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Author Topic:   Bible and Plagiarism
PlanManStan
Member (Idle past 3688 days)
Posts: 73
Joined: 12-12-2013


Message 1 of 51 (714741)
12-25-2013 9:18 PM


Considering that it is currently Christmas day where I am, this is a pretty opportune time to bring this up. Since many other deities and special religious events from before Christ fall on December 25th and other deities share Christ-like characteristics (12 diciples, etc.), is it fair to say that the Bible stole these ideas? I think so, because it is just too large of a coincidence, but is there evidence otherwise?
Edited by PlanManStan, : Admin revision

Replies to this message:
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AdminPhat
Inactive Member


Message 2 of 51 (714742)
12-26-2013 6:50 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by PlanManStan
12-25-2013 9:18 PM


Which Direction?
What is your view? You have to start the ball rolling here.(I read both supporting and contrarian views)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by PlanManStan, posted 12-25-2013 9:18 PM PlanManStan has replied

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PlanManStan
Member (Idle past 3688 days)
Posts: 73
Joined: 12-12-2013


Message 3 of 51 (714743)
12-26-2013 3:26 PM
Reply to: Message 2 by AdminPhat
12-26-2013 6:50 AM


Re: Which Direction?
I suppose I think it is fair to say that the Bible copied from these other sources, even though the evidence available amounts to "that's just too big of a coincidence".

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AdminPhat
Inactive Member


Message 4 of 51 (714745)
12-27-2013 3:19 AM


Thread Copied from Proposed New Topics Forum
Thread copied here from the Bible and Plagiarism thread in the Proposed New Topics forum.

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


(1)
Message 5 of 51 (714753)
12-27-2013 8:43 AM
Reply to: Message 3 by PlanManStan
12-26-2013 3:26 PM


Re: Which Direction?
even though the evidence available amounts to "that's just too big of a coincidence".
Normally when people are justified in saying this, they've strung together a list of unlikely sets of events. So I hope you are going to make more of a case than you have in the OP which cites two things.
As for the date of Christmas being the 25th, the Bible says absolutely nothing about that, so we cannot claim that the Bible copied it from anywhere. So we're left with your example of 12 disciples. Not much to work with, but I'm sure you're going to give us some more similarities.
I always thought it was kind funky that Isaac and Abraham both used the rather goofy sounding tactic of telling strangers that their wife was really their sister so that vagabonds might do what they willed with her and leave them alone. Even more coincidence was that they used the trick on Abimelech.
Compared to that coincidence, I don't see much here, yet.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy.
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If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. Frederick Douglass

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jar
Member (Idle past 394 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 6 of 51 (714755)
12-27-2013 8:48 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by PlanManStan
12-25-2013 9:18 PM


