₦airaland Forum

mbaemeka:
Daft and ignorant. I should be showing you the verse. How did the snake hang? By wrapping itself? BTW the words shake off in greek also mean to brush off.

The Maltans saw the snake HANG on Paul's hand and then he brushed it off and FELT no harm.

mbaemeka:
Clutching. At least now you know the Maltans didn't think they saw the snake hanging on his hand. They actually did see it.

vooks:
Shake off,brush off...am indifferent, the snake's grip was casual/light. A bite can't be brushed off, so thank you for THINKING and demolishing your own argument
Now study this image
https://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/attachments/modern/29432d1299766411t-pilot-lands-plane-rogue-snake-hand-black-racer.jpg
That snake is HANGING from his hand. Is it biting?

vooks:
Puny brains,
That's in the scriptures and I posted the verse BEFORE you but you copied me
Is it in contention that the beast was hanging?

mbaemeka:
OMG. You're dafter than I thought. Luke said the snake was hanging ON his hand.

Now you have brought up "the snakes grip was light". Hahahahaha.

trustman:
Gombs and Mbaemeka,

Only the original languages of Scripture can be said to be accurate in terms of inspiration.
 
Translations cannot be said to carry the same accuracy as the original languages. 

Therefore when there appears to be (or actually is) a contradiction between translations the best resort is to go to the original languages. 
In this case of Acts 28:3 the starting point should be what does the original say?
Is the word used in the original suggestive of
1. Hold on to, or
2. Bite?

mbaemeka:
The original translations said

1. It fastened in hostility; fit, etc his hand.

2. The Maltans saw it HANGING ON his hand.

3. He shook it off.

4. He FELT no harm and not that the snake DID no harm.

5. The Maltans watched for a long while.

6. When he didn't react to what they had seen, they concluded he was a god.

7. They brought the sick to him.

8. He healed them all.

WinsomeX:
When I first read the above, I was almost convinced you had goofed. I was going to read the scriptures again when Grundy provided it here. Indeed that scripture said the snake fastened itself around Paul's hands. It didn't say he was bitten by it. The islanders who were observing him, must have assumed like our WoF friends here that Paul was bitten. But the scripture did not record he was bitten. Now, he could have been bitten but that was not what scripture recorded; what was clearly written was that the snake fastened itself around the hands of Paul and not that it bit him.

I think this has been the problem with these back and forth debates. Reading assumption and preconceived ideas into scriptures and not allowing the bible to speak for itself.

I commend your doggedness in this debate, sir. Well done vooks.

Gombs:
You have acute problems with reading and comprehnsion.

3 As Paul gathered an armful of sticks and was laying them on the fire, a poisonous snake, driven out by the heat, [size=20pt]bit him on the hand[/size] .

Oya, run to your sewer, call your board members, go to your Wof thread and declare Wof wrote NLT and MSG translations.


you should be ashamed for saying Paul was not bitten.... Shame on you and Vooks

vooks:
Sure most miracles and LEAST verifiable.
I don't get the Creator to work, I work for the Creator

vooks:
Some Neanderthal in your camp believes in INSTANT. Anything else is fickle faith

Healing whether instant or not is a function of God's sovereignty and not merely down to FAITH. Paul had faith and his infirmity never left him. Epaphroditus was sick till he nearly died. Timothy's ailments took naturopathy. Trophimus. These are apostles' colleagues and himself and if they fell sick and stayed sick, then there is NOTHING like INSTANT healing or Divine Health BS

Faith and sovereignty are not mutually exclusive. Sleep over that

I just looked up Jesus miracles. Am still waiting for the first to feed 5000 with 5 bread and 2 fish. Before you can even claim to do greater than Christ, please match his miracles first

Candour:
If the bible didn't expressly tell you that Daniel slept overnight in a den with lions yet wasn't bitten, would you have believed it? Wouldnt you have said they probably bit him but his flesh was restored? Why do you think the God that shut the lions mouth couldn't have also shut the mouth of the viper? Do you think it has to be thoroughly dramatic for us to acknowledge the finger of God even when the bible is silent on it?

nlMediator:
To me the whole thing is simple: the community members must be utterly foolish to think of Paul as a god if all that happened was that a snake fastened itself on him. Were they seeing a snake for the first time? While they were waiting to see if he would die, why didn't Paul tell them it was no big deal, because the snake just played with his hand until he shook it off?

