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"eye of the needle" refers to a small gate or passage in ancient city walls, used after the main gates were closed at night. A camel could only pass through thi
by ipaddr 2y ago
"eye of the needle" refers to a small gate or passage in ancient city walls, used after the main gates were closed at night. A camel could only pass through this narrow opening if it was unloaded of its baggage and possibly crawled through on its knees.
Not as hard or impossible as it first appears but still harder.
- smokedetector1 2y agoEven better, thanks for that explanation
- krainboltgreene 2y agoExcept it’s not true, that’s a myth.
- gosub100 2y ago[flagged]
- coldtea 2y agoNo, more so.
- krainboltgreene 2y agoThe line absolutely exists in the Bible.
- coldtea 2y agoIt's not true though (and no evidence that such a gate existed with that name). It's more likely exaggeration referring to actual camel (the large animal of the area) and the eye of a needle (an example of the smallest hole one would be readily familiar with at the time). If it was reffering to a named place, the very capable in both Jewish and Greek authors of the New Testament wouldn't have translated it as "τρυπήματος ῥαφίδος" (needle's opening) or "τρυμαλιᾶς ῥαφίδος" (needle's hole), as opposed to something like "narrow gate" or similar that would convey to people unfamiliar with Jerusalem the point.
- krainboltgreene 2y agoThis is categorically false: https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTYveLPTC/ https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTYveLPTC/ Also it just doesn’t make sense.
- gosub100 2y agothere are better citations than tiktok, please.
- ksenzee 2y agoIn this case the video is a bona fide Biblical scholar who does public outreach on TikTok. It's a good source.
- Trasmatta 2y agoOh yeah, I just clicked the link and it's Dan McClellan. Maybe TikTok isn't the best place to cite, but he's highly credible in terms of Biblical scholarship and history.
- krainboltgreene 2y agoNo one asked for your opinion on TikTok.
- vFunct 2y agoThe source is Dan Mccllelan, not TikTok. TikTok didn’t publish this, Dan did. TikTok is the medium, not the author. Otherwise it’s like complaining about citing “words printed on paper” when citing a book or journal.
- gosub100 2y agoIt's just an unsuitable, attention-zapping, toxic format for sharing information. It would be best to link to an article that can convey the full message. not a 15 second jolt which is what TT is all about.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- WarOnPrivacy 2y ago> "eye of the needle" refers to a small gate or passage in ancient city walls, There's a lot of discussion on this verse. Apparently, the gate interpretation didn't exist until the 11 century. It was rethought to be Rope for a while but this blog post discredits that. https://kiwihellenist.blogspot.com/2023/11/camel.html https://kiwihellenist.blogspot.com/2023/11/camel.html
- Trasmatta 2y agoFrom what I understand, this is actually highly debated among biblical scholars. This idea that he meant "it's hard but not impossible" seems to generally be pushed by wealthy religions and "prosperity gospel" types. Reading everything else Jesus said, I find it more likely that he literally meant the "eye of an actual needle". He did not seem to be a fan of the rich or powerful in any way.
- BalinKing 2y agoYeah, Jesus clarifies as such a few verses later: > Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:26, CSB, emphasis mine)
- saulpw 2y agoIt's not impossible for a rich person to develop spiritually and attain heaven. They just have to give up all their riches. So functionally it is easier for a camel to do this other equivalent nearly-impossible thing.
- swat535 2y agoIn a Catholic and the way those verses are interpreted is that it’s not that you have to give up all your money but give up greed, it basically means that you should not worship your wealth but place your highest of high towards God, then and only then you can use your wealth towards the Good as you have no more attachments. I think Protestant have similar interpretations but I could be wrong as they have many denominations.
- astura 2y ago>I think Protestant have similar interpretations Lol, I see you've never heard of the prosperity gospel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology "Protestant" is such a broad group of beliefs it's nearly impossible to make any sort of board assertion.
- bccdee 2y ago
- relaxing 2y agoJesus literally told his followers to give up their worldly possessions, but… sure. He intended to give a free pass to those who came after, that hinged on a quirk of city planning that would not exist until centuries later.
- antifa 2y agoNo when he said "worldly possessions" he mostly just meant funkopops.
- cushychicken 2y agoI never knew that. Makes the metaphor a lot more applicable.
- bccdee 2y agoA common myth! No, no gate or passage was ever referred to as "the eye of the needle" in antiquity. [1] That verse is intended to be taken literally. Jesus Christ was quite outspoken on his feelings about the wealthy, but of course, wealthy Christians need a way for him to have meant something figurative when he told them to surrender their worldly riches. [1]: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/new-testament-studies/article/origin-of-the-needles-eye-gate-myth-theophylact-or-anselm/51F6B1FD504C36C42D6201F6D87F83C3 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/new-testament-studie...
- aitchnyu 2y agoThere is a hypothesis the Greek word means rope instead of camel, that the parable means we cant thread a rope through a needle. Arabic word for camel and rope are same in a similar verse. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_of_a_needle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_of_a_needle