What were the scriptural arguments used for modern western racism?

Great question! Here are reasons starting from Southern Christian slave-owners to modern times.
First, the long-used King James bible never condemns "slavery". Rather, it provides guidelines for this "slavery" and encourages "slaves" to embrace their "bondage".

Let all who are under the yoke of slavery regard their masters as
worthy of all honor, so that the name of God and the teaching may not
be blasphemed. Those who have believing masters must not be
disrespectful to them on the ground that they are members of the
church; rather they must serve them all the more, since those who
benefit by their service are believers and beloved. Teach and urge
these duties. (1Tim. 6:1-5)
Slaves, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, in
singleness of heart, as you obey Christ; not only while being watched,
and in order to please them, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will
of God from the heart. (Eph. 6:5-6)
Tell slaves to be submissive to their masters and to give satisfaction
in every respect; they are not to talk back, not to pilfer, but to
show complete and perfect fidelity, so that in everything they may be
an ornament to the doctrine of God our Savior. (Titus 2:9-10)
Slaves, accept the authority of your masters with all deference, not
only those who are kind and gentle but also those who are harsh. For
it is a credit to you if, being aware of God, you endure pain while
suffering unjustly. If you endure when you are beaten for doing wrong,
what credit is that? But if you endure when you do right and suffer
for it, you have God's approval. (1Pet. 2:18-29)

If you just read the surface level English, it seems as if God is okay with slavery. The issue become much trickier when you read the Bible in it's original language.

"In the ancient world, service and slavery were closely related, so much so that one can scarcely distinguish the one from the other. The original words used for “servants” and “service” carry a variety of meanings between which it is not always easy to determine what is meant (All the Trades and Occupations of the Bible 1969, p. 197).

Apologeticspress.org does a fine job of elaborating more on the subject:

Arndt and Gingrich documented that the Greek word doulos meant “slave,” but that it also was used “in a wider sense” to denote “any kind of dependence.” In 2 Corinthians 4:5, the apostles are called the douloi (plural of doulos) of the Christians. Christ took on the form of a doulos, as stated in Philippians 2:7. Paul designates himself as a doulos of Christ in Romans 1:1, Philippians 1:1, Galatians 1:10, and numerous other passages (1967, pp. 205-206). The term can describe a person who is obligated in some way, whether voluntarily or involuntarily, to another person. Due to this broad use, various translations have employed a wide range of words to render the meaning of doulos in English. Using Romans 1:1 as a case in point, the NKJV has “bondservant,” the New Living Translation has “slave,” the KJV and ASV have “servant,” and the Darby Bible has “bondman.”
The Hebrew word ebed is similar to the Greek doulos, in that it can be
translated as “slave” or “servant.” In Exodus 4:10, Moses referred to
himself as the “servant” (ebed) of God. Abraham called himself the
ebed of the angels who came to visit him in Genesis 18:3. In Genesis
39:17-19, Potiphar’s wife described Joseph as the Hebrew ebed, and
Genesis 24:2 talks about the eldest ebed in Abraham’s house, who
“ruled over all he had.”

Because slavery was profitable, it makes sense that some Christians would be pre-disposed to slavery- but perhaps some did search the scriptures. The King James version never explicitly condemns slavery.
Some slave-owners said that the Bible supported slavery.
Kenneth Stamp, in The Peculiar Institution writes:

"...when southern clergy became ardent defenders of slavery, the master
class could look upon organized religion as an ally ...the gospel,
instead of becoming a mean of creating trouble and strive, was really
the best instrument to preserve peace and good conduct among the
negroes."

Twisting the Bible has been very profitable to many different groups historically, and it was no different with slaveholders.
Slaves were taught the scriptures in a way so that they had a sufficient fear of Him and of course, knowledgeable about the "slave" verses. Thus, some of them saw their slavery as their cross they must bear in order to receive God's favor.
Additionally, there's the whole Cain/cursed descendent of Noah thing.

"Cursed be Canaan; lowest of slaves shall he be to his brothers" (Gen 9:25)

I had presumed that this was only a thing of history, but this article
says that the whole Cain thing is exactly what's happening in some churches still today. (I emailed the pastor about whether or not this article is true. I will update this article if I get a reply)
Additionally, it was said that different races should not mix. For a very long explanation of the arguments against interracial marriage, visit this site.
Here is a small excerpt from the article:

Interracial marriage is discouraged throughout the Bible. In the book
of Ezra, the Israelites repented of their abandonment of God. As part
of this repentance they pledged to end their interracial marriages
according to God's will:
“We have been unfaithful to our God by
marrying foreign women from the peoples around us. But in spite of
this, there is still hope for Israel. Now let us make a covenant
before our God to send away all these women and their children, in
accordance with the counsel of my lord and of those who fear the
commands of our God. Let it be done according to the Law. Rise up;
this matter is in your hands. We will support you, so take courage and
do it.” (Ezra 10)
A similar experience is recorded in Nehemiah 13:
“Moreover, in those days I saw men of Judah who had married women from
Ashdod, Ammon and Moab. Half of their children spoke the language of
Ashdod or the language of one of the other peoples, and did not know
how to speak the language of Judah. I rebuked them and called curses
down on them. I beat some of the men and pulled out their hair. I made
them take an oath in God’s name and said: ‘You are not to give your
daughters in marriage to their sons, nor are you to take their
daughters in marriage for your sons or for yourselves.’” Other
prohibitions against interracial marriage can be found in Exodus
34:12-16, Joshua 23:12, and Deuteronomy 7:3: “Do not intermarry with
them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters
for your sons.”
Some have claimed the Bible's ban on interracial marriage was based on
religion rather than ethnicity, and that the sole purpose of the
prohibition was to keep the people pure of idolatrous influence.

The article is saying that God has sanctioned the pureness of races and therefore they should not mix with a white-supremist attitude.
This subject is further explained here:

The theology of Donny Reagan, pastor of Tennessee’s Happy Valley Church of Jesus Christ, should inspire Anderson to think again. “If corn was raised in a certain way, yellow corn, don’t mix it with white corn. If you do your mixing, you can’t bring yourself back again,” Reagan warned in a sermon recorded last year at his 600-member church in Johnson City, Tenn. Claiming that black athletic stars choose white wives in a willful attempt to make their offspring lighter, Reagan declared, “It’s another defiance of God’s law, it’s a worldly way.”

Summary:
1. The widely and long used KJV does not specifically condemn slavery and has passages that provide guidelines that were twisted to support slavery.
2. The long surviving Curse of Cain/Cursed descendent of Noah belief. (That blacks are cursed by God)
3. The belief that interracial marriage is bad. (with a flavor of white supremacy)


How does Reformed Theology consider passages that may imply that God is the "subject of sufferings"?

The point Edwards makes here is that since God accomplishes his purposes in all things, even evil things, he cannot be said to be carried away by emotions and thus experience involuntary ecstasy or distress.  But Edwards clearly admits that God can feel pleasure – the crucial point being that God, not the creature, is its ultimate source:

Though he has real pleasure in the creature's holiness and happiness; yet this is not properly any pleasure which he receives from the creature.  For these things are what he gives the creature.1

Similarly, Edwards refers to God's "hatred"2 and "indignation"3 toward sin, but contends that since he wills that it occur, and that it ultimately glorifies him, it does not distress him:

There is no inconsistence in supposing, that God may hate a thing as it is in itself, and considered simply as evil, and yet that it may be his Will it should come to pass, considering all consequences.4
The judgments God executes on the wicked, are spoken of as being for the sake of his name, in like manner as for his glory.5

This is often referred to as the doctrine of impassibility, that is, that God does not have passions.  J. I. Packer explains:

Not impassivity, unconcern, and impersonal detachment in face of the creation; not insensitivity and indifference to the distresses of a fallen world; not inability or unwillingness to empathize with human pain and grief; but simply that God's experiences do not come upon him as ours come upon us, for his are foreknown, willed and chosen by himself, and are not involuntary surprises forced on him from outside, apart from his own decision, in the way that ours regularly are.6

In this light, some passages in which God is said to experience negative emotions (grief, jealousy, etc.) are often said to be anthropomorophisms.  Millard Erickson argues that stories of God experiencing pain "are simply descriptions of God's actions and feelings in human terms, and from a human perspective,"7 and A. A. Hodge writes:

When [the Scriptures] speak of his repenting, of his being grieved, or jealous, they use metaphorical language also, teaching us that he acts toward us as a man would when agitated by such passions.  Such metaphors are characteristic rather of the Old than of the New Testament, and occur for the most part in highly rhetorical passages of the poetical and prophetical books.8

(Specifically on the similar issue of God "repenting," see How have Calvinist theologians dealt with statements about God repenting?)
Many in the Reformed tradition desire to carefully safeguard the idea that God can experience emotions.  For example, John Frame argues that scriptural references to God's compassion, delight, jealousy, and grief are examples of emotions, and that emotion is inseparable from intellect and will.  Like Edwards, he appeals to God's ordaining will to reconcile God's emotional responses with his impassibility:

God responds (both transcendently and immanently) only to what he has himself ordained.  He has chosen to create a world that often grieves him.9

That said, some Reformed thinkers, while still accepting the immutability of God, don't find the doctrine of impassibility helpful.  For example, Wayne Grudem:

I have not affirmed God's impassibility in this book.  Instead, quite the opposite is true, for God, who is the origin of our emotions and who created our emotions, certainly does feel emotions.10

Summary
Some recent Reformed theologians are less committed to the traditional doctrine of God's impassibility, suggesting that it does not align with scriptural references to God's pity, grief, and regret.  But Jonathan Edwards and the general Reformed tradition tend to interpret such passages as anthropomorphic or analogical – not in order to deny that God is relational, but to argue that he is never carried away by passions or altered in any way by his creatures.  As Richard Muller summarizes early Reformed thought:

In the usages found in the Christian tradition, immutability (or, indeed, impassibility, when the term is actually used) in no way implies an absence of relatedness, love, long-suffering, compassion, mercy, and so forth.  Impassibility, when attributed to God in the Christian tradition and, specifically, in medieval and Protestant scholastic throught, indicates, not a Stoic notion of apatheia, but an absence of mutation, distress, or any other sort of negative passiones.11

References:

Edwards, Works, v2, 212
Ibid., 197
Ibid., 380
Ibid., 162
Ibid., 238; emphasis in original
Packer, "Theism for Our Time," quoted in Robert Reymond, Systematic Theology, Chapter 7
Erickson, Systematic Theology, Chapter 11
Hodge, The Westminster Confession of Faith: A Commentary, Chapter 2, 74
Frame, Systematic Theology, 412–14; emphasis in original
Grudem, Systematic Theology, 166
Muller, Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics, v3, 310; emphasis in original


Has the Catholic Church made any comparative study of the faith of Martha vis-a-vis that of Mary?

