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I know this will be a topic of debate and intence feelings.
I expect Elijah to make his thoughts known.
I'm wondering what Nick and t8 think of this.
Really, I'm just wanting a fresh topic to discuss, and this one isn't anywhere on here.Did Jesus die on a cross?
Should the cross be venerated?Hi david,
It does not really matter whether it is called a tree or something else. I guess history should be able to show what the Romans used for crucifixion. Not doubt it was made of wood. It was not a living tree. He was nailed to it and he was lifted up from the earth by it[to fulfill scripture].Whether it was a tree or a cross, Jesus died on it for us. I'm learning some Biblical Greek, so maybe I should look into it.
As for the cross as an image being Godly or not, I'm not sure. Why don't you ask our daddy?
Quote Why don't you ask our daddy? Who's your daddy, who's your baby, who's your buddy, who's your maaannn?
The Catholic and Protestants “” He'SUS “==Je'SUS= Tammuz= Nimrod= SUN OF JE'ZEUS “” was put on a Roman Cross, but the true Son of Yah( Psalms 68:4) was nailed on an upright stake.
Who's your daddy, the true FATHER Yah( Psalms 68:4; John 17:11), or the ” false father ” satan the devil( John 8:44; 2 Cor.4:4 )???
Quote but the true Son of Yah( Psalms 68:4) was nailed on an upright stake.
I actually agree with Eliyah on something.The Greek word rendered “cross” in many modern Bible versions is stau·ros´. In classical Greek, this word meant merely an upright stake, or pale. Later it also came to be used for an execution stake having a crosspiece.
The Imperial Bible-Dictionary acknowledges this, saying: “The Greek word for cross, [stau·ros´], properly signified a stake, an upright pole, or piece of paling, on which anything might be hung, or which might be used in impaling [fencing in] a piece of ground. . . . Even amongst the Romans the crux (from which our cross is derived) appears to have been originally an upright pole.”—Edited by P. Fairbairn (London, 1874), Vol. I, p. 376.Was that the case in connection with the execution of God’s Son?
It is noteworthy that the Bible also uses the word xy´lon to identify the device used.
A Greek-English Lexicon, by Liddell and Scott, defines this as meaning: “Wood cut and ready for use, firewood, timber, etc. . . . piece of wood, log, beam, post . . . cudgel, club . . . stake on which criminals were impaled . . . of live wood, tree.” It also says “in NT, of the cross,” and cites Acts 5:30 and 10:39 as examples. (Oxford, 1968, pp. 1191, 1192) However, in those verses KJ, RS, JB, and Dy translate xy´lon as “tree.” (Compare this rendering with Galatians 3:13; Deuteronomy 21:22, 23.)The book The Non-Christian Cross, by J. D. Parsons (London, 1896), says: “There is not a single sentence in any of the numerous writings forming the New Testament, which, in the original Greek, bears even indirect evidence to the effect that the stauros used in the case of Jesus was other than an ordinary stauros; much less to the effect that it consisted, not of one piece of timber, but of two pieces nailed together in the form of a cross. . . . It is not a little misleading upon the part of our teachers to translate the word stauros as ‘cross’ when rendering the Greek documents of the Church into our native tongue, and to support that action by putting ‘cross’ in our lexicons as the meaning of stauros without carefully explaining that that was at any rate not the primary meaning of the word in the days of the Apostles, did not become its primary signification till long afterwards, and became so then, if at all, only because, despite the absence of corroborative evidence, it was for some reason or other assumed that the particular stauros upon which Jesus was executed had that particular shape.”—Pp. 23, 24; see also The Companion Bible (London, 1885), Appendix No. 162.
Is it possible that the symbol of the cross, the very symbol of Christendom, comes from the same place that Christmas, Easter, hellfire, the immortal soul, the trinity and other pagan false teachings and practices come?
