₦airaland Forum

Totalitarian:
We no hear from you again oooo PastorAIO. Abi na Transport Fair you need? Just use am do excursion na

Exoticfarmer:
Good.
Besides, I believe the casting of lot in this context (Acts1:26) is same as voting.

LilMissFavvy:
Casting of lots was not practiced in the new testament.

LilMissFavvy:
You said anybody with wisdom, can interprete ifa?

Thereafter, the disciples did not cast lots again, I stand to be corrected

LilMissFavvy:
Ultracrepidarian? Joker. Anyway, was thinking you were anti Christian when I saw your thread about Corona virus.

Bible condemns casting lots, and use of these mediums. I am unable to understand if you are trying to insult' me oga undecided.

LilMissFavvy:
Casting lots was used mostly in the old testament, before Christ's death/resurection. Of course after Christ's death/resurection, there were a lot of changes in how things were done. I agree that casting lots is found in very many verses in the old testament. The disciples did not receive the holy ghost baptism during the time they cast lots to chose Mathias. As at that time Jesus only promised them that he will baptise them with the holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, so that the holy spirit will be teaching them what they need to know and give answers to their enquiries ( Acts 1:4- 8 ). Thereafter, the disciples did not cast lots again, I stand to be corrected.

As a Christian, why would you need to cast lots when the holy Spirit can tell you whatever you need to know? Look at the picture the OP used as emphasis, and tell me if anything concernining God can be done in that place.

You can remember how Saul fell out of grace with God when he consulted a medium, so it always good to avoid mediums. Casting lots is done by most mediums, so better to avoid it. I do not believe that a genuine pastor would cast lots to enquire from God in our world of today, what do you think? Can a genuine pastor do it?

Casting of lots is mentioned 47 times in the Bible. Some examples in the Hebrew Bible of the casting of lots as a means of determining God's will:

In the Book of Leviticus 16:8, God commanded Moses, "And Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats; one lot for the LORD, and the other lot for the scapegoat."
According to Numbers 26:55, Moses allocated territory to the tribes of Israel according to each tribe's male population and by lot.
In Joshua 7:14, a guilty party (Achan) is found by lot.
In the Book of Joshua 18:6, Joshua says, "Ye shall therefore describe the land into seven parts, and bring the description hither to me, that I may cast lots for you here before the LORD our God." The Hebrews took this action in order to know God's will as to the dividing of land between the seven tribes of Israel who had not yet "received their inheritance". (Joshua 18:2).

LilMissFavvy:
Read and digest what saynoto'cultism' wrote here, he took time to explain.

No, i have never been involved in such things.

There are ways to know things without being involved in it.

Are you trying to say that these things are Godly?

Bible condemns casting lots, and use of these mediums. I am unable to understand if you are trying to insult' me oga .

LilMissFavvy:
You are anti-christian. I just noticed the type of threads you create.

LilMissFavvy:
Yes they hear from their idols, that's why they may give accurate messages, but whoever visits such mediums is taking a risk. If something isn't stolen from the person, then the person may go back home with familiar spirits.

cofta:
Hello People, i believe this is the right section for this. I have once visited some voodoo priests in past and they seem to have one thing in common. They bring out some fetish things and they start forecasting your destiny.

My Question : Do they really hear from the gods ?

PastorMIsBack:
Perhaps this is what is putting most people off (I'm only thinking aloud before anybody slays me).

You have to go into a forest etc.

With Christianity, you simply believe in your heart and confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and you shall be saved.
Simple.

DeepSight:
How do men witness Odu please.

Can you expatiate on this please? And how do men

twaintoy:
Thanks. A friend told me females are not allowed to see Odu. How true is this and why?

OLAADEGBU:
If you are wise you would be able to discern between "Go" and "go!"

OLAADEGBU:
Who is able keep the 10 commandments, if any?

OLAADEGBU:
Wrong. False old prophet.

"For I desire mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings" (Hosea 6:6).

OLAADEGBU:
Who is able keep the 10 commandments, if any?

PastorAIO:
Ezekiel 20:25


25Moreover, I gave them statutes that were not good and rules by which they could not have life, 26and I defiled them through their very gifts in their offering up all their firstborn, that I might devastate them. I did it that they might know that I am the LORD.