Catholic theologians have compared Martha and Mary. The distinction they make is between the active life (of Martha) and the contemplative life (of Mary), not between their degrees of faith.

For example, St. Thomas Aquinas has a question on the active life in comparison with the contemplative life in his Summa Theologica II-II q. 182, where he mentions Martha and Mary frequently.

Addressing "Whether the active life is more excellent than the contemplative?" (a. 1 c.), he says:

  …the contemplative life is simply more excellent than the active.

He mentions several reasons, some of which are:

  because the contemplative life is more delightful than the active; wherefore Augustine says (De Verb. Dom. Serm. ciii) that "Martha was troubled, but Mary feasted."

&

  because in the contemplative life man is more self-sufficient, since he needs fewer things for that purpose; wherefore it was said (Lk. 10:41): "Martha, Martha, thou art careful and art troubled about many things."

&

  because the contemplative life is according to Divine things, whereas active life is according to human things; wherefore Augustine says (De Verb. Dom. Serm. civ): "'In the beginning was the Word': to Him was Mary hearkening: 'The Word was made flesh': Him was Martha serving."

In a. 2 he shows that the contemplative life of Mary is more meritorious than the active life of Martha because (ibid. c.):

  the root of merit is charity; and, while…charity consists in the love of God and our neighbor, the love of God is by itself more meritorious than the love of our neighbor

So, although Martha and Mary might have the same degree of faith in God, the contemplative life of Mary is superior to and more meritorious than the active life of Martha (cf. Lk. 10:42: "…Mary hath chosen the best part.…"). Mary is not divided (cf. 1 Cor. 7:33) between God and the world, but can devote herself 100% to God.

An excellent work on the relationship between the active and the interior/contemplative lives, the necessity of the latter for the former, etc., is:

The Soul of the Apostolate by Dom Jean-Baptiste Chautard

Fr. Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. discusses the necessity of contemplation for all Christians, because the "infused contemplation of the mysteries of faith and the union with God which results therefrom" is "in the normal way of sanctity" (i.e., everyone must pass through this way to become a saint / go to heaven). Cf. his works:

The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life

and

Christian Perfection & Contemplation


What do Latter Day Saints believe happens to persons who have rejected Christ Jesus

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints believe in the plan of salvation, which addresses several of the OPs questions.

Is this Spirit Prison called Hell a place of eternal torment, or do those who have rejected Christ Jesus get a second chance to be saved?

It depends, the LDS have two definitions of hell but the spirit prison definition is not eternal. From guide to scriptures, hell

Latter-day revelation speaks of hell in at least two senses. First, it is the temporary abode in the spirit world for those who were disobedient in mortality. In this sense, hell has an end. The spirits there will be taught the gospel, and sometime following their repentance they will be resurrected to a degree of glory of which they are worthy. Those who will not repent, but are nevertheless not sons of perdition, will remain in hell throughout the Millennium. After these thousand years of torment, they will be resurrected to a telestial glory (D&C 76:81–86; 88:100–101).

Second, it is the permanent location of those who are not redeemed by the Atonement of Jesus Christ. In this sense, hell is permanent. It is for those who are found “filthy still” (D&C 88:35, 102). This is the place where Satan, his angels, and the sons of perdition—those who have denied the Son after the Father has revealed Him—will dwell eternally

Scriptural basis for kingdoms of heaven solely in the New Testament are limited but they include:

Matthew 13:43 (celestial glory)

43 Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.

John 14:2 (degrees of glory)

2 In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.

1 Corinthians 15:40-42 (degrees of glory)

40 There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another.

41 There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star in glory.

42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:

2 Corinthians 12:2 (celestial glory)

2 I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago, (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) such an one caught up to the third heaven.

Other scriptures/details about kingdoms of glory can be found in True to the Faith: Kingdoms of Glory
all emphasis added by me


Do a significant number of Biblical scholars presently support inerrancy?

Even a "nearly" comprehensive list of inerrantist scholars from the past 100–200 years would be virtually impossible to compile and maintain.  However, the best list that I am aware of that approaches your criteria would be the signatories of the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy.  Over 200 evangelicals signed the document (PDF), and it includes figures such as:

Gleason L. Archer
Norman L. Geisler
R. C. Sproul
J. I. Packer
Francis Schaeffer

The first two of these are in your list, and the third is a prominent student of John Gerstner.  The statement was developed in 1978, and includes nineteen articles that carefully define what is meant by "inerrancy."  For example:

We affirm that the whole of Scripture and all its parts, down to the very words of the original, were given by divine inspiration. [Article VI]
We affirm that Scripture, having been given by divine inspiration, is infallible, so that, far from misleading us, it is true and reliable in all the matters it addresses. [Article XI]

Of course, there were many other Protestant scholars who could be considered "inerrantist" who may not have signed the document due to some quibble with the language or simply lack of participation.  And it only includes those who were prominent and living during the 1970s.  But the Chicago Statement contains perhaps the best-known list of late 20th century evangelical inerrantist scholars.


The Scripture actually reads:

  Revelation 13:18 KJV  Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man: His number is 666.

This in turn refers back to:

  Revelation 13:1 NKJV  Then I stood on the sand of the sea. And I saw a beast rising up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his horns ten crowns, and on his heads a blasphemous name.

George Moorish in his Bible dictionary says:

  Besides the ordinary use of this word — such as distinguishing all animals from man, Exodus 9:10; Psalms 36:6; and as specifying quadrupeds from fowls and creeping things, Genesis 8:19 — the word is used symbolically for:

b. Great worldly powers, cheyva, qhrion, having different characters according to the symbolic creature specified, but signifying in each case the absence of all moral connection with God: used by Daniel for the four great kingdoms, Daniel 7:3-23; and in Revelation 13:1 to Revelation 20:10 for the revived Roman empire and for the Antichrist.

Taking a look back at Daniel chapter 7 we find a description of his vision of a similar beast:

  Daniel 7:7 NKJV  "After this I saw in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, exceedingly strong. It had huge iron teeth; it was devouring, breaking in pieces, and trampling the residue with its feet. It was different from all the beasts that were before it, and it had ten horns.

Taken together many have concluded that This refers to a resurgent Roman Empire, and that Revelation 13:18 refers to the succession of rulers.

Others have concluded it refers to the Roman Catholic church and the Papacy.

Even others have taken:

  Daniel 7:4 NKJV  The first was like a lion, and had eagle's wings. I watched till its wings were plucked off; and it was lifted up from the earth and made to stand on two feet like a man, and a man's heart was given to it.

To mean that it is a completely new World order which will rise up out of the sea of humanity.

So in answer to your question the number itself, which is the number of his name, and not the number of the beast is no consequence until we know what that name is. The name itself is unknown as far as Scripture is concerned, The book of the Revelation is purposely vague in that it is a revelation of the future; and some if not most of the book is yet to be revealed, and the reason for giving it to the Apostle John may well have been to warn us that we should be ever vigilant.

The fact that there are contradictory references as to what that number actually is; is further evidence God is more interested in our being constantly vigilant that what the details of the Scripture are.

If we look at the opening of chapter 13 verse 18 we find that it says let he who has understanding do the calculation, and who fits that requirement?


cf. What Are the Origins of Ash Wednesday and the Use of Ashes? by Fr. William Saunders | Catholic Culture. In part

  The early Church continued the usage of ashes for the same symbolic
  reasons. In his book, De Poenitentia, Tertullian (c. 160-220)
  prescribed that the penitent must "live without joy in the roughness
  of sackcloth and the squalor of ashes." Eusebius (260-340), the famous
  early Church historian, recounted in his The History of the Church how
  an apostate named Natalis came to Pope Zephyrinus clothed in sackcloth
  and ashes begging forgiveness. Also during this time, for those who
  were required to do public penance, the priest sprinkled ashes on the
  head of the person leaving confession.

  In the Middle Ages (at least by the time of the eighth century), those
  who were about to die were laid on the ground on top of sackcloth
  sprinkled with ashes. The priest would bless the dying person with
  holy water, saying, "Remember that thou art dust and to dust thou
  shalt return." After the sprinkling, the priest asked, "Art thou
  content with sackcloth and ashes in testimony of thy penance before
  the Lord in the day of judgment?" To which the dying person replied,
  "I am content." In all of these examples, the symbolism of mourning,
  mortality and penance is clear.

  Eventually, the use of ashes was adapted to mark the beginning of
  Lent, the 40-day preparation period (not including Sundays) for
  Easter. The ritual for the "Day of Ashes" is found in the earliest
  editions of the Gregorian Sacramentary, which dates at least to the
  eighth century. About the year 1000, an Anglo-Saxon priest named
  Aelfric preached: "We read in the books, both in the Old Law and in
  the New, that the men who repented of their sins bestrewed themselves
  with ashes and clothed their bodies with sackcloth. Now let us do this
  little at the beginning of our Lent that we strew ashes upon our heads
  to signify that we ought to repent of our sins during the Lenten
  fast." As an aside, Aelfric reinforced his point by then telling of a
  man who refused to go to Church on Ash Wednesday and receive ashes;
  the man was killed a few days later in a boar hunt. Since this time,
  the Church has used ashes to mark the beginning of the penitential
  season of Lent, when we remember our mortality and mourn for our sins.

Please see also Ash Wednesday | New Advent.


Ends do not justify means
No, it is never permissible to sin so that good may come about.
St. Paul wrote:

Rom. 3:8let us not do evil that there may come good

and

Rom. 5:20 & 6:1where sin abounded, grace did more abound. […] [So] shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid.

