It seemed good in the LORD to show the grievous errors of logic, and sound Biblical interpretation to our faithful readers here at CRN. (See we can all add Bible sounding intro’s to our posts). Today has been perhaps one of the clearest examples of fundamental hypocrisy. I even thought about putting up a quote about how people will attack me if I say they are wrong and call it, “Pharisaical Fundamentalist Hypocrisy.” But I didn’t. In fact I won’t. I do intend to start linking to my own blog a little more, but that is irrelevant to what I want to discuss here today.

Simply put, I want to say, “Mr. Cardwell, it doesn’t work that way.” You accuse Rob Bell of being

“such a master at the old used car sales tactic of ‘bait and switch’.”

You said, you felt you “had” to point out his errors. Well, Mr. Cardwell, I’ve worked in sales, in fact I still do and there is another very common tactic employed by salesman, it’s called the “I didn’t really mean that” tactic. In fact it happened today at my work. I work at a car auction. We had a guy shake his head to a bid. Suddenly, his bid is the highest and he realizes he can’t make that payment. You know what he said? He said, “Well, I was just shaking my head I wasn’t really bidding.” So at the auction they pull out the tape (they literally tape everything) and sure enough this “shaking” is how he bid on everything all day. What does that have to do with your post? Well, let’s look at some quotes.

First you said,

“Second, Mr. Bell presents that closing the prayer shawl, the Kanaf in front of you [which he demonstrates in the video, covering his face and head], is what was called the “prayer closet” by the rabbis. I cannot find a reference for this except for a few Messianic rabbis that suggest it, and even more often, retailers using this “prayer closet” as a selling point for their Tallyot (plural Talliyt). Check out any picture you like of Jews praying at the Western Wall and you’ll never see one praying in the manner that Rob Bell suggests.” (Emphasis mine)

So, Chris L does a great job of taking on the task you gave him and shows you the very thing you say doesn’t happen. Then you come back with this quote,

“I don’t refute that Jews today place talliyt over the head and cover the face. My comment was made because I had never seen or heard of that exact posture that Rob Bell demonstrated in the video. The EXACT posture. Now, I will concede that Rob may have been mistaken the way he demonstrated it, and that possibly what he meant to demonstrate was just covering the head and face.” (Emphasis yours)

Mr. Cardwell, It doesn’t work that way. Just like the poor guy at our auction today (who lucked out and was able to drop the car in arbitration because of some unannounced frame damage) you don’t get to say, “I didn’t actually mean that.”

You were very kind and responded to my email almost immediately and I appreciate that. However, this post cannot be allowed to stand. It cannot be allowed to stand if for no other reason then I don’t want Chris P to think I only respond when Mr. Silva attacks Rob Bell. I almost erased the word attack. But I have to leave it because you did attack. Then you used less than sound logic to make your case. You used hyperbole (almost always a sign that someone’s case is at best weak), you attacked the man’s character (see previous bait and switch quote). As you can see from this missive you violated the very Biblical rules of communication. To some extent I understand that, I’ve had to delete quite a few sentences from this short missive myself so as not violate any of those rules. I also have had to go back and change a title to my first missive in response to what was Slice of Laodicea. What’s worse, you’re exegesis is less than consistent.
Let’s look at your first argument against Rob’s interpretation of the prayer closet.
You said,

“I would suggest that the rabbis and Pharisees of Jesus’ day didn’t use a their prayer shawls in this way, because to cover the face was to hide who one was and Jesus indicted the hypocrites for bringing attention to themselves and their identities:”

Really? I agree with you. The problem is, your argument doesn’t help your case at all. In fact it helps Rob’s argument. Jesus was saying you should not be like the Pharisees but you should cover up and go into your closet thus obscuring your identity. It would be bad enough if you stopped there, but you go on. You go on to say,

“Furthermore, Paul, a rabbi himself, said that it was a shame for a man to cover his head when he prayed and doing what Rob Bell says that they did, would cover their heads:”

You even quoted the verse for us. But you stopped a little short from quoting that passage in its entirety, didn’t you? Doesn’t verse 13 of the same passage tell us that a woman should not pray with her head uncovered? I’m curious; do all the women in your church cover their head when they pray? And if you’re going to go into how it’s talking about a covering of authority then you are still guilty of an inconsistent hermeneutic. In case anyone is wondering you can look at the passage yourself by clicking here.

I won’t even bother quoting the first part of the passage that really goes into the whole head thing. It would just be too easy for me to get sidetracked.
I will close with another of your quotes. You said;
“Remember, Jesus is indictment upon the religious leaders of the day was that they followed the Law to such an degree that they stuck their finger in their mouth to [sic] themselves to vomit out a gnat so they wouldn’t eat blood. They tithed of the smallest of herbs, of mint and dill and cummin.”
I would say that Jesus actually had a few more indictments for the Pharisees then that, but this quote works. If I could paraphrase you, you seem to be saying that Jesus’ indictment of the Pharisees was that they kept the law but missed the point of it. I couldn’t agree more. In fact that is my biggest problem with Christian Research Network.

The problem this type of thing is very dangerous because I am sure many many people read what you (the you here referrring to all of the writers at Slice/CRN) write and it has the sound of being correct and spiritual but its not. It’s toxic. It goes against Scripture. It hurts the body of Christ. There is some good stuff posted over there (read Chris R’s post on James Cameron) but that only makes it worse for as you call them, “undiscerning Bible student.”

Coming in the future, we’ll look at the Sunday Night service; Is it Biblical or a past attempt by the church to be culturally relevant?