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So what difference does Aramaic primacy really make?
#10
Shlama Fr. John,

What about when it comes to apologetics? Our agnostic, Muslim & other unbelieving critics are more than capable of finding the skeletons in our closet. They find out the dirty history of Greek textual transmission and throw it our faces. They point out contradictions in the Greek texts and we can't answer them. The Peshitta does make a difference when it comes to faith, especially when it comes to the most important issue - defending the Faith. When I used the Greek NT my opponents would eat me for breakfast, since I switched to the Peshitta they all shut-up. They may not want to believe that the Bible is the word of God but they can't discredit the Peshitta no matter how hard they try, its transmission history is spotless and it contains absolutely no contradictions, they have nothing to throw back in my face. The Greek texts can't boast this, it's only with the Peshitta that I can say "you have no proof, and are arguing from conjecture".

The theological implications for Aramaic primacy might not be so big with doctrinal matters within the Church, but the implications are gigantic when it comes to the Church's relationship with the unbelieving world. Yeshua gave us only one mission: "go forth and make disciples of all nations", and quite frankly with the Greek NT we're not doing as well as we used to. Today we live in an age of information overload, the lost soul that we are witnessing to can easily dig up the dirty laundry of our forefathers, then come back to us and say "how can you believe this, didn't you know...". Many Muslims for example even accuse the "Romans" of deliberately destroying the original Aramaic "injeel" (which supposedly foretold the coming of Muhammad, go figure) and replacing it with a Greek "corruption". Do we value our comfort zones more than the great commission?

The Greek NT has contributed hugely to Church division, we have so many different Greek texts so we shouldn't be surprised that we have so many different denominations, the connection is unmistakable. Yeshua said that a house that is divided against itself cannot stand, and this is what the enemy wants. If we value our traditions above the word of God - the true word of God then we are giving the adversary ammunition to destroy us.
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Re: So what difference does Aramaic primacy really make? - by Christina - 09-09-2008, 05:16 PM
Kudos to Christina - by Stephen Silver - 09-09-2008, 09:32 PM

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