and statutory language depicting those offerings found in the Law of Moses. He wrote it. In the Genesis account Moses specifically uses the phrase “burnt offering” on at least seven occasions. These have to do with a sacrifice immediately after the flood, and with Abraham’s test of faith regarding sacrificing Isaac. This usage of “brunt sacrifice” is conspicuously absent in the account of Abel’s sacrifice. So, the omission spoken of is the notion that Abel’s sacrifice was a “burnt offering”.
Of Abel’s sacrifice Moses termed it “offering” and not “burnt offering”. Also, of Abel’s sacrifice Moses made sure to include that his offering included “even their fatty pieces”.
As compiler of the Law, Moses was familiar with the different sorts of sacrifices, and it was important as law giver that his readers could understand what he was describing. A burnt offering was one where the entire animal was consumed by fire. The offering that spoke about fatty pieces (not to be confused with fatty ashes) was the communion sacrifice (also known as peace offering). The main difference was that a burnt offering was not shared whereas the communal sacrifice was partly burned on the altar and partly eaten by the worshiper.
So, the question is, did Abel consume part of the sacrifice he made to God as part of a communion offering (peace offering)? This question arises because the offering mentions “fatty pieces” but not in the context of the statutory language “burnt offering” as Moses took care to do with later sacrifices spoken of in the Genesis account. Also, of the later instances in Genesis speaking of "burnt offering" sacrifices nothing is mentioned about "fat" or "fatty" pieces.
On this matter, also there is extra-biblical text in the form of the Babylonian Talmud that states “And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat [heleb] thereof. What thing is it whose ‘fat’ [heleb] [only] is offered on the altar, but the whole of it is not offered on the altar? Say, that is a peace-offering.”
So what does any of this have to do with transplantation of human organs? As it is true of transplantation of human organs it is also true of Abel eating meat. As the Bible does not rule out transplantation of human organs for us, it also does not rule out eating meat for Abel.
In other words, though the biblical account of Abel’s sacrifice does not say he ate any of the animal he sacrificed, it is also does not say he didn’t. It’s also true that the sole food prohibition documented for the time was of the tree of knowledge, not meat. Abel could have eaten part of his sacrifice to God as a communion offering.

The instant you proposed your basic question , I knew the correct answer, as do you, although you have a much more elegant and civilized way of expressing yourself.
it’s like the Farmer in the bar telling a friend about his talking mule. The Farmer tells his friend to go out to his place, and behind the barn his talking mule is tied up, but go ahead and he will follow in about ten minutes.
When the Farmer gets home his friend is trying to have a conversation with the mule, with no success, and accuses the Farmer of lying about his talking mule.
The Farmer picks up a 4x4 and whacks the mule upside his head. The mule falls over, and when it gets up it won’t stop talking.
The Farmer looks at his friend, Many Miles, and says “… What you fail to understand is …. FIRST …. you have to get his attention!.”
Breaking away from Agenda driven thinking often requires a knock down blow  to “get your mind right”.

Thanks for those crystal clear answers. That helps tremendously.
As for what you characterize as me admitting "there is a great disconnect from what the Apostles where doing with their authority and what is being done today in the 21 century", I think you're speaking to my comments about the early apostles having supernatural power authenticating their teaching verses today where we do not have teachers with such powers to authenticate their teaching. Is this what you're alluding to?
If so, that distinction would not lessen an authority today, it would only mean we would have to have a different means of verifying authenticity of teaching. The authority would remain the same; God ordained.