Grace is always sufficient to doing good:

2 Cor. 12:9My grace is sufficient for thee

Soul to be preferred over the body
Both the body and soul are goods, and it is against the 5th Commandment to do bodily or spiritual harm to oneself, but usually the body (a good) is against the soul (another good):

Gal. 5:16-17I say then, walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the spirit: and the spirit against the flesh; for these are contrary one to another.

This is why the Church prescribes fasting and abstinence, for mortifying our evil inclinations.
Because we are dealing with two goods (body and soul), we must apply the principle of double-effect (cf. this Christianity StackExchange answer) and prefer the soul over the body:

Mat. 10:28…fear ye not them that kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him that can destroy both soul and body in hell.

Tolerating evil to prevent greater evil or to do greater good
Sin can be tolerated in order to prevent a greater evil. For example, a ruler could tolerate the evil ideology of Islam because if he condemned it, it might excite Muslims to greater violence and make Christians lose their faith.
Addressing the question of "Whether the rites of unbelievers ought to be tolerated?," St. Thomas Aquinas says:

…although God is all-powerful and supremely good, nevertheless He allows certain evils to take place in the universe, which He might prevent, lest, without them, greater goods might be forfeited, or greater evils ensue. Accordingly in human government also, those who are in authority, rightly tolerate certain evils, lest certain goods be lost, or certain greater evils be incurred: thus Augustine says (De Ordine ii, 4): "If you do away with harlots, the world will be convulsed with lust." …


Did any of the Church Fathers think the current-day Gospels were not inspired?

Not to define exactly what is a Christian, but, very broadly speaking, there were early Christians who rejected parts of what today's Christians consider to be the New Testament.  But, by doing so and thus having a presumably different faith, they are not widely considered "Church Fathers".

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Fathers

Yet, as heretics so-called, Origen and Tertullian are considered by some to be "Church Fathers".

So, the quick answer to the OP question is it depends on your definition.

As to the others at that time, Marcion of Sinope is one example of an early "Christian" who rejected the Gospels of Matthew and John.

  http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf03.v.iv.v.v.html

The primary problem wasn't particularly rejecting books of the New Testament, but rather interpreting the books in a new and different fashion.  This problem, obviously, continues to the present day.

  http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf03.v.iii.xxxvii.html

So, yes, depending on your definition of "Christian" and "Church Father", a case may be made that yes certain books were rejected by them as inspired.


As a young Jew what would Jesus have been taught about heaven and hell?

To understand their view, you would need to understand what Sheol is to them.
In The Hebrew Old Testament, or the Judaism view, Sheol (שְׁאוֹל) is described as the permanent place of the dead, known as the common grave for man (mankind), in addition, it is associated with an individual’s burial place or grave (Judges 16:31; Genesis 35:20) or a burial tomb (Job 21:32). So, regarding death, physically, an end of life, which seems to be the case regarding figures such as Abraham, Moses, and Miriam. Sheol is also called a dark and or deep pit, an abyss, or a land of forgetfulness when a human die and is buried. Moreover, Ecclesiastes and Job, insist that all the dead go down to Sheol, whether good or evil, rich or poor, slave or free man (Job 3:11-19). Later on in Ecclesiastes, death is spoken of as a cease of consciousness.
Now in the Bible, it says in Ecclesiastes 9:5 and Psalm 146:4 that those who are alive are conscious that a time will come that they will die, however, those in death, they’re the opposite, conscious of nothing at all, and their thoughts have perished with them, so in short, when we die, we cease to exist, we cannot think, we cannot act and or take action, we cannot feel, we cannot act upon goals and or anything else, essentially, when a light blub stops working, in this sense. The Bible even goes on to say that from dust we came and to dust we return in Genesis 3:19, hence Adam’s case, Genesis 2:7, in addition, Ecclesiastes 3:19, 20, not only refers to humans, but animals as well.
Despite this, death is not necessarily the end of everything. We already know that in the Bible, death is compared to sleep (Psalm 13:3; John 11:11-14; Acts 7:60). A person who is fast asleep is unaware of what is happening in their surroundings. Likewise, the dead are not conscious of anything as mentioned. But we do have the hope of the Resurrection that Jesus talks about. In the Bible, it teaches that God can awaken the dead as if from sleep and give them life again (Job 14:13-15). For those whom God resurrects, death is not the end of everything.


How do we know that Judas was a "wealthy landowner"?

As you have already noted in your reading, there is no biblical basis for Judas Iscariot as a wealthy landowner, at least prior to purchasing the field, as he does in Acts of the Apostles.

Contrary evidence is found in John 12:6, since a wealthy landowner would scarcely need to be a petty thief:

  John 12:6 (NIV): He did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.

It is equally unconvincing that a wealthy landowner would leave it all behind to follow Jesus on foot and share his privations, but then betray his master for what, to a wealthy landowner, would have been a small amount of money.  The clearest modern non-fiction 1 reference to Judas as a wealthy landowner is in the Urantia Book,  which provides what can only be described as a highly imaginative biography of the unfaithful disciple.

Amos Oz, the subject of the interview referenced in this question, is a novelist. He describes Judas Iscariot as a wealthy landowner but does not tell us the source of his information, although no doubt this factoid would make a good theme as part of his novel about Judas.

1In describing the Book of Urantia as 'non-fiction', I make no value judgement, but simply follow convention used in describing all scripture, as Urantia appears to be.


Do Reformed paedobaptists call for the baptism of household servants, just as Abraham's servants were circumcised?

In a limited sense, yes, some Reformed paedobaptists have supported this: the presentation of slave children for baptism by their masters was practiced and supported in the Presbyterian Church in the USA in the antebellum period.  However, I find no evidence that adult slaves were baptized except upon their own conversion (that is, not when the master was converted, nor when the slave was purchased by a Christian master).

A resolution by the General Assembly in 1816 concluded that slave children should be presented for baptism by their masters if the latter were in a position to "train them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord":

  That it is the duty of masters who are members of the Church, to present the children of parents in servitude to the ordinance of baptism, provided they are in a situation to train them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, thus securing them the rich advantages which the gospel promises.
  That it is the duty of christian ministers to inculcate this doctrine, and to baptise all children of this description, when presented to them by their masters.

The Synod of New York and Philadelphia made a similar declaration in 1786, holding that Christian masters had the "duty" to have "children of their household" baptized, even those "born of parents not in the communion of any Church."

The Testimony and Practice of the Presbyterian Church in Reference to American Slavery, pages 122 and 123.


If you promise or swear to do something evil or sinful, do you have an obligation to fulfill that promise?

Scripture teaches God's absolute righteousness and holiness (Is 6, Rev 4:8). Like the priests of old, a Christian's life ought to be "HOLINESS TO THE LORD" (Ex 39:30).

1 Jn 1:3-9 3 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you,
that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is
with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.   4 And these things
write we unto you, that your joy may be full.   5 This then is the
message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is
light, and in him is no darkness at all.   6 If we say that we have
fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the
truth:   7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have
fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son
cleanseth us from all sin.   8 If we say that we have no sin, we
deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.   9 If we confess our
sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse
us from all unrighteousness.

Here we read of the believer's responsibility and privilege to walk in the light - that is, to do what is right. If we sin, we are to confess our sins, but we ought not go back to sin more.
The 10 commandments - as non-optional commands given to Israel - give strict direction, and never take into account if they had promised to sin.
If a believer were to make a promise to do evil, he ought to repent of it and bring it to God for forgiveness by the blood of Christ, as above in 1 Jn 1:9, but he ought not to sin more by fulfilling a promise to do what displeases God.

Jn 8:10-11   10 When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the
woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath
no man condemned thee?    11 She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said
unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.


I must admit, I chuckled at This is the kind of question kids ask me in Sunday School.. Anyway...

First off, Revelations 19 has a wedding feast.

  Revelation 19:9 (NIV)
  9 Then the angel said to me,   “Write this:   Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!”   And he added, “These are the true words of God.”

(Emphasis mine.)

You can't really have a feast without food or drink. There is also the promise of Jesus that He will not drink wine again until this very same feast.

  Matthew 26:29 (NLT)

  29 Mark my words—I will not drink wine again until the day I drink it new with you in my Father’s Kingdom.”

  Mark 14:25 (NLT)

  25 I tell you the truth, I will not drink wine again until the day I drink it new in the Kingdom of God.”

  Luke 22:18 (NLT)

  18 For I will not drink wine again until the Kingdom of God has come.”

This statement takes place immediately after Jesus offers wine and bread at the first Communion. Now, if there weren't any grapes in Heaven, could there be wine? Now, obviously, God could very easily simply produce wine on the spot, and a miracle should never be excluded from the set of possibilities.

Now to actually answer your real question: we can't really know. I know of no verse that talks about whether or not there is any food or drink being consumed in Heaven right now. That said, what is there to keep Jesus and other people already up there from enjoying the gift of eating that God gave them? I mean...I could totally imagine Jesus munching on some fish with Peter, James, and John right now...


History of the doctrine of religious vocation in Catholic Church

"One should take long time to discern his religious vocation."

From Fr. William Doyle, S.J.'s Vocations:

7.  Deliberation
It follows from what has been said that once the voice of God is recognized, that is when the thought of leaving the world has been more or less constantly before the mind for some time, and the souls realizes, even though she dreads it, that “the Lord hath need of her,” the call ought to be obeyed promptly.
St. Thomas [II-II q. 189 a. 10] holds that the invitation to a more perfect life ought to be followed without delay, for these lights and inspirations from God are transient, not permanent, and therefore the divine call should be obeyed instantly. As of old, when He worked His miracles and went about doing good, “Jesus of Nazareth passeth by”; if we do not take advantage of His passing, He may never return. “I stand at the door and knock,” He said, “If any man shall hear My voice and open to Me, I will come in to him,” if not, that call may never come again.
“Make haste, I beseech you,” exclaims St. Jerome [Letter 53 to St. Paulinus, 11.], “and rather cut than loosen the rope by which your bark is bound fast to the land,” for even a day’s delay deprives a person of invaluable merit, which he would acquire in religion.
Delay is dangerous, and long deliberation, as Msgr. Malou assures us, is unnecessary: “Of all the state of life the religious state is, without contradiction, that which demands the least deliberation, and is that of which the choice should cause less doubt, and provoke the least hesitation; for it is in this state that fewer difficulties are met with, and the best means are found for saving our souls.”

