dagblog - Comments for "What If Jesus Was Just A Teacher and Philosopher? "

Organized Religion - an

Wattree — Sat, 25 Jul 2015 17:49:31 +0000

In reply to What If Jesus Was Just A Teacher and Philosopher?

Organized Religion - an Accident of Birth

Danny, you wrote yet another great and insightful article. I'd like to address one of the issues that you broached
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In it you asked the pivital question - "What if Jesus was merely the teacher of a social gospel and moral philosophy . . .?"
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That's exactly what Jesus was, a philosopher, and then ignorant and superstitious people, who believed in talking snakes, took his words out of context and turned him into some kind of superhuman being. If we hadn't been conditioned all our lives to believe in this counterintuitive nonsense it would be clear to us that it holds just about as much validity as voodoo - Dead men don't walk, men don't walk on water, no man can walk up to the Red Sea and tell it to scoot over, and if Adam and Eve were the first people on Earth, where did the people come from that Cain went to live with after he slew Abel?
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Just take a moment to consider the following. Don't you think it's just a little bit strange that your religious beliefs are merely an accident of birth? If you were born in Israel chances are you'd be just as devout a Jew as you are now a Christian, and if you were born in Iran you'd be a Muslim, or China, a Buddhist. So your religion isn't God-inspired - it's an accident of birth. Think about it. Do you actually believe that just because a person happened to be born in Israel, Iraq, or China that they're going to Hell? Anyone who does is stupid.

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And here's another thing that should be considered. If God HAD decided to put religion on Earth to guide man, don't you think he'd have had sense enough to give us just one religion so religious dogma wouldn't be the most hate-inspiring, murderous, and destructive force on Earth? Look around you - here in America, in the Middle East, and literally all over the world - organized religion is THE primary source of agony, pain, and misery of all mankind. Thus, organized religion isn't a blessing; it's a curse.
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God made birds to fly, fish to swim, and man to think, not to follow a users guide written by other men.
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About the Bible
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The Bible that Christians Worship today was compiled and “bless” by the Catholic Church, not God. Any book that disagreed with the Catholic Church was banned. What Christians call "The Holy Bible," and what these preachers run around thumpin’, wasn’t even put together until almost 400 years after the death of Christ. So everything in it is hearsay. In terms of years, they were as far away from the life and times of Jesus Christ as we are away from George Washington. So in reality, they didn’t know fact from fiction, any more than we know whether or not George Washington really chopped down a cherry tree:
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For the first 300 years of Christianity, there was no Bible as we know it today. Christians had the Old Testament Septuagint, and literally hundreds of other books from which to choose. The Catholic Church realized early on that it had to decide which of these books were inspired and which ones weren't. The debates raged between theologians, Bishops, and Church Fathers for several centuries as to which books were inspired and which ones weren't. In the meantime, several Church Councils or Synods, were convened to deal with the matter, notably, Rome in 382, Hippo in 393, and Carthage in 397 and 419. The debates sometimes became bitter on both sides. One of the most famous was between St. Jerome, who felt the seven books were not canonical, and St. Augustine who said they were. Protestants who write about this will invariably mention St. Jerome and his opposition, and conveniently omit the support of St. Augustine. I must point out here that Church Father's writings are not infallible statements, and their arguments are merely reflections of their own private opinions. When some say St. Jerome was against the inclusion of the seven books, they are merely showing his personal opinion of them. Everyone is entitled to his own opinion. However, A PERSONS PRIVATE OPINION DOES NOT CHANGE THE TRUTH AT ALL. There are always three sides to every story, this side, that side, and the side of truth. Whether Jerome's position, or Augustine's position was the correct position, had to be settled by a third party, and that third party was the Catholic Church.
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Now the story had a dramatic change, as the Pope stepped in to settle the matter. In concurrence with the opinion of St. Augustine, and being prompted by the Holy Spirit, Pope St. Damasus I, at the Council of Rome in 382, issued a decree appropriately called, "The Decree of Damasus", in which he listed the canonical books of both the Old and New Testaments. He then asked St. Jerome to use this canon and to write a new Bible translation which included an Old Testament of 46 books, which were all in the Septuagint, and a New Testament of 27 books.
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THE POPE HAD SPOKEN, AND THE ISSUE WAS SETTLED. THUS, WHAT CHRISTIANS REFER TO AS "THE HOLY BIBLE" IS NOT THE WORD OF GOD, IT'S THE WORD OF POPE DAMASUS I.
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http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080928064041AATOZUD

Dahmer? Apparently so...

oldenGoldenDecoy — Tue, 06 Jan 2015 23:23:03 +0000

In reply to "We are each our own answer"

Dahmer? Apparently so...