It takes intellectual courage to do this. To investigate other positions fairly, and with an open mind, not only because we fear that we might currently be wrong, but also because we fear we might not presently know enough to keep ourselves from being deceived if we openly consider other positions. Intellectually stepping outside of one’s own tradition, and sincerely considering other traditions, takes courage and a kind of faith that there is truth to be found. Refusing to consider other traditions allows one to preserve the security of one’s own tradition. But for the truth lover, the risk of being deceived is worth taking, because one might presently be deceived, and the only way to find out is to start digging. That act of digging is like Peter’s act of stepping out on the water, it is uncertain, but it is willing to allow itself to be insecure and uncertain, in order that it might be lifted up by the truth.
I don’t think anyone is well enough to avoid error absolutely, but some people are better at avoiding error than others. When we work together as a community, we can help each other out, those with strengths in an area helping those with weaknesses in that area. So by jumping into the discussion, whether we are weak or strong, we can grow. When we look at someone’s evidence or examine an argument, it’s very important to determine if the assumptions and methodology at work in what people write or say are true. Once we know the difference we can begin to see who is using sophistry. 
As my friend said, "we have to eschew sophistry, and pursue truth, even when it hurts, even when it cuts us open, even when it takes away all our pseudo security and leaves us in a fog. Our heart must cry out: truth or die. We all know the Bonhoeffer line: “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” But Christ is the Truth. And when Truth calls a man, he bids him come and die. Sophistry and truth-loving cannot go together; to choose one is to reject the other. If you wish to join us, you have to set aside sophistry, come and die with us, pursuing truth. Those who pursue truth also pursue charity and the unity to which charity is directed. Those who do not pursue truth, do not pursue charity and the unity to which charity is directed. For that reason, sophistry is incompatible with our mission. Only truth-seekers (who are the genuine unity-seekers) may truly participate here; sophists couldn’t participate in our activity, even if they tried. It might look similar, but it would be a completely different activity, and that would start to become clear as the sophists refused to refute objections to their arguments, or modify their position when it was shown to be false. To participate, they would need to turn away from sophistry and take up the cross of the truth-seeker.

As I said at the very beginning of this discussion, the real issue to me is about the limit of obedience.
- The language of Paul to Galatia speaks to a limit of obedience to human authority ordained by God.
- The incident of what Aaron should or shouldn't have done at Meribah speaks to limit of obedience to human authority ordained by God.
- The incident of how David reacted and responded to his King, Saul, speaks to limit of obedience to human authority ordained by God.
In each of these cases the authorities cited were in positions of authority ordained by God. And, in each instance obedience to that ordained authority had a limit.

We must never forget that we each are human, and we each have needs and limitations. Sometimes the seeming simplest of things can wreak havoc in someone's emotions and psyche. Though we should be mindful of this to avoid needless pain, it is still important to help others learn to cope with greater things to help them grow. A key thing for me is accepting that it's okay to find out I'm wrong about something. All truth lovers should gladly embrace that notion. We should look for it! The truth sets us free, and sometimes the truth is that we have false ideas in our own head. Sometimes we also have people asking us to accept something that is wrong. That's okay to admit that these things occur. It's not a statement of failure or malice. It's just part of living, and growing.
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.

Honestly, that’s what it sounds like. Ask a basic question regarding Aaron’s behavior at Meribah, the answer to which should be known by everyone in the room, and we see everything but a straightforward answer. Admittedly, I fail to understand this. 

@Many Miles Come on now! Hold on a second. I think we are getting too far afield and need to bring back the discussion to the beginning because otherwise we are just talking past each other. Let’s put a pin on Aaron , because I’m also getting frustrated with your comments. You’re so eager to criticize, that we are loosing track of what is entailed by your admission (limited obedience in regard to interpretative authority) or namely the structural problem of not having any ecclesial authority. That is what is entailed by granting that Witnesses may at any time reject what their ecclesial authority says, so long as they disagree with them. If we may reject our ecclesial authority whenever we disagree with them, then there is no ecclesial authority. That’s the implication of that concession. When I submit (so long as I agree), the one to whom I submit is me, and then notice that if you were doing just that, i.e. submitting to a person (or set of persons) because we agree with their general interpretation of Scripture, nothing would be different than it is right now. At that point, we realize that the, we cannot reject those taking the lead, line is just a slogan, something we say to hide the unpleasant truth from ourselves that underneath it all, we’re just surrounding ourselves with persons who generally say what we agree with, and on that basis treating them as though they are authorities. But in actuality, it is all a charade, the one in charge is us. This is the contradiction I’m concerned we live, generally not allowing ourselves to see it, keeping the contradictory propositions compartmentalized, so that we can we can pull them out whenever we want, to preserve the charade of being under authority.
So I understand (and share, to some degree) your frustration. In other words, it takes a lot of hard work from all parties to a discussion to agree on even a narrow proposition and, depending on the work committed, THE discussion can either be a labor of love or a waste of time. Much of the hardest work, the real nitty-gritty of discourse, is dedicated to coming to agreement on language and the meaning behind language. This process is far less glamorous than scoring points. Too often in discussions, I see people respond to a challenging narrow proposition (the matter at issue) with a broad “shotgun” critique of the other person's overall position. A ‘shot-gun’ approach is not conducive to genuine dialogue aimed at coming to agreement concerning the truth. 

