No answer to my question about belief in angels spiritual

Comment on Believing the Disproven – An Adventure in Science by Sean Pitman.

No answer to my question about belief in angels spiritual being and demons as empiricial realities. Discounting of conventional scholarship.
Look at Jude and 2 Peter and look at the word used for sons of God.

I’ve already explained where Jesus argued that angels, while empirically real beings, are not sexual beings and cannot “mate” with humans or anyone else. I’ve also explained that the term “sons of God” is applied to humans in several different contexts throughout the Bible.

Only used in 3 other places in each case they were spiritual beings or angels. Job 1:6, 38:7 and Psalms 29:1.

The story of Job is about the representatives of each of many inhabited worlds meeting together at a conference, and Satan shows up as a representative of Earth – since he took the position from Adam at the Fall as “prince of this world” (John 12:31). Otherwise, Adam would have been the representative “son of God” or “prince” from this world. Also, the term “sons of God” is used many times in the New Testament, as previously explained. Consider, as another example, the following passage:

The Jews answered Him, “For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself out to be God.” Jesus answered them, “Has it not been written in your Law, ‘I SAID, YOU ARE GODS ‘? If he called them ‘gods,’ to whom the word of God came–and Scripture cannot be set aside–what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, ‘I am God’s Son’? – John 10:33-36

Clearly then, Jesus argued that humans who accept the word of God are also “sons of God”.

To argue then, as you do, that the term “sons of God” in the Bible can only refer to angels is simply unwarranted and out of context from everything that the Bible has to say about angels being asexual beings and the reasons for the Flood (i.e., the overwhelming evil of the pre-Flood world that threatened to destroy all traces of good in human society).

Even Wiki entry on sons of God has this as the consensus view.

Not that it matters, but Wiki does say that your view has become especially commonplace in modern-day Christian commentaries. Of course, for both of the terms “sons of God” and “Nephilim” Wiki also points out that various groups of Christians and orthodox Jews have long argued against your view. Consider the following passages in this regard:

Likewise, a long-held view among some Christians is that the “sons of God” were the formerly righteous descendants of Seth who rebelled, while the “daughters of men” were the unrighteous descendants of Cain, and the nephilim the offspring of their union. This view, dating to at least the 1st century AD in Jewish literature as described above, is also found in Christian sources from the 3rd century if not earlier, with references throughout the Clementine literature, as well as in Sextus Julius Africanus, Ephrem the Syrian and others…

Some individuals and groups, including St. Augustine, John Chrysostom, and John Calvin, take the view of Genesis 6:2 that the “Angels” who fathered the nephilim referred to certain human males from the lineage of Seth, who were called sons of God probably in reference to their prior covenant with Yahweh (cf. Deuteronomy 14:1; 32:5); according to these sources, these men… took wives of the daughters of men, e.g., those who were descended from Cain or from any people who did not worship God. (Link)

So, the Adventist position certainly isn’t without precedent or reasonable argument within Christianity. And, in any case, it seems to me that the testimony of a prophet of God and Jesus Himself trumps your view.

That you and EG White should both feel queazy with this interpretation does not make it wrong. Indeed to suggest it refers intermarriage between the good and bad people moves the reasons for the mass killing of the deluge from being a cosmic crisis to make it seem like some petty veneagance.

It isn’t “petty vengeance,” but mercy on the part of God who moves for the preservation of the good in the face of horrendous evil that threatens to completely overwhelm all traces of good. Also, how can a postmodernist argue for a particular interpretation of the Bible as being “right” or “wrong”, “superior” or “inferior”? You’re being inconsistent again…

You indeed may have read a lot but I find it hard to believe you have read all the primary data in the fields where you proclaim expertise sufficient to discount conventional understanding.

Great, then explain to me how I’m wrong if it is so clear to you. It should be easy if you know so much more than I do about how the Darwinian mechanism of RM/NS can be so creative beyond very low levels of functional complexity. The problem, of course, is that you have absolutely no idea – and nobody else does either.

Talking in the blogosphere does not you a scientific expert make. You have to be a participant.

I don’t have to talk to or convince anyone else before I can know that the neo-Darwinian mechanism simply cannot do what you neo-Darwinists claim. Your argument that no one can use scientific methodologies or discover any empirical truths on an individual basis is nonsense. Now, if you disagree with me, great. Show me how I’m wrong. Where is your math? Where is your demonstration? Where is your empirical evidence of any kind? Where is your “science” beyond just-so story telling and your usual wishful thinking?

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Believing the Disproven – An Adventure in Science

God given gifts are not what we receive from Adam after his sin. The work of the Holy Spirit comes by way of the atonement and if there was no atonement, there would be no “God given gifts.”