“Various objects, dating from periods long anterior to the Christian era, have been found, marked with crosses of different designs, in almost every part of the old world. India, Syria, Persia and Egypt have all yielded numberless examples . . . The use of the cross as a religious symbol in pre-Christian times and among non-Christian peoples may probably be regarded as almost universal, and in very many cases it was connected with some form of nature worship.”—Encyclopædia Britannica (1946), Vol. 6, p. 753.
“The shape of the [two-beamed cross] had its origin in ancient Chaldea, and was used as the symbol of the god Tammuz (being in the shape of the mystic Tau, the initial of his name) in that country and in adjacent lands, including Egypt. By the middle of the 3rd cent. A.D. the churches had either departed from, or had travestied, certain doctrines of the Christian faith. In order to increase the prestige of the apostate ecclesiastical system pagans were received into the churches apart from regeneration by faith, and were permitted largely to retain their pagan signs and symbols. Hence the Tau or T, in its most frequent form, with the cross-piece lowered, was adopted to stand for the cross of Christ.”—An Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words (London, 1962), W. E. Vine, p. 256.
“It is strange, yet unquestionably a fact, that in ages long before the birth of Christ, and since then in lands untouched by the teaching of the Church, the Cross has been used as a sacred symbol. . . . The Greek Bacchus, the Tyrian Tammuz, the Chaldean Bel, and the Norse Odin, were all symbolised to their votaries by a cruciform device.”—The Cross in Ritual, Architecture, and Art (London, 1900), G. S. Tyack, p. 1.
“The cross in the form of the ‘Crux Ansata’ . . . was carried in the hands of the Egyptian priests and Pontiff kings as the symbol of their authority as priests of the Sun god and was called ‘the Sign of Life.’”—The Worship of the Dead (London, 1904), Colonel J. Garnier, p. 226.
“Various figures of crosses are found everywhere on Egyptian monuments and tombs, and are considered by many authorities as symbolical either of the phallus [a representation of the male sex organ] or of coition. . . . In Egyptian tombs the crux ansata [cross with a circle or handle on top] is found side by side with the phallus.”—A Short History of Sex-Worship (London, 1940), H. Cutner, pp. 16, 17; see also The Non-Christian Cross, p. 183.
“These crosses were used as symbols of the Babylonian sun-god, [see book], and are first seen on a coin of Julius Cæsar, 100-44 B.C., and then on a coin struck by Cæsar’s heir (Augustus), 20 B.C. On the coins of Constantine the most frequent symbol is [See book]; but the same symbol is used without the surrounding circle, and with the four equal arms vertical and horizontal; and this was the symbol specially venerated as the ‘Solar Wheel’. It should be stated that Constantine was a sun-god worshipper, and would not enter the ‘Church’ till some quarter of a century after the legend of his having seen such a cross in the heavens.”—The Companion Bible, Appendix No. 162; see also The Non-Christian Cross, pp. 133-141.
David
Veneration of the cross?
New Catholic Encyclopedia:
“The representation of Christ’s redemptive death on Golgotha does not occur in the symbolic art of the first Christian centuries. The early Christians, influenced by the Old Testament prohibition of graven images, were reluctant to depict even the instrument of the Lord’s Passion.”—(1967), Vol. IV, p. 486.Concerning first-century Christians, History of the Christian Church says: “There was no use of the crucifix and no material representation of the cross.”—(New York, 1897), J. F. Hurst, Vol. I, p. 366.
Ex. 20:4, 5, JB: “You shall not make yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything in heaven or on earth beneath or in the waters under the earth; you shall not bow down to them or serve them.”
Notice that God commanded that his people not even make an image before which people would bow down. Yet what do we see people doing with the cross?
It doesn't even make sense. Jesus died a horrible painful cruel death on that torture stake. To kiss the cross and hold it as dear is … insane.
If your son died by the bullet from a certain gun, would you hang a replica of that particular gun around your neck and adore it?
