Tuesday, September 8, 2009

10 Acts from the N.T. in Modern Language

1. Love "I Am/I Will Be"--the Personal Ultimately Real, the Eternal Good, Truth, and Loving with all of your self, all of your heart, all of your mind, and all of your strength.

2. Don't make any finite thing, idea, goal, or person the center of your life. Your focus is to be the unseen Center, the Eternal 'behind' all that is visible and temporary.

3. Be sacred in your words and thoughts. don't ridicule what is true or ultimate.

4. Take at least one evening and day a week for worship, reflection, and re-creation. This time is to help and revitalize, not to limit or to legalize.

5. Honor and help others, especially your own aging parents.

6. Love all, including your enemies as yourself. Don't violate others in thought, word, or deed, certainly don't kill anyone.

7. Be faithful and loyal to one other person for life, in an ultimate sense through intellectual, emotional, and physical union. Sexual fidelity and purity are very important.

8. Share your things with those in need. Don't take what doesn't belong to you.

9. Speak the truth always in love, in compassion and mercy. Be honest and forthright.

10.Simplify; be content with what is good and necessary. Don't long for what others have.

In the Light,

Daniel Wilcox

5 comments:

Hystery said...

From where are you drawing your ten? I do love biblical studies.

Daniel Wilcox said...

Hi Hystery,

Look at the order of the commands again:-) I'm doing what Keith Ward the Oxford prof (of God: A Guide for the Perplexed, et.) says was done in faith history and should still be done by us--sublate. By this term he means that we should continue to revise our understanding of Scripture as we grow closer to the Truth of God. For instance, Jesus chose the "love all humans" passages in some of the prophets of the O.T. as normantive and revised the hate passages in the Psalms and parts of the Torah.
What I did in my blog is restate the Ten Commandments from the perspective of the NT in modern English. I actually got started doing this when I was trying to help several individuals who had a desire for Truth but who found traditional religious language abhorrent. I am trying to honor the original Israelite commandments but sublate and paraphrase from the perspective of Jesus and present day understanding.

How's your 'whirlwind' going:-)

Daniel

Hystery said...

Oh! That makes sense. To my thinking, that is very Quakerly of you. I often think that there is a deep message we carry with us (perhaps I should call it a message of potential) which can be unlocked and which, when unlocked, frees us to become that which is Good in us. I think this is why holy writings, when contextualized and interpreted through the appropriate lens, often speak so deeply to us. We can be reformed, seemingly by words but really by the Light within us waiting patiently for us to awaken to what the deepest part of us has always already known. At this point, I think of Harry Potter choosing to be in Gryffindor rather than in Slytherin although his apparent nature was more Slytherin-esque.

But I have a cold. It feels as though some malicious person packed my face with mucous and my thinking is not very clear.

Daniel Wilcox said...

Hi Hystery,

I'm responding way late to your comment.

Would you believe I'm not a Potter fan. My oldest son (who's 27) thinks there is something wrong with my mind;-)
I don't care for fantasy lit, so I no doubt am missing some great times, right?

Thanks for sharing. And I hope your cold is long gone.

Daniel

Hystery said...

Now, I'm responding way lay to your response!

First I must say that your son is right. There is something wrong with you if you don't like Harry Potter. ;-) Maybe you aren't as dorky as I am. I just assume everyone loves Star Wars and Star Trek, Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings.

My cold is over and I've been haunting QQ just to read your discussions with Adrian. Good stuff from both of you although admittedly, much of it goes over my head. Still, I learn so much from you.