Re: About perceiving flames. Was Addendum

On Saturday, December 4, 2004, at 07:48 , caeruleancentaur wrote:
[snip]
> I truly did not remember that it was you.  Please
> chalk the lapse of manners to my newness in the group.
Touché. I truly had forgotten that Charlie was Fr Charlie Brickner. I
haven't yet got used to the varying views of the new members - tho I am
learning very fast at the moment!!

Please accept my apologies both for imputing to you a motive that was
certainly incorrect and for the manner of my reply. If had had remembered
who you were, I would still have replied but I would have done so in a
very different way.

> .... And I will take your advice about giving my
> responses more thought.
Sally has advised me many times. I've got better (just imagine how I might
have replied otherwise!), but I still have some way to go, obviously    :)

> And I certainly meant no snipe at a traditional trinitarian belief.
> It is a belief that I hold, too.
It was most unfortunate that it was worded so very like arguments I have
heard used to attack that belief which we both share.
===========================================================

On Saturday, December 4, 2004, at 07:32 , Sally Caves wrote:

[snip]
> Ray writes:
>> I am saddened that Charlie has chosen to use the list to
>> make a not very subtle snipe at traditional trinitarian belief. I can
>> make
>> a reasonable guess which religious group he adheres to - but I have no
>> wish to go down that path.
>
> Now Ray, forgive me, but this was not only dogmatic and inflammatory, but
> an
> ill-informed ad hominem attack.
I cannot for the live of me see anything _dogmatic_ in what I wrote. As
for inflammatory, I had found many earlier remarks inflammatory and
offensive in this and some other recent threads - but, OK, two wrongs do
not make a right.

I said however I was *saddened*. Maybe you do not believe me, but there it
is. It is not exactly an attack - I personally was saddened at what some
one said, period.

I do take the point that I was ill-informed. Fairly obviously I would have
worded things differently if I had realized that Charlie was Fr Charlie
Brickner.

But I remember watching a TV program many years ago now - before Castro
took control in Cuba. An interviewer was asking someone why he thought
Castro & co, were communists. He replied something like "When you see
something white, covered in feather, with webbed feet and a bill, you know
it is a duck."

Over the past five decades I have several times had occasion to be told by
certain people that the trinity is untrue and one of the planks of their
arguments is *precisely* that certain passages in the NT should be
translated with "a"/"an" because there is no definite article in Greek. I
then see the same thing being written here on the list.

> It has turned a relatively low-keyed
> dispute about a linguistic matter into a true flame.
Let me remind you what was actually written:
> BTW (not to you, Ph.D.), neither the Matthean annunciation story
> (1:24) nor the Lucan (1:35) mention The Holy Spirit/Ghost.  In those
> verses the definite article is not used, so the translation would
> be "a holy spirit." To insert "the" is to paraphrase, to add a
> theological nuance not found in the text.
To translate "a holy spirit" is, as you agreed, to add a theological
nuance not in the original. Having heard practically the same argument put
to me several times, I wrongly assumed someone was using the list to slip
in an attack on traditional Christian belief without actually saying so.
But I may well have kept quite had I not found some remarks that followed
in the thread more offensive.

[snip]
> Never jump to conclusions, Ray.  And if you don't wish to go down that
> path,
> as you *say,*
I did *say* - and I meant it. I could name several groups that hold
similar views, but I have encountered them mostly from one. But I do *NOT*
  want to turn this into such an argument, that is why I said I was
*saddened* at the original statement.

[snip]
> Charlie's error was of a
> linguistic nature,
I seem to remember something about "theological nuance".
======================================================

But let me make it clear to everyone, as there seems some misunderstanding.
  I have no problem with accepting that other people do not agree with me.

Indeed, I explicitly said I respect their views and do not intentionally
seek to give offense. I have no problem with discussing the doctrine of
the Trinity, tho the _Constructed Languages List_ does not seem to me the
most appropriate place.

What I was objecting to is what I perceived to be - and quite mistakenly
perceived - the misuse of a thread to launch an attack on people's
personal belief without actually coming clean and saying so. OK - I
misunderstood some one and I have apologized for imputing such
dishonorable conduct to Charlie. I now realize it was unfounded. I have
apologized for the manner of my reply.

I hope Sally has noticed that I have not responded to certain other mails
in recent threads - I have heeded her words about wrestling with certain
creatures      ;)

Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
ray.brown@freeuk.com
===============================================
Anything is possible in the fabulous Celtic twilight,
which is not so much a twilight of the gods
as of the reason."      [JRRT, "English and Welsh" ]

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