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You obviously have NO idea what the Passive and Aorist are....

Aorist is NOT "past tense." Passive is not "past tense," either. Aorist refers to a completed action--in the past when coupled with the indicative mood (but the verb in question--gennao--is subjunctive, not indicative).

Here's a grammar lesson for you: Passive tense isn't past time, not even in English.

Here's a sentence with an active verb:

I hit the ball
​

The verb, hit, is what I (the subject) do. I act upon the ball.

Here's a sentence with a passive verb:

I was hit by the ball
​

The verb, was hit, describes what the ball did, not what I (the subject) did. "I" did not act; I was acted upon.

So, in Greek, the passive means that the subject (Nicodemus, in John 3) is acted upon--he does not do the borning again to himself.

This really is quite simple. I had hoped you had even a simple understanding of English grammar. Obviously, Greek grammar is not the only thing you're ignorant of.

The Archangel

 

"Jesus was baptized by John."
That is a statement that is in the passive.
In English it is a form of the verb "to be" used with the past participle of another verb.
The above statement is entirely different than:

You must be born again. (verse 7)
or
Except a man be born again he cannot enter the kingdom of God. (verse 3)
Verse 3 is written in the form of a subjunctive (Unless, except, if...)

In Verse 7 an infinitive is used.
You must be born again, however it might more literally be put:
It is necessary "to be" born again.
The necessity to be born again is still stated. Nicodemus had not been born again. I am sure that neither one of us disagree on the fact that this is an action that would be taken by God. He needed to be born "from above."

But it wasn't a past action, as in aorist tense--something completed.
Verse seven indicates that. It was imperative that Nicodemus be born again. Jesus made this statement three times.

Eventually he will get around to telling Nicodemus what needs to be done in order for him to be born again, for he ins't born again now.

 

You simply have no clue how Greek works, do you?

In no place in this passage is the imperative form of gennao used. You are simply wrong.

Every time Jesus makes the "born again" statement in this text, it is in the passive. It simply isn't something Nicodemus can do to or for himself.

You simply don't get it. What you are doing, however, is demonstrating that you have no facility with or understanding of the biblical languages or, for that matter, English....

The Archangel

 

The Munster Rebellion was an aberration among Anabaptists, not typical of the movement. Anabaptists were pacifists in favor of religious liberty. You cannot justify the systematic persecution, torture, and murder by Magisterial Protestants and Roman Catholics of other Christians by pointing to the Munster Anabaptists. It was an approved policy by Protestant and Catholic state churches to persecute and attempt to exterminate Anabaptists, Baptists, and other Dissenters.

For one thing, I would not have been on the religious counsel in Geneva because I would not have been a state-churchist. I would have been an Anabaptist/Baptist who believed in religious liberty and did not believe in punishing anyone for their religious beliefs.

If you are a Baptist and can say that you would have sat on such a counsel or been a part of such a state church which persecuted and killed others for their religious beliefs, you should be deeply ashamed. You spit on your spiritual ancestors, and any defenders of state church murderers do the same.

 

This is a deflection which cannot justify or excuse Calvin or any other state church murderer.

However, I regularly and actively fight against abortion.

 

Did you read my post? It is seldom the entire confession. For example reformed Baptists do not sprinkle infants.

 

Not that it's germane to the discussion between you two.... but, you do realize, don't you, that the baptist movement did not grow out of the Anabaptists, right?

Calvin died in 1564 and John Smyth began what would become the Baptist Movement in the 1600s.

So, no, you wouldn't have been a Baptist in Calvin's time.

The Archangel

 

You are only partially correct. The General Baptists, who were the first Baptists, were influenced by the Anabaptists/Mennonites, through John Smyth who gravitated toward them. Thomas Helwys, who was with Smyth when they fled to Holland, did not join Smyth in his sentiments and went back to England where he established the first Baptist church on English soil. Helwys and his group produced the first Baptist confession of faith.

In Calvin's time, I would have been an Anabaptist.