Easter and the Pentecost; Passover and Shavuot.
Of course it is not plagiarism but yes, any religion that tries to suppress parties is very likely to fail. Had Jesus first miracle been turning wine into water it's unlikely anyone today would even have heard of him.
Let me give you a few other examples from the Judaic tradition.
Easter and Pentecost. On Easter Day we celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus and on Pentecost the arrival of the Holy Spirit. As a Jew, Jesus would have celebrated Passover and Shavuot at the same times.
But what are Passover and Shavuot?
Jesus had made his annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. Passover is one of the three Pilgrimage Feasts mandated in the Torah. The other two mandated Pilgrimages are Shavuot and Sukkoth.
Most of us grew up learning the stories of Exodus, how the Israelites were warned to stay inside their homes and to paint the door frame with blood so the Angel of the Lord would pass over their homes as he killed the first born son of the Egyptians.
Shavuot is likely less familiar, but like the other two Pilgrimage Festivals, is related to the Exodus story. It celebrates the day that Moses was given the Torah on the Mountain of Sinai, and the day that the Jews accepted God’s Law, became a Nation of God.
Like Easter, it is a movable feast and falls seven, seven day weeks after the Second Day of Passover. It is called The Feast of Counting as the Jews anticipate the days, count the days, from Passover to the day of acceptance.
But how did the exact time of celebration come about?
No one actually knows when the Passover happened, or when exactly Moses received the Torah, so why do we celebrate Passover, Shavuot, Easter and Pentecost at these particular times of year?
Historically, Passover was celebrated with the first offerings of Barley. Wheat ripened slightly later and Shavuot was also the first offering from the Wheat harvest. The timing for these Pilgrimages corresponded to bringing the first of the harvests to the Temple, as offerings and for blessings.
The Third Mandatory Pilgrimage is Sukkoth. It too is related to the Exodus and when I was growing up, one of the most fun celebrations.
I grew up in an almost all Jewish neighborhood, so all my friends were Jewish. I was the Shabbat Goy, the Christian boy the orthodox Jews could call on to do things on Shabbat, turn on lights, turn on or off the stove, run errands.
One advantage though was getting to celebrate Sukkoth with my friends. Sukkoth commemorates living in the desert while on the Exodus march. All the kids get to make tents from tables and we got to sleep in them and have our meals on the floor and eat with our hands and get dirty and all the things we couldn’t do at other times.
But even Sukkoth is timed with the harvest. One of the traditions of Sukkoth is shaking the Four Species. The Four Species are Date Palm Fronds, Willow Branches, Myrtle and Citron, a fruit like lemons. As folk living here in the Valley know, citrus fruits are a Fall Harvest.
To celebrate, you take the Date Palm Frond, some Myrtle and the Willow in the left hand, and hold the Citron in your right. As you bring the two hands together, they are blessed. You then shake them three times to each of the four corners, to North, East, South and West.
The ceremony is a prayer of thanks for the year’s bounty and that there be rain enough for all the coming years’ growth.
Beyond the symbolic meanings of the Exodus in Passover, Shavuot and Sukkoth, beyond the symbolic meanings of Easter and the Pentecost, there was life, and an acknowledgement of the cycles of life and the harvest.

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

This message is a reply to:
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1405 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 7 of 51 (714756)
12-27-2013 8:51 AM
Reply to: Message 5 by NoNukes
12-27-2013 8:43 AM


Re: Which Direction?
myths similar to bible stories - Search
quote:
48,500,000 results
Bible Stories Ripped Off From Greek Mythology | Cracked.com
http://www.cracked.com Topics
5 Bible Stories Ripped Off From Greek Mythology. ... God and Zeus are similar only in apparance, ... 6 Ridiculous Myths You Believe About Stuff You Use Every Day.
Creation Myths - Usbible.com
Creation Myths - Usbible.com
Creation Myths. The Bible's similarities with Egyptian, Greek and Babylonian mythology are too close to be a coincidence. The writers weren’t isolated from other ...
The Bible and Greek Mythology - Verona Fair on HubPages
veronafair.hubpages.com Religion and Philosophy
An essay discussing the similarities between Greek Mythology and the Bible. An unbiased, historical, and researched look at the stories behind the books. Please ...
Ancient Days:: Comparison of Genesis with Creation Stories of ...
Ancient Days:: Comparison of Genesis with Creation Stories of the Ancient Near East :: by David Livingston
Many today consider the Bible's Creation Story a "myth." ... Taken out of context, some sentences sound similar to the Bible account.
Comparing bible stories with roman/greek
answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20061006184916AAT3ofL
Oct 07, 2006 Best Answer: Yes. One of the most interesting ones is the story of Sargon of Akkad, a great Mesopotamian king, which is almost exactly the same as
Did the Bible copy some of its stories from other religious ...
Did the Bible copy some of its stories from other religious myths and legends? | GotQuestions.org
Did the Bible copy some of its stories from other religious myths and legends? Why do some of the stories in the Bible have parallels in other religions?
Take your pick.
Enjoy

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by our ability to understand
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PlanManStan
Member (Idle past 3688 days)
Posts: 73
Joined: 12-12-2013


Message 8 of 51 (714760)
12-27-2013 9:06 AM
Reply to: Message 5 by NoNukes
12-27-2013 8:43 AM


Re: Which Direction?
I definitely see your point, especially about December 25th. I once saw a documentary on the History Channel (yeah, I know, history on the History Channel?) which talked about how the date for Christ's birth was moved to coincide with a pagan festival, to convert more peoople.
Compared to that coincidence, I don't see much here, yet.
You're right. I must've been quite tired when I wrote thisi

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PlanManStan
Member (Idle past 3688 days)
Posts: 73
Joined: 12-12-2013


Message 9 of 51 (714761)
12-27-2013 9:08 AM
Reply to: Message 6 by jar
12-27-2013 8:48 AM


Re: Easter and the Pentecost; Passover and Shavuot.
Ah yes, I remember this. I watched an old movie which was focused around a citron that was so beautiful, everyone tried to steal it.

