Forum Post: This goes back to the Bible
Posted 12 years ago on Dec. 10, 2011, 9:43 p.m. EST by PeaceByJesus
(3)
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Well, the way it appears to me is that this goes back the Bible. You have a disgruntled being demanding that the Landowner "share the wealth" so to speak, and trying to install a victim-entitlement mentality into others, and much succeeding. And while the analogy is wanting due to the fact that those who "have" are not all benevolent, or are all rightful owners, and make restrictions based on what is best, yet in substance there is much that i see as analogous in your protests to the "original occupy movement". If you will bear with me...
This original "occupy movement" was that of the "occupy the throne of God" initiative by a selfish being, who like many protesters i believe, basically have an animus against the idea of want striving lawfully for rewards, (2Tim. 2:5) but seek to "climb up some other way." (Jn. 10:1) See Isaiah 14:12-14. As the devil would have God divest Himself of His rightful power and position (not out of selfishness but as that is what is right and best) , to "share the wealth" with one who selfishly lusts after such, so these souls are at war with the principles of gaining position, and demand those who are worthy of their reward relinquish it so that the indolent can live as a wealthy man, seeing everyone as a victim of the former.
In the Garden the devil sought to instill the same victim-entitlement mentality he evidences, working to convince Eve she was victimized due to the solitary restriction, and basically demanded that God "share the wealth," that of Divine knowledge which innocence needed not was not best to have.
As in the 60's, it largely seems there is a lust is for a Garden of Eden without God, in which no one has to work, or wear clothes, or where such commitments as marriage are required to enjoy sexual union, and other restraints against the sinful proclivity of fallen men.
Instead all just eat from the trees which grow food and whatever else is needed while smoking bongs (which also hang from trees). But in this case the government is as God, and provides all for these elite class, as earning things is unnecessary. And in essence much of the the protest today is actually against the failure of this ideology, of the government to provide what this fantasy demands, and thus louder demands are made, using the legitimate failures of capitalism to demand a socialist state, but whose elite rulers end of being worse than what they replaced.
As this is a rebellion against the principles of earning position and power, and of consequences for rejecting it, in which context mercy is mercy and is appreciated, then ultimately it is a rebellion against God.
The end of which is Hell, and its absence of anything positive and realization of the opposite, in contradistinction to those with God, who were redeemed by God/Christ on His expense and credit, on His blood and righteousness in God's mercy; Not by rejecting that there are consequences for sin, but by God making reconciliation, and is given to those who repent and believe on Him, (Rom. 3:8-4:12) with a faith that effects love and works, and who will be recompensed with rewards according to their labor. (1Cor. 3) To the glory of God who gave His Son, and is still giving.
Do not speak in my name or I shall smite thee down.
SOROS/Rothchild Hasbarabots run the show here, but a few interlopers catch the odd truth that slips in.
Hasbara is a concept "normal" people here aren't familiar with. It takes so many forms. Zionism is the political manifestation of Talmud, most holy book of Jews (most Jews) it’s fair to say. Until we are willing to address the fact that this is a “religious” supremacist movement used from one end to the other by Rothschild et al at the top end of the $ pyramid to dominate and manipulate the rest of the world including those at the bottom end of the "Jewish" pyramid and the entire pyramid scheme is designed to rest directly on the backs of “Goyim” non Jews the world over, we are subdividing the problem only looking at pieces of it, apologizing for the SOURCE. Talmud, it’s adherents, Jewish and non Jewish (I know people who operate by Talmudic principle who have never heard of it) are antithetical to common law principles. If you can agree that the 7 laws of Noah or the Ten Commandments are basically sound in principle, you can also say that Talmud is an 18 volume collection of Rabbinical sophistry designed to circumvent the law for Jews and only Jews. No such thing as "Jew" Things have specific names that represent predictable qualities and quantities. Things like "frisbees(tm)" get special recognition for being representative of a product that is a small plastic flying disc. Frisbees fly in any direction you throw them, with predictable results based on how you throw the disc, and let's say, weather conditions. Frisbees are made from plastic (other things are plastic that aren't frisbees) I could probably list dozens of types of plastic. There are cloth frisbees (flying discs) there are disc golf discs (or "frisbees"-to most observers who don't play frisbee or frisbee golf / disc golf, there is no difference between frisbee golf and any other game of frisbee. There is ultimate frisbee-some type of team frisbee with scoring. How many colors are there of frisbees? How many sizes? How many shapes? They ALL sail through the air gracefully when you throw them properly. Where does the Jew label come in? There is NO predictable set of things a Jew is known to do. All the things they ARE capable of: Infinite list of every kind of positive thing