"Life in married state and in a state of religious order or in priesthood are equally good ways to sainthood, you just need to discern which one of these God wants you to take."

Your first clause is Jovinian's heresy, against which St. Jerome (Against Jovinian bk. 1) et al. wrote and the Council of Trent, session 24 canon 10 infallibly condemned:

Canon X.—If any one saith, that the marriage state is to be placed above the state of virginity, or of celibacy, and that it is not better and more blessed to remain in virginity, or in celibacy, than to be united in matrimony: let him be anathema.

That virginity/celibacy is a superior means to sanctification than matrimony does not mean that all virgins/celibates necessarily have more merit than marrieds, because sanctity is due to one's degree of charity. Discussing "Whether virginity is more excellent than marriage?" (Summa Theologica II-II q. 152 a. 4), St. Thomas Aquinas writes (ad 2):

Though virginity is better than conjugal continence, a married person may be better than a virgin for two reasons. First, on the part of chastity itself; if to wit, the married person is more prepared in mind to observe virginity, if it should be expedient, than the one who is actually a virgin. Hence Augustine (De Bono Conjug. xxii) charges the virgin to say: "I am no better than Abraham, although the chastity of celibacy is better than the chastity of marriage." Further on he gives the reason for this: "For what I do now, he would have done better, if it were fitting for him to do it then; and what they did I would even do now if it behooved me now to do it." Secondly, because perhaps the person who is not a virgin has some more excellent virtue. Wherefore Augustine says (De Virgin. xliv): "Whence does a virgin know the things that belong to the Lord, however solicitous she be about them, if perchance on account of some mental fault she be not yet ripe for martyrdom, whereas this woman to whom she delighted in preferring herself is already able to drink the chalice of the Lord?"

"One can know God's will for his particular state of life via prayer and whether he feels peace (or something like that) when he prays or somewhere else."

See Thomist Fr. Richard Butler, O.P.'s 1960 Religious Vocation: An Unnecessary Mystery.
He would agree with your statement that "One can not know God's will [perfectly] directly and with [perfect] certainty about one's particular state of life," because we cannot know God's essence perfectly (His essence and will are identical, because He is supremely simple). But we do know His will is our sanctification (1 Thess. 4:3: "this is the will of God, your sanctification").

"Calling to religious vocation typically involves some kind of event where God is manifest or some deep experience of God."

Pope Pius XII's apostolic constitution Sede Sapientiæ on vocations to the religious life says (part II.) two necessary conditions must be met when discerning a vocation: that one is called by God and called by the Church. For example, canonical impediments to entering religious life would be a clear sign God does not call one to religious life.
See also Pius XII's 1954 encyclical Sacra Virginitas, which refutes many modern errors regarding the religious life and virginity. See also Joseph Marie Perrin, O.P.'s Virginity (esp. ch. 9, "The Gift of a Vocation"), the appendix of which is that encyclical.


What manuscripts did people use to create the NIV and KJV? Are the manuscripts used to fashion the NIV older than those used for the KJV?

Both versions use distinct sets of manuscripts for the Old Testament and New Testament.

One might say that the NIV uses an "older" Old Testament manuscript on occasion by deferring to the Septuagint or Dead Sea Scrolls (as explained below), but I am not sure this is significant.  There are rumors that the King James translators may also have done likewise, even if forbidden by the translation rules the King had put in place (see, e.g., Adam Nicholson, The Making of the King James Bible).

In the case of the New Testament, whereas the King James editors seemed to have consulted a single 1598 manuscript compilation, the NIV, which relies on the so-called "Critical Text", probably included some "older" manuscripts in its translation.  But it is very difficult to judge whether the underlying text is older or newer from the age of the manuscript.  A newer manuscript may actually hold a copy of a variant that had somehow been lost, for example.

With regard to archaic English language, some prefer the King James Version because it preserves a difference between singular and plural forms which has now been lost to the English language, but present in the underlying Greek.

In Mexican Spanish, for example, one uses the word "tu" for you if speaking to a single person, and "Ustedes" if one is speaking to a group.  This distinction has been lost in modern English (except, perhaps, in Texas, where "y'all" is used), but it was present in Jacobian English (i.e. "thou" for you singular, "ye" for you plural. There is a discussion of this here.

I try to set out the major differences between manuscripts below.

Old Testament

 NIV

The Introduction provided in the 2011 New International Version states:

  For the Old Testament the standard Hebrew text, the Masoretic Text as
  published in the latest edition of Biblia Hebraica, has been used
  throughout. The Masoretic Text tradition contains marginal notations
  that offer variant readings. These have sometimes been followed
  instead of the text itself. Because such instances involve variants
  within the Masoretic tradition, they have not been indicated in the
  textual notes. In a few cases, words in the basic consonantal text
  [the original Hebrew used no vowels] have been divided differently
  than in the Masoretic Text. Such cases are usually indicated in the
  textual footnotes. The Dead Sea Scrolls contain biblical texts that
  represent an earlier stage of the transmission of the Hebrew text.
  They have been consulted, as have been the Samaritan Pentateuch and
  the ancient scribal traditions concerning deliberate textual changes.
  The translators also consulted the more important early versions—the
  Greek Septuagint, Aquila, Symmachus and Theodotion, the Latin Vulgate,
  the Syriac Peshitta, the Aramaic Targums, and for the Psalms, the
  Juxta Hebraica of Jerome. Readings from these versions, the Dead Sea
  Scrolls and the scribal traditions were occasionally followed where
  the Masoretic Text seemed doubtful and where accepted principles of
  textual criticism showed that one or more of these textual witnesses
  appeared to provide the correct reading. In rare cases, the committee
  has emended the Hebrew text where it appears to have become corrupted
  at an even earlier stage of its transmission. These departures from
  the Masoretic Text are also indicated in the textual footnotes.
  Sometimes the vowel indicators (which are later additions to the basic
  consonantal text) found in the Masoretic Text did not, in the judgment
  of the committee, represent the correct vowels for the original text.
  Accordingly, some words have been read with a different set of vowels.
  These instances are usually not indicated in the footnotes.

The NIV Old Testament omits the so-called Deuterocanonical books that were included in the King James Version, as well as in other versions based on the Latin Vulgate (i.e. Douay-Rheims) and Septuagint (e.g. the 1851 English translation by Sir L.C.L. Brenton).

 KJV

The original 1611 King James Version and subsequent updates published by Oxford and Cambridge in the ensuing centuries included the Deuterocanonical books, which were written in Aramaic and Greek.  I have never seen anything identifying which particular manuscripts the translators consulted for these.  As far as I know, only Cambridge continues to publish a version of the King James Version with the Deuterocanonical books included.

The underlying Hebrew text is supposed to be a version of the Masoretic Text compiled by the Tunisian Jew of Spanish origin and later Christian convert Jacob ben Hayyim ben Isaac Ibn Abonijah, published by Daniel Bomberg in Venice sometime around 1525 (Introduction to the Rabbinic Bible, tr. Christian Ginsburg, p. 2-7).

New Testament

 NIV

Again, according to the Introduction in the 2011 NIV:

  The Greek text used in translating the New Testament is an eclectic
  one, based on the latest editions of the Nestle-Aland/United Bible
  Societies’ Greek New Testament. The committee has made its choices
  among the variant readings in accordance with widely accepted
  principles of New Testament textual criticism. Footnotes call
  attention to places where uncertainty remains.

The Greek New Testament the authors refer to is a compilation of hundreds of different Greek manuscripts.  The editors essentially judged all of the variants available for each verse and made a decision as to which particular variant reading to select.  Bruce Metzger has published separately a Textual Commentary that explains each decision made.  The resulting text is sometimes referred to as the "Critical Text".

 KJV

Dr. Maurice Robinson claims in the introduction to a modern edition of the 1550 Stephen's Textus Receptus that there are actually several extant Greek texts published around that time frame that are similarly named.  He writes:

  The Stephens 1550 edition of the so-called “Textus Receptus” (Received
  Text) reflects a general agreement with other early printed Greek
  texts also (erroneously) called by that name. These include editions
  such as that of Erasmus 1516, Beza 1598, and (the only one actually
  termed “Textus Receptus”) Elzevir 1633. Berry correctly notes that “In
  the main they are one and the same; and [any] of them may be referred
  to as the Textus Receptus” (Berry, p.ii).

  All these early printed Greek New Testaments closely parallel the text
  of the English-language Authorized (or King James) Version of 1611,
  since that version was based closely upon Beza 1598, which differed
  little from its “Textus Receptus” predecessors. These early Greek “TR”
  editions generally reflect (but not completely) the “Byzantine
  Textform,” otherwise called the “Majority” or “Traditional” text,
  which predominated throughout the period of manual copying of Greek
  New Testament manuscripts.

Dr. Robinson also explains the key differences between the Critical Text (e.g. NIV) and the Textus Receptus (KJV):

  The user should note that the Stephens 1550 TR edition does not agree
  with modern critical editions such as that published by the United
  Bible Societies or the various Nestle editions. These editions follow
  a predominantly “Alexandrian” Greek text, as opposed to the Byzantine
  Textform which generally underlies all TR editions. Note, however,
  that 85%+ of the text of ALL Greek New Testament editions is
  identical.

He also points out that the New King James Version (NKJV), published by Thomas Nelson, footnotes verses where the CT and TR variants diverge.


How does the trial of Jesus compare to the judicial standards of the epoch and of the modern times?

No, no and no. But it doesn't matter.

He was guilty of what he was charged of. Blasphemy. Claiming to be God.
The thing he was guilty of did carry a death penalty under Jewish law.
The Jews couldn't actually administer the death penalty, they had to get something to take to the Romans to get clearance.
The Roman governor (Pontus Pilate) operated the trial as a political maneuver to stop a Jewish uprising (of the people that wanted to kill Jesus more so than of Jesus himself). He kept the peace by doing what the mob and religious leaders wanted. No claim was ever made of it being a fair trial.
Nobody stopped to consider the fact that his claim was actually true. The final proof of that was in the pudding, and that wouldn't be served up for three more days.

