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[DMcKay]

My Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Several times in the last few weeks I have had similar questions posed to me. These question, while not Earth shattering are important to the people asking them and usually take a great deal of time in answering. The questions I am talking about are those that are asked by new Christians and even more mature Christians who may have never heard or understand certain Christian terms that many of us take for granted.

I have seen this as being a problem while I was in the service. If you have ever watched a war movie you will see the troops look like they are speaking another language because they are constantly using Military terminology which is often just the Military's abbreviations for different things such as "Sargeant, I want you to set up an NDP over there with M60s arranged at guard positions with overlapping FOF." Means " I want you to set up a Night Defensive Position in that area, with the belt-fed machine guns set up so that they can overlap where the bullets will go so that it won't allow hole in our defense that the enemy can get through.

As Christians there are many terms that we use on a daily basis, or maybe even just on an occasional basis which many of our members may not have ever heard before or have any idea of the meaning. I would like to set up a Christian jargon dictionary Forum in the Theology section that can be used like a dictionary for all of our members. So I am going to set up a folder in the Theology area called terminology. If you have terms that you don't understand or terms that you do and would like to share them with us post them in that folder. I will go through them and make sure that the meanings that are given are correct and as easy to understand as possible. If just the terms you want to understand are posted I will give the meanings from a Biblical position and keep everything alphabetized so that things are easy to find. Some of us use these terms like we think that everyone knows what we mean and I know that this isn't true.

The more people who get involved the faster this tool will be provided for the use of our members. If you are giving the meaning of a term, remember that you can't define a term by using that term in your definition. If we have more than one answer or meaning given for a term I will either decide which is the most concise, or combine them if the cover different aspect of the terms meaning. If you would like credit for you assistance them write you name at the bottom of the definition and I will cite you as the source of the terms meaning.

Remember, I am not talking about the terms that people can just open BibleGateway and do a search. I'm looking for the terms that can be completely baffling to many members. For example the term "kenosis" is used quite a bit when discussing the birth and ministry of Jesus Christ. this short word takes a fairly long paragraph to describe in English terms and not all of our members are speaking English as their primary language.

Remember if you have a question or doubt about a meaning of a term others do as well.

[RestoreTheRiver]

This is a excellent idea. I fully agree that scripture should be the foundation of the definitions in our glossary of terms. Given that, there are terms where there is more than one responsible perspective as to the scripturally based definition. Will more than one perspective be welcome, and represented, in the glossary?

Michael

[DMcKay]

Originally Posted by RestoreTheRiver

This is a excellent idea. I fully agree that scripture should be the foundation of the definitions in our glossary of terms. Given that, there are terms where there is more than one responsible perspective as to the scripturally based definition. Will more than one perspective be welcome, and represented, in the glossary?

Michael

Michael,

I think that the answer to that depends on the term or terms themselves. I think that for the most part Biblical terms are going to have a single meaning. If there is more than one definition it will depend on whether or not it is Biblical.

Don M

[intricatic]

This sounds like a good idea to me. I could set up a collaborative database type of system for it, as well, if it's necessary or beneficial to organization.

[DMcKay]

Ian,

If you can set up something that has a simple alphabetical structure that can be cross-linked to other terms that are relevant to the understanding of differences, no forget that. If you can set up something that is just alphabetized similar to the members list, we can just add a "See also" to the back of an entry to direct anyone to other terms that also are tied to understanding terms that someone is looking up. For instance, someone is looking for information about Jesus being both God and man, under Jesus we could place "Also see: Kenosis". I think that this would be easier on you and simple enough for our members.

Don M

[intricatic]

Well, mysql is inherently a relational database system, so a system that cross-references would actually be easier than just a simple alphabetic system, in theory. I'll see what I can put together with existing mods first.

[DMcKay]

NOTE: to all Forum members, if there is a term you have heard and don't know or aren't sure what it means let us know. I want this to be a helpful working tool for studying Scripture. The more terms that we list and define the greater help that this project will be. Don't be embarrassed to ask about or mention a term you don't understand, if you have doubts there are probably several others who also are unsure and afraid to mention it.

[intricatic]

This is currently in the process of being implemented. The system itself is the easy part, writing out all the different terminologies is going to be the tricky part.