Like I said, the solution to arguing this stuff in circles, is not to quit the discussion, but to argue in straight lines, in an ordered way. And usually it takes training to know how to do that, particularly, training in logic. I’m not going to claim having that. Without that sort of training, discussions will typically go in circles or move all over the place and down every rabbit trail. That's why a profitable discussion usually requires a trained guide or moderator, just as a profitable classroom experience requires a trained teacher. So whoever you guys think is more qualified take the lead. @JW Insider 😉
 
 

In the end we have to maintain a tender, but clean conscience. Regardless of who holds authority, saying we're just following orders may not be enough. Like Aaron should have done, we have an obligation to place our ultimate obedience to the ultimate authority. We should not act out of preference or bias. But if acting based on 1) what the Bible says explicitly or 2) acting based on a sound logical conclusion of what the Bible says explicitly is insufficient, then our worship is not our own. In that case, we are worshiping for someone else. But not for ourselves.
For the life of me, I have no idea why simple the question regarding Aaron's action at Meribah is so hard to answer. It's not a hard question. Everyone here should know the answer. Aaron put loyalty to Moses (God's spokesman) ahead of his loyalty to God. In that instance, that was Aaron's sin.
The idea of limited obedience appears to be a new concept. I don't understand this.

So pre-flood we know it was a sin to eat of the tree of knowledge. Do we agree on that?
Now, are we supposed to believe that eating carrion was also a sin prior to the flood?
Would Adam have jeopardized his perfect condition were he to have eaten carrion when he looked around creation and saw carrion being eaten as created by God?

Genesis 6:21 says, “And on your part get yourself some of every kind of food that is eaten, and stow it with you, so as to have it for your eating and for theirs.”
According to the society, carrion was a kind of food eaten prior to the flood. Creation testifies to this. Carrion eaters, like cockroaches, are part of God's creative work.
So, do we accept Genesis 6:21 literally for what it says?
If not, then aren't we interjecting a food prohibition what was never stated to Adam in the first place? I don't see anything in the biblical record prohibiting pre-flood humans from eating carrion, just like I don't see anything in the biblical record prohibiting pre-flood animals from eating carrion. Do you?
As for Genesis 1:29, 30, for reasons already stated, we know the list there of what humans could eat is not exhaustive. Though the text (Gen 1:29, 30) does not spell out carrion it also does not spell out essential nutrition like water or milk. Do you think pre-flood humans could not (did not) eat water or milk because they were not listed at Genesis 1:29, 30?
 

… Notice on the plates there is ZERO “spiritual food”.
 

….

When I get something I don’t understand, I print it out on paper, then read it once fot the overall idea. I have ADD and tricky vision.
Then I read it again for detail, underlining and highlighting points, and making arrows over to the margins for notes. 
All during this I try to build a mental picture that makes sense. Visualizing a portrait with a smushed bug makes the problem obvious, so to speak.
Problematic syntax sentences can be diagrammed (which nobody teaches anymore) to determine exactly what is being actually said. Usually this is not what the author meant.
Sometimes I meditate and let the whole thing sit overnight, and read the text the next day.
I PAID to see “2001  -  A Space Odyssey“ nine times, because I didn’t “get it”. It wasn’t until I bought the Screenplay (book) and read it that I understood the movie.
Many times you can wrestle the secrets out of the Universe if you are willing to do the work, and never submit to not understanding.

When I get something I don’t understand, I print it out on paper, then read it once fot the overall idea. I have ADD and tricky vision.
Then I read it again for detail, underlining and highlighting points, and making arrows over to the margins for notes. 
All during this I try to build a mental picture that makes sense. Visualizing a portrait with a smushed bug makes the problem obvious, so to speak.
Problematic syntax sentences can be diagrammed (which nobody teaches anymore) to determine exactly what is being actually said. Usually this is not what the author meant.
Sometimes I meditate and let the whole thing sit overnight, and read the text the next day.
I PAID to see “2001  -  A Space Odyssey“ nine times, because I didn’t “get it”. It wasn’t until I bought the Screenplay (book) and read it that I understood the movie.
Many times you can wrestle the secrets out of the Universe if you are willing to do the work, and never submit to not understanding.

