Your are confusing what martyrdom is, in my opinion. I pointed this out, and now you give me some long drawn out lecture about the irrelevance of doctrine. Without the understanding of doctrine you cannot fathom why people choose martyrdom. So either you don't know what martyrdom is defined as or you are deliberatly confusing. The thought on the second paragraph was an attempt to show the isolation of the Apostles. They had no idea what the others were doing or saying, but they all died believing the Jesus rose from the dead, or decieving themselves and the ones that followed them. You took the last sentence out of it's context. Because in context, I was referring to the Apostles. It does not make sense to me that the Apostles would die the deaths they did for something they KNEW was not true. As far as "being in their right mind." If they went to their death believing in the fact of Jesus' death & resurrection then yes, they were. People don't die for a lie, especially when they know it is a lie.
If the New Testament included only the Gospels.....
by Spectrum 32 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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Spectrum
Garybuss,
No I haven't. Anything different about it? -
Spectrum
inquirer,
"It's amazing how many times people debate New Testament Scripture, but never the OT books! Why are the OT books alway all so sacred, and that the Jews were so good at keeping the canon and there can be only 39 books in their part of the Bible."
Probably because they were better organised than the christians. The christians were writing whilst trying to establish themselves in a hostile environment. It seems the Jews recognised their prophets whilst they were still alive and took everything they wrote as kosher unlike the Christians who couldn't make their minds up. -
Narkissos
Dying is so easy, everyone eventually succeeds... And many, many people are ready to accept about any reason to have it come sooner if that makes it look meaningful.
That being said, I think the "apostles" and the "apostolic age" are part of Christianity's foundational myth, cast over its (mostly irretrievable) historical origins. There are tons of problems with the NT "data": "Twelve" with different names, depending on which Gospel you read, overlapping with the distinct group of the "brothers of the Lord". James popping up from nowhere as the acknowledged leader of Jerusalem's group. A distinct group of "Seven" as Hellenistic leaders. Other "apostles" (e.g. Paul, or Barnabas) which belong to neither of the above.
What about martyrdom? The NT mentions John the Baptist (not a "Christian"), Jesus (?), Stephen (of the "Seven"), and James (of the "Twelve," killed by Herod like John the Baptist, just in time before James of Jerusalem enters stage in Acts 12). That's about all. The sporadic Roman persecutions of the late 1st century are scarcely alluded to (1 Peter, Revelation) and do not refer to any martyred "apostle" by name. All the "apostle stories" have to be gathered from 2nd century and later legends, which are full of contradictions.
Don't misunderstand me. I do not make little of anyone who dies for his/her faith. In a sense, the ability to do so is the beginning of human freedom -- a highly sacred thing if there is any. But that doesn't make their specific belief a truth by any means. Btw, if faith is worth dying for, I'm not sure truth is.
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Spectrum
Narkissos,
Do top catholic and orthodox clergy share the same views you have expressed in this thread? Or do they really believe the whole NT is a seamless truthful naration of Christ and his message? -
Pole
:Your are confusing what martyrdom is, in my opinion. I pointed this out, and now you give me some long drawn out lecture about the irrelevance of doctrine. Without the understanding of doctrine you cannot fathom why people choose martyrdom. So either you don't know what martyrdom is defined as or you are deliberatly confusing. The thought on the second paragraph was an attempt to show the isolation of the Apostles. They had no idea what the others were doing or saying, but they all died believing the Jesus rose from the dead, or decieving themselves and the ones that followed them. You took the last sentence out of it's context. Because in context, I was referring to the Apostles. It does not make sense to me that the Apostles would die the deaths they did for something they KNEW was not true. As far as "being in their right mind." If they went to their death believing in the fact of Jesus' death & resurrection then yes, they were. People don't die for a lie, especially when they know it is a lie.
