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Ben_Masada
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Ben_Masada
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The teachings are not of Jesus but of Paul. The teachings of Jesus stayed with the Nazarenes. They would make of the converts staunch defenders of the Law. (Acts 21"20)
The teachings of Paul would abolish the Law. (Ephe. 2:15)
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Ben_Masada
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All I need is one single EYEWITNESS to the resurrection and you seem to be unable to provide me with. Then again, I am sorry to tempt you. There isn’t any.
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Ben_Masada
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Jesus said in John 17;17 that the Truth is the Word of God. And the Psalmist says in 147:19,20 that the Word of God was given to Israel only and to no other People on earth. Now, you know my fuss about the Truth.
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Ben_Masada
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Well, at first, I thought Thomas was like an Atheist who needs to see to believe. But if he thought Jesus was a ghost, he must have been a fake Atheist because legitimate Atheists do not believe in ghosts.
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Ben_Masada
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**I did read both books in 1987. I think Joseph Mendson wrote “The Interview” and made a translation of “The Myth of the Pax Romana.” Now, the why you guys can’t find either, is beyond my understanding. If I had those books with me, I would check some more details to post them here. Sorry! BTW, I went to the Library here in Jerusalem and was equally unsuccessful in my search. I read them when I was in Los Angeles, California. Public Library. That’s 22 years ago. **
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Ben_Masada
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Ben_Masada
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Anyone who makes use of ad hominem deserves no reply. You should know much better that ad hominem is forbidden in this forum.
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KindredSoul
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Of course not; that’s why I said he had overstepped his bounds as well. You had already attempted, quite sharply, to defend yourself from that overstepping and displayed no need of help; you merely went a bit too far in the opposite direction.
I know that. Actually, remember that I never implied I could have been Christian without Judaism. I simply said it wouldn’t be Judaism, in that case, that would have to keep me from worshiping idols in caves.
It may be that Judaism caused conversions, but from your own admission, Judaism is not a missionary faith in the same way that Christianity is; ergo, why would Judaism have ever made as many converts? That’s not part of your mission the same way it is ours, unless I have misunderstood you, which is fully possible.
The same is true for us too; my point was, however, that the Classic Philosophers didn’t need Judaism to get them to the point of believing in that Unmoved Mover. Again, I was defending the intelligence and ability of Gentiles to come to know a God other than statues and the like quite without Judaism.
We’ve been over this; if the Apostles claimed to see Jesus after His death (and they were in a position to know whether or not He was miraculously raised or just a man who had been doctored up) and were willing to die for this claim, a claim that they would have known to be a lie if it was one, then that seems to be just as good as an eyewitness to the actual resurrection; modern Muslims and Fundamentalists may die for what they believe to be true, but the Apostles were dying for something that, if it wasn’t true, they would have known better, which is the difference. Also, their deaths were not sudden and could have been avoided if they only recanted what, if it were a lie, they would have known to be a lie. You deny that the Apostles believed in and claimed to see Jesus after His resurrection. You believe that’s made up. You’ve given opinions but no proof of this, and neither do any early historians ever try to deny that the Apostles believed in and died for the belief that Jesus really did die and really did rise from the dead, even though some of those historians didn’t like the Christian movement and would have been most happy to expose such an inconsistency. We’ll beat this dead horse over and over because, essentially, you believe that the Apostles never said and died for what history suggests they really did in fact say and die for. And if they did, that is powerful evidence for the resurrection I keep talking about.
In believing that the Christian concept of God is not Monotheistic, you show a poor grasp of what the Trinity is. It is monotheistic; it is just not as simple to understand as the vision of it before Christ’s revelation. Even so, properly understood, no one could say that the Christian concept of God is not Monotheistic. You may not agree with the Trinity, but that doesn’t mean it is not a true and valid form of monotheism, equally monotheistic to any other conception. But this mistake has been made by many others; you are not the first.
As for you not having faith, explain to me why you come to believe in Judaism and others do not. If reason alone led you to Judaism, without the aid of Faith, then reason–which merely takes into account facts to make a decision–would lead everyone to that same conclusion…unless every single non-Jew has no sense of reason, which I should hope is not your intended implication. Things that do not require at least some faith tend to be universally agreed upon by all people who have any sense of reason, as reason leaves no room for ambiguity in those conclusions it absolutely, by itself, leads one to. Judaism, like all ontological beliefs (including non-theism, such as atheism) is not universally agreed upon by any means. Faith is absolutely necessary as a deciding factor, unless you are making the choice totally arbitrarily, when reason might lead to more than one conclusion and yet it is important to choose. Clearly, unless all non-Jews are unreasonable, then reason alone doesn’t lead one necessarily to believe in Judaism…meaning at least some faith is necessary to decide with any degree of firmness.
