by yaddayadda 93 Replies latest watchtower bible
You would think if the early disciples of Christ or church fathers wanted to create an entirely fictional character named Jesus, that they would make sure there were NO similarites with any other religious beliefs, so that they would not be accused of plagerism.
So the plagiarised Christ would be unlike anything we've ever heard of? Interesting...
INQ
You would think if the early disciples of Christ or church fathers wanted to create an entirely fictional character named Jesus, that they would make sure there were NO similarites with any other religious beliefs, so that they would not be accused of plagerism.
So the plagiarised Christ would be unlike anything we've ever heard of? Interesting...
INQ
You are missing the point again. The early church fathers did not hide the fact that there were similar teachings at the time. They did not create a totally fictional character either. That teaching is totally ridiculous. Many who were alive during the time of Jesus life on earth, later on went to horrible deaths by heheadings, being thrown to lions and other terrible deads. There was absolutely no good reason to say you believed in christ because it was a guarantee of persecution. Many want to say that these people were under some sort of dillusion and following a fictional myth? Would you allow your entire family to be thrown into a lion pit to keep up a charade of a fictional character?
Some say there is no evidence of Christ existing, yet they believe that Paul and Peter existed. And BOTH of these men believed Jesus to be an actual historical person. Bible scholars also agree the Bible book of James was written by Jesus' half brother. Are you saying James is a real person but his brother Jesus is a myth?
Why would anyone make up a fictional person and then not try to hide this by making sure no one can claim they had similar belief? If they did make this claim it would draw attention away from Jesus being true, not the opposite. But the church fathers willingly discussed these issues because they didn't care what anyone else tried to claim, they knew Christ was real and not based upon other mystery cults and they knew the evidence was true and would stand on its own. And Justin Marytr which someone quoted here to prove otherwise was actually teaching that he was NOT teaching the same as the stoics or those who followed Plato. Of course if you pull out one line from its context, you can claim it means anything.
Anyway, that is all for me. My words are already being twisted to suit someone else's fancy. Yadda, thanks again for bringing out this information for others. Good thread! Lilly
And BOTH of these men believed Jesus to be an actual historical person.
actually lilly, you are most likely wrong. that is most likely a fallacy. paul did not refer to jesus in a human context. it was heavenly/spiritual, by direct revelation. there is no reason to believe, by reading the writings of paul, that he saw jesus the way the writers of the gospels said jesus was.
perhaps you haven't read as equally on "BOTH" sides of the issue as you thought? or did someone miss a point again somewhere?
if you're interested: http://www.holysmoke.org/hs00/jc-hist.htm
okay, now i'm really going to bed.
tetra
Narkissos, your response is a classic case of someone who embraces the old “history of religions” school of biblical criticism. To you the gospels merely represent some kind of complicated, fictional patchwork embodying all manner of literary redactions, plagiarisms and syncretism over a long period of time. The slightest similarity between the NT and other literature is taken to mean the latter borrowed if from the former.
You obviously didn't read, or understand, my post. I explicitly pointed why the notion of "borrowing" is globally inadequate and only applies to fringe features of mythologies. Your extended quotations on this subject are aimed at a strawman; I actually agree with most of them.
Furthermore, there is no evidence of syncretism in apostolic Christianity. The first century Jewish mind-set loathed syncretism and refused to blend their religion with other religions. Judaism was strictly monotheistic, as was Christianity.
Your mistake here is to assume that there was one "apostolic Christianity" and one "first-century Judaism". Open your eyes to the wide diversity of both nebulae and you will see opposite attitudes toward "paganism" at the ends of both spectra. Who do you think wrote works like the Sibylline oracles, if not Jews (and Christians) immersed in Graeco-Roman culture?
There is no archaelogical evidence today of mystery religions in Palestine in the early part of the first century. Norman Anderson (1984): “If borrowing there was by one religion from another, it seems clear which way it went. There is no evidence whatever, that I know of, that the mystery religions had any influence in Palestine in the early decades of the first century”.
I would question that, especially about Galilee. But most importantly, I personally doubt that the core of the Christian myth cristallised either in Palestine or in the early decades of the first century. Don't forget the first Christian writings are located in Greece.
As a Bible believing Christian, commited to upholding the integrity of the text of scripture, I would naturally take sides with yaddayadda on this issue.
In my opinion, Christanity, born into the world of humankind at a time and place that was a maelstrom of religious ferment and activity, had to fight all the way for its existence. Christianity first appeared as a development within Judaism, and the first controversies that the early Church had to deal with were those concerning the new faith's relationship to its parent religion, the most famous example being the circumcision debate described in Acts
As Christianity grew however, it had to come to terms with religious and intellectual movements that it met up with, often in an environment of agressive hostility, in the wider world. During those early years, the Early Church Fathers, our earliest theologians, had to evaluate these rival movements and try and establish a place for their own faith in relation to them.These early Christian Fathers were themselves for the most part, Gentile Greeks and Romans, and as they came to grips with their own faith and presented it to the world of their contemporaries, they were forced to relate it to the thought patterns of their society. Had they, for the sake of "purity" invented their own vocabulary and portrayed their religious thought in alien concepts, the religion of Christianity would have become a meaningless vacuity, and the true message, that of salvation being available to all, would be drowned in endless debate.
