Philippians 3:8
8 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as
rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ
skybalon/skubala (rubbish)
[FONT="]The Greek word translated as “rubbish” is skybalon, but that’s not the most accurate translation of the Greek. Skybalon is a dirty word in Greek, and our lovely wholesome translators have really dulled the translation down. What does it mean? The NET Bible translates it as “dung”, which is still not quite the full meaning. The NET Bible note on verse 8’s “dung” says:[/FONT]
The word here translated “dung” was often used in Greek as a vulgar term for fecal matter. As such it would most likely have had a certain shock value for the readers. This may well be Paul’s meaning here, especially since the context is about what the fleshproduces.
[FONT="]Skybalon was a vulgar term! It has been found in ancient graffiti and in manuscripts linking it as pure profanity! Paul purposefully uses a vulgar and offensive term in his letter in order to grab the attention of his readers and get into their faces. (thinkhebrew.wordpress.com)
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It seems from the above they Paul used a word that was considered vulgar, basically s**t
Now if the above is true he has used a word that seems to be offensive.
I think for me to cuss or use what is considered a swear word is one that is used against a person.
So if the above word us s**t the Paul is saying "Everything I have lost is s**t and indeed it should be because the s**t I have lost had been replaced by Jesus"
In a nutshell "Everything not of Jesus is s**t.
We did have a preacher who used the S word in a evening sermon once. Brief pause then he said "having looked out I want to ask how many of you are offended that I used that word, how many of you are upset I used that word, don't raise hands but if you were does that upset you more than the people God has given you to proclaim the gospel to are going to hell?
I'm not an advocate of gratuitous profanity I must admit.
My mother uses the f word a lot.
I was off the mind set that if was a swear word and to be honest it upset me.
As I thought about it and prayed about it I realised the majority of the time it was "Well F me"
It was in fact to her an element of surprise, that's all.
Funnily enough since she became a Christian she hardly uses that word, I think mainly because she was aware I would not visit with my kids because of the ways words she would use. Not that the word to her was swear word but because she knew they may hear it and bigger blur it out in school or to a friend because they would find it offensive.
Hope the above makes some sense.