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Author | Topic: My Beliefs- GDR | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
Yes there is very likely some embellishment in some of the accounts that would have grown over time. Seems like there was embellishing in 4 of the 12 Gospels - which coincidentally were the specific 4 Gospels chosen by the Council of Nicea. That kind of ruins the story of Jesus, if in fact such a person actually existed. There's also the blatant plagiarism. The story of "Jesus" mimics the same story of a number of other gods. - Oni Edited by onifre, : No reason given.
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined:
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No, the fact is that the pagan stories mimic Jesus. Born of a virgin, 12 deciples, died on a cross, cured the blind, rose from the dead 3 days later, are not unique to Jesus AND are in stories about gods that pre-date Jesus by a thousand years.
The Messiah was prophesied all the way back in Eden and everybody knew the prophecy. These gods weren't Messiahs, nor were they claimed to be. They were the gods of the Greeks and the Egyptians, etc. (like the story of Gilgamesh) that were written way before the Old Testament was written. Anyone studying this can see, being that the Hebrews were slaves of these people, where the Hebrews got their stories from.
Also the canon was chosen by men guided by the Holy Spirit Why? Because they said so?
And the writings were not merely chosen by the Councils -- and not a single Council -- every Council drew up their own list of canonical writings -- but the usage of the writings in the many churches as chosen by Holy Spirit led people was the basis for the ultimate choice. These people had their orders, to choose the Gospels that made Jesus look like a god rather than an average man. Which wasn't the case with the other Gospels who spoke of him being a regular guy. The ones that were chosen were chosen because Constantine needed a way to control the people - the pagans and jews and "others".
Really, you'd think that the illustrious history of Christianity which at least since the Protestant Reformation built the civilized and prosperous west, which produced great men and thinkers, you'd think they deserve a little respect and just the tiniest suspicion that maybe the religion they accepted was what they said it is and not what the latest debunker says it is. I'm just going by the evidence. If the evidence proves them to be full of shit, as it does, then too bad. I mean frankly, you're only placing your faith in what men have told you. You haven't seen anything! You read a book, believed what it says with zero evidence to support - forget everything else - that Jesus existed for realz, and rose from the dead? Really? Because a book says that a few people claim to have seen that? Are you serious? Sorry, but I can't take beliefs like that serious. - Oni Edited by onifre, : No reason given. Edited by onifre, : No reason given.
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
You're not going by evidence, you're going by deep deep prejudice. I'm just going by what is written about previous gods: all born as the "son of god" or Zeus, many born from a virgin, they share similar life stories with Buddism and Hindus, and their deaths are all quite similar - to include being judged for claiming to be the son of god. And of course we know that coming back from the grave is nothing unique to Jesus. So, I don't know what I'm being prejudice toward. I'm simply looking at the history and evidence. - Oni Edited by onifre, : No reason given.
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
Out of curiosity can you give me an example of where the resurrection in a new bodily form of Jesus would have been plagiarized from? Resurrections have a long history, especially in Egyptian mythology. The earliest that I've read about (there might be earlier one's) is Osiris pre-dating the story of Jesus by more than 2500 years. Just a snippet:
quote: Being that the Hebrews were the slaves of the Egyptians, one can see where the source of resurrections may have come from. - Oni
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
Here is that quote in a broader context. It is clear that what they refer to as resurrection here quite different. Yes, Christian mythology does change the details a bit. But it's a resurrection nonetheless. They had, what, over 2500 years and loads of other resurrection stories to come up with their own? Does that some how save it for you or make it unique?
