A short exchange on APOLLUMI and Robert Frazier.

 

Robert Frazier!

The following is two posts of a protracted discussion where the fate of Judas was being discussed, whether his fate was "annihilation" or not. A JW poster had argued that the word Greek word APOLLUMI means "destroy" or "destroyed utterly" and this is but one indication that the 'wicked,' as Judas was, will be 'annihilated," will cease to exist. At one particular point in jumps Robert V. Frazier with an objection and some kind of answer to something the JW poster had remarked. The following is what Frazier had written and the reply that was given him to which he did not respond to, either to make a rebutal or accepting his error in his first post.

Originally by JW poster: Well, the Greek words do mean "destroy" and..well, "destroy" does mean to "destroy." Do you know of anything than has been "destoyed" and "destroyed utterly" but keeps remaining what it was?

Robert V. Frazier's reply: As a matter of fact, yes, I do. Wine and wineskins, in Mark 2:22: "And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, he pours new wine into new wineskins." Yes, you guessed it: the word translated "ruined" above is apolumi, in the form apolountai to be precise. Not a single atom of either the wine or the wineskin would cease to exist in the example Jesus gives here.
Both would be rendered unfit for their intended purposes, however; the wineskin having a big rip in it is no longer able to hold liquids, and the wine being dumped on the dirt is no longer drinkable.
But the one is still a wineskin, and the other is still wine. Neither ceased to exist. Under normal conditions, matter is never created nor destroyed, only changed. A ripped wineskin will not cause itself or its contents to be converted to energy.
There is not a single instance in the Bible of this word ever meaning "annihilate". There are plenty of examples of it referring to living people becoming dead people. Also a lot of examples of various shades of meaning of "lost". If "annihilate" is even in the semantic range of apolumi, which is debatable, it is not ever used with that meaning in the Bible.
Here are all of the verses using the word, with Thayer's lexicon entry:
http://www.blueletterbible.org/tmp_dir/words/6/1138127960-2142.html

JW poster's rebutal: Who said anything about a person being "destroyed" in that their atoms that make up their physical body would no longer exist? I did not so who are you arguing with? If a person is "destroyed" that means the person no longer exists, not that the atoms that made up the phyiscal body do not!

>Both would be rendered unfit for their intended purposes, however; the wineskin having a big rip in it is no longer able to hold
>liquids, and the wine being dumped on the dirt is no longer drinkable.

And the person, the "soul," whose body has been destroyed is no longer able to keep the spirit, the life force that keeps the person alive (remember that a soul= body + spirit, you take away the body..no soul, no person...you take away their spirit...again, no soul, no person), for the body has been "destroyed" and hence has been "rendered unfit for (its) intended purpose"...so the person does not exist even though the atoms which comprised the body may well do...and in turn may well become part of another living thing...like a tree

>But the one is still a wineskin, and the other is still wine. Neither ceased to exist. Under normal conditions, matter is never created >nor destroyed, only changed. A ripped wineskin will not cause itself or its contents to be converted to energy.

And no one would use that "wineskin" as a "wineskin" again and the wine that would have spilt onto the "dirt" will soon degrade and the atoms it was comprised of will no longer be combined into what we call "wine, the wine would have ceased to exist, not its atoms Robert, as would the wineskin if not mended, it would eventually cease to exist as a wineskin. All this is analogous to a person who, being destroyed, would also have no resurrection, will not be "mended," so as not to be "a person" ever again. So, can you see now that though in both, the wineskin's and the wine's atoms still exist and have not been converted into "energy" or "destroyed," both will cease to exist as such? So, once again you have not said anything that refutes the fact that the bible says that the fate of the wicked is "destruction" in the sense it means it and you have used a completely bogus argument as no one, including me, has said anything about atoms turning into energy or ceasing to exist!

And under "normal conditions" Robert, tells me what you would do with a "wineskin" that has a rip in it or the wine that has been split onto the ground? You would throw away the "wineskin" and leave the wine to degrade where it fell. Now Robert, tells me what would happen to both? Would they both degrade over time so that they would completely disintegrate and eventually they could not either be said to be a wineskin nor the wine they once were? Is that not correct. Would they not have been destroyed...and as you would not be able to re-combine those atoms that made up either the wineskin or the wine they would have ceased to exist...yep, I would bet my bottom dollar that you know what this means to your use of Jesus illustration of the wineskins...or at least I hope you and JR does!

>There is not a single instance in the Bible of this word ever
>meaning "annihilate".

The English word "destroy" is the given lexical meaning for the word APOLLUMI and if one looks at any good English dictionary you will find that a synonym for "destroy" is...yep, you guessed it..."annihilate".

>There are plenty of examples of it referring to living people becoming dead people. Also a lot of examples of various shades of >meaning of "lost". If "annihilate" is even in the semantic range of apolumi, which is debatable, it is not ever used with that >meaning in the Bible.

Simply an assertion backed up with no evidence whatsoever. The fact is that the word is used of things that have been destroyed completely and this word is used by the bible writers to refer to the wicked's fate, along with "gehenna" and "fire". All these mean and depict that the person so destroyed will cease to exist and is hence...destroyed utterly and if they do not receive a resurrection they would have been destroyed forever...annihilation.

>Here are all of the verses using the word, with Thayer's
>lexicon entry: http://www.blueletterbible.org/tmp_dir/words/6/1138127960-2142.html

Good, one should be able to see that for the wicked then destruction is their fate....yes, they will be annihilated having neither life (of any kind) nor the hope of ever living again. Next time Robert, though I doubt there will be, why not actually deal what I have written rather than what you think I did and take your readers down the garden path blissfully unaware that you are doing so? Though I must admit it is funny watching you walk down the garden path while I sit on the porch drinking....wine! Cheers Robert.