@Many Miles @Srecko Sostar@George88 @JW Insider Let me know if you guys want to create a new post with this topic in mind (Galatians) here in the open forum or closed.
Here’s two comments. One made by a Jehovah’s Witness and another by a Catholic Philosopher that may shed some light:
Rotherham:
“The Watchtower has never addressed the idea as to what would happen if they apostatized because the notion is considered ridiculous. From what I know of them, I would agree. Going astray is a far cry from apostasy. The organization has been “astray” a number of times. That’s the very reason they change a certain view or teaching or policy, they were astray and they corrected it.
From their standpoint, the notion that they as the GB would apostatize is considered ridiculous. I am not sure why that seems to be such a problem to understand. They are dedicated to the pursuit of Biblical truth and are willing to change their views regardless of the consequences that the change may bring. 
Of course I never stated that such a thing would be impossible, I said it was considered ridiculous. The WT is a self-correcting organization with the Bible as the guideline. All JWs are admonished to let the scriptures be their main guide. The combination of the two would stand as a bulwark against the organization as a whole to fall into apostasy.
As I tried to get you to appreciate, the Bible is the first and foremost guide in a JWs life. Everything else is secondary to the Bible. Within the scriptures there are absolute statements and non-absolute statements. A clear apostate position would be to take a stand against an absolute statement offered in the Bible. I am sure you would agree that there are many. 
Ambiguity or non-absolutes naturally present a difficulty with a clear interpretation, such as prophecy and/or the understanding of certain parabolic features. But if a defined stand were to be made against absolute statements in the Bible, then the result is apostasy as I stated before. 
For instance, if the WT came out and stated that the scriptures are no longer considered inspired of God, that would be clear and defined stand against what the scriptures teach. That would be apostasy, and naturally any Bible believing Christian would walk away from an organization that would promote such and idea, and rightfully so.
Independent thinking is not prohibited in a some wholesale fashion as you seem to want to establish. The entire admonition against independent thinking is within the context of one entertaining and promoting teachings which are not accepted by the GB, who adhere strictly to the scriptures. As I stated, we certainly know that independent thinking is entirely necessary even for a person to live their life meaningfully and with a certain a natural, balanced autonomy. 
And yes, just as the teachings of the Apostles were adhered to in the first century, according to Eph 4:11-17, that same process of gifts of men would be followed until full understanding would be achieved. Teachers, prophets and evangelizers would continue the work of the Apostles that would be responsible for “perfecting/readjusting” the holy ones until that full-grown stature of the church is recognized.
The Bible takes precedent in any teaching within the JW congregations. If there were clear and unquestionable deviation from an established Biblical teaching, if that were maintained and not expeditiously corrected, they would lose God’s favor and be rejected as his earthly organization and God would establish another. Those who appreciate the Bible as the final word would follow as it would naturally result in a schism..
The WT is considered to be like the eyeglass that helps one understand the true teachings from God’s word. It is however, recognized as fallible. The scriptures, as far as they are translated properly, reflect the perfect word of God and the Bible is well known to be our primary textbook. It is infallible and takes full precedent in any understanding, teaching or practice. Therefore, with the Bible at the helm, your above contrived scenario is not an issue.
Although the organization is considered God’s arrangement, that would only be as long as they were devoted to the teachings of the Bible. Just as Israel was rejected for corruption, so could the WT. Israel was God’s nation but became corrupt to the point that God rejected them as a nation. Not individually but as a nation. Jesus told them that the kingdom of God would be taken from them and given to nation producing its fruits.
Those who adhere first to God’s Word would clearly see the reason for their rejection, but as I said, the notion is a purposeful contrivance on your part. The WT has proven faithful in changing as they discern error, as they should. They are lovers of truth and will change as the revelation and clarification of truth continues.This would be in harmony with the idea presented in the parable of the wheat and the weeds.
Besides, one can question what they will. The problem is not questions or doubts, it is the promoting of teachings against what has been accepted by the governing body. In the first century, that was the Apostles as all congregation adhered to the teachings of the Apostles. In the harvest it would be the FDS as mentioned in Matthew or the wheat as mentioned in the prophecy about the wheat and the weeds. Ephesians 4:11-17 would be in full support of that type of arrangement.
 