Read Narkissos's last post and give me your extra-biblical evidence documenting the martyrdom of "the Apostles" (and not early Christians in general). How do you know all of the Apostles (and how many) were real people? How do you know they witnessed what is described in the Gospels? Which Gospels? How do you know what they knew was true and what they thought was true? How do you know they suffered and died for what they "knew was true"? Then multiply your probabilities. Don't add them. At the end of the day you will see that the doctrinal details are totally irrelevant and that even if many Christians died for their faith there is no way we can know what they knew was true and what they thought was true. At the psychological level (and not adoctrinal one) I see no reason for distinguishing between the martyrdom of Christians and the martyrdom of other people who die for their beliefs.
Making these simplistic disctinctions between lie vs truth in this case is what you base your apologetics on. Which reminds me of the fact that I was at this stage some time ago too. If you look at this thread:
The apostle Peter - an honest Christian or a cynical manipulator?
The answer given by Leolaia was very simple and I had to accept it after some consideration:
2 Peter was not written by Apostle Peter.
Isn't it sometime easier to accept the most likely answer rather than multiply endless chains of probabilities?
Pole -
zen nudist
But I agree that Paul's "conversion" (whatever its real motivation) is hardly a starting point either because Hellenistic Christian churches predate him.
what actual evidence is there that any "christians" predated Paul.... they were not called christians until AFTER Paul in "Antioch" by the bibles own accounts and Antioch was a center of Pauls missions.
prior there were lots of Jewish apocolyptic sects, but no christians.
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zen nudist
But I agree that Paul's "conversion" (whatever its real motivation) is hardly a starting point either because Hellenistic Christian churches predate him.
what actual evidence is there that any "christians" predated Paul.... they were not called christians until AFTER Paul in "Antioch" by the bibles own accounts and Antioch was a center of Pauls missions.
prior there were lots of Jewish apocolyptic sects, but no christians.
as to the nature of Paul's hallucination, spectrum, you are talking as if we really understand how ALL of them work, and I doubt that is even close to the case. Paul was not persecuting christians as no such thing existed at that time yet....not by that name, but he was persecuting people of THE WAY which may have been an apocolyptic sect in the deserts and he was working for the HIGH preist, which in that time meant he was a traitor to the Pharisees who saw the High priest as a nearly godless traitor and sell out to the Romans. his guilt over being a traitor, his zeal to make these people pay for their anti-social religious beliefs that threatened the stability with Rome, perhaps[?] and who knows what other thoughts going through his mind combined with the desert heat and dehydration could have lead to him hallucinating a savior [Jesus = yhwh saves] as the answer to all his delemnas... which matched closely to the teacher of righteousness [preached upto a hundred years prior] and the coming war of the children of light and darkness.
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XJW4EVR
Pole,
You have given me a lot to chew on, so I certainly hope that you will give me that time.
I do want to respond, at this time, to one statement:
At the psychological level (and not adoctrinal one) I see no reason for distinguishing between the martyrdom of Christians and the martyrdom of other people who die for their beliefs.
Again, I reiterate, that as a general rule, Islamofascist "martyrs" tend to kill others (mostly innocent) in order to attain their "martyrdom." Compare that to Christian martyrs who, as a general rule, do not kill innocents, in their martyrdom. That is a level of distinction that I, and others, apply to martyrdom. Maybe I "simplistic", and to be quite honest, I am glad that I am, because to make all religious martyrs equal is a level of sophistication that I really find morally reprehensible.
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Pole
XJW4EVR,
:Again, I reiterate, that as a general rule, Islamofascist "martyrs" tend to kill others (mostly innocent) in order to attain their "martyrdom." Compare that to Christian martyrs who, as a general rule, do not kill innocents, in their martyrdom. That is a level of distinction that I, and others, apply to martyrdom. Maybe I "simplistic", and to be quite honest, I am glad that I am, because to make all religious martyrs equal is a level of sophistication that I really find morally reprehensible.
I see your point and I want to make it clear that I'm only comparing different martyrs in terms of their readiness to die. Whether their death is morally acceptable or justifiable is as you point out another story.
Cheers,
Pole