they can do and every kind of negative thing, every kind of imaginary thing. The fiction is self perpetuating...a lie that got started, and rolled out of control. The harder they try to make it all true, the more lies must be told. We have "Jew" as a racial distinction and disagreements as to qualifications within each of those subdivisions. (Sephardic, Ashkenazi, Spinoza, yada yada...) We have "Jew" meaning adherent to a religious doctrine. Within this subset we have orthodox, reform, and others. Why "Jew" is SO diverse and unbounded by qualitative and quantitative meaning that this label can be of no use to us in reasoned discussion. By allowing any discussion to be framed around anything "Jew"ish, it's as though we accept and ratify, sight unseen, tomes of Talmudic Sophistry, every person place thing or act that has ever been attributed to "Jews" since the beginning of written records (including all the fakes). Why start from a lost position? Time to move on to addressing the problems that are being associated with Jews and Israel and make clear distinctions so we can divide and separate the real crimes of commission from the false ideas of pseudo religion/false origin and most especially, the ingrained squeamishness that prevents most people from seeing the problem. The term "Jew" serves to obscure these criminals. It has only the life we give to it. Jew is a fiction-a STRAW MAN. If frisbees started coming off the line that didn't fly-we wouldn't call them frisbees. Why do we afford Jews the same kind of leeway. That label doesn't fit anything. It's pure equivocation. It falls flat-it does NOT fly. I suppose It would be impossible for me to come to this conclusion without the entirety of my experience and education, and without the Jewish label attached to ao many people i have dealt with directly and indirectly. I'm sure we could not have caught the tail of the problem without an overwhelming mountain of evidence. The continuous identity theft and self abusing sophistry is a paper trail like none other. These diverse tribal gangs march to a familiar drumbeat that is inaudible to the rest of us "normal" people. However, by the time we "normal folk" waking as truth seekers, seem able to grasp at the name of this problem, history shows that we may again find the strawman * has a new name, and that we really only have hold of the tail. Forget the name. It's the thing they fear most-irrelevance. Truth. We must identify their codes, their systematic criminal methods. Read the manuals full of hate speech they use to train generations of extremeist supremacist criminals. Talmud is one of these hatefull manuals (Protocols of The Learned Elders of Zion is like Talmud for Dummies or Cliffs Notes). Kaballah caballah -another. We lose the game before we even start when we write or speak "Jew" in a thought that is supposed to address concrete crimes they have commited or may be suffering (as a result). The word itsself is subtle poison - toxic in any amount, and lethal in many cases, where people mistook strawmen for humans.
and you're a conspiracy nut. go see a shrink.
IGNORE
So, just so I heard you correctly, resisting against the 1% and the 20 or more multinational corporations, and the illegal foreclosure of homes, etc. is rebelling against your God?
Well, that is a clever way that has been used for many centuries to control people. No one is on to that little trick. We have never seen this before.
No, i am speaking of a broader ethos of victim entitlement mentality, which among other things worked to promote multitudes buying houses apparently without an income that could justify such, and then bail them out at the expense of others who did not choose to be surety for them.
http://www.care2.com/causes/five-major-banks-being-sued-for-illegal-foreclosure-practices-in-massachusetts.html. http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/11/29/377392/banks-illegally-foreclose-military
Are there people that lost their homes because of job loss or predatory loans? Yep. However, lets be fair here.
Do you ever FEEL like an asshole trying to pervert Jesus' message to mean the exact opposite of what it was or do you know that's what you're doing but are completely shameless?
Bible thumper, go thump yourself in the head with The Holy Bible a zillion times, take a few holy aspirins, and beg for forgiveness for your stupidity.
Victim entitlement mentality! I did not "chose" to be layed off from my job because the ceo of my company managed their money poorly but I sure as hell am going to use the unemployment insurance that I paid into all these years rather than tell my kids that some religious nut on the internet said you can't eat this month because god might see taking unemployment insurance as "victim entitlement mentality". You are right I should starve my children, would that make your god happy, do you live on planet earth! no one choses to lose their job and live in poverty! What a sick statement
No, starving your children would not be sanctioned by God, nor employers withholding what is due (in the O.T. wages had to be made at days end). Nor did i say unemployment insurance (or SS) is the cry of "victim entitlement." But if you want to construe what i wrote to be that, then there is a problem. Rejecting the laws of God are the real problem:
http://peacebyjesus.witnesstoday.org/RevealingStatistics.html
all liberalism policy is only carried out with the use of force. Social Security is force, Medicare is fore, Re distributive progressive tax structure = force. Obamacare = force. Unions = use of force. So tell me how compassionate liberals are when everything they do requires the use of force
Whaaaaat?