Certainly many but not all of the early Jews had a belief in resurrection but it was going to be for them at the end of time when they would all be resurrected simultaneously. Yes, and? From the history and creation of the Bible we see that a few authors of the Gospels took it upon themselves to claim Jesus was such a "god" tortured (like Osiris) in a blood bath and resurrected - but anyone who knows a bit of Greek/Egyptian mythology can see that he was not unique. Also to note, who was the first witness of the resurrection? Mary Magdalene (claimed by some Gospels to be the "wife" of Jesus) And who resurrected Osiris? His wife Isis. Again here we see huge similarities. And like that so many others: Adonis died in Aphrodite's arms - who then sprinkles his blood with necter and he is resurrected as a plant (or something like that). Asclepius castrates himself and dies and is brought back to life by the goddess Astronoe. The goddess Ishtar descended into the realm of the dead to rescue Tammuz (mentioned in the OT). The story of tortue, death, resurrection and somehow involving a woman (goddess or wife) is nothing unique to Christian mythology. - Oni
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
No, I apply the commonly accepted historically accepted definition of what it means to be a Bible believer: believing the entire Bible as God-inspired without exception. Where did you hear/read/were told that this is the commonly accepted definition of what it means to believe in the Bible? What evidence do you have? - Oni
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
All the Reformers, the originals and today's as well, starting with Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Wycliffe, Tyndale, also the Waldensians (Peter Waldo), the Albigensians and millions of others who were persecuted and killed by the RCC for being Bible believers. All of today's evangelicals who haven't gone liberal, Jonathan Edwards, George Whitefield, John and Charles Wesley, all the Puritans such as John Owen, Thomas Watson, Richard Baxter and many others; A W Pink, A W Tozer, Leonard Ravenhill. John MacArthur, R C Sproul, John Piper, Alister Begg, Alistair Grath, other names that aren't coming to mind. I'm just touching a few names off the top of my head, probably about a tenth of the ones I might list given more time, not even mentioning local preachers nobody's heard of or various ministers that aren't preachers (oh such as Chris Pinto, Jan Markell, Eric Barger, Brannon Howse, Jimmy DeYoung, Kay Arthur.) All the preachers I regularly read and listen to are Bible believers according to the definition I gave. Ravi Zacharias, K P Yohannan, Bakht Singh, Zac Poonen. Watchman Nee, Jessie Penn-Lewis. Bishops Latimer, Ridley, Cranmer, Cromwell. Look at the list of names of preachers at Sermon Audio.com and Sermon Index.com. I won't say all of them fit the definition but at least 95% of them do. So you've placed your faith on the biblical interpretation of other men? Because at no point did you say, "This is what God said to do." - Oni Edited by onifre, : No reason given.
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
Of course I take into account the Biblical interpretation of other men, the more the better.
Well then, so do others. And those men are no better or worse at interpreting than the men you referenced.
My faith isn't in THEM, it's in God's word and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. So then, it should be a relationship between you, the Bible and God/Jesus. In no way should the interpretation of other people have any bearing on how YOU interpret the Bible. You place your faith in the words how YOU see them, not in faith in other people's interpretation. What if they're wrong?
Scripture itself says ALL of it is inspired by God, I already said that earlier. We're not talking about inspiration now. This is about how to interpret scripture. Of course the Bible would say it's inspired by God... What else would it say?! "Hey we're not too sure about all this"...? - Oni
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined:
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How do YOU know? You haven't a clue. My point to GDR has been that my sources go back to the apostles, and his are all very recent. Your sources are just regular people, nothing special about them. You also reference modern day people as well - as you put it "the one's who haven't gone liberal." So what's the point of bringing up time frames when you reference recent "scholars also? In fact, if you were to really look at it, modern scientist know more than scientist from even just 100 years ago. Take any current university Bio major and they know more than Darwin did about evolution. Perhaps the same goes for Biblical scholars.
We MUST make use of the interpretations others who know more, read the Bible more deeply or consistently than we do. Who says they do that? You?
Nobody takes the words of commentators and exegetes as gospel truth, that's why it helps to read many of them and decide among many points of view where there are differences. Well there in lies the rub. They're all simply points of views that you've decided on. A point of view is subjective in it's very nature. Accepting one point of view over another doesn't make one any better than the other.
For cryin out loud what do YOU know about what I put my faith in? Your words, when you say you decided among many points of views. And when you said you accept the interpretation of all those other people. I assume you've never actually spoken to god, right? So your faith lies in the interpretation of men.
That's why I'm referring to a great many back 2000 years who understand what it means to be a Bible believer, which disagrees with GDR's much more recent and much shorter list of authorities. Who cares how many one lists? An authority on the Bible is an authority on the Bible. You don't like his because they are in direct conflict with the one's you've chosen to put your faith on. But that doesn't make your Biblical authorities any better than his.
No other book has ever said it's inspired of God that I know of. Well "that you know of" is kind of limited. One other book is the Koran. I believe Joseph Smith said the same thing also.