OLAADEGBU:
The same way God hardened the heart of Pharaoh and all those who hate him.

killyaselfie:
Wherever you see the influence of the ignoble Abrahamic fictions, you see bigotry, ignorance, injustice, and self-righteous belief that they have the moral high ground. The present state of Israel even goes so far as to run an apartheid state with support of most christians.

It’s elevation of one group of people over others as the “chosen people” of a universal deity promotes prejudice. If you accept the ridiculous notion that these people are chosen then you imply that you are somehow inferior. In order for the Romans and the Catholic Church to really spread the religion in Europe, they had to create images based on these stories in the likeness of Europeans, so that when the European mercanitile class started using it as a tool of conquest, Europeans saw themselves as the chosen people and everyone else to be beneath them. This is thh by e foundation of “white supremacy” and we continue to see the harm it causes worldwide.

Africans and other people that came in contact with these European Christians were seen as inferior and their images did not make it into the description of the divine. Non-Europeans who continue to adhere to these religions are implying their own inferiority and such people will be mired in mediocrity because they can’t envision themselves as more. There as to be an extensive and comprehensive propaganda project to reverse the psychological damage already done.
https://upstanderproject.org/firstlight/doctrine

mazaje:
More of Yahweh's acts of deceit as recorded in the bible. . . .

  JER 4:10 - Then I said, "Ah, Sovereign LORD, how completely you have deceived this people and Jerusalem by saying, 'You will have peace,' when the sword is at our throats."

JER 20:7 - O LORD, you deceived me, and I was deceived you overpowered me and prevailed. I am ridiculed all day long; everyone mocks me.

Its very clear that Yahweh has a penchant for sending lying spirits to people or deceiving people himself as recorded in the bible(Isaiah 37:7 and 2 Kings 19:7). The problem is if you read down in the book of Jeremiah you will see that Yahweh even acknowledge that he does evil and he apologized for the evil he did. . .

By the way what is it with Yahweh enticing people to send prophecies and then killing them at the same time. . .

EZ 14:9 - "'And if the prophet is enticed to utter a prophecy, I the LORD have enticed that prophet, and I will stretch out my hand against him and destroy him from among my people Israel.

jamesid29:
It is well...

DeepSight:
Regrettably it is a familiar pattern among religionists of all colors, save perhaps some of the far eastern spiritual and meditative schools. One thing that never ceases to amaze me is the sheer ease with which they are able to dismiss and waltz past even the clearest verses, so long as they do not like them. I mean you can see a verse that reads "This stone is black" and poker faced, they will tell you that it actually means the stone is white - that is if they do not simply ignore the verse altogether even if you cite it a thousand times.

These same will insist that all scripture is inspired by God.

jamesid29:
LoL... I hope you know that Abraham's Modern Yoruba dictionary is available on online libraries, right...

It is well sir

jamesid29:
Part of my job heavily depends on research..

In any case, I borrowed it and it clearly shows that apart from both words not even sharing the same sound, they don't share the same root or etymology.

Added the other one's that share the same sound but not the same root or meanings for further clarity.

Anyway, it's fine.

jamesid29:
Just look at the dictionary. I believe you should know how it's structured since you also own it.

As for the sound, that has to do with the ami.. BỌ́ is a different ami ohun from BỌ

Etymology[edit]
In Yoruba language, Ìyá mi literally means "my mother".[1] In Yoruba cosmology, the mother's roles as the force of creation and the sustainer of life and existence elevates her to the realm of the divine. Consequently, Ìyá mi - with alterations in tones - becomes Ìyààmi or Ìyàmi,[2] which can be translated as "the super-powerful ones"[3] or "My Mysterious Mother."[4][5] Àjẹ́ is a Yoruba word that signifies the biological and spiritual power of African women that has myriad potential, including but not limited to, powers of elemental, biological and artistic creation

jamesid29:
Part of my job heavily depends on research..

In any case, I borrowed it and it clearly shows that apart from both words not even sharing the same sound, they don't share the same root or etymology.

Added the other one's that share the same sound but not the same root or meanings for further clarity.

Anyway, it's fine.

