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Golden rule
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this post was submitted on 01 Apr 2024
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Possibly also "the eye of a needle" meant a gate in Jerusalem. Regardless, it doesn't mean what people think it means when they first hear it. Still has the same message, just less stupid.
No, it doesn't. This is a bullshit lie spread by rich fucks. The words are meant literally - the animal camel through the tiny eye of an actual needle.
Not my theory.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_of_a_needle
https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-25583,00.html
It has the same meaning. It was a small gate that a camel couldn't fit through. It's just that it may not have meant a literally eye of a needle, just like it may not have meant a literal camel in the previous explanation.
Are you illiterate? At which point did I say you came up with it? You're spreading a lie, pure and simple
Down voting me for discussing something that is brought up frequently is implying a disagreement with me. I said it's not my theory because you don't have a disagreement with me. It's a piece of trivia people may like to know. It also isn't some conspiracy to lie about it. It doesn't change the meaning. It's just people guessing as to what was meant.
In thousands of years if we no longer have trains, people are going to have to guess about what sidetracked meant. Some people may come to totally different conclusions. Discussing alternative interpretations isn't bad, especially when no one is arguing with the underlying meaning. Everyone know what was meant and I've never seen an argument against it. It's just some pieces of trivia that it may have been an idiom (that had the same meaning) that was used at the time.
But I just want to be mad and insult someone!
This myth has been pretty thoroughly busted, as has most every other attempt by rich pricks in the last couple thousand years to soften or undermine Jesus' use of hyperbole.
That does not say it's busted at all. It only says the citation is often wrong. However, they hyperbole is still identical no matter the translation. Regardless of what the literal translation should be, it says a rich man can't enter heaven. I don't know how discussing the literal translation could possibly be used to soften that because it's pretty clear. I think some people just want a conspiracy where there isn't one. Literally no one is arguing it doesn't mean rich men can't enter heaven.
Yes, people are arguing it doesn't mean rich men can't enter heaven. People have been coming up with various interpretations of that Bible passage for that explicit purpose ever since Jesus said it - a couple thousand years - for which we have written records.
The "eye of a needle is a gate in Jerusalem" interpretation was dug up from 11th century writings by televangelists who - believe it or not - used it to argue that you could, in fact, fit a camel through it with great effort.
Who is? I've never seen that. I don't believe that at all. It's pretty clear what was meant, and this isn't the only place it's said.
There weren't TVs in the 11th century, so no televangelists. I know what you mean by this, but that's the problem. Language is weird. Terms come and go, and someone from the 11th century wouldn't know what that means, just as we don't know exactly what was said by people who wrote the Bible.
I don't even believe Jesus was a real person. We really don't have much evidence for that. I sure as hell don't trust the translation of the King James Bible, which isn't even the original Hebrew, as to what was said exactly. The meaning is cool, and there's no arguing what it means, but it could be referring to anything, and idioms come and go and we can only guess what they are.
You actually didn't know what they meant by this. They were saying that a televangelist, in the age of television, dug up this interpretation from the 11th century to argue, in the age of television, that the lesson was that it was challenging for the rich to get into heaven but not impossible.
But it does serve the more fundamental point that language is complicated and prone to misinterpretation. And that people will voice confidently incorrect opinions based their misunderstanding.
There's nothing that irritates me more than when people misinterpret me not because of vague language, but due to poor reading comprehension. Except perhaps when people admire TV villains because of poor media literacy.
why say it after telling a man to sell his possessions and give it to the poor. Jesus literally telling rich people to stop being rich to go to heaven and you think he's talking about a gate?
Yeah, it was apparently a small gate, and possibly a common saying. We have all kinds of weird idioms, like if you start talking about something off-topic you're "getting sidetracked." Why would you be talking about a train?
I didn't come up with this. It's a really old explanation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_of_a_needle
https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-25583,00.html
From the article you linked:
It seems so unlikely that this is the case. Why would anyone write a metaphor so convoluted about a gate? It's an attempt to weasel out of the fact that Jesus outright tells rich people to give away all their shit.
It still means that exact same thing. We use weird idioms all the time that make no sense why we'd talk about them that way. Why do we use sidetrack for a tangent when that's a term used for trains? We do we call "crazy" people "coocoo", as in a type of bird? Idioms are strange things.
It's clear what Jesus meant (assuming he said this at all, but I'm not convinced he's even real), whatever it is that may have been being discussed. No one is arguing that. It doesn't matter if camel meant rope, whether the eye of the needle was a gate, or if that translation we read in the king James Bible is accurate (it isn't). It all says the same thing.
It doesn't necessarily mean the same thing. The camel/gate (unfounded) interpretation has been stretched to note that a camel COULD fit through the gate on its knees, therefore it's a metaphor about being on your knees (pray) if you are wealthy and you can go through the gate, i.e., you can be rich if you are pious.
Which... brings us full circle to the Pharisees. The good news is, we can all be Jesus, right now and start finding these people in person and calling them out.