Are you aware that in Jewish myth as well as in some versions of the Jewish Bible (what we know as the Old Testament) there appears Lillith who was the first wife of Adam and was created at the same time as he was? She left Eden (or in some versions was exiled) because she refused to submit to Adam and become his subservient wife. She did not return to Eden until she had mated with the Archangel Samael bearing children by him. It is supposedly from these children of Lillith and Samael that the children of Adam and Eve -- Cain, Seth, and "other sons and daughters" found their mates after the exile.
Hate to break it to you but God did not start out as singular but plural meaning many Gods. God became a singular entity when the leaders decided it was useful and more powerful if their was one God and that is where the 10 commandments was written into law. The first law of the land was written here in addition to every law that came after the 10 commandments that now has become so corrupt and profitable that it makes you sick. The US has the highest prison population in the world so what does that tell you?
I agree -- many people forget that in Genesis 3:22, the Bible says, "Then the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever” Clearly here, the reference is that YHWH (or Yahweh as it became later) is speaking of equals rather than subordinates.
Genesis, when read from an objective point of view -- instead of a faith-based one -- is an almost direct relation of Babylonian religious stories. In fact, the story of creation in Genesis and the Enuma Elish (the Babylonian Creation story) are almost exactly the same and, in many places identical word-for-word. It's important to note that Genesis was composed a short time after the Hebrew returned from the Babylonian Exile (after that empire conquered Israel) and, after many generations in Babylonia, it is certain that exposure to that reilgion and its stories was firmly in the minds of the Hebrews.
A good site to see and better understand this is http://faculty.gvsu.edu/websterm/Enuma_Elish.html.
Elsewhere in the OT we can find Babylonian myth in the story of the Great Flood. even the Epic of Gilgamesh contains many of the same stories contained in the OT.
In the New Testament, there is a direct correlation between the story of Jesus and that of Horus. In fact, Mythologist David Leeming wrote an excellent book called "The Voyage of the Hero" in which he builds on the previous work by Joseph Campbell, "The Hero with many Faces." Campbell, in exhaustive research, developed the idea that all heros in mythololgy share certain things in exact commonality. IN "Voyage" Leeming builds on this using comparatives to show that all heroes take the same "journey" I highly recommend both books. There is also a website for the Leeming book fro those interested: http://www.units.muohio.edu/technologyandhumanities/leeming.htm
This is not to challenge anyone's faith in their religion; merely to offer a chance to better understand the foundations and origins of it.
This is simply more evidence of the effectiveness of Internet myths and the willingness of masses to uncritically repeat such specious theories.
http://kingdavid8.com/Copycat/Home.html
http://www.christian-thinktank.com/copycat.html
http://www.tektonics.org/lp/monoelohim.html
http://www.tektonics.org/jesusexisthub.html
In short, to be objective you need to at least see some of the responses to these and such charges: http://christianthinktank.com/gilgymess.html
http://www.tektonics.org/af/babgenesis.html
http://www.tektonics.org/lp/lynchmob.html
http://www.preventingtruthdecay.org/zeitgeistpartone.shtml
http://christianthinktank.com/fabprof4.html
Thanks
Thank you for the websites. I found them interesting and informing as far as they went.
I put it that way because 1) I am not aware of the credentials of the people who are presenting the information and therefore cannot adequately judge their qualifications. While I am not one who places complete faith in a mere degree, knowing that the authority has been actively working in the field using recognized research and analytical techniques is important. (I liken this to a situation where one is seeking redress of a wrong. I may have a friend or know someone who is knowledgeable in the law, but when going to court, I wold choose an attorney over the well-informed acquaintance.); and 2) I was very careful in my response to separate a faith-based approach from a scholarly approach. I did so specifically because the objectives for each of these approaches – while no less valid to the practitioner or their adherents – are completely different. The faith-based approach has as its objective to affirm the faith of the reader through research and analysis. It begins from a point of at least assuming that the conclusion , if not already known to be true, is at least presumed to be true and then presenting data that will support it and arguments against that data which does not. The goal of the scholarly approach is to take a neutral position on the matter and search for any information, of any kind, which will shed light upon the subject; to take a truly agnostic approach (agnostic being the Greek word for “having no knowledge of” and describing a state of complete absence of knowledge) and assembling the acquired information, analyzing it, and seeing where it takes the conclusion.