Yes, Jesus died for us. We appreciate that. But do we love the intrument of his torturous death? How does that make any sense?In ancient Israel, unfaithful Jews wept over the death of the false god Tammuz. Jehovah spoke of what they were doing as being a ‘detestable thing.’ (Ezek. 8:13, 14) According to history, Tammuz was a Babylonian god, and the cross was used as his symbol. From its beginning in the days of Nimrod, Babylon was against Jehovah and an enemy of true worship. (Gen. 10:8-10; Jer. 50:29) So by cherishing the cross, a person is honoring a symbol of worship that is opposed to the true God.
As stated at Ezekiel 8:17, apostate Jews also ‘thrust out the shoot to Jehovah’s nose.’ He viewed this as “detestable” and ‘offensive.’ Why? This “shoot,” some commentators explain, was a representation of the male sex organ, used in phallic worship. How, then, must Jehovah view the use of the cross, which, as we have seen, was anciently used as a symbol in phallic worship?
Something else that bothers me, is that when people think of Jesus, when people picture him, they seem to picture him in two ways. During the Christmas season, as a helpless babe in a manger. The rest of the year as a man dying in agony on a cross.
Jesus is neither of these things now. He is a mighty king. He has been given great authority and power and is second only to Jehovah.
Yet, people seldom picture him that way.Hi david,
Sounds right.
Num 21.8
“Then the Lord said to Moses
'Make a fiery serpent and set it on a standard; and it shall come about that everyone when he is bitten, when he looks at it he will live'”
Jn 3.14f
“And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up; so that whoever believes in him will have eternal life”
Jn 12.23f
“Jesus answered them saying
'The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified…………
Jesus answered..'Now judgement is upon this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out.And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself'
But he was saying this to indicate the kind of death by which he was to die. The crowd then answered him
'We have heard out of the Law that the Christ is to remain forever; and how can you say
'The Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of man?'”Eph 2.2
“in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience”Surely as the power of God was symbolised over Satan's evil work in the days of Moses by the lifting of an image of that evil instrument so the lifting of Jesus to die on a similar vertical instrument, carrying Jesus with the sin of the world, demonstated the overcoming of the false dominion of Satan on earth over all who have been bitten and deceived by his worldly wisdom and deceit.
Hi david,
The crucifix or cross with the dead Christ hanging from it is a classic catholic symbol. They believe the body of Christ is an object of worship and their mass is based on that principle. It is a fleshly visual experiential religion with no understanding of the deeper spiritual aspect of faith. It does not teach being reborn into Christ instaed bapyising babies, so they attempt to worship Christ from without in these bizarre ways.“Vanity, vanity all is vanity.”
“Come out of her My people lest you suffer for her sins”
I believe it was an upright larger beam with a removable crossbeam (which was the part carried by the Lord). For the Romans, crucifiction was a business and they were clever. From a practical standpoint the easiest way to hang someone would be to nail them to a beam on the ground (hands only) now you have something ridged to lift up into a notched (permanent) upright beam, if slightly tapered you would need only drop it in. The raising could be assisted by ropes over the top of the upright beam or by the base of the upright being dug out so two people, one on either end, could from the elevated positions on either side lift the beam into the notch.
The other reason I believe it was on a crossbeam is scripture speaks of His joints being pulled out of place. If you are hung with your arms straight up it may, or it may not, pull some joints out of place, but if you stretch out arms horizontal then hang the body weight from them, then physics tells us you apply many times the bodies weight, enough to guarantee that the joints will be pulled out of place.
Obviously this is only my opinion and whatever it was He hung on the only important thing is that He died for us.
Hi David,
New Catholic Encyclopedia:
“The representation of Christ’s redemptive death on Golgotha does not occur in the symbolic art of the first Christian centuries. The early Christians, influenced by the Old Testament prohibition of graven images, were reluctant to depict even the instrument of the Lord’s Passion.”—(1967), Vol. IV, p. 486.David the New Catholic Encyclopedia is not infallible, if you want to test the Catholic Churches teachings look at official teachings that have been made infallible. The above statement in the Catholic Encyclopedia is not correct. Even if the Pope makes a statement or writes a document etc it doesn’t make it infallible, he is a sinner! Infallible teachings are very rare that’s why the Orthodox and the Catholic Churches Teachings are nearly identical even though the Bishops separated themselves nearly a thousand years ago.