Lobeez:
I still recommend Gill's commentary on this issue.
And I will repeat what I said earlier, vipers don't naturally bite on their prey, they strike very fast. It is very unlikely that what was described was a snake bite. It was simply the snake fleeing the burning wood and curling on to Paul's hands and then Paul doing the most natural thing which was try to shake it off quickly, the snake however may have still wrapped around his arm after the first attempt but finally fell into the fire from whence it ran out. The people knowing how quick and venomous vipers are were certain he must have been struck so waited to see him swell. This didn't happen because by divine providence, God had kept him from being bitten by the viper.

nlMediator:
To me the whole thing is simple: the community members must be utterly foolish to think of Paul as a god if all that happened was that a snake fastened itself on him. Were they seeing a snake for the first time? While they were waiting to see if he would die, why didn't Paul tell them it was no big deal, because the snake just played with his hand until he shook it off?

WinsomeX:
I am with DrummaBoy on that post and here is a response to your post.



It is OK if bible teachers divide the bible according to the dispensations that suites their understanding. Some give us two - old and new; some six; others three. But this is the first time I will be hearing of dispensations divided after the persons of the trinity: Father, Son and Spirit. This I believe is error. I will like us to see the bible from two dispensations: old and new, and in all of them the Trinity functioned fully. Jesus said he was sending the Spirit to be our HELPER and not to create another dispensation. Whatever else the church might have become, the gospel we are called to preach is the gospel of Jesus Christ and not of the Spirit. This new dispensation revolves totally around Jesus. It was God that was in Christ redeeming the world. And the Holy Spirit is still the Spirit of Christ. If the gospel we proclaim is the gospel of Christ and not of the Spirit, I again insist that the emphasis of scripture and any preaching on it must be on Jesus Christ and no one else. It is this gospel the power of the Spirit is available to support. And only in proclaiming Christ is God glorified.



Again, our calling is not to "spiritual experience(s)"; our calling is to Jesus. To know him and to serve him. Whatever comes out of it, experience or not, is secondary.



It is true that it will be wrong to anchor a doctrine on one book of the bible. Indeed the other parts of the bible teaches on the Spirit and the writer of that post did say the bible contain a rich theology on the Holy Spirit; John 14 has Jesus teaching on the Spirit; 1Cor 12-14; Romans 8; and many other references to him. But Colossians is unique. If you had referred to the Facebook page on that post, you will realize that it was part of a verse by verse teaching on Colossians, with the purpose of bringing Paul's emphasis out the in it.

Paul had not visited Colossae before, just as he had not visited churches in the world today in the flesh. He had one chance to speak to them and us, and he mention the Spirit once. What else does this imply? It implies that God will have us emphasize what should be emphasized and deemphasized what should. The point is simple, if Paul will not emphasize the Spirit to us and we do, especially as we see with WoF, Benny Hinn, etc, then we are in error.

I do not believe this point belittles the Holy Spirit at all. In fact in Colossians 1: 15-22, Paul lays out the strongest biblical doctrine in the bible on the deity of Christ, which proves the verity of the trinity further and affirms the Spirit as God.



You would be omniscient to claim that you know those who have intimacy with the Spirit and those who lack it. It's best we remain with what is written or revealed and not go on tangent in your bid to scorn.

mbaemeka:
Vooks,

You and your delusions. You are not deceiving anyone but yourself. Will I have to start explaining fastening and hanging to you? How does that relate with your picture? Anyone looking at any of the uploaded images can readily tell that it had nothing to do with a snake fastening itself or hanging ON a man's hand. I don't know what you smoke but I don't think Fela would have gone close to it. Even your comrades are trying to give you a softlanding by claiming that God prevented the snake from biting him. That's all extra biblical hocus pocus. The Eye witnesses called Paul a god because of what they witnessed. If a man shakes off a snake that barely wrapped his hands around him into the fire, how does that make him a god? If they didn't see the snake bite him then why conclude that he was a god when they could have simply called him a lucky man?

You lots problem is simply unbelief. The very Maltans after seeing this act brought a lot of sick folks to Paul and he healed all. The reason they knew he could heal them happened with his fulfilling the promises of Jesus.