 

I don't often use fundamentalists as sources, Baptist or otherwise, but this article has the facts about Magisterial Protestant persecution and murder. I'll link to the entire article, and I urge all to read it, but below the link, here is an excerpt about Calvin:


http://www.wayoflife.org/database/protestantpersecutions.html



"JOHN CALVIN IN GENEVA WAS A PERSECUTOR

1. Calvin enforced Christian doctrine and principles at the point of the sword. In October 1563, the Geneva government burned to death Michael Servetus for heresy. Servetus held unitarian views and was definitely a false teacher, but the New Testament nowhere instructs the churches to kill false teachers. Servetus’ death sentence was supported not only by Calvin, but also by Melanchthon in Germany and Bullinger in Geneva and by other Protestant leaders who were consulted about the case.

2. Other men were also put to death under Calvin’s tenure. “So entirely was he in favour of persecuting measures, that he wrote a treatise in defence of them, maintaining the lawfulness of putting heretics to death; and he reduced these rigid theories to practice, in his conduct towards Castellio, Jerom Bolsee, and Servetus, whose fates are too generally known to require being here repeated. At the council of Geneva, 1632, Nicholas Anthoine was condemned to be first hanged and then burned for opposing the doctrine of the Trinity...” (J.J. Stockdale, The History of the Inquisitions, 1810, p. xxviii).

3. In the days of King Edward VI of England, Calvin wrote a letter to Lord Protector Somerset and urged him to put Anabaptists to death: “These altogether deserve to be well punished by the sword, seeing that they do conspire against God, who had set him in his royal seat” (John Christian, A History of the Baptists, Vol. 1, chap. 15).

4. Historian John Christian observes that Calvin “was responsible in a large measure for the demon of hate and fierce hostility which the Baptists of England had to encounter.”


Calvin was a demonic monster, and some supposed Baptists here want to defend, admire, and idolize someone who would have put them to death for their beliefs. Astounding! I thought I had seen just about everything, but I guess not.

 

Monergists err when they allow themselves to be pulled into debates about John Calvin. Even if Calvin was a deranged psychopath it has nothing at all to do with Monergism. The theological case for Monergism pre-dated John Calvin. Rabid Synergists bring out the Calvin trump card thinking it is a theological refutation of Monergism. If you think about it, that is a tactic used when theological arguments have failed.

 

Here is an example of what another state church, the RCC, did to the Waldensians. I wonder if our resident Catholics will defend this the way some of our resident Calvinists defend Calvin:

Piedmont Easter

In January 1655, the Duke of Savoy commanded the Waldensians to attend Mass or remove to the upper valleys of their homeland, giving them twenty days in which to sell their lands. Being in the midst of winter, the order, of course, was intended to persuade the Vaudois to choose the former; however, the bulk of the populace instead chose the latter, abandoning their homes and lands in the lower valleys and removing to the upper valleys. It was written that these targets of persecution, including old men, women, little children and the sick "waded through the icy waters, climbed the frozen peaks, and at length reached the homes of their impoverished brethren of the upper Valleys, where they were warmly received."

By mid-April, when it became clear that the Duke's efforts to force the Vaudois to conform to Catholicism had failed, he tried another approach. Under the guise of false reports of Vaudois uprisings, the Duke sent troops into the upper valleys to quell the local populace. He required that the local populace quarter the troops in their homes, which the local populace complied with. But the quartering order was a ruse to allow the troops easy access to the populace. On 24 April 1655, at 4 a.m., the signal was given for a general massacre.

The Catholic forces did not simply slaughter the inhabitants. They are reported to have unleashed an unprovoked campaign of looting, rape, torture, and murder. According to one report by a Peter Liegé:

Little children were torn from the arms of their mothers, clasped by their tiny feet, and their heads dashed against the rocks; or were held between two soldiers and their quivering limbs torn up by main force. Their mangled bodies were then thrown on the highways or fields, to be devoured by beasts. The sick and the aged were burned alive in their dwellings. Some had their hands and arms and legs lopped off, and fire applied to the severed parts to staunch the bleeding and prolong their suffering. Some were flayed alive, some were roasted alive, some disemboweled; or tied to trees in their own orchards, and their hearts cut out. Some were horribly mutilated, and of others the brains were boiled and eaten by these cannibals. Some were fastened down into the furrows of their own fields, and ploughed into the soil as men plough manure into it. Others were buried alive. Fathers were marched to death with the heads of their sons suspended round their necks. Parents were compelled to look on while their children were first outraged [raped], then massacred, before being themselves permitted to die.

