From: Dave Haggard (dave.haggard@mci.com)
Date: Tue Jul 30 1996 - 12:56:01 EDT
EG Frank said: "This means that you may need ONE bonified evangelical to send
"tolerance" messages to other evangelical christians." (text below, and also referring to other previous comments on this thread). -one of the most intolerant statements I've read in a long time.
It truly saddens me that non-evangelicals have the notion that evangelicals are intolerant of non-evangelical Christian and Jewish viewpoints.
Some high-profile evangelicals, a minority, with big mouths and closed minds, have soiled the reputation of the majority of evangelical Christians. IF YOU'REONE OF THOSE SMUG EVANGELICALS WHO THINKS YOU'VE GOT A CORNER ON THE TRUTH, THEN EXAMINE YOURSELF AS YOU READ THIS.
On the other side of the coin, though, I have run into many very intolerant Jews and non-evangelical Christians. For a while, I railed against the intolerance of so-called liberals. Then I learned that the intolerant ones were the minority, and were usually the ones of high-profile. IF YOU'RE ONE OF THOSE SMUG LIBERALS OR JEWS WHO THINK YOU'RE TRULY TOLERANT, THEN EXAMINE YOURSELF AS YOU READ THIS.
Yeah, I'm an evangelical Christian. Proud of it. Get down to the personal level, and I could not, in good conscience, be anything else. But guess what! I have an open mind, and I approach discussions with those of other views with the sole purpose of learning. Every day, I work beside both the Jew and the liberal, and embrace both as brother or sister.
And all the while, I've been attacked by supposedly loving, so-called liberals, just as they have been attacked by supposedly loving, so-called evangelicals.
There's a whole boat-load of intolerance going on on both sides, and the comments I've read on this thread proves it.
Yeah, they're out there. BUT THEY AIN'T ME, OR THE SCHOOL I GRADUATED FROM, OR THE CHURCH I ATTEND, OR THE PEOPLE I MINISTER ALONGSIDE!!!!
It's high time we got off our evangelical/non-evangelical/Catholic/Jewish high-horse pride, and started to treat and speak to each other like brothers and sisters, children of the most-high God. The evangelical who questions the status of the Jew and the salvation of the liberal, and the Jew or the liberal who pigeon-holes the evangelical as a closed-minded weirdo, are all equally WRONG!!!!!
It's time that Christian and Jew of whatever stripe finally figure out that our mission is the same: to lead the world by the Light of Truth to salvation only by faith in God/Jehovah/YHWH. It ain't gettin' done with internal squabbling....
Sorry... 'Nuf said...
Rev. David Haggard --- | --- Tom's Kids Ministries
2895 El Capitan Dr. --- | --- Colorado Springs, CO 80918
(719) 534-9252 --- | --- fax: (719) 534-9570
renegade@rmii.com --- | --- http://www.rmii.com/~renegade
If you do not stand firm in your faith, you will not stand at all. -- Isaiah 7:9
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From: Elizabeth Grace Frank[SMTP:egfrank@cais.com]
Sent: Tuesday, July 30, 1996 8:47 AM
To: 'David John Marotta'; rweis@rci.rutgers.edu
Cc: Biblical Greek Mailing List; Biblical Hebrew Mailing List
Subject: RE: Managing the B-HEBREW list. A note from the List Owner
Our list owner has said:
>The difficulty with asking for "tolerance, civility
>and sympathetic respect for the views of others" is that those who
>would be the most likely to claim such virtues are often those who
>diislike evangelicals for not having these virtues. Since "tolerance"
>is often seen as a vice among evangelicals, to have a non-evangelical
>advocating that they have the virtue of tolerance is going to be like
>mixing oil and water.
This means that you may need ONE bonified evangelical to send
"tolerance" messages to other evangelical christians. It does not
mean that the board should be entirely evangelical.
These texts are religious documents for both jews and christians.
Just as there are some matters of sensitivity that may be best
understood by an evangelical christian, there are other issues that
require a jewish perspective.
I'm uncomfortable with evangelical christians trying to represent
the jewish perspective. I do a lot of jewish-christian dialog, and
its been my experience that even sympathetic christians do not
always understand the jewish perspective. I think therefore it
would be helpful to have people from both faiths on the board.
>helped the scholarly lists more than any other change has. Having
>some board members which can say, "Yes, I too believe that the
>Bible is authoritative in my life and have many of the same beliefs
>as you, but your post is still inappropriate because..." will do
>more for the list than trying to find common ground on the basis
>of scholarly tolerance.
Both religious christians and jews can make this statement. Surely,
you did not mean to imply that ONLY evangelical christians believe
that G-d has an authoritive role in one's life. Surely, you did not
mean that ONLY christians can affirm religious questions while limiting
the scope to scholarly discussions.
I agree that finding scholarly common ground can sometimes be
difficult. As a matter of course, I (I'm jewish) usually try to affirm
someone's religious search even when I offer criticism. I think I
demonstrated that when I made my post on the scope of the list
after the job posts. I'm sure I'm not the only jew who does so.
Yours, beth frank (egfrank@cais.com)
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