1 John 1:5 states “God is Light” and God can not be seen directly (or at least that is what He told Moses in Exodus 33) but His presence is often described as light of some kind (Revelation 21).
So He would not have a shadow but would have the inverse, a brighter spot that is all around Him.
Anyway, Plato was very intelligent and I think was close in his description but I would change it to:
“God is Truth and light His robe”.
It is just very hard to describe God and His attributes because we are human.
I wouldn’t take Plato’s ideas of “God”–capital G–to be the same as we take it today.
It’s similar to saying that a lot of our founding fathers were these stalwart Christians, but many were in fact quite esoteric and sketchy in their beliefs of Christ.
Very true that Plato most likely did not believe in a single god or even the God, I Am. However, the statement he made was definitely in the singlular unless someone messed with the Greek which makes me wonder if he was thinking when he made the statement.
Aside from that, as for “our founding fathers”, it may surprise the modern, liberal that historians that are writing biographies and history books that many of these men were very dedicated to God and had pretty clear pictures of who He is (or it may not surprise them in light of them “revising” history because they do not want to deal with the truth). Yes, there were some founding fathers that were not aligned fully in the scriptures but many were.
A side note on this, several have claimed to me that great people in American history did not believe in Christ Jesus but the funny part is that these people have written prayers that pray in the Name of Jesus, the Person that they supposedly do not believe in.
I personally like to read what the “founding fathers” wrote, especially about God, rather than read what historians say they wrote or believe. It is much more inspiring and probably more truthful about what these people believed.
Interesting thoughts. These all may reference quotes from Jefferson and others but one will ideally look at the original documents. I enjoy reading letters and journals from these guys. Like the most news on religion and politics these days, clips of the full story can be taken and twisted to say whatever. So it is usually best to go to the source. In technical work, I often have dig up original sources to filter though some Wall Street Journal article and get to the truth (often it is just hype).
A lot of the third party articles I have read on the founding fathers are very extreame and usually both sides forget why many came to America in the first place (to get away from “forced” religion).
I think we’d have to read a lot to get at the truth of the matter, which is that there are varying shades of truth to the matter, no doubt.
Last night, I looked at the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and wondered how many of those signers’ views aren’t known.
Really, though, I don’t think some of those quotes could be taken out of context, though I concede that others could well be.
Well-known liberals have admitted that being liberal almost always means to take the extreme view; I’d hope that between conservatives and liberals we could find the objective truth.
Shadow would imply his form or being is blocking something? It woudl be better to saw light reflects his glory or reveals his glory.
Good thought there Dave.
1 John 1:5 states “God is Light” and God can not be seen directly (or at least that is what He told Moses in Exodus 33) but His presence is often described as light of some kind (Revelation 21).
So He would not have a shadow but would have the inverse, a brighter spot that is all around Him.
Anyway, Plato was very intelligent and I think was close in his description but I would change it to:
“God is Truth and light His robe”.
It is just very hard to describe God and His attributes because we are human.
I wouldn’t take Plato’s ideas of “God”–capital G–to be the same as we take it today.
It’s similar to saying that a lot of our founding fathers were these stalwart Christians, but many were in fact quite esoteric and sketchy in their beliefs of Christ.
http://plato-dialogues.org/email/960211_1.htm
Thanks Steve!
Very true that Plato most likely did not believe in a single god or even the God, I Am. However, the statement he made was definitely in the singlular unless someone messed with the Greek which makes me wonder if he was thinking when he made the statement.
Aside from that, as for “our founding fathers”, it may surprise the modern, liberal that historians that are writing biographies and history books that many of these men were very dedicated to God and had pretty clear pictures of who He is (or it may not surprise them in light of them “revising” history because they do not want to deal with the truth). Yes, there were some founding fathers that were not aligned fully in the scriptures but many were.
A side note on this, several have claimed to me that great people in American history did not believe in Christ Jesus but the funny part is that these people have written prayers that pray in the Name of Jesus, the Person that they supposedly do not believe in.
I personally like to read what the “founding fathers” wrote, especially about God, rather than read what historians say they wrote or believe. It is much more inspiring and probably more truthful about what these people believed.
Well, we shouldn’t look to Jefferson:
http://www.monticello.org/reports/interests/religion.html
Trust this following one however much you want, but it does have direct quotes:
http://www.sullivan-county.com/id3/debate.htm
I’m not saying we should say none were Christians, but looking at the dollar bill makes one wonder…
Interesting thoughts. These all may reference quotes from Jefferson and others but one will ideally look at the original documents. I enjoy reading letters and journals from these guys. Like the most news on religion and politics these days, clips of the full story can be taken and twisted to say whatever. So it is usually best to go to the source. In technical work, I often have dig up original sources to filter though some Wall Street Journal article and get to the truth (often it is just hype).
A lot of the third party articles I have read on the founding fathers are very extreame and usually both sides forget why many came to America in the first place (to get away from “forced” religion).
Thanks for the insights.
I think we’d have to read a lot to get at the truth of the matter, which is that there are varying shades of truth to the matter, no doubt.
Last night, I looked at the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and wondered how many of those signers’ views aren’t known.
Really, though, I don’t think some of those quotes could be taken out of context, though I concede that others could well be.
Well-known liberals have admitted that being liberal almost always means to take the extreme view; I’d hope that between conservatives and liberals we could find the objective truth.