People may believe other books are inspired of God, but the Bible is the only book that SAYS it is. Just to be clear here: you only accept that the Bible is the word of god because the Bible says so?
The only reason I'm saying this is that you seem to think if it doesn't say they aren't sure of the message they have no choice but to say it's inspired of God. Weird logic there it seems to me. No. What I'm saying is, of course they would write in the Bible "this is inspired by god" what else would they write? If I was writing a book about god surely one of things I'd write in there is this was inspired by god. Here again you're placing your faith on the people who wrote the Bible to be telling the truth. How do you know they were telling the truth about it being inspired by god? - Oni Edited by onifre, : No reason given.
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
This idea that because I personally share these views makes them bogus is ridiculous. I'm not saying that at all. I'm not saying you're right or wrong. What I am saying is that neither of you knows which one is right or wrong - if any of you is even right at all. You're both placing faith on a group of people who you believe are right. There is no right or wrong. - Oni
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined:
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NEITHER of us is "placing faith" in "a group of people." Sure you are, you may not know it though, or, this might be the frist time anyone has explained it to you. You are placing your faith on those who wrote the Bible to be telling the truth; that it truly is inspired by god and not just their own point of view passed on as the word of god. If you're not placing any faith on these people, then show me how you know for a fact the Bible is the inspired word of god. Becaue all you've ever said in every thread on the subject is you BELIEVE that to be true. Well, how do you know it to be true? - Oni Edited by onifre, : No reason given. Edited by onifre, : No reason given. Edited by onifre, : No reason given.
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined:
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The Christian faith hangs completely on the bodily resurrection of Jesus. I can't prove it although I still contend that the best explanation for the rise of the early church is that the resurrection is an historical fact. I don't doubt that you've found a way to be content with that analysis. Although history has detailed the rise of the RCC at the time, and it was about 200 years after the death of Jesus - if in fact the story of Jesus is real. The church's rise had nothing to do with a supposed miracle that happened two centuries before. It is well cataloged how it came to power, and it was by the sword not the resurrection.
In the end though it is about faith. But in nothing more than a collection of men who wrote stories - and stories that were not unique and came down from the ages. How can you be conviced you have a grasp on the truth? - Oni Edited by onifre, : No reason given.
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
I've not merely said that I believe it, I've also said that I find the testimony to be believable and honest. This all means the same thing - you've place your faith in the authors of the Bible. But how can you know they were being honest? How do you know they were truly inspired by god? Fact is you can't know that. You MUST take it on faith that these men were being honest.
That's one of the reasons I trust the Bible, but I also trust it because I know the nature of God and how and why God inspired it. How do you know that?
My FAITH is in the "things unseen" that scripture teaches, things we can't know through our own abilities. Again, your faith lies in what men wrote. - Oni
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined: |
By early church I meant the first century after the death and resurrection of Jesus. Then you're not talking about a "church"...you speak of the small group that spread it around the poor and lower class, which eventually raised the concern of the government at the time. Communism worked in the same way in Cuba. But from the creation of the first Roman Catholic Church - the first church - it has been spread by the sword.
It is a narrative of the story of God as understood by individuals at various points of human history. We can't be sure they understood anything. These accounts of the story of god are all quite similar to the stories the Greeks and Egyptians had. So if anything, it's a retelling of the same old stories with different names and a slight different twist.
So yes, I am largely dependent on the Biblical authors Then how can you be sure of any of it? - Oni
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onifre Member (Idle past 2977 days) Posts: 4854 From: Dark Side of the Moon Joined:
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The problem is of course I don't know which parts of what I believe are wrong. Why do you "believe" anything at all? Why not only accept those things that are evidenced?
The fundamental Christian message rings true in my heart and through my experiences of life. I don't know what that message is, because it means so many different things to so many different Christians. Do un to others? Is that the fundamental message? Because you could have just said the fundamental message of Buddism, or Islam, or Hindu. The mesaage is probably nothing unique to Christianity.
We all believe something about why we're here and what if any meaning there is to our lives, and none of us can be sure that we have it right. I get that, but believeing from the perspective of your own personal experience is one thing. Placing belief in a bunch of authors from 1000's of years ago and in a book that lifted most of it's stories from other stories is not the same thing. - Oni
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