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Morality in Bible stories that you don't understand

Can someone explain this?

In Luke 14:26, Jesus delivers a challenging message to His followers: "If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple."
 
The standard apologetic answer is that it's all a matter of ratios. Sure, you love your family, but you gotta love Jesus so much more that by comparison, it looks like you hate them.

Why Jesus couldn't simply say that is never explained. Why Jesus would say something that when taken at face value would imply just the opposite is never explained. Either he meant exactly what he said or he was trying to trick people.
 
James Brown said:
The standard apologetic answer is that it's all a matter of ratios. Sure, you love your family, but you gotta love Jesus so much more that by comparison, it looks like you hate them.

Why Jesus couldn't simply say that is never explained. Why Jesus would say something that when taken at face value would imply just the opposite is never explained. Either he meant exactly what he said or he was trying to trick people.
Click to expand...

Yes, specially if Jesus is considered an apocalyptic messiah.

https://ehrmanblog.org/the-apocalyptic-context-for-jesus-view-of-the-messiah/

Dualism
"Jewish apocalypticists were dualists. That is to say, they maintained that there were two fundamental components to all of reality: the forces of good and the forces of evil. The forces of good were headed by God himself, the forces of evil by his superhuman enemy, sometimes called Satan, or Beelzebub, or the Devil. On the side of God were the good angels; on the side of the Devil were the demons. On the side of God were righteousness and life; on the side of the Devil were sin and death. These were actual forces, cosmic powers to which human beings could be subject and with which they had to be aligned. No one was in neutral territory. People stood either with God or with Satan, they were in the light or in darkness, they were in the truth or in error."

"This apocalyptic dualism had clear historical implications. All of history could be divided into two ages, the present age and the age to come. The present age was the age of sin and evil, when the powers of darkness were in the ascendency, when those who sided with God were made to suffer by those in control of this world, when sin, disease, famine, violence, and death were running rampant. For some unknown reason, God had relinquished control of this age to the powers of evil. And things were getting worse."

"At the end of this age, however, God would reassert himself, intervening in history and destroying the forces of evil. There would come a cataclysmic break in which all that was opposed to God would be annihilated, and God would bring in a new age. In this new age, there would be no more suffering or pain; there would be no more hatred, or despair, or war, or disease, or death. God would be the ruler of all, in a kingdom that would never end."

Pessimism

"Even though, in the long run, everything would work out for those who sided with God, in the short term things did not look good. Jewish apocalypticists maintained that those who sided with God were going to suffer in this age, and there was nothing they could do to stop it. The forces of evil were going to grow in power as they attempted to wrest sovereignty over this world away from God. There was no thought here of being able to improve the human condition through mass education or advanced technologies. The righteous could not make their lives better, because the forces of evil were in control, and those who sided with God were opposed by those who were much stronger than they. Things would get worse and worse until the very end, when quite literally, all hell was to break loose."
 
Politesse said:
In short, a classic revitalization movement in which positivist outlooks could only be realized on the other side of a fundamental restructuring of the world.
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There is also a contradiction there...
John 4:20. "Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen." :unsure:

And what about this?
"For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it (Matthew 10:35-39).

Personally, I think that what Jesus means is that you have to let go of your individualistic, limited, dualistic, sense of self, and embrace a unified sense of self, more in tune with the concept I AND THE FATHER ARE ONE...
 
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Thomas II said:
Politesse said:
In short, a classic revitalization movement in which positivist outlooks could only be realized on the other side of a fundamental restructuring of the world.
Click to expand...
There is also a contradiction there...
John 4:20. "Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen." :unsure:

And what about this?
"For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it (Matthew 10:35-39).
Click to expand...
I would note that another very common feature of revitalization movements worldwide is the adoption of "fictive kin terms" for fellow members of the movement. Calling a fellow Christian a brother or sister, for instance, would not be unexpected. To whom do you owe your loyalty in a tome of Apocalypse -- your family of birth, or your family of choice? In the classic zombie apocalypse movie, does the chainsaw wielding hero take his aging parents with him into hiding, or does he take his best bud, and some other allies they meet along the way? We seldom imagine the end of the world in terms of fidelity to an extended biological family.
 
Politesse said:
Thomas II said:
Politesse said:
In short, a classic revitalization movement in which positivist outlooks could only be realized on the other side of a fundamental restructuring of the world.
Click to expand...
There is also a contradiction there...
John 4:20. "Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen." :unsure:

And what about this?
"For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it (Matthew 10:35-39).
Click to expand...
I would note that another very common feature of revitalization movements worldwide is the adoption of "fictive kin terms" for fellow members of the movement. Calling a fellow Christian a brother or sister, for instance, would not be unexpected. To whom do you owe your loyalty in a tome of Apocalypse -- your family of birth, or your family of choice? In the classic zombie apocalypse movie, does the chainsaw wielding hero take his aging parents with him into hiding, or does he take his best bud, and some other allies they meet along the way? We seldom imagine the end of the world in terms of fidelity to an extended biological family.
Click to expand...
I added something about my personal interpretation...but in regards to the apocalyptic Jesus, there's an added immediacy to the whole change of consciousness. There is no time left! Let the dead bury the dead! (Luke 9:60)
The phrase let the dead bury the dead is another way to say put your spiritual responsibilities to God before all other duties.
 
Yes. The gospels, Mark especially, proceed at a breakneck pace even for an ancient work, and there's a sense of tense urgency underlying everything. This present world is ending, what will replace it? Who will have a place in its re-ordering? What will be the nature of the Kingdom of God to come?
 
Thomas II said:
Can someone explain this?

In Luke 14:26, Jesus delivers a challenging message to His followers: "If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple."
Click to expand...
Long after Jesus was gone, someone put words into His mouth to serve their own agenda.
Tom
 
And then we get to ISAIAH 53...

Isaiah 53

New International Version

​

53 Who has believed our message
and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?
2 He grew up before him like a tender shoot,
and like a root out of dry ground.
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,
nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.
3 He was despised and rejected by mankind,
a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.
Like one from whom people hide their faces
he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.
4 Surely he took up our pain
and bore our suffering,
yet we considered him punished by God,
stricken by him, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him,
and by his wounds we are healed.
6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to our own way;
and the Lord has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.
7 He was oppressed and afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before its shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth.
8 By oppression[a] and judgment he was taken away.
Yet who of his generation protested?
For he was cut off from the land of the living;
for the transgression of my people he was punished.[b]
9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth.
10 Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the Lord makes[c] his life an offering for sin,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.
11 After he has suffered,
he will see the light of life[d] and be satisfied[e];
by his knowledge[f] my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.
12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,[g]
and he will divide the spoils with the strong,[h]
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.

:oops:
 
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