This massacre became known as the Piedmont Easter. An estimate of some 1,700 Waldensians were slaughtered; the massacre was so brutal it aroused indignation throughout Europe. Protestant rulers in northern Europe offered sanctuary to the remaining Waldensians. Oliver Cromwell, then ruler in England, began petitioning on behalf of the Waldensians; writing letters, raising contributions, calling a general fast in England and threatening to send military forces to the rescue. (The massacre prompted John Milton's famous poem on the Waldenses, "On the Late Massacre in Piedmont".) Swiss and Dutch Calvinists set up an 'underground railroad' to bring many of the survivors north to Switzerland and even as far as the Dutch Republic, where the councillors of the city of Amsterdam chartered three ships to take some 167 Waldensians to their City Colony in the New World (Delaware) on Christmas Day 1656. Those that stayed behind in France and the Piedmont formed a guerilla resistance movement led by a farmer, Joshua Janavel, which lasted into the 1660s.

 

I care nothing about the Monergist-Synergist debate. I do care about religious liberty. I will admit to being "rabid" about that.

 

Well, if you study Reformation history you will realize that the two were inexorably linked. That is not the case today, for "religious liberty" has lost its meaning.

 

Seeing what some Baptists have posted here, I would say that religious liberty needs to be reemphasized and its history re-taught. Maybe then the price our ancestors paid for it would be appreciated and not dishonored by misplaced loyalties and admirations.

I'm beginning to wonder if Baptists even hold to religious liberty any more.

 

"What we have done: We have taken the great, sanctified Baptist doctrine of the priesthood of the believer, and made it to cover every damnable heresy that mind could imagine! It’s a tragedy--it's a tragedy." W. A. Criswell


"Because of the opprobrious epithet "liberal," today they call themselves “moderates.” A skunk by any other name still stinks!" W. A. Criswell

 

Speaking of heresies...this is a classic from "Rebel":

"I certainly don't believe God poured out his wrath on Christ. That is a view of the atonement that I do not accept." (2/9/2015)

 

The problem is Calvinist PROUDLY wear the label. Why? Face the facts, Calvin was a thug and understood nothing about the love of Christ and brethren. In fact according to God through John, one who says they love God and hates their brethren are liars. That is God's word on the matter and I agree with God.

 

Face the facts. You are dead wrong. You need to do some real in-depth reading of the life of Calvin by a legitimate scholar --not your normal poisonous websites.

You need to read samples from his sermons, lectures, commentaries and letters. Do not feed yourself on hatred and utterly false accounts of his life. Act Christianly.

This is what he wrote to Servetus :

"I neither hate you nor despise you; nor do I wish to persecute you; but I would be as hard as iron when I behold you insulting sound doctrinewith so great audacity."

 

I'm justifying church persecution. You say I deflect......why bring up Anabaptist? When did Calvin persecute them?


You say I deflect? Why bring up Anabaptists? When did Calvin torture or kill them? Do you call King David a murderer? We do not denounce all thinks David because of this sin. To do so would be to denounce his blood line.....which is unthinkable. To denounce all thinks Calvin due to a sin makes no sense either. Calvin didn't even invent Calvinism. He did come up with the 5 points, nor did he teaching anything new.

I am glad to hear that you work against abortion. You may not agree, but I am honest when I say, that the silence of the modern Christian on this, is worse than any sin Calvin(Luther, Anabaptists,) ever did.

And regarding the counsel of Geneva. You think you would have the moral conviction you do now? That is incredibly hard to say, seeing how your environment would have been much different. You view of capital punishment may have been different, view of slavery may have been different, view of heresy may have been different..... You would have been a product of the time, economics, education system, etc..... Granted the Bible would influence you. But it has took America hundreds of years and we still can't total shake racism(not just by whites). Environment is never an excuse for evil, but it does always breed sin.

You think there would be baptist churches all over America if not for the reformation? We would all still probably be part of the RCC or you would be the modern day Anabaptist (maybe), who are the Amish. Talk bad about them.... Vilify them if you want. But our Protestant churches would not be here if not for them.