Edward Feser: 
Fathers have the authority to teach and discipline their children, but this authority is not absolute.  They may not teach their children to do evil, and they may not discipline them with unjust harshness.  Everyone knows this, though everyone also knows that there are fathers who do in fact abuse their children or teach them to do evil.  Everyone also knows that it is right for children under these unhappy circumstances to disobey and reprove their fathers, while still acknowledging their fathers’ authority in general and submitting to his lawful instructions.
All the same, probably no father ever says to his children: “Children, here’s what to do if I ever start to abuse you or teach you to do evil.”  The reason for this is surely that the default assumption is that children will never need to know what to do under such circumstances, and that explicitly addressing it in this way would give them a false and disturbing impression.  Children might start to wonder whether abuse or evil teaching is a likely prospect, and for that reason come to doubt their father’s wisdom and good will. 
Hence, in the typical case, what to do in such a situation is left implicit and vague.  The nature of paternal authority is such that this is the way things should be.  Because the presumption that fathers will not abuse their authority is so strong, and because children need to believe viscerally that this is extremely unlikely to happen, the matter almost never comes up in most families.  There is a downside, of course, which is that on those rare occasions when a father does abuse his authority, children are bound to be confused about how to deal with the situation.  What do you do when the man appointed by nature to be your primary teacher and guardian starts to mislead or harm you?
Now, the papacy is like this.  The Church has no official and explicitly stated policy about how to deal with a pope who teaches error or otherwise abuses his office.  That is not because such error and abuse are not possible.  On the contrary, not only has the Church always allowed for the possibility that a pope can teach error when not speaking ex cathedra and that he can make policy decisions that do grave harm to the faithful, but both of these things have in fact happened on a handful of occasions – for example, the doctrinal errors of Pope Honorius I and Pope John XXII, the ambiguous doctrinal formula temporarily accepted by Pope Liberius, the Cadaver Synod of Pope Stephen VI and its aftermath, and the mistakes of Pope Urban VI that contributed to the Great Western Schism.  (I have discussed these cases here, here, and here.)  
But there is in Catholic theology so strong a presumption against a pope making grave doctrinal and disciplinary errors that, as with a father in relation to his children, it would be potentially misleading and destabilizing explicitly to formulate a policy concerning what to in such a situation.  Hence you won’t find in the Catechism a section on what to do about a bad pope.  The very existence and expression of such a policy might give the false impression that bad popes are bound to arise with some regularity.  
The downside is that on those rare occasions when a bad pope does come along, the Church is bound to be flummoxed.  Many Catholics without theological expertise will wrongly suppose that a Catholic must absolutely always support any policy that a pope implements, or assent to any doctrinal statement that a pope issues – even when such a statement seems manifestly contrary to traditional teaching (as in the cases of Honorius I and John XXII).  This will lead to one of two outcomes, depending on the capacity of such ill-informed Catholics for cognitive dissonance. 
Those who are more prone to react emotionally and less capable of clear and logical reasoning – and thus who are comfortable with embracing contradictions – will tend to go along with the doctrinal or policy errors of such a pope.  Their own understanding and practice of the Faith is going to be impaired as a result.  They are also bound to sow discord in the Church, since they will likely accuse those Catholics who do not embrace the errors of disloyalty and dissent.  By contrast, those who cannot bear such cognitive dissonance are liable to have their faith shaken.  They will wrongly suppose that they are obliged to assent to the errors, but find that they are unable to do so given the manifest conflict with traditional teaching.  They will needlessly worry that this conflict between current and past teaching falsifies the Church’s claim to indefectibility. 
It is important, then, for Catholics to realize that the traditional teaching of the Church has always allowed for the possibility of criticism of a pope who teaches error.  Indeed, such an acknowledgment is there in the New Testament, in St. Paul’s famous public rebuke of St. Peter for conduct that “seemed to indicate a wish to compel the pagan converts to become Jews and accept circumcision and the Jewish law” (as the Catholic Encyclopedia characterizes Peter’s scandalous action).  
 

How about as a litmus test all commentary has to use standard definitions of words, and terms? And completely eliminate the word “evidently” when there is zero evidence?

Boy that brings back some memories! I had more than a few exchanges with Rusky on the subject of blood, fractions, and associated biblical texts, etc. There is so much left unsaid about this issue. Even academic writers usually miss some of the big things. One day. One day.