Streams Of Truth

This is a ver good question: "what was salvation for the people before Jesus?" I was asked this question a few days ago by a muslim friend. I believe it is a great question, because it is central to understanding the unique and consistent message of The Bible. At the time of Jesus, the religion views were not unified. The Gospel records that there were two dominant religious groups: the Sadducees and the Pharisees. Unlike the Pharisees, the Sadducees did not believe on life after this life (Mt 22:23, Mk 12:18, Lk 20:27, Acts 23:6). It is related that Jesus questioned this Sadducean belief with this statement: 37. Moses even indicated in the passage about the burning bush that the dead are raised, where he calls the Lord the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.   38   He is not God of the dead but of the living, because all are living to  Him.”   39 (Luke 20:37-39 HSCB) In another passage of the Gospel we are told that in an occasion Mos...

I have been in a pleasant conversation on a social network, with a sunni muslim who is interested on having an authentic discussion about faith. I've decided to post my responses on this blog, rather than saturating the twitter server and the inbox of my muslim friend. My muslim friend has brought forward the following arguments: In my Muslim friend's opinion, multiple passages in the Bible indicate that God only requires repentance for forgive one's sins. Passages such as the parable of the Prodigal son (Luke 15) and Isaiah 43 indicate God only requires repentance for forgiveness of sins. This in his/her argument supports the idea that God does not need any sacrifice for forgiveness of sins. The second brought forward is that doctrine of original sin is unfair in my muslim friend's perspective. I'm quoting here one of the messages I received: " you are giving hell TO EVERYONE, a baby a boy for something they didn't do. 'The inherited sin' you...

---------- SUMMARY No book of the Bible is eternal for they were written at a point of time. The Word of God on the other hand is not created. It is eternal and has coexisted with God. The believe of multiple personalities within the essence of God is not in contradiction with this, and in fact it explains the apparent dilemma. The books should not be worshipped for they are not God. However The Word is God. Unitarian views of God, such as rabbinical judaism an islam among others, struggle to explain this. Triunitarism does not. ---------- During recent debate about the unity of God, it was posted the following question: If the Torah is the eternal word of God, why not worshipping it? The issue was brought forward by Dr Shabir Ally in response to Dr Nabeel Qureshi. Qureshi brought forward a dilemma discussed in the past by muslim theologians: since the Qur'an is verbatim the Word of God, revealed to humanity via the Angel Gabriel and prophet Muhammad, it's concluded that it...