Comments on Fire in the Bones [Biblical, Heterodox Christianity]: What does "Son of Man" mean?

this is the way a blog should be! thanks!

2010-11-01T05:16:20.614-07:00

this is the way a blog should be! thanks!

http://www.christiananswers.net/q-eden/son-of-man....

2009-10-21T09:05:55.162-07:00

http://www.christiananswers.net/q-eden/son-of-man.html

David, I had just read something about this very t...

2009-09-03T22:05:04.383-07:00

David, I had just read something about this very thing not too long ago in the book I'm reading. I had to backtrack about 140 pages to find it, but I did. The book is "The Temple and the Church's Mission" by G.K. Beale. I'll quote some of it. It is all from page 169 in the book:

Luke 2:32 and Acts 26:23 picture Christ as fulfilling this commission to be a 'light' to the end of the earth (an allusion to the Servant Israel's commission in Is. 49:6). This is why Matthew 28:18 portrays Jesus as the Son of Man saying, 'All authority has been give to Me in heaven and on earth.' This is an allusion to the prophecy of Daniel 7:13-14, where it is said of the 'Son of Man', 'authority was given to him, and all the nations of the earth ... [were] serving him' (so LXX). On the basis of this authority, Jesus then gives the well-known commission 'therefore, as you go, disciple all the nations, baptizing them ... teaching them to keep all things whichsoever I commanded you; and, behold, I am with you all the days until the end of the age'. ...

... Jesus is a Last Adam figure, and this is partly why he implicitly identifies himself with Daniel's 'Son of Man' in issuing the universal commission to his followers: he is the 'son of Adam;, the equivalent to Daniel's 'Son of Man', finally accomplishing what the first Adam should have and what Daniel predicts the messianic end-time Adam would do.

As for Anonymous' post, scripture knows nothing of any persons called "God the Son" or even "God the Holy Spirit." Scripture does plainly tell us, however, that there is only one God, who is the Father (John 17:3, 1 Corinthians 8:6)

Anonymous, most of your post is based on flawed re...

2009-09-03T19:03:58.992-07:00

Anonymous, most of your post is based on flawed reasoning.

"Son of God" was actually a title used to refer to the Messiah, so claiming that Jesus' fulfillment of the Messianic prophecies suggests something more has no basis.

The grammar of John chapter 1 does not support your contention.

Romans 1:21 is not a discussion of Jesus [as a simple reading of the context shows. The 1st century Jews who rejected Christ were certainly worshipping "birds" or "reptiles" instead.

Indeed, that you would consider Romans 1:21 as a discussion of Jesus or that you would take this article as an attack on Jesus' deity I find very puzzling. I make one off-hand remark about one way the term "son of Man" is misused to refer to divinity, and it becomes the total focus of your comment.

I think it is worthwhile to note that the misunderstanding of scripture that often occurs today on this topic is more or less just a replay of how the Pharisees misunderstood Christ's own words in John 10:30, and He corrects them in John 10:34-36. Unfortunately, that correction has largely gone unheeded.

If Jesus were just a man, then you'll have to ...

2009-09-03T14:59:12.524-07:00

If Jesus were just a man, then you'll have to throw out the majority of the Bible along with all the 300 fulfilled prophecies about Jesus as the coming Messiah. Read John ch.1 which tells us that Jesus isn't just the Son of God, but God the Son. If you want to believe the Bible, you'll have to either believe all of it or none of it. Romans 1:21 says "Because that, when they knew God, they glorified [him] not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened."

He would have been saying Ben Adam the son of Adam...

2009-08-02T18:09:28.148-07:00

He would have been saying Ben Adam the son of Adam. Adam of course meant red, so he was saying I'm Big Red's son, or to break it down further I am a human, a mortal, coming from a line of mortals all the way back to Big Red just like everyone else on the planet. Or today he could say I am a bipded with 24 male DNA Chromosones and 23 female.

Yes the full verse you quoted from Numbers says God is not a man nor the son of man. So he was not claiming, in fact never claimed, to be God. Son of Man was his favorite title for himself. It looks like he went out of his way to assure us he was not a deity but a regular Joe like the rest of the blokes. What if we were to take him at his word instead ow what the preachers tell us about him?

Hi Sabine, welcome to the blog! That is really in...

2009-07-23T15:48:30.132-07:00

Hi Sabine, welcome to the blog!

That is really interesting, and something I had not heard of before. I'll be thinking about this as I read in the future, and perhaps it will make me see something in certain passages I hadn't saw before.

Hi David, through various bible studies on "c...

2009-07-23T15:28:09.563-07:00

Hi David, through various bible studies on "covenant" l believe that by refering to Himself as "Son of Man" Jesus showed or demonstrated a covenant relationship, which, apparently, Jews understood very well (as opposed to us moderns who often have no clue about covenant.) In such studies l have leaned of covenant steps (9 altogether) that played a role in creating a covenant. One of them being that each partner (and especially the stronger) take full responsibility of each other and exchange names (compare marriage covenant and the wife taking the name of husband/= his protection as well), and so, when Jesus, who also said that He was the Son of God, refered to Himself as "son of man".