Nobody has ever claimed the trial was fair or investigation thorough. But nobody cared then and I'm not sure why anybody would care now.


Did Rahab sin by hiding the Hebrew spies and lying to the leaders of Jericho? (Catholic/Protestant overview)

Summary: Rahab is widely praised for protecting the Hebrew spies, despite her betrayal of her countrymen, but opinion among both church fathers and modern commentators is divided with respect to her false report.

Hiding the spies

Church fathers such as Gregory of Elvira and Cassiodorus praise Rahab's protection of the spies and see in her an image of the church.1 Augustine in particular says that she was rewarded by God because she was "merciful to God's people" and that she ought to be praised for putting herself in peril to host and hide the men of God.

Reformer John Calvin sees Rahab's hiding of the spies as "treachery to her country," but that she was "set free from the common rule" through her adoption "into the body of the Church."  He finds proof that there was "no criminality in abandoning" her countrymen in the apostolic praise of her in Hebrews 11:31 and James 2:25.

Catholic commentator George Leo Haydock explains Rahab's actions by saying that "[s]he felt authorized by God on this occasion, to abandon those upon whom he had declared war."  Маtthew Henry likewise sees Rahab as betraying her country, but says that in this special case she is justified because "she knew the Lord had given Israel this land" (v. 9).

Lying to the king

The church fathers are split on the morality of Rahab's lie.  John Chrysostom goes so far as to praise Rahab's skill in lying, saying "O this good lie!  O this good fraud, which does not betray the divine but safeguards the sacred!"2  John Cassian says that "for her lie alone [...] she deserved to share an eternal blessing with the people of God."3

Augustine, on the other hand, pointedly questions the assumptions of those who claim that the lie was necessary to save the spies, asking,

  And where do we put the will and power of God? Or haply was He not able to keep both her, neither telling a lie to her own townsmen, nor betraying men of God, and them, being His, safe from all harm? For by Whom also after the woman's lie they were guarded, by Him could they, even if she had not lied, have in any wise been guarded.

Calvin follows Augustine, saying that those who excuse an officious lie "do not sufficiently consider how precious truth is in the sight of God."  But one successor of Calvin, Charles Hodge, suggests that in cases such as this, there is no "violation of some obligation," which he sees is a requirement for considering a falsehood a sin.

Methodist Adam Clarke says that there is "no excuse" for Rahab's lie, "for God could have saved his messengers independently of her falsity."  Jamieson et al. suggest that she might have "deem[ed] herself bound to do it by the laws of Eastern hospitality," but that ultimately, "her answer was a sinful expedient."  Haydock calls it an "officious lie, which is a venial sin," noting that she did not intend injury to anyone, and in fact protected her countrymen by preventing them from murdering the spies and thereby incurring God's wrath.

Matthew Henry particularly struggles with the extenuating circumstances of this case, not seeing how the spies could have been saved if Rahab had told the truth or kept silent.  He suggests that she "may be justified here" in the context of the impending judgment of Jericho, but nonetheless says that most theologians consider it a sin.

References:

1 Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, Old Testament, IV, pp. 9-10

2 Chrysostom, Homilies on Repentance and Almsgiving 7.5.17; cited in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture

3 John Cassium, Conference 17.17.1-2; cited in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture

Augustine, Against Lying, 32 and 34
Calvin, Commentary on Joshua
Clarke, Bible Commentary
Haydock, Catholic Bible Commentary
Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible
Hodge, Systematic Theology, III-441
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible


According to most Christian traditions, God cannot change His mind.

There are those that teach that He can change His mind, a position inherent in Open Theism.  However, this is seen as a heresy by most orthodox Christian traditions.  It denies the omniscience of God.

From http://www.reformationtheology.com/2011/07/does_god_ever_change_his_mind.php

  In recent years though a new movement has emerged called Open Theism.
  This movement has taken Arminianism to its logical intellectual
  conclusion. Knowing the "problem" that complete knowledge of the
  future means that the future is fixed, they have consciously taken the
  position that God does NOT know the future at all. They argue that
  because the future does not yet exist, even God does not know of it.

In layman's terms, if He were to change His mind, it would mean that He was mistaken in the first place.  This flies in the face of the doctrines of Omniscience and infallibility.

There are several passages in Scripture where God appears to change His mind, for example, in cases where He has promised judgment and then "repents".  In those cases, the people repent and turn toward God, and God spares them the judgment He had promised.

I these cases, He is not changing his mind.  had they continued in their sins he would have carried out the promised judgment.  However, since the people repented, He was able to show his mercy.  Further, since God knows the beginning from the end, He knew in advance that they would repent.  He knew that his judgment would not be necessary.

There's a fine article explaining this in further depth at Grace Online Library.

Excerpt:

  The biblical narratives in which God appears to repent, or change His
  mind, are almost always narratives that deal with His threats of
  judgment and punishment. These threats are then followed by the
  repentance of the people or by the intercessory petitions of their
  leaders. God is not talked into “changing His mind.” Out of His
  gracious heart He only does what He has promised to do all along – not
  punish sinners who repent and turn from their evil ways. He chooses
  not to do what He has every right to do.

This is consistent with the Catholic teaching as well.

  In hearing our prayer God does not change His will or action in our
  regard, but simply puts into effect what He had eternally decreed in
  view of our prayer. This He may do directly without the intervention
  of any secondary cause as when He imparts to us some supernatural
  gift, such as actual grace, or indirectly, when He bestows some
  natural gift. In this latter case He directs by His Providence the
  natural causes which contribute to the effect desired, whether they be
  moral or free agents, such as men; or some moral and others not, but
  physical and not free; or, again, when none of them is free. Finally,
  by miraculous intervention, and without employing any of these causes,
  He can produce the effect prayed for.

And Reformed Theology:

  In reading certain narrative portions of Scripture, some have
  incorrectly concluded that God changes His mind. Yet the Bible is
  clear that not only does God not change in His essential nature (Mal.
  3:6) but that He does not repent or change His mind. The Bible
  actually teaches this in a didactic portion. "God is not man, that he
  should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he
  said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill
  it?" Numbers 23:19.

  For the sake of argument though, lets try to imagine God literally
  changing His mind. I want to explain how this concept is inseparably
  linked with God's omniscience because for God to change His mind, He
  would need to make a decision and then be given new information He did
  not have before, so that He could either see the error of His ways, or
  choose a better course of action. It is important we see this.For God
  to change His mind, it would mean that God is learning new material as
  each day unfolds, and because you and I make that information known to
  God, or He sees that plan A is not working too well, because He is now
  armed with new information, He can make a better decision than the one
  He did previously. However, this idea would totally undermine God's
  exhaustive knowledge of future events (His omniscience) one of the
  very attributes of God. Such a thought is unthinkable. He would not be
  the all knowing God Scripture declares Him to be if indeed He ever
  learnt something. No, He has always had total, complete and infinite
  knowledge of all things from all eternity past.

Thus, the answer would appear to be "no" from the perspective of the major branches of Christianity.


For mainstream Christian denominations (including Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, mainline Protestants, and Evangelicals), Resurrection is NOT the key to Jesus's identity.  Rather, the resurrection shows the VICTORY of Jesus over the power of death due to His obedience to God the Father.  If you read the four Gospels, the speeches in the book of Acts, and the letters of Paul, the identity of Jesus as the promised Messiah was determined based on the PROPHECIES in the Hebrew Bible (called the Old Testament by Christians now).  There are overwhelming details in the prophecies that matched the details of Jesus's birth, ministry, suffering, and the manner of his death on the cross.  See my answer to another question for a list of key Bible verses that Christians deem to point to Jesus.

Your charge that Jesus taught His disciples to worship another god is not true because Jesus worshiped the same God that Abraham and Moses worshiped.  The writings in the New Testament consistently show that when the 12 apostles spread the good news (that God the Father has finally sent the messiah as He promised) and established churches throughout the Roman Empire, they exhorted the church members to worship the same God the Father as well (Example, see Romans 12-13:10 where Paul instructed the church in Rome to live in the manner pleasing to God the Father; Jesus was barely mentioned and out of focus).

Of course Christians also worship Jesus as Lord, because Christians believe that the essence of Jesus is the same as the essence of God the Father.  But yes, the Pharisees in Jesus's generation didn't believe that it was God the Father who sent Jesus, so understandably this led to the charge that Jesus was a false prophet and more seriously that Jesus blasphemed God by claiming that He shared God the Father's essence.  Even the famous missionary Paul (a Pharisee who studied under the famous Rabbi Gamaliel) also hunted down Christians before his conversion (possibly so the land was not polluted with their "sins" which could have led to the anger of God the Father).  After Paul became Christian, the religious authorities in Jerusalem wanted to kill him too, just as they killed Jesus for blasphemy; see Acts 21:26-22:23.

I agree with you that the Resurrection on its own is not enough to determine Jesus's identity.  So if you notice, in the Gospels Jesus explained, especially after his resurrection, how the prophecies pointed to Him (see for example Luke 24:13-53).  Notice also how verse 53 says that not only Jesus's disciples worshiped God the Father for sending Jesus, they worshiped IN THE TEMPLE, where every Jew throughout the Roman Empire believed to have the presence of the God of Abraham, Jacob, David, etc.  It is clear then, from the very beginning, how the earliest disciples never wavered from associating the God of Jesus with the God of their ancestors.  The resurrection (along with the miracles which Jesus performed prior to his death) was simply to AUTHENTICATE that Jesus was who He said He was.  If we believe the Gospels to be roughly historically accurate (i.e. not Legend), then we are left with the famous trilemma when considering Jesus's claim of who He is.

ADDENDUM

After further reading such as here, I can see how my answer above will not be sufficient for you, because Judaism's own presuppositions judge a priori (using Deut 13:1-5) how:

Christian's God the Father is considered a different God than Judaism's God, although both Paul and Jesus emphatically credit the God of Abraham, Jacob, Moses, David, Isaiah with all the miracles and the sending of the Messiah.
"God is not allowed" to update the Torah, so therefore Christian teaching of how Mosaic law has been superseded by the New Covenant is considered heretical outright, although according to Christians the laws that Christians are supposed to keep with the help of the New Heart (given by God) are purer and more universal.
Even if Jesus performed greater miracles than Elijah and Elisha to show that the power came from God the Father, Judaism will reject it as irrelevant, and uses Deut 13:1-5 to regard the miracles as lies and as coming from the devil, just as how the Pharisees claimed Jesus's power came from the devil, as in when Jesus healed a demon-possessed man.