DeepSight:
OK Jamesid29,
[b]Away from all the technicality of language and wayizbahs and Josiahs and Jephtahs and what not.
[/b]What is your own take on the concept of a transcendental omnipotent God requiring any kind of propitiatory sacrifice for sins - be it the animal sacrifices of the Old Testament or the alleged sacrifice of Christ of the New Testament.

jamesid29:
hmm.... it's alright sir
Enjoy the rest of your week

DeepSight:
1. On what basis is it confidently asserted that Jesus was without sin? ? ?
2. So what if he was without sin. How does that answer the question. Oho, so your Yahweh is blood thirsty for pure sacrifices, is that what you are saying?

jamesid29:
Part of my job heavily depends on research..

In any case, I borrowed it and it clearly shows that apart from both words not even sharing the same sound, they don't share the same root or etymology.

Added the other one's that share the same sound but not the same root or meanings for further clarity.

Anyway, it's fine.

jamesid29:
LoL... I hope you know that Abraham's Modern Yoruba dictionary is available on online libraries, right...

It is well sir

jamesid29:
You're making the point we've all been trying to make to you sir. Almost every regular speaker of the Yoruba language, associates Ebo with the meaning Ritual offering. I even did a google search of it and everywhere I looked(even in sites and papers focused on yoruba tradition or spirituality), I didn't see any where ebo meant anything other than ritual sacrifice. You're actually the first person I'm hearing a different meaning from. I am not disputing you're interpretation of ebo because
a) Critical Resources on yoruba spirituality and traditions are not easily accessible, so just because I couldn't find one anywhere that matches what you said after a couple searches doesn't automatically mean I should discard it
b) I do not know enough about the Yoruba conception of certain things in other to authoritatively negate your argument.

Now let's assume you are correct: Imagine you are faced with a text that say, Iya re fun l'ebo

On the passages he raised, I believe you can engage his aurguments with the paper you provided a link to. The author already did well in providing arguments from both sides of the conversation . It's a good place to start following the rabbit trail from. Just my opinion though

jamesid29:
That's really what you're doing sir.
Without attempting to understand how each language works on its own terms, you're making authoritative statements on one of them.. This usually leads to a lot of misunderstanding and sometimes serious errors when people make translations in this manner. E.g John 1:1 and the identity of the word.

Like in this case, you're basing your argument on the word wayyizbah and looking it up on a concordance. Two out of those concordance entries don't match your own understanding of the word so your conclusion was, the translators were being malicious in 2kings and as for 2chronicles, the answer is still up in the air.

As I stated in my last post sir, the first misunderstanding stems from your understanding of what the form wayyizibah really means.
The thing is wayyizibah is not really a word on its own. It's a combination of a narrative sequence tool called a waw/vav consecutive ( 'WA' + the doubling of the first letter of the verb it's attached to) and a conjunction of a verb in it's 3rd person masculine singular.

Unlike English, Hebrew verbs & nouns are built from a 3 consonant root word in combination with one of 7 stems(constructor/binyan) namely: "Pa'al/Qal, Niphal,Hiphil and so on".
So for example: שׁ-מ-ר (sh-m-r), in the Qal stem/constructor, we get שָׁמַר (shamar) - meaning Guard. This concept will coming handy latter

Also hebrew verbs also change forms to denote Person,Gender,Number and Tense.
For example using our verb above ( Shamar):
He will guard in hebrew would be just one word Yishmor (יִשְׁמֹר)
She will guard in hebrew would be just one word Tishmor (תִּשְׁמֹר)
As you can see, the three word sentence in English is smushed together into just one Hebrew verb. In that one word denotes the Person ( in this case, the subject in the 3rd person: he/she), Number(singular/plural), Gender(male/ female) and Tense(present, past or future tense in English: in Hebrew its Perfect or Imperfect tense).

This type of smushing of word happens across the board for 1st person, 2nd person, plural, present tense,past tense and so on. This makes a single verb be spelt differently depending on where it's used.
For an English speaker, the verbs Yishmor, Tishmor, Shamar and it's many other forms might look like they are different words, but in reality they are all the same word( in this case Shamar).
So if want to know what the word Yishmor means, you have to go look up what the word Shamar(it's root verb) means. And if you want to look up a concordance on the word Yishmor, you’ll only get the word where it’s used as a 3rd person mascular singular.