The promise of atonement was in existence from the foundation of our world and “from eternity past”. That is why Jesus could tell Adam and Eve that He would immediately step in and provide the necessary “enmity” between us and evil that would enable them and all of their offspring to resist evil and cling to God. Jesus’ sacrifice on the crossed reached into the future as well as the past and took in the entire human race…

No parent would agree with this statement. Children have no feelings of guilt until and unless they are taught right and wrong. And this process begins immeadiately at birth as mother’s begin the process of instruction.

I am the father of two small boys (5 and 3) and I can tell you by my own experience that you’re wrong. Very young children do inherently know right from wrong on a very basic level without having to be taught about what to think or believe and do experience guilt without having to be taught about it. Beyond this, you are ignoring the scientific studies in this regard. It’s been established experimentally as I’ve already pointed out to you. You also ignore what Paul said in Romans about the heathen having the law written on their hearts so that it is “natural” to them even without having ever read or ever hearing the written law. According to Paul they instinctively know right from wrong…

Believing the Disproven – An Adventure in Science
Again, the basic ability to recognize love and exhibit love does not “have to be taught” by parents. A child will also naturally feel guilty for doing harm to another – without the need to be taught about feeling guilty for doing wrong. On the other hand, if you were correct, those who did not have good parents, or had no parents at all, would have an perfect excuse before God for why they didn’t choose to act lovingly toward their neighbors. They would feel no guilt or remorse for anything wrong that they did. After all, according to your argument, no one is born with a conscience – or an inherent knowledge of any kind of moral right or wrong to any degree. You claim that the conscience does not exist at all before one is taught, by one’s parents. You claim that there is no way to know right from wrong unless one is taught by some outside source of information. However, in reality, no one has such an excuse because all are in fact born with an internally-derived conscience regardless of the goodness or training, or lack thereof, of one’s parents.

It is a studied fact that a very young child naturally knows what is right regarding the Royal Law of Love on at least a very basic level… and is naturally attracted to it. This knowledge is hardwired – by God. That is why, yet again, Paul described this ability among the heathen as “natural” – not something that they had to learn from their parents, but understood by having the Law written on their hearts by God (Romans 2:13-15). This Biblical claim is actually backed up by modern research that shows that very young babies do in fact have an innate sense of right and wrong (Link).

And, Ellen White also speaks of children having a God-given conscience that must be considered in their training. They are not like animals that are born without a conscience:

The training of children must be conducted on a different principle from that which governs the training of irrational animals. The brute has only to be accustomed to submit to its master; but the child must be taught to control himself. The will must be trained to obey the dictates of reason and conscience. – Ellen White, January 10, 1882

So, here we have a child being born with inherent God-given gifts of both reason and conscience. Such gifts are created as internally-derived gifts by God. Call it “hocus pocus” of you want, but God is in fact a Divine creator who is well able to create such gifts with no less ability than He is able to create the universe or the complexities of the living human body. Therefore, it is not the parents who create the original ability for “enmity” against evil within their children. Parents do not get the credit for this basic ability to judge right from wrong. After all, it is God who said that He is the one who would create this enmity against sin within the human race (Genesis 3:15). He did not leave this up to us to create within our children. It is God and only God who creates the conscience in each one of us. Our responsibility toward our children is to train them on how to apply, maintain, grow, and guard their God-given gifts of reason and conscience. We nurture the plant that God has made, so to speak, but we did not create the original seed from which the plant was made able to grow.

Believing the Disproven – An Adventure in Science
You’re confusing different concepts. I’ve already pointed out that it is a miraculous act on the part of God that we are able to recognize the beauty of holiness and be truly free moral agents – despite being born with fallen sinful natures. Your problem is that you believe that this information, the knowledge of the goodness of love, is taught and must be learned over time. This just isn’t true. It is given by God as internally-derived information that is indeed “written on the hearts” of all mankind – from birth.

It is only because of this that Paul argues that the heathen “naturally know” right from wrong (Romans 2:13-15). Paul specifically claims here that God has made this knowledge part of everyone’s inherent nature – an internally derived truth that is completely natural or internally derived and need not be learned over time. And, this “natural” gift of God isn’t “hocus pocus” any more than any other miraculous act of God. Your argument that the heathen are taught various truths that have been handed down over time (such as the truth of marriage for example) doesn’t hold water. For example, there are many non-Biblical forms of marriage observed by various heathen cultures. What the heathen do naturally recognize, however, is the goodness of the Golden Rule to do unto others as you would have them do unto you… the Royal Law of selfless love for one’s fellow man.

Consider, in summary, that it would be impossible to even recognize “objective truth” without a pre-existing internal moral compass by which to determine truth from error. How do you know “the truth” when you see it? How do you know how to judge right from wrong? You only know because you’re given a conscience from birth that guides you toward the moral truth when you see it. It is this compass, this enmity against Satan, that has been supernaturally implanted by God, from birth, in every single human being.