If you don't believe, that is your own headache. The scriptures are very clear and besides, there are many other expositions and commentaries that say he was bitten. So it is not an issue of posting links to some commentaries (that's directed at the link posters).

vooks:
I have given a plausible explanation for their reaction.
1. They knew he had survived a major danger;shipwreck
2. The mere sight of a venomous snake at a striking distance to the same man made them assume he had been bitten and they waited for the signs.
3. Luke's failure to capture the miracle ( argument from silence). How does he narrate ALL that and miss the climax?


So they were not foolish to expect his death any more than the disciples were foolish when they were scared out of their wits by a 'ghost'

Image123:
Who is the hyper Grace brother?

nlMediator:
I never said faith and sovereignty are mutually exclusive. To the contrary, that's the point I've been making. A person that upholds faith is not rejecting the sovereignty of God.

Obviously, you have no Scripture to back your claim that delayed or no healings are based on God's sovereignty. Quit adding to God's Word.

vooks:
The same apostles who wrought instant miracles suffered persistent sicknesses/delayed miracles
Name ANY WOFer and I can show you a string of delayed miracles or no miracles at all.

nlMediator:
No, your explanation is not plausible. There are 2 reasonable explanations.

1. The Maltans thought Paul was bitten. They found out he was not. They still went ahead to consider him a god, not a lucky but ordinary fellow. They must be idiots to think that way. And neither Luke nor Paul acted honorably in relaying this story without telling us that what the people thought was not true. They needed to correct the impression both to the people present and to their readers. Why did they choose not to? Would you, as a Christian, act in that manner? Oh and people survive shipwrecks. It doesn't make them gods.

2. The Maltans thought Paul was bitten. They never found out he was not. So, they treated him as a god. But that cancels out scenario 1. Which is it? You guys seem to suggest both are possible simultaneously, which makes no sense. Besides, Paul and Luke's obligation to correct the wrong impression is also present there.

That they did not suggests that they were affirming the people's impression.

nlMediator:
I still don't get your point. [b]WOF is not against delayed miracles. Teachings abound on what to while waiting. [/b]And how God sometimes gives you the blade, then the ear and afterwards the full corn. Are you Ok?

Again, if you didn't hear it the first time, we're not talking instant miracles here because WOF accepts only such. We're talking instant miracles because somebody suggested that there's no such thing as an instant result from prayer and in response was shown lots of examples from the Bible. How you can jump from there to your baseless charges against WOF is puzzling.

NobleG1:
It's very easy to call someone names when you, absolutely, have nothing intelligent to offer.

Gombs:
Mba, nlmediator, it's ok they don't believe Paul was bitten. Vook's pictures are even against him, but anyway, like always, they can believe what they may.

if they said Paul wasn't bitten and the Maltan's were assuming, and never saw Paul bitten, but waited for him to die, and later assumed he was a god, fine.

we've made our points, them theirs. The viewers would make a sound decision by the Spirit. No need trying to convince them, but i admire your efforts. DB just wrote off newer bible versions because it did not support his stand. Writers of MSG, NLT, etc must be half wits, getting everything right except Acts 28.

it' ok sha, me i'd not continue the snake hugging Paul's hand debate. Thanks buddy, for your efforts. Good morning

The below picture shows FASTENING on Paul's hand, and the Maltans SAW the viper HANGING on Paul's hand.. and theyaid to themselves, he was surely a murderer.

My last bit bro!

vooks:
Paraphrases versions are good for for private study and teaching but no serious theologian refers to them. When real meat is served, you go for Greek and literal translations as far as possible. This is because the less opinions of the translators are injected into a verse, the easier it is to discern the truth.

If you were half honest, you would not have grabbed versions that buy the fastening=biting theory, you would look at ALL versions and see that VERY FEW have this translation. Let me help you;

[url]https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Acts%2028:3[/url]
How many translations do you have on this site? Of these, how many render fastening as biting?

Thinking is probably the ONLY thing that separates man from animals and I never suspend my brains when meditating and studying scriptures. My photos showed a few irrefutable facts;
1. A snake can fasten itself on a hand WITHOUT biting
2. A snake can fasten itself on a hand and hang at the same time

This means you don't have to INFER a snake bite from the phrases 'fastened' and 'hanging'.