Please take the time to read all these documents. David I am not trying to knock you and these links backup what they say they have a huge range of scans and photos and historic evidence. They also prove that the Church fathers even used the cross YES even before 100AD. Take the time to read and test the documents for yourself.David I respect Jehovah Witnesses, I was not raised a Catholic, I had no form of Baptism in my life what soever. It was my choice to become a Catholic as a young adult, NO ONE in my ENTIRE family was a Catholic. My Father thinks God is a Joke, my Mother had no form of Baptism until I studied the different Churches and there beginnings, teachings, and after over a year of study I was then baptised. I only tell you this so you DON’T think I’m a craddle Catholic, NO I have not been brain washed. I believe the Word is truth and the pillar and ground of that truth is the Church. The same Church that declared which books where the truth.
1: The Jehovah's Witnesses use of Crosses:
http://www.catholicapologetics.net/jw_cross.htm
2: Does the Greek word “Stauros” Mean “Cross” or “Torture stake”:
http://www.catholicapologetics.net/jw_cross4.htm
3: How Did the Early Christians depict the Cross in their art work?: A look at some of the ancient art work of the early Christians, and their portraits of the Cross.
http://www.catholicapologetics.net/jw_cross_5.htm
4:The Jehovah's Witnesses, THE CROSSES, AND “IDOLATRY”: The Witnesses will often argue that the crosses supposed connection with paganism makes it's use automatically a form of “Idolatry”. The question Is, are these teaching constant with other Witness beliefs?
http://www.catholicapologetics.net/jw_cross_2.htm
5:
The Watchtower's “TORTURE STAKE”, AND PAGAN MYTHOLOGY: A Side by side look at the Watchtowers depiction of the death of Christ, and death Marsyas in ancient Greek mythology.http://www.catholicapologetics.net/jw_cross_3.htm
Again please “take the time” to read these links and let me know what you think!
No offense intended David. The only reason I’m posting these links is because it gets pretty hard to prove that Jesus was crucified on a cross if we don’t agree what Stauros means. You would have seen that over 50 Bible versions translate the Greek word Stauros as Cross including some Jehovah Witnesses translations.God Bless
Quote (david @ April 20 2006,08:14) Veneration of the cross? Yes, Jesus died for us. We appreciate that. But do we love the intrument of his torturous death? How does that make any sense?
David,
I agree 100% with you on not setting up the cross as something to be worshiped or even adored (it's what was accomplished on it that matters). However I do not have a problem with it as a symbol (an icon if you will).Hi seekingtruth,
Quote From a practical standpoint the easiest way to hang someone would be to nail them to a beam on the ground (hands only) now you have something ridged to lift up into a notched (permanent) upright beam, if slightly tapered you would need only drop it in. The raising could be assisted by ropes over the top of the upright beam or by the base of the upright being dug out so two people, one on either end, could from the elevated positions on either side lift the beam into the notch. Ropes, a ridged “something,” pulley systems, a notched slightly tapered beam…
None of these things sound easy to me. The easiest way would be to find a simple stake and nail him to it. It’s not pretty. But it’s not meant to be.
The fact that Luke, Peter, and Paul also used xy´lon as a synonym for stau·ros´ gives added evidence that Jesus was impaled on an upright stake without a crossbeam. (Ac 5:30; 10:39; 13:29; Ga 3:13; 1Pe 2:24)
Example:
Acts 5:30 refers to “hanging him on a tree.”
1 Peter 2:24 says “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree.”A tree seems to imply simplicity.
Xy´lon also occurs in the Greek Septuagint at Ezra 6:11, where it speaks of a single beam or timber on which a lawbreaker was to be impaled.