With that said, at least one of your sources supports my position. The section on the flood myth on the Christian Think Tank pages had the following which I have cut and pasted directly:
This does not appear to be a detail that two different cultures would just happen to include independently of one another. Heidel expresses the consensus: 'That the Babylonian and Hebrew versions are genetically related is too obvious to require proof.'
“We should not be surprised, then, to find that in the flood story, more than in any other literary tradition, it is assumed by scholarship that the Mesopotamian and biblical accounts cannot be thought of as having been independently composed. And again, since even the copies of the flood traditions in Mesopotamia date from the early second millennium (The Eridu Genesis), the biblical account is usually judged to be secondary. So, as stated by Finkelstein, 'the dependence of the Biblical story upon the Babylonian to some degree is granted by virtually all schools of thought.'” [AILCC:38]
Alexander Heidel was an Assyriologist who was also a Christian. His work in comparing the OT Genesis stories to Assyrian myth was, at the time of publication in 1942, taken as very important. However, in the intervening years, scholarship in this field has almost universally overturned Heidel's conclusions and he is seen now as a Christian Apologist. Nevertheless, even he states clearly above that there is a direct connection between the Genesis stories and Babylonian myth.
But I want to emphasize here something I stated before: it is not my purpose to challenge anyone's faith. My purpose is to merely provide information and add to the discussion of the issue. We – you and I – may debate the origins of the Bible – and other religious texts – and it would be quite enjoyable to do so. But as pertains to this site, I think it wold get us off your central question of whether there is a place for Christian belief in OWS. To that I answer that it's my feeling that there is a place for all religions in OWS and that those who are faithful in whatever way should be welcome as long as they do not seek to impose their views upon others. (I do not imply here that you are doing so – you stated your position and you had the right to do so.)
However, while religion is important in the giving of guidance to one's personal life, I do not believe it has a greater role in government. Religion – to me – is a deeply personal and intimate thing and to put it on public display is, in my view, the same as kissing and fondling one's wife or husband in public: it cheapens, trivializes and degrades the relationship and no one wants to see it anyway. To put religion, of any kind, as a centerpiece to government, also of any kind, is to immediately disenfranchise all others and that is contrary to the purposes of how I see OWS and a free nation.
Thank you for trying to be objective. Sources as Holding and Miller (tektonics and thinktank) are seasoned apologists who debate the opposition and provide referenced material.
As for whether there is a place for Christian belief in OWS, not doubt there is, as the Bible has much to say about oppression, but i see such being misused in general, and in which i see a strong antipathy against Christ and moral authority, even leaning toward toward anarchy.
Barb is right. The western nations took to monotheism after the fall a Athens and Rome. Their thinking was that because Babylon and other Jewish nations survived longer it would be wise to incorporate their beliefs into the new national formation. Also, there was already a lot of followers of Jesus, a JEW, so why not role with it. This does not negate Jesus's wisdom but it does give argument against the omnipotency of Christianity. I'm an agnostic. just because I believe atheism is no different than religions and ideologies. They blind you to other perspectives.
Thanks
It's not just Babylonian. It's also Canaanite.
In fact, lost of Ancient Near Eastern religions have a story about a deity bringing order out of Chaos, usually by defeating a chaos monster that is somehow connected to water ("and the spirit of God hovered over the water", also check out psalm 74). Chaos Kampf, the struggle against chaos, is how the Ancient Near East showed how powerful its deity is.
I'm not sure if your dating of the material after the Babylonian Exile is right, though. The three sources which primarily make up Genesis (Prophetic Source, Elohis Source, and the Priestly source) I think all are pretty well dated before the Babylonian Exile, and it was part of the Deuteronomic History that was written after Babylon takes over.
There are major differences between the Enuma Elish and the Genesis account, though. Humans are made in God's image, and have an intimate connection with Him. God cares for them, even after they sin. In other stories, humans do the work that the gods don't want to do, whereas in Genesis they are given dominion over the Earth. God speaks the universe into existence, instead of recycling the dead body of a god(dess) or a monster. When God rests in Genesis (as other deities do in their Chaos Kampf), he sanctified that time for his people to rest, too. And other Chaos Kampfs usually don't make much mention of animals.