As a result of the a priori rules above, it becomes a lot more complicated to make Christian teaching acceptable to adherents of Judaism.  But I did find a blogger who in fact responded to a similar charge  (that resurrection is irrelevant).  I hope his answer helps!

On further reflection, I believe the root cause between the diverging interpretations of Deut 13:1-5 is simply a different hermeneutics when reading the Scriptures, especially because in Judaism there is Oral Torah and other authorities which significantly changes one's reading of the same passage.  Yes, within Christian mainstream there are internal differences on how to interpret certain passages of Scriptures (also due to differences in hermeneutics), but they are VERY minor when compared to how Judaism reads the Hebrew Bible.  Case in point: how very different Jewish interpretation of the prophetic verses commonly used by Christians to show as predicting Jesus.  Another Jewish interpretation of the prophetic verses can be found here.  (Both links are taken from the posts of JPH who initiated the "resurrection is irrelevant" discussion on the aforementioned blogger's site).

At this point I'm just satisfied to agree to disagree.  God bless you!


When & where did the word "Christian" originate?

Actually, the word Christian is used three times in the New Testament. The first occasion answers your question (Acts 11:26c):

  It was at Antioch that the believers were first called Christians.

Regarding ''how'' they came to be called Christians, Wikipedia states:

  Kenneth Samuel Wuest holds that all three original New Testament verses' usages reflect a derisive element in the term Christian to refer to followers of Christ who did not acknowledge the emperor of Rome. The city of Antioch, where someone gave them the name Christians, had a reputation for coming up with such nicknames


Are Israel and the Church two different kingdoms?

There is only one kingdom because there is only one king.

The kingdom was offered to Israel and not accepted at that time. The kingdom will come and a remnant of Israel will glady receive her king.

Gentiles were being added to the kingdom during the period of Acts. This was a mystery that Paul describes had been hidden.

The end of Mark describes a little of what the kingdom on earth would be like (such as making disciples of all nations).

This kingdom is described briefly in a few places. There will be no more war, people will live longer, nature will be less hostile.

Until the kingdom comes on earth, Christians are like ambassadors of that kingdom in a foreign and hostile country.

Romans 11:12  Now if the fall of them be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fulness?


What exempts a Catholic from going to Mass on Sunday at church?

The first precept of the Church is to

  go to Mass and refrain from servile work on Sundays and holy days.

Grave inconvenience can exempt one from observing a precept of the Church. Grave inconvenience is, according to Fr. Hardon, S.J.,

  a sufficient reason to excuse a person from fulfilling certain positive precepts of the Church, not of themselves binding by the natural or revealed law. Also sufficient reason for delaying or even not performing certain actions, otherwise obligatory, provided there is a sincere desire to do so.

However, the 3rd Commandment (Ex. 20:8-10),

  Remember that thou keep holy the sabbath day. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy works; but on the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God; thou shalt do no work on it

is "binding by the natural or revealed law".

So, even if one cannot without grave inconvenience observe the first precept of the Church, one still must sanctify Sunday, such as by extra spiritual reading, prayer, or even watching a live "internet Mass" or television or radio broadcast of a Mass, which can have spiritual benefits according to Father Connell Answers Moral Questions (Washington: Catholic University of America 1959) 75–6:

  One may participate in the benefits of the Mass without being actually present — namely, by directing one’s intention and devotion to the sacred rite. By hearing Mass over the radio one can certainly foster his devotion, and thus profit considerably from the offering of the Holy Sacrifice. Indeed, it could happen that one who participates in the Holy Sacrifice in this manner will gain much more benefit than many of those who are actually present.


What order were the Pauline epistles written, according to evangelical critical scholarship?

Both "majority opinion" and "evangelical" (even with the guidelines you supplied) are slippery terms. They'll probably always be in a state of flux, so it's difficult to supply exactly what you've asked for. But don't panic. I think a relatively clear picture can still emerge.

I've decided to give a sampling of three scholars who I think are firmly within the evangelical camp: Dan Wallace, J. Hampton Keathley III, and Luke Timothy Johnson. For Wallace and Keathley I found dates, but for Johnson I was only able to find an order. Note that Johnson groups together 1-2 Corinthians, 1-2 Thessalonians, and the Pastorals as one unit each.

+-----------------+----------+---------+---------+
|                 | Keathley | Wallace | Johnson |
+-----------------+----------+---------+---------+
| Romans          | 57-58    | 56-57   |       4 |
| 1 Corinthians   | 55       | spr 54  |       2 |
| 2 Corinthians   | 56       | fall 55 |       2 |
| Galatians       | 49 or 55 | fall 48 |       3 |
| Ephesians       | 60-61    | c 60    |       8 |
| Philippians     | 60-61    | c 60    |       5 |
| Colossians      | 61       | c 60    |       7 |
| 1 Thessalonians | 51-52    | spr 50  |       1 |
| 2 Thessalonians | 51-52    | sum 50  |       1 |
| 1 Timothy       | 63-66    | 63      |       9 |
| 2 Timothy       | 67       | 64      |       9 |
| Titus           | 62-67    | 63      |       9 |
| Philemon        | 61       | c 60    |       6 |
+-----------------+----------+---------+---------+

Table formatting provided by Senseful Solutions.

If we consider the same units Johnson does and add the Prison Letters (Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Philemon), then we have exactly 6 "units" or "chunks" of letters that need ordering: Romans, 1-2 Corinthians, Galatians, Prison Letters, 1-2 Thessalonians, Pastorals. Using that schema, here's the above table simplified:

+----------------+----------+---------+---------+
|                | Keathley | Wallace | Johnson |
+----------------+----------+---------+---------+
| Romans         | 3        |       4 |       4 |
| Corinthians    | 4        |       3 |       2 |
| Galatians      | 1 or 2   |       1 |       3 |
| Prison Letters | 5        |       5 |       5 |
| Thessalonians  | 1 or 2   |       2 |       1 |
| Pastorals      | 6        |       6 |       6 |
+----------------+----------+---------+---------+

From here, as promised, a clear picture emerges. The consensus is that the Thessalonian letters were the first or second written, Galatians was also early, Romans was written third or fourth, the Prison Letters were later, and the Pastorals last (shortly before the end of his life). The only major point of disagreement is where the Corinthian letters fit in, which is a very complex question as you can read in Wallace (look for the phrase "special problem").


Sacred Tradition would say yes, the recently reworded Nicene creed says,

  He suffered death and was buried

We also say it was in:

  accordance with the Scriptures

which means, there's some prophecy that says this had to happen which you can read in Psalm 22 or Isaiah 53 or Genesis 22

Death is the splitting of the body, but not splitting "The Godhead" from the body.  So, no part of Christ ceases to be God upon death.

The Summa has some other pretty good points concerning this question, I'll summarize:

All humanity was subject to death because of original sin. Jesus was the only one who, because of who He was, could payback this debt through death.
Jesus proves concretely that He did take on human flesh by dying in it.
His death destroys the power of death, knowing God has complete power over death and life gives us comfort.
To set an example of being "Dead to Sin"
So that He could be the first to rise from the dead and give us all hope in the resurrection.

So, it's clear that He did it for a reason, but you're wondering if it is possible.  Some say God can "square a circle" other's don't.  Naive me says God can make a circle square, but "reply to objection 1" me has learned that God cannot deny himself.  He cannot tell a lie and if he says He's going to send us His Son as a Redeemer who will die, then that's what's going to happen.

Furthermore, St. Thomas says:

  Christ did not suffer death which comes of sickness, lest He should seem to die of necessity from exhausted nature: but He endured death inflicted from without, to which He willingly surrendered Himself, that His death might be shown to be a voluntary one.

Which leaves you hanging, and this is a central point of the Faith, which to wrap around with what I said about the Nicene Creed, is probably why it gets a mention.  If Jesus didn't die, he couldn't have risen and if Christ didn't rise from the dead then:

  And if Christ has not been raised, then empty [too] is our preaching; empty, too, your faith.


Catholics ordained as "mail order ministers"?

The Church seems to be silent on this matter, not because of its' gravity but more so because the whole purpose of canon law is to set down guidelines for Catholics in good faith to make the right choices and to act accordingly. How can one be in communion with the Church while being an ordained minister in another denominational church?

Catholics who freely get ordained as a non-denominational minister cease to be Catholics in good standing and as a result canon law will no longer hinder them because they outside the jurisdiction of the Church. They are outside the unity of the Church and are to be considered heretics and/or a schismatics. How can one serve two masters. Either he will love the first and hate the second? See: Matthew 6:24 One is Catholic or one is something else!

How Can someone claim to be a practicing Catholic and then get ordained as a non-denominational minister (such as from The Universal Life Church Ministries)  makes no sense. One can not abide by what the Church teaches and then leave the fold and teach what may be contrary to Catholic theology.

The following article is found online and although it is only indirectly on this topic, many of its' points are quite prevalent to this subject: Catholic Priests Who Become Non-Catholic Ministers.


An image of half a leg on a church wall?

It is very likely what you were seeing was a picture of a relic.

From Wikipedia:

  "A relic usually consists of the physical remains of a saint or the
  personal effects of the saint or venerated person preserved for
  purposes of veneration as a tangible memorial."

If you think seeing a picture of a limb is odd, then you would be really taken back by some churches that actually have a physical leg, or right forearm, or even the skull of a saint on display in a reliquary (a fancy glass display box). The passage beneath the picture likely included the name of the person being venerated.

Reliquary and skull of Saint Ivo of Kermartin (St. Yves or St. Ives), (1253–1303) in Tréguier, Brittany, France:


Do conservative Presbyterians accept 4-point Calvinists?