Consequently for our verb in question Way Yisbah,technically the "h" here had the ch sound but anyway the second part of the word Yisbah is actually a 3rd person singular of the verb Zabach in the imperfect tense.
Now for the first part of the word(the waw-prefix/ the WAY part), As stated above this is called a Waw consecutive or Preterite (= “past”) or a Wayyiqtol.
This concept is a narrative style used in the Hebrew bible to show a sequence of events. In other words, its used to express the main line of action in a past tense narrative.
English uses the simple past tense to achieve the same result. For example:

George walked toward the cliff, wondering what had happened to his friends. Standing on the edge,he gazed down its face, looking for some sign of them, but no one was there. He sighed, put his hands to his mouth, and shouted yet again. There was still no answer, but then something far below him moved on the face of the cliff.
The main storyline consists of five events: George walked, gazed, sighed, put, shouted, and something moved. The other verbal forms (“wondering”, “had happened”, “standing”, “looking”, and “was”), also identify events (or non-events), but do not describe the next event on the storyline. Both “wondering” and “standing” tell us that George was doing two things at the same time : wondering as he walked and standing as he gazed.
“Looking for” modifies “gazed”, narrowing its focus to tell us that George was not merely admiring the scenery. Only the highlighted sequential verbs identify a sequence of actions.

Also in biblical Hebrew The waw/vav consecutive/ Preterite (= “past”)/ Wayyiqtol is also a thread—a narrative tool used to tell readers that the event that it describes is the next event in the sequence of events in the story.
For example: In Gen 24:17-18:
And ran the servant to meet her, and said, let me drink please a little water from your jar and so she said, .......
The main storyline consists of five events: The servant ran, then he said something, so she said something, and she quickly let down her jar and then gave him water.
Hebrew uses waw-consecutive to show that this actions are a sequence of events. This is done basically by adding waw(W/V) followed by a patach vowel(an "ah" vowel like f[b]a[/b]ther) and lastly a strong dagesh to the first letter of the verb(it's just a sign that generally means double the letter it's pointed on in English: Eg hamock, becomes hammock, if the dagesh is on the m letter).

So the word:
Yō·mer( 3rd person masculine singular of the verb ruts/רוּץ) becomes Way·yō·mer(וַיֹּ֕אמֶר) - And (he) said

Tō·mer( 3rd person feminine singular of the same verb ruts/רוּץ) becomes
Wat·tō·mer(וַתֹּ֖אמֶר) - And she said:

So this is the same way, Yiz·baḥ(3rd person mascular singular of the verb Zabach) becomes "Way yizbah".

If you use an interlinear and check closely under the an highlighted "Way·yiz·bah", you would see a
Conj‑w | V‑Qal‑ConsecImperf‑3ms underneath. This is there to tell you that this word is a "conjunction waw", a verb of the "Qal(stem)", Its a Consecutive imperfect( meaning it's showing a sequence of events in a story: something happened,then another thing happened and so on), and finally it's in a 3rd person masculine singular form of it's verb.

So if you're using a concordance to look up the word Wayyizbah and making a translational judgement of that without understanding what the verb is doing there, you would be looking up wrong thing.
Ofcourse because of time, there's been a lot of simplification and things are generally more complex than this, but I hope you got the general idea.
In other to do an accurate word study of the word and an interpretation of the text itself, one has to

1) Strip the word of it's conjugation and other stuff to get to the root word & stem. This is called parsing. Most good software tools like logos, olive tree etc automatically do this part.
2)Look up the parsed word in a good lexicon to see it's current semantic range. Semantic range can change depending on more discoveries & understanding of the language
3) You can use a concordance to find every instance of the word in it's root word & stem. Languages are very tricky. A word can be used one way a thousand times and used in another way with a different naunce and meaning in a few other place. That's a feature of every language, even English. E.g 9 out of 10 times, the word "to dust" connotes cleaning but in a few cases it can also be used as "to sprinkle"
4)Learn enough about the background, culture, worldview and so on of the text in question. The goal is to try and get into the world of the author and original audience. In other words to think the way they would have thought.. This is arguably harder and slower than it sounds but Cultural river plays a huge role in how we understand any text( or any piece of information/ communication actually). The way I think is different from the way someone brought up in Germany thinks even though we share the same century and there's always a lot of miscommunications when both parties do not understand their cultural differences.
5) It's always a good idea to look up good critical commentaries and other resources on the text, regardless of the level one is( even expert scholars do this). Knowledge doesn't happen in a vacuum and seeing how others who have expertise in the field parse the text can help one see blindspots or gain perspective.