As the early Church Fathers grappled with several religious notions, many of which seemed to bear a superficial resemblance to their own beliefs, I believe they suceeded, not without disputation, in preserving the original message of Christianity, and its Author, in an atmosphere free from intellectual influence.
Those early years were not easy for this infant religion. Fighting off such twin problems as vicious persecution, on the one hand, and ambitious savants bent on hijacking the new faith on the other, it was a miracle that it survived at all.
Cheers
Many who were alive during the time of Jesus life on earth, later on went to horrible deaths by heheadings, being thrown to lions and other terrible deads. There was absolutely no good reason to say you believed in christ because it was a guarantee of persecution. Many want to say that these people were under some sort of dillusion and following a fictional myth? Would you allow your entire family to be thrown into a lion pit to keep up a charade of a fictional character?
I have read this time and again as a response to why a person should believe in Jesus as the Christ.
My response to that would be, so if a person dies for their beliefs that makes them valid beliefs? If a person is willingly tortured for their beliefs that makes them of sound mind, because who in their right mind would die for a man who doesn't exist?
Think about it.
As for this thread...
For myself, I didn't read scholars, I didn't read Metzgar or Martyr. I knew my bible very well. I had some serious questions and set it aside for a bit. I started reading mythology, Egyptian, Sumerian etc. Celtic. What I found, on my own, was an evolotion of the concept of God. No, Jesus might not have been directly copied from mythology, but to me, the basic strings of living, dying, rebirth for the sake of the people are there.
My point here is this:
Scholars are great for many things. They give us a way to look at it all that comes from much research in many areas. But there is a scholar for every position. I know people who would read everything that I have read and have a view point close to Lils and Yadda's. Yadda you can't say for certainity that man did not use mythology to create the story of Jesus, because well, you weren't there. None of us were. If you take from the story of Jesus a reason for hope, peace be with you.
However, I didn't need a scholar to point the incredible similarities between the Bible itself and the various mythologies of early man. And I don't need a scholar to reject them. I just look at what is there and call it as I see it.
Tetra,
I am familiar with Paul's conversion to Christianity and aware that he converted after Christ died and went to heaven. But Paul did in fact believe Jesus was the promised Messiah, born of a virgin, that the prophets fortold. Just because his writings were from a different view point, his being chosen by Christ from heaven and not by Christ on earth as the other Apostles, does not mean he believed in a different Christ than the others did. Remember he did not see the physical Christ but heard him speak to him from heaven. Jesus said he chose Paul as his special messenger to the Gentile peoples. There are then differences in Pauls conversion and ministry compared to the other Disciples. But again, to say he believed in a totally different Christ is complete rubbish. He certainly DID understand that Christ was alive on earth at one time, for he himself used to stone and persecute Christ's followers. Thinking that they were following a man instead of the true God. And this opinion of men about Paul believing in a different Christ comes from those who have virtually no understanding of the Bible's simple writings but rather complicate matters for themselves by inventing scenarios that only exist in their own minds. Many of them are so haughty because of their own percieved intelligence, that they lack the humbleness to "see" what is right in front of their noses.
That being said, I have no need today to sit here and continuing banging my head into a brick wall. People will believe what they want. Not everyone will become a Christian, and that is their personal choice.
The best advice I can people who want to learn more about the Bible is to read the bible themselves and build up thier trust in it, and their understanding of it, before looking into all these contrary arguements. That is what I did and due to this, in 25 years no has has been able to break my faith in God, his word or his Son. Or succeed in convincing me that these contrary arguements against the Bible really have any merit. And believe me many have tried. Peace, Lilly
yaddayaddaAnd even more so, since disbelief in God, hence disbelief in the Bible, means no accountability to anything higher than yourself and the police. Eat, drink, fornicate, and generally be merry with impunity, for tomorrow you are to die. Complete moral freedom. Lovely notion aye. So very tempting. I'd fight tooth and nail to defend my right to complete moral freedom.
Its not hard to see who has more reason for 'ulterior motives'.
LOL. Is it even worth having a discussion with someone who subscribes to such a distorted representation of people who don't believe in god?
Very few such people will say their opinion is their sole moral arbiter; they might, for example, subscribe to a moral system based around human rights. These in turn are based around concepts founded in fact, demonstrable in a court-of-law. There is a substantive base to such morals.
A religionist such as yaddayadda has no equivalent substantive factual base. They have their personal interpretation of a book with an inadequate provenance, known errors, and a complete ambiguity as to metaphorical or factual interpretation over extensive passages.
Rather than factually based, legally acceptable principles forming a moral code (as is the case with many non-believers in god), they largely base their moral code largely on unsubstantiable opinion.
Thus it is the religionist who often exercise 'complete moral freedom' free from inconvenient facts or consideration of human rights, as they gild the pursuit of their own unsubstantiable opinion and idolatrize it. The claims that such an opinion is anything to do with god is provable only to someone accepting the same unsubstantiated claims as fact.
The utter and total failure to consider anyother claimed 'Holy' text is also note worthy. Why should I not accept similar claims about other Holy Books made by Hindus, Muslims, Mormons, Sikhs or incompatible claims about the Bible made by other Christians? Where is the proof that the Bible is clearly the 'right one'?
Yes, I know, I can't dissuade someone from an illogical opinion by logical argument. But sometimes I can have a real laugh trying...