Conservative Presbyterian churches typically require their elders to subscribe to the Westminster Standards, which include the Westminster Confession of Faith, the Westminster Shorter Catechism, and the Westminster Larger Catechism. The lay members of the congregation are usually only required to submit to the teaching of the elders, which in practice means that a wider variety of beliefs are tolerated than what the Westminster Standards permit.
In addition, many Presbyterian denominations permit the taking of exceptions to the wording or entire articles of the Westminster Standards. The extent and permissibility of these allowed exceptions varies from denomination to denomination.

The Westminster Standards do not align with the Amyraldian position, so a potential office-bearer would not be able to honestly subscribe to the Westminster Standards and remain Amyraldian. However, there are some positions of Calvinistic hypothetical atonement which some argue are plausibly acceptable within the bounds of the Westminster Standards, such as those promoted by James Ussher and Richard Baxter.
The relevant sections in the Westminster Confession of Faith are Chapter 3, Article 6, and Chapter 7, Article 3. The relevant Westminster Larger Catechism question is Question 67. I quote them below:

Chapter 3, Article 6. As God has appointed the elect unto glory, so has He, by the eternal and most free purpose of His will, foreordained all the means thereunto.Wherefore, they who are elected, being fallen in Adam, are redeemed by Christ, are effectually called unto faith in Christ by His Spirit working in due season, are justified, adopted, sanctified, and kept by His power, through faith, unto salvation. Neither are any other redeemed by Christ, effectually called, justified, adopted, sanctified, and saved, but the elect only.
Chapter 6, Article 3. Man, by his fall, having made himself incapable of life by that covenant, the Lord was pleased to make a second, commonly called the covenant of grace; wherein He freely offers unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ; requiring of them faith in Him, that they may be saved, and promising to give unto all those that are ordained unto eternal life His Holy Spirit, to make them willing, and able to believe.
Q. 67 What is effectual calling?
A. Effectual calling is the work of God’s almighty power and grace, whereby (out of his free and special love to his elect, and from nothing in them moving him thereunto) he doth, in his accepted time, invite and draw them to Jesus Christ, by his Word and Spirit; savingly enlightening their minds, renewing and powerfully determining their wills, so as they (although in themselves dead in sin) are hereby made willing and able freely to answer his call, and to accept and embrace the grace offered and conveyed therein.

Double predestination is more clearly supported in the Westminster Standards.
Chapter 3, and in particular Article 3 and Article 7 are clearly in support of double predestination:

Chapter 3 Article 3. By the decree of God, for the manifestation of His glory, some men and angels are predestinated unto everlasting life; and others foreordained to everlasting death.
Chapter 3 Article 7. The rest of mankind God was pleased, according to the unsearchable counsel of His own will, whereby He extends or withholds mercy, as He pleases, for the glory of His sovereign power over His creatures, to pass by; and to ordain them to dishonor and wrath for their sin, to the praise of His glorious justice.

In answer to the involvement permitted, a conservative Presbyterian congregation or denomination would most likely not allow the ordination of someone who denies double predestination, but would potentially allow an exception taken on Amyraldianism, or alternatively the more permissible positions of Ussher and Baxter. Ordinary members would be otherwise comfortable, depending on their understanding of their membership oath to submit to the teaching of the elders of the church. Each congregation/presbytery/denomination will vary somewhat, though. Your mileage may vary.
There are two articles by Lee Gatiss, titled Shades of Opinion with a Generic Calvinism: The Particular Redemption Debate at the Westminster Assembly, and A Deceptive Clarity? Particular Redemption in the Westminster Standards which give a brief summary of what occurred during the debate of the Westminster Assembly on the issue of hypothetical universalism. The minutes of the debate are also available.


How do Catholics make sure that the supposed saint they are asking intercession of is truly saved?

Unless the saint has been canonized by the Church, one cannot know for sure whether he or she is truly a saint or is in purgatory or hell.
One must pray for the deceased (suffrages for the dead: "Masses, prayers, or acts of piety offered for the repose of the souls of the faithful departed"), in case they are in purgatory. Once they are in heaven, then they can pray for us.
Fr. Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., Life Everlasting: A Theological Treatise on the Four Last Things: Death, Judgment, Heaven, Hell, ch. 26 "Charity for the poor souls [in purgatory]":

May we also pray to the poor souls [in purgatory]? The liturgy does not pray to them. But we are not forbidden to pray to them, though we must give preference to prayer for them. Here is a sentence from St. Thomas: "The souls in purgatory are not in the state of praying, but in the state of being prayed for." [Summa Theologica II-II q. 83 a. 11 ad 3]


Does the Catholic Church consider the 40 year trek in the wilderness an allegory?

The Catholic Church teaches that [a]ccording to an ancient tradition, one can distinguish between two senses of Scripture: the literal and the spiritual, the latter being subdivided into the allegorical, moral and anagogical senses. [Cf. CCC 115]. The next point CCC 116 goes on to say that [t]he literal sense is the meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture and discovered by exegesis, following the rules of sound interpretation: "All other senses of Sacred Scripture are based on the literal." [St. Thomas Aquinas, STh I, 1, 10, ad I.]. Cf. also this @Geremia's answer.

Therefore according to the Church's rules for biblical interpretation, one always starts with the literal sense and all the other senses are based on it.

I haven't seen anything in Catholic circles that considers the 40 year trek in the wilderness [as] an allegory. Of course the Church considers the Old as a type of the New in which the Old is revealed and fulfilled. Cf. This answer for a Catholic understanding of the Temptation of Jesus in Mt 4:1-11 as contrasted with Israel: Matthew uses this episode of the temptations in the wilderness to depict Jesus as the new Israel, in contrast to the old. Jesus is tempted, as Moses and the chosen people were in their forty-year pilgrimage in the wilderness. The Israelite yielded to temptation [while Jesus did not]. [...]. And from this article Lesson Four: On the Way to the Promised Land | St. Paul Center in the section III. The Making of the Old Covenant B. Testing in the Wilderness:

  Paul also said that we should read the account of Israel’s testing in
  the wilderness "as an example…written down as a warning to us, upon
  whom the end of the ages has come" (1 Corinthians 10:11).

Further Reading

Pontifical Biblical Commission - Documents.


Who was the intended audience for the Book of Matthew?

Matthew was likely written for Greek-speaking Christians of Jewish descent.
In my answer to your first question, I discussed reasons for believing Matthew was written in Greek rather than Hebrew. And it should be self-evident that the gospels were written to Christians. So here I'm going to list the reasons for believing the intended audience was specifically Christians of Jewish descent.
Scriptural fulfillment
The Gospel of Matthew, more than the other gospels, often concludes a passage by introducing a Jewish Scripture and claiming Jesus has now fulfilled it.
In many cases, Matthew is simply drawing a parallel between events from the life of Jesus and events from Israel's history. Examples are Matthew 1:22-23 quoting a passage about a sign given to King Ahaz, Matthew 2:15 quoting a passage about the exodus from Egypt, and Matthew 12:17-21 quoting a passage about God's servant Israel (see Isaiah 41:8-9 for identification of the servant with Israel).
Structure of the Gospel
Just as Matthew draws parallels between Jesus' experiences and those of Israel, the gospel itself parallels the Torah, the five books of Moses. In Matthew, Jesus' teachings are combined into five long discourses.

Sermon on the Mount - Matthew 5-7
Missionary Discourse - Matthew 10
Parabolic Discourse - Matthew 13
Discourse on the Church - Matthew 18
Olivet Discourse - Matthew 24

Each of these discourses contains more uninterrupted teaching than the parallel sections of Mark or Luke.
Respect for Jewish law and customs
The phrase "kingdom of God" appears 62 times in the New Testament, but Matthew uses the substitute phrase "kingdom of heaven" 31 times, even where the parallel accounts in other gospels say "kingdom of God". This is likely due to a Jewish custom of never writing the word "God" as a precaution against using God's name in vain.
In Jesus' teaching about handwashing, Mark 7:19 indicates that Jesus thereby "declared all foods clean".

He said to them, "Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?" (Thus he declared all foods clean.)

But in the parallel in Matthew 15, this parenthetical comment is omitted. We know from Paul's letters that some Jewish Christians kept part of their unique dietary restrictions as a matter of conscience. Matthew perhaps did not want to offend their sensibilities.
In Mark 10 Jesus prohibits all divorce. However, in the parallel in Matthew 19, Jesus makes an exception for marital unfaithfulness. The version found in Matthew acknowledges that divorce is allowed in Deuteronomy under certain circumstances.
Furthermore, Jesus says in Matthew 5:17, in a statement not found in the other gospels, that he has come not to abolish the law but to fulfill it. (Fulfill is probably used here in the same sense as above.)
Conclusion
Matthew's attention to the Jewish scriptures and respect for Jewish customs, as well as the structure of this gospel, indicate that it was written primarily for Jewish Christians rather than pagan converts.


What is a "Daud of Sons" as stated in Definition of Faith of the Council of Chalcedon?

I suspect it should read a 'duad of sons', not a 'daud of sons'. A duad is something made two parts. Compare it with triad or monad.

The Nestorian position is sometimes described as teaching that Christ is a duad, composed of a divine person and a human person. According to this, Jesus was not a single person who was fully man and fully God. Instead, the human son of Mary and the Divine Son of God, the Word, were closely connected but not united. (The nature of this connection differs depending on the version of Nestorianism.) In particular, Nestorius argued that Mary was the mother of the man Christ, but was not the mother of the Word. As such, he was accused of dividing Jesus into two persons, two sons.

The Chalcedonian position is that Christ is a single person with two natures. This unity is such that it is not possible to separate the actions and experiences of Jesus into human parts or divine parts. In opposition to Nestorius, they taught that Mary is the Theotokos, mother to the  Theanthropos Jesus, both human and divine.


The meaning of "The Other" in the writings by pope John Paul II

OP quoting John Paul II "All, believers and non - believers alike, need to learn a silence that allows the Other to speak when and how he wishes, and allows us to understand his words."
The meaning of "the Other" in context would refer to a believer's or non-believer's God.


Do any other denominations agree with the Jehovah Witnesses that Satan was cast to earth in 1914?

Yes, if you consider dissident groups of JW tradition.
In my research I have found at least 3 groups that share this belief to a greater or lesser degree.