You may live by hope, as do Christians as well, but you also live by faith. See above. Also, Christians believe that the Word of God was initiated to be spread to all people with Jesus’ coming, and again, we believe Christ to be the very Incarnation of that Word. It makes perfectly rational sense that, since God is supposed to be the Creator of the whole world, He would eventually want to a full understanding of Himself to be shared with the whole world, and not wait until the end of time as we know it to initiate this.
CONTINUED…
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KindredSoul
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…CONTINUED (From Above)
Blessings in Christ,
KindredSoul
I agree with you that Jews are not idiots. No argument there; I simply hope you return the same respect, and sometimes it doesn’t seem that you do.
This was a totally unnecessary jab, in context of the conversation, and based upon poor knowledge or a deliberate refusal to demonstrate knowledge of the difference between Catholic statues and ancient pagan idols. For Catholics, statues serve a function very much like pictures. Pictures remind one of a loved one, and one might look at a picture of a loved one to call them more fully to mind. Some people might even affectionately kiss a picture of a loved one who is separated from them by time or death, just to express how much they care. But by no means do they believe the loved one is the picture, nor that being near the picture actually makes them any physically closer to them; they do not believe the picture is a living incarnation of the one they love. It is simply something that might help one focus one’s thoughts in calling a loved one to mind, gives them something to look at and cathartically release their emotions by. While no one would argue that statues always accurately depict the saints and such, they serve to call them to mind like a picture. Unless cherishing a picture of a loved one is idolatry, neither is iconography or statues as used by Catholics.
Blessings in Christ,
KindredSoul
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Angelo_Michael
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Replies:
- From what I understand, the Gospel of John and letters of John were either written by him or some of his followers or students and contains – unlike many of the writings of Paul, (who is not the first Pope; that is Peter) – an admonition to follow the commandments of Christ [as He is Prophet, “like unto Moses.”]
- Perhaps, I am what some would call a “Cradle Catholic.” Some of my recent posts about the errors of accepting or allowing the title of “Father” have been deleted from this site – (they are based on Jeremiah 23, Matthew 23, and others). If you had read them you might understand that I am not a “Complacent Catholic” in that I don’t fail to object to lawlessness or fail to warn of it’s consequence. As I have noted earlier, Paul’s writings seem to have more of a philosophical merit than an infallible integrity; either before the Old Testament prophets, or the teachings of Christ. Also, I feel Paul influenced Peter as Peter was susceptible to such influence. (Matthew 16:23, “But [Christ] turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.”)
- I often have great difficulty holding a grudge against Jews that do not convert to Christianity because, in many of it’s interpretations, the teachings [of Christianity] are opposed to, or in contradiction of, what Christ taught – which was not so different from what Moses related. (To support these views I generally reference the story of the Rechabites contained in Jeremiah 35.)
- Well, I am someone that is very fond of Moses and the Old Testament scriptures and I generally have no problem accepting or quoting them. When I think of Paul’s writings, it is as though he has replaced most of Moses’ and Christ’s teachings with his own in his representation of Christianity. In John 14-16, Christ depicts someone that will come after Him, the “Spirit of Truth.” I myself have prophesied many times concerning many things in many ways (as a portent for the terrorist attacks of 9-11 wherein I was routinely injected with drugs in my arms and buttocks, in an open revelation about future events such as the tsunami of 2004 and hurricanes of New Orleans, and a witness to the existence of a stone, separated from the others, in orbit in our soal system.) Do you notice the similarities between the works that have been given for me to do and those of O.T. scripture? The references to Moses, Joseph’s blessing], and David’s battle with Goliath? I am not the Christ, neither am I God. I generally conclude that I may be that character depicted in John 14-16, and yet that would contradict with the associations already attached to it [by certain relgions]. I basically view that role as being the [ordained] new apostle (to replace Judas I.) and as a Nebuchadrezzar like rebuttal to the errors of some of the representations of Christianity. And, to my credit, I am rejected in most organized religions, and my works have been hidden from the public. I don’t know if I’m Assyrian and/or if a “bride” will eventually come forth from Egypt to fullfill both the Old and New Testament scriptures [concerning the interplay between the 3 nations]. I suppose that the “bride” would apear sometime after me and testify of me even as I have testified of Christ and she would be rejected and killed as a prophet as well. Perhaps, I may be a Ninevite, and I, and all the people that have been killed, will rise again on Judgment Day for the purpose of condemnation??