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Replies to this message:
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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 10 of 51 (714850)
12-28-2013 2:19 PM
Reply to: Message 3 by PlanManStan
12-26-2013 3:26 PM


Re: Which Direction?
Well, a lot of those claims ARE spurioius. Some are true.
How about pointing out which ones you think used Dec 25th, and then, show where the original source is? And, I am not going to accept a book written in the 19th or 20th century making the claim as the original source, but rather point to the archeological evidence for your claim.

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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 11 of 51 (715332)
01-03-2014 10:25 PM


i'll post here later when real life settles down. but i made a potentially relevant post here: EvC Forum: Isaiah 53 speaks about ISRAEL, and not about the messiah.
you guys should look up the baal cycle, and how it relates to both sumerian and israelite mythology.

אָרַח

  
dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 12 of 51 (715333)
01-03-2014 11:03 PM
Reply to: Message 9 by PlanManStan
12-27-2013 9:08 AM


Re: Easter and the Pentecost; Passover and Shavuot.
I watched an old movie which was focused around a citron that was so beautiful, everyone tried to steal it.
You've got NetFlix too? Only wasn't it a green Citron?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 9 by PlanManStan, posted 12-27-2013 9:08 AM PlanManStan has replied

Replies to this message:
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PlanManStan
Member (Idle past 3688 days)
Posts: 73
Joined: 12-12-2013


Message 13 of 51 (715338)
01-04-2014 12:06 AM
Reply to: Message 12 by dwise1
01-03-2014 11:03 PM


Re: Easter and the Pentecost; Passover and Shavuot.
Well the one I saw was called Ushpizin and it was in school.

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dwise1
Member
Posts: 5930
Joined: 05-02-2006
Member Rating: 5.8


Message 14 of 51 (715340)
01-04-2014 1:10 AM
Reply to: Message 13 by PlanManStan
01-04-2014 12:06 AM


Re: Easter and the Pentecost; Passover and Shavuot.
This movie was French, 1974 with a much younger Gerard Deparidieu and Miou-Miou (unbelievable that she's still using that name 40 years later). I very much doubt that it would have been shown in any school.

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Raphael
Member (Idle past 462 days)
Posts: 173
From: Southern California, United States
Joined: 09-29-2007


(1)
Message 15 of 51 (715376)
01-04-2014 7:05 PM
Reply to: Message 14 by dwise1
01-04-2014 1:10 AM


Plagiarism
I believe it is important to not blindly follow a source proven to be false. There are many reasons this happens. This is very easy to happen with religion because religion is subjective. My truth may not be your truth, my experience may not be your experience, and so on.
My subjective experience has been that it is very easy to accept something when you are raised in an environment when said thing is accepted as truth. When, from birth, your entire community (family, friends, teachers, co-workers, etc) live with the assurance that what they believe is true, it's very easy to think "well of course it's true! Everyone I know believes it." But is it?
There are many things i have questioned over the years, things which I was taught as truth my entire upbringing, but upon further review aren't exactly what they seem, and that has been an incredible growth experience.
When it comes to the Bible however, it's a strange sort of organism. Within the book are certain claims and statements. God exists. He became human. He died so we can have new life. Stop worrying about stress in your life, and trust him with it, and he'll work it out. Stuff like that. And along with these claims, it speaks on faith. That faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the evidence of things which have not yet been seen. (Hebrews 11).
So was the Bible, or even portions of the Bible plagiarized? I don't know. Considering the evidence, I'd say it's 50/50. But what is faith? Believing something without a 100% guarantee is a hard thing to do. To trust? To look stupid, at the end of all things? So many risks. But what is faith?
Even Paul brings this up in 1 Corinthians 15. He makes the argument that if Christ has not risen (something He was an actual witness to on the road to Damascus), then everything will have been in vain. Worthless. Haha it's like he's saying "bro this stuff better be true!" So it's hard. But what is faith?
Regards yall!
- Raph

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