These are:

As Testemunhas dos Deuses Santos - Holy Gods Witnesses
The Herald of Christ's Kingdom (Bible Students)
The Dawn Bible Students Association

There are many other JW dissident groups but I could not verify if they still share this belief. Even because some of them doesn't exist anymore.

They are:
Laymen's Home Missionary Movement
Epiphany Bible Students Association
Laodicean Home Missionary Movement  (1957-1990)
Pastoral Bible Institute
Watchers of the Morning  (1937-1957)
The Christian Millennial Fellowship
The Standfast Bible Students Association
The Elijah Voice Society
The Servants of Yah
New Jerusalem Fellowship (1922-1992)
Old Paths Publications (1925-1961)
Forest Gate Church (1920-1979)
Goshen Fellowship
The Institute of Pyramidology
The Angel of Jehovah Bible and Tract Society
Berean Bible Institute
The New Covenant Believers (Berean Bible Students Church)
Associated Bible Students
Association of Free Bible Students of France
German Bible Students Association
Greek Bible Students Association
International Bible Students of India
Polish Bible Students Association

The year 1914 is used as a basis by Jehovah's Witnesses due to a calculation created by William Miller. As far as I know, William Miller used the same calculation currently used by the Jehovah's Witnesses, but it came to 1843/1844 not 1914.
See the chart below

On the 2520 website you can see more details about the prophecy and Miller's charts.

Seventh-day Adventists use the verse of Daniel 8:14 to get to the year 1844 but no longer use the 2520 year count.

Both Wiliam Miller and Seventh-Day Adventists do not believe that Satan was cast to earth in 1914/1844. William Miller Believe that Christ would come in 1844 and Seventh-Day Adventist believe that in this year Christ started his work as a High Priest on the Heavenly Santuary.


What is the argument supporting that there is a break between the 69th and 70th week in the book of Daniel?

Background

The premise of the "gap" of Daniel's 70 weeks is both structural and doctrinal.

There is no immediate indication in the text that it is required, except for the initial breakdown of the 70 weeks into three groups.  7 weeks, 62 weeks, and the final week.

Depending on many variables, various dates for both the decree and the crucifixion, as well as different terminal points for the 69th week have been suggested.  Added to this, the text itself (Daniel 9:24-27) is difficult to accurately translate and then to understand, or at least to convince others of your translation/interpretation.

The Argument

The premise for the "gap" is, then, based on the structure.  The final week is separated from the 7 and 62 weeks.  While the 7 and 62 were without breaks, the argument holds that the there holds the possibility that there could be a break there.

More specifically, the doctrinal portion comes into play, claiming that the fulfillment of the "six things" of Daniel 9:24 has not yet occurred by Israel as a whole, and so that, due to the Jews rejecting Jesus as their Messiah, "the clock stopped", and the plan of God was put on hold.  This is reflected in the larger system of "dispensationalism", which holds that the Kingdom was offered but rejected in Jesus' time, and it will be re-offered in the future.

Additionally, it is pointed out that even many opponents of a 2,000 (or so) year gap often adopt a "shorter gap", namely, the 33 or so years until 66 AD, or 3 1/2 years before the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD.  This is because, for many, the 3 1/2 years mentioned in Revelation are often interpolated in the light of Daniel 9's 70th week, as in the "midst", or middle, of the 70th week, Messiah was "cut off" (karath).

Daniel 9:26 then becomes of importance, because it mentions the destruction of the temple and the city, by some interpretations.  This is pointed out by defenders of the 2,000 year gap, because this event certainly did not happen until approximately 33 years after the crucifixion (again, depending upon the specific dates used).  Because Daniel 9 references events that would have to be OUTSIDE of the 490 years themselves, it is argued that there is already a purported 33 year gap at least, and, then, on the basis of that, extending that to 2,000 years is "relatively easy".

The Summary

Thus, as the argument goes, the Jews will be offered yet another chance at the Kingdom.  This time, they will fulfill the six things of Daniel 9, including putting away sin, sealing up vision and prophecy, etc.

These are viewed as the "final seven years of history", as after this, the "Kingdom Age", the proposed Millennium (Revelation 20:1-6), would come.  This is supported by similar time periods in the book of Revelation, presented as varying forms of roughly 3 1/2 years (figuring a 360 day year, in general).

Simply by correlating the various 3 1/2 and 7 year portions in Daniel and Revelation, it is then argued that these periods of time are the same, and that, because much of Revelation is thought to be future, and the first 69 weeks have already occurred, there remains the possibility, now a necessity, that this seventieth week is yet future.

Since the text does not explicitly claim a contiguous 70 weeks, they enter in on the possibility of it, as I understand, on the necessity of the remainder of their position.

Rebuttal

Having presented the case as fairly as I am able, I will point out briefly a few weaker points of it.

The 7 and 62 weeks are contiguous, why shouldn't the 70th week be as well.
The system relies upon the city of Jerusalem to be built, destroyed, rebuilt, and destroyed again, as the 70th week entails is destruction.  Since the prophecy itself contains its rebuilding, and does not contain its destruction and re-re-building, it adds weight that this may not be.
The prophecy records a "moat" and "plaza", as interpreted by some.  As these are very specific details of a particular city, it would appear that only the historical Jerusalem, with those historical features, would suffice.
The argument hinges upon the idea that the 6 things had to be fulfilled.  It states that since they were not, they prophecy was put on hold.  This argument fails on two accounts.  First, it can be conjectured that the six things WERE fulfilled fully, particularly by those who believed.  Simply because only some believed and others did not does not invalidate the belief of those who did believe.  Second, the prophecy is about the period of time to fulfill the 6 conditions, and not the actual fulfillment of them.  That is, God promised the time period, not that they actually would.  Compare this to, "You have until April 15th to file your taxes".  You are promised the time period, not your compliance.  Failure to meet the condition simply results in greater consequences, but does not invalidate the original decree, which was only for the time period.
The argument generally stems from a dispensationalist viewpoint, or the 'Kingdom' aspect of it.  The general line of thought behind it usually holds some form that the church is a 'parenthesis' in the plan of God, and that the 'Kingdom' is coming as a physical rule in the 'Millennium'.  However, this does not hold, despite anyones view of what the Millennium may or may not be, because in the last 2 verses of the book of Acts (Acts 28:30-31), Paul is right there proclaiming the Kingdom of God.  In fact, all through the epistles, it is the Kingdom that he is preaching, right there and then.  The notion that God has 'put the Kingdom on hold' does not find support in the New Testament, despite Dispensationalist claims to the contrary (in my appraisal of the text).
Taking into account that the Jewish calendar was built upon a 7-year cycle (and, additionally, a 7*7+1 cycle of the Jubilee), the similarity of 7-year, and 3 1/2 year periods becomes less of an identificational marker.  Simply because there are multiple mentions of a 3 1/2 year period does not, in the light of a 7-year cycle very familiar to the Jewish people, does not constitute sufficient proof in itself that these all refer to the same time period.  It could just as easily be an issue of the calendar.

In short, the failure of the majority Jewish people accept Christ as their Messiah does not invalidate the fulfillment of the 6 things of Daniel 9:24.  Further, while the argument that Christ is cut off "after the 69th week", before the 70th week is mentioned, does not explicitly indicate a period of time elapsed between them.

Further, while some Preterists yet insert a "gap" of roughly 33 years, from the crucifixion to 3 1/2 years before the 70 AD time-period, this, also is not necessary unless you equate specific time periods on the basis of them both being of the same duration (3 1/2 years, as already stated, should not be sufficient proof).

The argument against any gap, for a contiguous 70 7's, points out that there is no claim that all of the last few events of Daniel 9:26-27 must happen within the 70 weeks, but are the mere outcome of those events situated within them.  The differentiation comes in where v26 says Messiah will be cut off "after" the 69 weeks (hence, is that directly after, or is 3 1/2 years later still "after", but within the 70th week), while v27 says that in the middle of the last seven (or, week), "he" would put an end to sacrifice.

Personal Opinion

While "After" affords a sufficient grounds for flexibility, some would say, there remains debate on whether the 69th week ends with His baptism or His triumphal entry.

If it is His baptism, karath, or "cut off" (in my opinion), could refer to His baptism (karath, in its third use in the Scripture, is used for circumcision, of which baptism is a type), leaving him with "nothing" (John 2:24).  Then, in the middle of the week, 3 1/2 years later, he was cut off.  For the duration of this 3 1/2 years of ministry, plus 3 1/2 years afterwards, the invitation was still to the Jewish people, and Christ confirmed His Word, before and after (before is clear, after is Mark 16:20, Christ confirmed His Word by the signs that accompanied it).

This would have been terminated, then, roughly 3 1/2 years after the cross, possibly corresponding to the timeframe of the stoning of Stephen, and the subsequent salvation of Paul, wherein, the Jews demonstrated their adamant desire to reject the plan of God, and God chose a man, Saul of Tarsus, that the Gospel for the Jew would then go over to the Gentiles, to provoke them to jealousy.

Thus, in this understanding, the 70th week would follow continguously on the 69, but the necessary conclusion of this interpretation would be that the 3 1/2 year time frames of Revelation must then refer to a separate time frame than that of Daniel's 70th week, which is, indeed, what I would claim, seeing as there is nothing special about such a timeframe, as stated, when one considers the typical Jewish 7-year cycle, being the outline of God's calendar.


Perhaps the first failure in the churches was that of hypocrisy (Acts 5:1-11). Hypocrisy is a matter of pretending to be somebody in order to get a name that they may have vainglory. It could be ambition was the seed of the failures in the churches.

Ananias and his wife Sapphira was probably seeking a position. They wanted to be somebody and to have a name so that they could enjoy vainglory. They did not offer everything to the church for the Lord’s sake but pretended to do this.

Acts 5:4 indicates that selling possessions and distributing them to others was not considered by the apostles a practice of legality. The believers were not required to have all things common. That was something that should have been done willingly.

If Ananias and Sapphira did not want to sell their property, they were not required to do so. It would not have been sinful for them to keep their property or to keep the proceeds from the sale of the property. Their sin consisted in lying to the Holy Spirit. Their intention was to cheat the church and to get a name for themselves by lying.