EZRA 6:11
“And by me an order has been put through that, as for anybody that violates this decree, a TIMBER will be pulled out of his house and he will be impaled upon it, and his house will be turned into a public privy on this account.”In the Greek Septuagint, the word “xylon” appears here. Now, obviously, a “cross” wasn't pulled from his house for him to be impaled on. This seems to stronlgy indicate that “xylon” which is used as a synonym of Stauros with reference to Jesus death intrument–are the same. “Xylon” just means “wood,” or timber. It's where we get the word “xylophone” from.
However I do not have a problem with it as a symbol (an icon if you will).
But if it was a pagan symbol stretching into antiquity used in many pagan cultures long before Christ and if Christ actually died on a xylon or stauros, would you then have a problem with it?Quote David the New Catholic Encyclopedia is not infallible Agreed.
Quote the Pope . . .is a sinner! Agreed.
Quote I was not raised a Catholic
Well I was. And one thing I've learned from watching my parents, grandparents, and with speaking with hundreds of Catholics while preaching from door to door, is that in the end, it doesn't really matter to them what the Bible says–tradition is just as important. I've had too many Catholics tell me this after speaking with them about the trinity, to not believe it.Most of your references look like this:
“Stauros…cross.”
(Some encyclopedia.)That doesn't tell me a lot.
Can I ask what your encyclopedias say about the word “xylon”?
Quote It was my choice to become a Catholic as a young adult, NO ONE in my ENTIRE family was a Catholic. . . .DON’T think I’m a craddle Catholic
Well then you are the exeption to the rule. I commend your zeal for God. But there are so many things I disagree with when it comes to Catholasism–it hurts my head to try to contain them all. My grandma was a Catholic who liked to say: “I was born a Catholic and I'll die a Catholic.” And so she did. My Father, who is also a Catholic was quite bothered by all the money that the Catholic Church filtered out of her in her old age. My Father (what I consider to be the average Catholic) attended Church on Christmas and Easter, and then eventually that stopped too. I consider Hitler to be a fine Catholic. After all, how many Catholics have pictures of them shaking hands with the pope? Hitler was never removed from the Catholic Church (which makes me wonder what you have to be). When I think of Catholics, in general, 1 Tim 3:5 applies.I'm sorry for this rant, Scripture Seeker, but I have a lot of feelings about the Catholic Church.
I think this sums up my confusion over Catholics:During WWI, Roman Catholic Cardinal Amette of Paris told soldiers fighting in the French army: “The Almighty God is on our side. . . . God will give us the victory.”
On the opposite side, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Cologne told German soldiers: “God is with us in this fight . . . and he will give us the victory.”
(Quoted in the Belgian newspaper “La Dernière Heure.”)Which side was God on?
Neither.
(I'm sorry, I've gone off topic. I would love to discuss what the Bible says.)
On your quotes about Staruos meaning Cross, I will quote this:
The book The Non-Christian Cross, by J. D. Parsons (London, 1896), adds: “There is not a single sentence in any of the numerous writings forming the New Testament, which, in the original Greek, bears even indirect evidence to the effect that the stauros used in the case of Jesus was other than an ordinary stauros; much less to the effect that it consisted, not of one piece of timber, but of two pieces nailed together in the form of a cross. . . . It is not a little misleading upon the part of our teachers to translate the word stauros as ‘cross’ when rendering the Greek documents of the Church into our native tongue, and to support that action by putting ‘cross’ in our lexicons as the meaning of stauros without carefully explaining that that was at any rate not the primary meaning of the word in the days of the Apostles, did not become its primary signification till long afterwards, and became so then, if at all, only because, despite the absence of corroborative evidence, it was for some reason or other assumed that the particular stauros upon which Jesus was executed had that particular shape.”—Pp. 23, 24; see also The Companion Bible, 1974, Appendix No. 162.
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