All that said... it's kind of beside the point. The point is this; the guy has a faith which tells him that OWS is unbiblical. And, to an extent, he is right. As long as OWS fits his (ok, maybe her? I'm trying to get over that habit...) schema of jobless lazy bums who want what they haven't earned, then it's not a Biblical model.
Helping people who are not lazy bums, but who are truly oppressed, is definitely Biblical.
I truly enjoyed your repsonse. Thank you for it. And first of all, let me say that I agree with you that our discussion is beside the point and possibly a distraction from it.
My own response to your analysiss that, from my research -- and admittedly the vast bulk of my interest lies in the NT rather than the OT -- Genesis is generally considered to be in two parts and coming from two periods -- one, Gensis Two, is older than Genesis One and is based, at least in part, on the Gilgamesh Mythos. Genesis One is a later scribal addition to the older segment. The dividing line is the name used to describe the Hebrew God -- Elohim in G2, and YHWH in G1. This accounts for some of the apparent contradictions in Genesis -- such as the well-known duplicate and disageeing stories of Noah's Flood that appear practically side-by-side in the text.
But the differences between Gilgamesh (and the other sources) would not indicate to me that the earlier sources can be discounted as a source for Genesis. After all, they would have been vrebal traditions from the Exile and very likely changed to me the circumstances of the Jews when written. As support for this, I point to the Synoptic Gospels. Depending on your scholarly "camp" Mark, the first gospel written (68-73 or 60-65) and used as at least one source the document now known a "Q" (which in turn stands for "quelle", German for "source"). Matthew followed somewhere in the neighborhood of 70-100 or 80-85 in turn followed by Luke (80-100 or 80-85 with most scholars agreeing on a probably date of 85). John was the odd-man-out being considered by most experts as having been composed in stages, so there was not one given date. The range here is either 90-100 or 90-110, which, to me, is splitting hairs.
Nevertheless, it is agreed by the vast amjority of scholars that both Matthew and Luke drew heavily on Mark as their primary source, and (possibly) on "Q" as well. There may have been other sources available to them as well.
My point is that it was not intended to directly copy them but that, as one would do in writing any history, using them as a source of information. So the fact that there are distinct and even glaring differences does not surpirse me. In fact, I would question even more if there were no differences at all.
I am only vaguely familiar with the Gospel sources; I haven't had an NT class yet, and it's been a while since I read Metzger's introduction to the NT.
As for the OT, you're right about the two sources which call God Elohim and YHWH, and those are the names used for him in the Elohist source and the Yahwist (which I mistakenly called the Prophetic source, though it is generally believed to be from prophetic circles in its origin) source, respectively. There is also a bit of Priestly source. in there, and if I remember correctly, P was more of a Redactionist than a genuine source. I'd have to check my notes on it.
I tend to believe that, rather than using the Chaos Kampf as a source of information, it is a borrowed form of expression to describe a unique and original God. Not that they borrowed God from other religions around them, but that they borrowed ways of talking about their God.
I agree. I have a saying that "no god ever invented a religion -- only humans do that" and in such cases, they find ways of expressing a believe and an image that language is quite unable to convey.
As one who works with language professionally and as an enthusiast, I ahve at times been tried to get "laymen" to understand the limits it has in conveying ideas. It's truly a pitiful medium through which to try to communicate but it's the best humans have invented, I suppose.
Then again, it also occasionally gives me a perverse amusement to twist it and mold it into a game that is secret to me.
And you are correct that P was the Redactor.
If you ahve not studied them yet, I can highly recommend the Nag Hammadi texts for an insight into what Christianity was in the several decades following Jesus's death. They are so completely different, in many cases, from what we have been taught about the religion and even, in some cases, seems almost like the author of certain texts was entertaining himself with the precursor of LSD. The Heretical texts and doctrines can be very eye-opening to the study of the origins of Christianity, including the later ones such as the Cathar Heresy.
Elaine Pagels is the acknowledged expert on the Nag Hammadi Library and I can highly recommend her books.
Thanks, see above. Also http://www.ukapologetics.net/docu.htm
http://leonardooh.wordpress.com/2010/01/20/response-bablonian-exilepost-exilic-dating-for-the-hebrew-bible/
Isaiah 10:1-2 Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people, making widows their prey and robbing the fatherless.