Of course doing all this is not a guarantee that one will not make mistakes( we all have blindspots) but it's a whole lot better than not doing them.


You're making the point we've all been trying to make to you sir. Almost every regular speaker of the Yoruba language, associates Ebo with the meaning Ritual offering. I even did a google search of it and everywhere I looked(even in sites and papers focused on yoruba tradition or spirituality), I didn't see any where ebo meant anything other than ritual sacrifice. You're actually the first person I'm hearing a different meaning from. I am not disputing you're interpretation of ebo because
a) Critical Resources on yoruba spirituality and traditions are not easily accessible, so just because I couldn't find one anywhere that matches what you said after a couple searches doesn't automatically mean I should discard it
b) I do not know enough about the Yoruba conception of certain things in other to authoritatively negate your argument.

Now let's assume you are correct: Imagine you are faced with a text that say, Iya re fun l'ebo


Working proficiency is not an abstract concept or something hard to benchmark. It just basically means knowing enough to work with the language or subject matter.
German scholarship dominated & pushed the field of biblical studies forward a couple of centuries ago. Because of that, many critical commentaries and works are written in German. Today most biblical scholars have to have enough knowledge of German in other to engage with many of those works. They might not be able to speak German fluently but they know enough of the language to work with it.
Most physicist have to know maths to a certain degree so they can do their calculations.
Even in MMA, regardless of one's martial arts background (kick boxing, karate etc), every MMA fighter needs to know how to grapple to an extent. Israel Adesanya comes from a kick boxing background and is not an expert grappler but he won't have been successful in MMA if he didn't pick up enough grappling skills to survive in the octagon.
As I said earlier, working proficiency is not an abstract concept neither is it hard to benchmark. It doesn't necessarily mean one is an expert in the field but means one at least has enough understanding of the field to effectively engage and work with it.

Our conversation has been about 2kings and A) whether what Josiah did was a ritual sacrifice to God and
B)whether translations were intentionally manipulated to hide this fact.
This has been the only conversation between the both of us.
The video of Dr kipp doesn't touch on any of this two points.
In what I watched, he doesn't associate Josiah's killing of the priest with a ritual sacrifice to Yahweh, neither does he even hint at it or even bring it up.
There's a reason for that...
(incase I missed it because I skipped right to section on Israel, pls provide the timestamp and I'll go back & watch it).

On the passages he raised, I believe you can engage his aurguments with the paper you provided a link to. The author already did well in providing arguments from both sides of the conversation . It's a good place to start following the rabbit trail from. Just my opinion though



That's not the point sir. The point is not about not thinking but about knowing our limitations on the things we might reasonably not be certain about.

I'll round up here by giving two examples
1) A scholar I respect alot made an aurgement connecting Hammurabi with Amraphel of Gen 14 using linguistic connections. Problem is, many other expert in the space reject this view and I don't know enough about the augment to speak confidently on it(one way or another).
Best I can do is mention it and leave it at that.( That's if I even mention it at all in the first place)
2) Recently, I was pondering on Matthew 7 and I had an interesting interpretation of one of the verses. It made sense to me based on the text but before I went out telling people about it, I checked it up against some sources to see how well my arguments stacked up. Slowly, I realized I had missed some things and my interpretation was possibly a bit skewed.

So the point isn't about not thinking but about knowing that with everything we know, there's a world of things we are yet to know especially if we haven't done due deligence.
Over the years I've learnt to live with ambiguities. There are very few things I hold on too very strongly. One of the things I can say for certain when it comes to my faith is that the God of the bible is exactly who Jesus portrayed him to be "A just & loving God". This is not an understanding that comes from emotions but from my understanding of the scripture on its own terms. I've seen other people who were anti christians but who allowed the bible speak on its own terms come to the same conclusion( some are even not still Christians but don't doubt God's justice and love ).

I know you might not see things that way but I hope some day, you will.
Have a great week ahead.