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yankee_doodle
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Ben Masada;5709926**That’s not faith that moves me to believe in Judaism. It’s Reason. When you wish I could put my faith in the Christian concept of God said:So what do you think about the fact that earlier Mesopotamian myths are so strikingly similar to stories in the Jewish bible? What about wild claims like those in the book of Numbers affirming the existence of unicorns?
If you want to talk about logic and reason, then great. Why isn’t there a shred of evidence affirming the claim that the Jewish people were enslaved in Egypt in any of the archeological or other historical Egyptian artifacts we’ve found (and we’ve discovered an immense array of information at this point that brings ancient Egyptian history alive).
So is your faith really reasonable? If it isn’t reasonable then how smart has it been for your people to base its entire ethnic heritage on mythological fabrications? Wow right
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OneTrueCathApos
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Hadi is Muslim. Hadi is on the other side of your wall with the Palestinians whom your people seclude from living a normal life. You are out there in the wilderness.
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Angelo_Michael
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Have you ever seen a documentary called, The Exodus Decoded, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exodus_Decoded ? In it there is a somewhat controversial application of evidence to the enslavement and deliverance of the Hebrew people in, and from, Egypt. According to the documentary, the Egyptians referred to the Hebrews as “hyksos (sp?).” Also, the documentary states that the general consensus of when the Exodus occurred is probably inaccurate and that, once corrected, the Biblical source coincides with many other sources and that they all relate similar events – albeit from different perspectives. Another note in that documentary is that the word that is translated to, “Red Sea” ( I think it might have been, ‘yam suf’) is actually intended to mean,
“reed sea”; and the documentary also claims to have found the Mount Sinai and many other artifacts from the same era that are pertinent “evidences” that corroborate the Exodus account in the Hebrew Bible.
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yankee_doodle
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The Wiki article you cite begins by saying:
Its claims and methods were widely criticized both by Biblical scholars and mainstream scientists (and cites four sources in support of this statement).
It’s not worth a serious discussion about something that’s been discredited.
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Angelo_Michael
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I was not promoting the validity of any aspect of the documentary but it seemed to me you were ignorant of it and I supposed you might be interested in it.
Also, I would expect you to have understood from my previous statement here (#171) that not all information [pertaining to religious events] is distributed equally at all times – even in our modern era.
Perhaps you should consider that if someone can relay information that could deliver people’s lives, (in a similar manner as when Moses or Noah revealed information for the deliverance of others); and if that information is not made available, nor any public record is made of the information’s availablity by [any] religious, political, legal, and media personnel; then it may be possible to misrepresent other data as well – if only to a certain populace at a certain time.
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yankee_doodle
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well, you peaked my interested enough to look at it … but it’s already been discredited (if it were at least somewhat credible, of course I would have been very interested to explore it further
).I’m always willing to check out new information, and if I’m wrong or uninformed, then great (because I learned something new).
frankly I’m not in the habit of disputing purely historical claims made by the bible (it’s usually a problematic methodology). But in the Exodus case archeologists and historians have been looking very diligently for even a spec of evidence, for a long, long time … and nothing (not a shred). Obviously they didn’t limit their search to the time period asserted by the bible (since biblical chronology isn’t exactly the most reliable, at least in many cases).
My commentary though was really aimed at debunking the OP, who is under the delusion that his religion finds more support from logic than yours.
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yankee_doodle
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I think your statement here is probably not something we ought to get into in this sort of thread. The Arab-Israeli conflict is a far steeper slippery slope than debates between different religions, or between theists and non-theists
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Angelo_Michael
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Seeing the date of the documentary, and the claim that it was a tsunami that occured in the Exodus, I felt the documentary may have been trying to make me out to be the “Prophet like unto Moses” for a certain religious agenda; which may have been: a) justifying the rejection and murder of Christ and/or b) making me out to be a ‘false Christ.’ Of course these are only vague implications that I myself have associated with the content, but in lieu of any direct mentioning of any of the events pertaining to my works, I found it difficult to accept that the documentary was truly trying to inform me so much as mislead others and myself. Yet, I tried to focus on the data presented and made a note that many computer graphics were used. It was a lot of information and I just don’t know that much about it. I was kind of hoping Ben might shed some light on that Red/Reed Sea part or let us know what is the sentiment of that assertion (that it is was the Reed Sea) among Jews.well, you peaked my interested enough to look at it … but it’s already been discredited (if it were at least somewhat credible, of course I would have been very interested to explore it further
I’m always willing to check out new information, and if I’m wrong or uninformed, then great (because I learned something new).
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