(Matthew 5:20) “For I say to you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.”I am a “scribe”. This mean that I write (Christian and other) books. The modern word for “scribe” may be “book author”. The words of Christ mean that if one writes correct theological books (even speaking correctly on the topic of salvation), this does not warrant his salvation. The faith needs to be manifested by the life. It is confirmed by
(James 2) “19 You believe that there is one God; you do well: the devils also believe, and tremble. 20 But will you know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead? 21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son on the altar? 22 See you how faith worked with his works, and by works was faith made perfect? 23 And the scripture was fulfilled which said, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed to him for righteousness: and he was called the Friend of God. 24 You see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.”The salvation depends on faith only not on deeds (and who say otherwise has no right to be called a Protestant), but the faith is true only when it is manifested by deeds. In the example of Abraham, he was justified by the fact that he did a certain deed (agreeing to sacrifice his son) accordingly the faith he had that God may resurrect him even if he got killed.
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Extended sermon text — Matthew 5:20 — The Righteousness of the Scribes and Academic Degrees
Victor Porton’s personal theological reading of Matthew 5:20; the views below are the author’s interpretation.
Full sermon text
I will show that God considers PhD as a sin, because of the stamp on the forehead and because of the following Matthew verse. You need to clean from this sin, even if you are not a PhD.
A sermon on Matthew 5:20:
“For I say to you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.”
Scribes are now called PhD. Pharisees are defined by Strong’s Greek lexicon as “a separatist, i.e. exclusively religious”. Let call them “monks”.
Both PhDs and monks have strong ethic codexes. Many, if not most, PhDs strive to improve well-being of mankind by doing scientific research, rather than just working for money. Monks dedicate life to prayer. But God rejects both PhDs and monks.
What is righteousness? It is proper alignment with a standard of goodness. Many PhDs are aligned with their ethics. But God does not suffice with their ethics.
Jesus is requiring righteousness that is greater than both PhDs and monks. That is, you need to have features of both PhDs (search for knowledge) and monks (dedication by faith). If you don’t search for knowledge, you won’t enter into kingdom of heaven. If you are not a robot for doing good (like monks pretend), you won’t enter the kingdom of heaven. To enter into kingdom of heaven, you need both search for knowledge (not only religious one) and dedicate yourself to God.
God is against the closed system of the academia. Why? I discovered in mathematics some things such as ordered semigroup actions and discontinuous analysis. But the world is divided (PhDs vs non-PhDs) so that there is no celebration of my discoveries. Introducing ordered semigroup actions into the educational system would probably grow world economy additional 2x in 30 years (or faster due to AI). That nobody helps me is a big crime (at least, morally), like stealing $50 trillion. God holds PhDs responsible for the crime.
Like other Christians, I tried to guess what the “stamp on the forehead” from Rev. 13:16 may mean. Once I however was struck by what seems the most proper understanding: “forehead” here means what is the stamp is for: the mind located in forehead, that is the stamp is a certification of the mind, the higher education degree. And the other stamp in the same verse is on a hand, that is the stamp of hand-working skills that a human has.
This also explains some of the hidden sense after (Rev. 13:17) “And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.” This simply means that people having no either higher education or registered working skills (mark on the hand) will have no legal capacity.
The stamp on the forehead is called the stamp of the beast, a symbol of stupidity. Moreover, (Rev. 14:10) “… The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation…” Wine signifies stupidity, because a human who drank wine becomes stupid. This is especially true for wine poured out without mixture.
This means that the “brain” of this world, the academy is considered stupid by God. One example of such stupidity is missingness of ordered semigroup actions in scientific databases, due to degree separation process and everybody being greedy (you not paying for my work despite it is important).
(1Jn. 2:2) “And he is the propitiation… for the sins of the whole world”. A possible translation is whole world, rather than entire world. For people for whom the world is divided into castes (not whole), such as PhDs and non-PhDs, there is no propitiation for the sins, that is they go to the hell.
Now, consider: Even you yourself aren’t a PhD, you may have PhD friends, you may trade (even unknowingly) with PhD, etc. So, you are contaminated by the theft of $50T. (1Cor. 6:10) “… thieves… shall [not] inherit the kingdom of God.” So, the only way to be clean from theft is to return the money to the society. I work on a project that will distribute money to scientists using blockchain. So, to return money to the society, you need to donate to me. (The first donations will be used to move finances to a charity instead of my personal money.) If you are a PhD, just send like half of your salary. See the link in the video description, how to donate. If you didn’t donate, you are still in theft sin and the heaven are closed for you.
You may be against me earning this way money through religion. But in this case, if you don’t donate me, because of that your reasoning, you go to the hell because you consider me not ethical. What is more important: not to send me money because of your religious ethics, or you not to go to the hell? It is more important that you should be cleaned from participation in the theft of $50T by donating back to the society. Suppose, if I had the same ethics as you. Then I would weep: I can’t earn a little money for returning $50T to its place, and billions of people would suffer from my ethics.
If you are told that you are evil, you can change, and you don’t, you are going to the hell: (He. 10:26-27) “For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins, But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries.”
You may ask: But how then salvation by faith? Aren’t you preaching salvation by deeds? It is resolved using a simple but important principle: If you both want and can, then you do. If you request from God salvation, then you want to do good deeds (because salvation is not “I don’t want to go to the hell”, but it is instead “I want to become good, that is to do good deeds.”) When you request from God grace, you request to get the desire to do good. You request God to make you a robot doing good. Therefore, if you repent, then you want to return stolen money. If you both want and can return money, then you return money. If you don’t want to return money, then you didn’t receive grace against theft, because you didn’t pray that you wouldn’t a thief anymore and are not willing to become non-thief. So, you don’t pay, only if you are not saved by faith. In other words, when you convert to Christ, you request God to make you a robot doing good. If you are not doing good, then you never requested it from God. Think about (1Pe 1:17) “And if you call on a Father, him who judges impartially according to each man’s work, live the time of your journey in fear.”, (Jam. 2:24) “You see therefore that from works a man is made righteous, and not from faith only.”
If you never requested God to make you do good, then you never converted to Christ. To ask not to take you to hell is not enough. If you don’t want to be non-thief, you cannot ask God to make you non-thief. If you want to be non-thief and can pay, you will pay.
When bombing Germany, everybody there were assumed to be a Nazi, unless he/she were belonging to resistance movement. Who is not with me to overcome the PhD system, is against me. (Matthew 12:30) “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.”
Check the donate link in video description.