Still beholden to the scribblings of cavemen, eh? The Bible is so clearly a crude cobbling together of age old fables and myths. It's 2011, dipshit. We know what the sun is. We know why it rains. There isn't a man in the sky.
Actually, if you think about it the sun is God. Without the sun we wouldn't exist.
prove your faith by taking your following out to a giant field and drink some koolaid.
@PBJ...you are a very sick individual. seek help. there are plenty of good meds out there.
it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is
for a rich man to get into heaven -
unless koch / murdoch / grover buy it first
ooops!
Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Matthew 19:24
I think a lady is buying the stairway.
My beliefs, and those of the movement, rest on two things. In one sense they rest on a willingness to embrace social progress; that technological change can and should be matched by social change, and that the only important parts of an idea are how many lives it betters and how much it betters those lives. This does not mean that anything goes, but rather that we continually reevaluate the social contract under which we live, and when it fails to serve the people as well as it is able we seek the minimum amount of change needed to rectify that failure. We believe that continuous incremental change is part of life, but that a sudden upending of our world is often counterproductive and should only be used as a last resort.
If you want to talk about what it means to me in terms of policy, it means that I accept that our fortunes rise and fall based on the flow of capital between industries and enterprises, and feel that choking off that flow would be in very poor judgement. I do, however, believe that capital is inherently an amoral force (not immoral, but amoral) and thus should be directed, firmly but gently, toward the enterprises where it can do the most good for the most people.
To that end I want to see a robust regulatory environment, in which small businesses are allowed to grow and flourish free of most burdens, but in which the natural pressures that lead the markets toward oligopoly and monopoly need to be countered such that the larger a business is, the more difficult it is to continue growing and thus an equilibrium will develop such that economies of scale can be realized without driving the little guy out of business. It means that I also believe in protecting the environment via direct regulation and by pollution taxes, not because I enjoy placing burdens on our industry but because on some level we all breathe the same air, drink the same water, and live under the same climate, and irreversibly fouling any of these things may be profitable in the short term but is bad for everyone in the long term.
It means that I believe in a strong social safety net for our poor because our economy is strong enough that doing so should not impose an undue burden on those of us who are not poor, and a form of collective poverty insurance (think something similar to Social Security to supplement welfare) is a good idea because as few people should be sleeping on the sidewalk and having to live on spare change as possible. It also means that I believe (at least right now) in some form of economic protectionism until we reset our balance of trade, because a reset balance of trade means more jobs for Americans and thus a route out of generational povery for those who wish to take it and a road to the top for those who are smart enough and ambitious enough to pursue such a position.
It means that I side with the left on most if not all social issues, because I believe that as long as no undue harm comes to people there is no reason to regulate how they conduct their private lives, and that most actual stupidity is either self-correcting or can be corrected at far less of an expense to the community and to the nation than it would take to punish it. I also believe that the kind of bigotry and hate your post promotes is ultimately far more corrosive, un-American, and un-Christian than any of the things you argue against in here. I honestly haven't seen anything this viciously reactionary and woefully out of place being justified by American Christianity since the antebellum days in the South, when God wanted slaves to obey their masters and those who thought differently were going to Hell. Guess who had the final say when the dust settled? Hint: it wasn't you.
Rather, you are a fan of fiction, as the specious nature of your revisionist ideas have long ago been examined and found wanting .
http://carm.org/when-were-gospels-written-and-whom
http://debate.org.uk/topics/history/bib-qur/bibmanu.htm
http://www.tektonics.org/ntdocdef/gospdefhub.html
http://www.evidenceandanswers.org/articles/Historical%20Reliability%20of%20the%20Gospels.pdf
http://www.amazon.com/Case-Divinity-Jesus-Examining-Earliest/dp/1442203226
But if you want to justify your rejection of God and what He represents, then there are plenty of comrades you will cater to your needs.
Pure ego.
Did Jesus advocate the use of force?
“(34) Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. (35) For I have come to turn ‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law – (36) a man’s enemies will be members of his own household.’ (37) Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; (38) and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. (39) Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 10:34-39, NIV).
“But now, whoever has a money belt is to take it along, likewise also a bag, and whoever has no sword is to sell his coat and buy one.” (Luke 22:36 NASB)
"[Jesus] made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple area, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables." John 2:15
Matthew = hyperbole to make the point that Following Christ isn't going to be easy, and you have to be willing even to go against your family.
