This is interesting, because when the rich young ruler asked Him, "Good Master, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?" Jesus answered, "But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments." "He said to Him, Which? Jesus said, You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, honor your father and mother, and, you shall love your neighbor as yourself."
So here He quoted the Decalogue and pointed to it. What do you say about this?

Either you didn't read the passage or you didn't pay attention to it.
Num 23:19 God is not a man that He should lie, neither the son of man that He should repent. Has He said, and shall He not do it? Or has He spoken, and shall He not make it good?
The text is clear: God doesn't lie; if He said, He will do it; if He has spoken, He will make it good. Which means that in case He didn't do it after He had said it, in case He didn't make it good, He would have lied.
Any unbiased person would see this.
I suppose that in your opinion Ananias and Sapphira didn't lie when they failed to fulfill their promise. However the Bible says otherwise. Just read Acts 5.

But who is speaking about commentaries here? Friends, I'm simply speaking about Greek grammar; I'm simply speaking about a lexicon, which is a kind of Greek-English dictionary; I'm speaking about the meaning of a word.
If Webster was a catholic, a protestant, a buddhist, or an atheist, would there be any reason for not trusting his dictionary because of his profession?
And how could Thayer or anyone else have read about the Sabbath in a newspaper? Please, remember that the Advent Movement had nothing to do with the Sabbath. The Sabbath truth was discovered some years later.

Rosangela,

Perhaps you are not as aware of the religious background of the "secular" world in the United States. Newspapers and other public magazines and journals do often touch on religious topics, especially when they are considered newsworthy. Harold Camping, televangelists, Ben Carson, and many others are modern examples of religious persons who have appeared in the news for legitimate and religious reasons. But in the days of Mrs. White, William Miller, Josiah Litch, the National Religious Liberty Association (founded around 1893 by Seventh-day Adventists) and Mrs. White herself were all subjects for the newspapers.




It is certain that the fact of Mrs. White's church affiliation would have been included in the newspaper articles about her which also presented her views; so, if for no other reason, the name "Seventh-day Adventist" would have brought the Sabbath question to the minds of the public who were reading the newspaper.

Remember, this was in 1876 when the above quote was published--well after the "Seventh-day Adventist" church had officially formed (this church name appears as early as 1864 in Mrs. White's writings).

As for Thayer, anyone can read about him in an encyclopedia or online. The following, published online via Wikipedia, is said to contain material from Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911.



Notice the dates in the above. Thayer would have been exposed to the Sabbath truth before he finished his Greek lexicon. Also, I wonder if you realize that Mrs. White was given the Sabbath truth, in vision, in 1848. Adventists began keeping the Sabbath over 15 years before the Seventh-day Adventist church officially formed.

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

Arnold,

I just saw your response to me in post #165265. I would go on Mrs. White more than those other authors. She said that Luther had not discovered the truth of the Sabbath. I suppose being exposed to it and realizing the truth of it might be separate things. In any case, he did not "discover" the Sabbath.



Obviously, the Bohemians would have been among the "some" who kept the Sabbath.

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

GC, I wish I could understand yours and Gordon's viewpoint. Do you mean you will only believe a dictionary (which is not even a theological dictionary), if it's written by an SDA? I find this strange, because EGW's personal and office library was largely composed of non-SDA authors, many of them her contemporaries.

This is a valid point, Rosangela. We must beware that we do not make Gail Riplinger and others have too much influence on our views.

I can tell you that Mrs. White might have had books like John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress in her library, but she probably did not have any books by Thomas Paine. Neither, of course, was an Adventist. So, what is the difference between them? Both were scholars. Both were authors. But one was a sincere, truth-loving, law-abiding Christian while the other was a spiritualist. Interestingly, while Thomas Paine wrote in favor of deism, some of the same views which he held, such as that the scriptures were not inerrant, were views held by Thayer. Thayer was a unitarian, and had a big hand in making changes to the Bible through the translation of the corrupted manuscripts of Westcott and Hort.

The link below provides a good background into all of this, and shows the relationship each one has to the matter of Bible doctrines. It is noteworthy that Paine, Hort, and Thayer are all mentioned on the same page.

http://textualcriticism.scienceontheweb.net/AA/Unitarians.html

To answer your question more directly, Rosangela, I have no problem accepting a dictionary that is written by one who is following God's Spirit, regardless of their professed religious affiliation. However, by the same token, I would not follow the writings of even a Seventh-day Adventist who is not following God's Spirit. I would ask questions like these: How faithful is the man? What is his character and what are his fruits? What agenda does he have? What purpose does he have for writing what he does?

When I study the Bible, I want to know that the interpretation I make of it is not tainted by human corruptions of any kind, whether it be from adulterated Hebrew and Greek manuscripts, corrupted translations, or lexicons tainted by those willing to "bend" the truth to fit their own dogmas. I don't even want the interpretation I make of it to be tainted by my own opinion, pride, or prejudice.

Blessings,

Green Cochoa.

Commentaries sometimes must be taken with a grain of salt, but lexicons? There are no lexicons written by SDAs. If you can't trust a lexicon, you can't read the Bible in the original languages - not even if your mother tongue is Greek or Hebrew, for ancient Greek and Hebrew are very different from modern Greek and Hebrew. For those who have studied Greek and Hebrew, mere versions of the Bible are not enough, and lexicons are very useful tools.
As to Ellen White, she not only read but also quoted many Sundaykeepers - and many of them were her contemporaries. She had in her library, for instance, the Analytical Concordance of Robert Young, a biblical scholar (1822-1888). Surprisingly, she had in her library many books written by Brooke F. Westcott.
I didn't understand the reaction against Thayer. By the way, the definition he gave of the word anomia is biblically correct.

GC - do you ask the same questions when you introduce to us the views of Gail Riplinger?