Luke = if you agree with Dr. Ben Witherington III (Not sure yet whether or not I do), has linguistic earmarks of sarcasm.
John = it's hard to make that image as exciting in actual history as it is in the movies, especially when you consider that the Empire had soldiers stationed in the very temple where these tables and animals were, and would have moved in if Jesus actually was attacking people, which would have made for a very different end to the story.
Actually, the soldiers were not at the Temple. The Temple was surrounded by an area called The Antonia. This was located actually around temple grounds, not on. Separating the Antonia from the Temple itself was the large outer court where people of any belief were allowed to assemble, and then the inner courts where only practicing Jews were permitted. finally, inside the inner courts was the Temple itself. Each of these areas was separated by walls and gates, so to say tht there were Roman soldiers within the Temple would be completely incoorect. As Gentiles and infidels, they would not be permitted even in the inner court.
Besides this, it was not the practice of Rome to interfere in the religions of subjugated states as long as they did not present an indiciation of subversion. Jesus's activities within the Temple were, if we take the Biblical story to be exact in all details, pointed at and intended for Jews and the Jewish priestly class alone. It had nothing at all to do with Rome or their government. Whatever else Jesus might have said outside the Temple -- and here we ahve conflicting statements of his views on Rome -- his actons inside the Tmple were not directed in any way that is evident toward Rome and would not ahve been seen as a threat by the Roman soldiers tht were, at any rate, several hundred meters away and closed off from the incident by high walls and gates.
No, and the N.T church did not, and as the church is not constituted to use force to spread the faith and punish theological opponents, every time in history that it has done so it has left a negative testimony.
"Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence. " (John 18:36)
"For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: " (2 Corinthians 10:3)
"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. " (Ephesians 6:12)
"By the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, " (2 Corinthians 6:7)
Except that early Christianity did utilize force. People did not run to Christianity. It was a top down approach. Not to mention the thug mentality during the Christological formation.
Perhaps you have been reading much of da vince code fiction ( http://peacebyjesus.witnesstoday.org/thedavincicode.html ), and consider Roman Catholicism as definitive of Christianity over Scripture. When mortals presume to be the supreme infallible authority you have a cult, and the souls as well as the bodies of good men are in danger.
Oh, no. I'm not a fan of the Da Vince Code fiction. I prefer non-fiction. I also find that one cannot just cherry pick versus from any text to attempt to prove anything. The gospels are wartime literature. If Jesus existed, he didn't write anything down and nobody else bothered to write anything down. There were no eye witnesses. You have Paul of Tarsus who admits that he never knew the man and, obviously, is not the author of all of the epistles. The oldest one comes in at 65 CE.
In 66 CE we have the beginning of the Jewish Wars or the Jewish Revolt. We only have one account and that was written by Josephus. This brings us to the author of Mark 70 CE. Note: 35 years after the alleged crucifixion of Jesus. Luke was written 80-85 CE. Matthew and John were written 90-95 CE. Prior to these writings the concept of Jesus was handed down through storytelling and of course follows in the same line as the Persian Kind Mithridates VI of Pontus and, more importantly, Apollonius of Tyana. The earliest Latin text of the gospels is dated 180 CE.
The collection of texts doesn't get started until 180 CE and Irenaeus of Lyons is considered the man responsible for initiating this. Montanus proclaimed that the second coming was immediate and would occur in Papuza, Phyrgia. Seeing that this was competition, Irenaeus set to work.
I think people forget that not everything came out of Rome. Antioch, Alexandria, and Constantinople were equally, if not more, important. The Ecumenical Councils were very brutal. Further, it took about 800 years to create Jesus as the western world knows it today.
The truth is far better than fiction.
Rather, you are a fan of fiction, as the specious nature of your revisionist ideas have long ago been examined and found wanting .
http://carm.org/when-were-gospels-written-and-whom
http://debate.org.uk/topics/history/bib-qur/bibmanu.htm
http://www.tektonics.org/ntdocdef/gospdefhub.html
http://www.evidenceandanswers.org/articles/Historical%20Reliability%20of%20the%20Gospels.pdf
http://www.amazon.com/Case-Divinity-Jesus-Examining-Earliest/dp/1442203226
But if you want to justify your rejection of God and what He represents, then there are plenty of comrades you will cater to your needs.
Wrong answer, Cornflake!!!
That's ok, I knew that you weren't capable of discussion.