Dahmer's own answer was fulfilled on November 28, 1994 at the hands of another who continues to rot from his own doings.

You have your own answer... to fulfill in your own way.

I realize that's too deep for you to understand.

~OGD~

It's you who is doing the

oldenGoldenDecoy — Sat, 03 Jan 2015 06:11:02 +0000

In reply to Is this what passes as

It's you who is doing the Yabba dabba doo...

I asked if you could translate the following without looking up the translation in a search engine. In light of the fact you didn't take a shot at translating it, I've elected to not listen to any thing you say...

~OGD~

The 4 primary gospels were

PeraclesPlease — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 08:34:01 +0000

In reply to Thanks for taking the time to

The 4 primary gospels were codified by Constantine at the Council of Nicaea in 325AD, when Greek was the most common language from Constantinople to Alexandria in Egypt. Even in the time of Acts, the apostles spoke Greek as their most common language when travelling. If you had a Bulgarian group (Bulgarian women's choir, great early recordings), would you put their album in Bulgarian or English?

I agree with your conclusion.

Danny Cardwell — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:56:34 +0000

In reply to No offense, but there are

I agree with your conclusion. My specific claim was that these were the most prevalent forms I see practiced. My intention wasn't to lay out a universal system for classifying religious practices and beliefs. Thanks so much for engaging with this post.

Thanks for taking the time to

Danny Cardwell — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:50:12 +0000

In reply to "The fact that the disciples

Thanks for taking the time to read and comment on this post; I'm truly humbled. I have wrestled with my faith over the years. There's a lot in the bible that has been misappropriated for the sake of manipulation. Over the last 500 years the hermeneutics of certain scriptures have been challenged by scholarship. I agree that translations are the cause of some of this confusion, but it seems odd that the disciples were given more European sounding names where as prophets in the Old Testament and the Hebrew names in Numbers or Kings were left in tact. Again, this is a belief that many hold. The use of Christianity to subjugate people is real. I choose to believe in the spirit of Christianity.

The moral code of the bible

ocean-kat — Thu, 01 Jan 2015 22:17:24 +0000

In reply to We see the results.

The moral code of the bible is a mix of a few basic principles articulated by every religion i.e. don't steal don't murder, a lot of trivial and ridiculous food and hygiene rules, and a lot of actual evil rules and lessons. It's only of value as a moral code if one picks and chooses, which is what most christians do. Unfortunately many christians pick and choose poorly and are more likely to have a bad moral code than humanists, atheists, and secularists.

"The fact that the disciples

PeraclesPlease — Thu, 01 Jan 2015 21:58:54 +0000

In reply to I agree with your position on

"The fact that the disciples have European names is something that should set alarms off." - hardly a fact - asde from Greek being lingua franca of the eastern Mediterranean at the time, most of the apostles had Aramaic names.

http://www.city-data.com/forum/christianity/1791364-whats-name-apostles-aramaic.html

Jesus spoke Aramaic (Hebrew) His name was Yeshua. Aramaic can be found even in Genesis. Y'shua was known as the king of the Yehudi (Jews). The name Apostle in Aramaic(Seliah) means to be sent.

The twelve Apostles and their name meanings.
Simon Peter--Aramaic--Simon (Shim'on)--means God has heard--Peter (Cephas/Kephas) means rock
Andrew--A GREEK name--means Adam, man, manly--He's Peter's brother
John--Aramaic/Hebrew--(Yochanan)--means God is gracious
James/Jacob--Aramaic--(Ya'aqov)--means to follow, heel
Thomas--Aramaic--(Tau'ma)--means twin
Matthew--Aramaic--(Mattityahu)--means gift of God
Simon the Cananaean--Aramaic--means the zealot or jealous one
Philip--A GREEK name--means lover/friend of horses
Bartholomew--Aramaic--means son of farmer/furrow/hill (He was also known as Nathanael)
Judas Iscariot--Aramaic--(Yehuda)--means praised one
James the younger--Aramaic--(Ya'aqov) means to follow, heel
Matthias(chosen after Judas)--Aramaic--(Matityahu)variant of Matthew--means gift of God
Thaddaeus--Aramaic--means heart--brother of James

If you're curious the name of Mark is Latin (Marcus) and means sea green or hammer---The name of Luke is Greek (Loukas) and means from Luciania (Italy)Timothy is a Greek name tha means honouring God. Titus is Latin and means to honor or defender.
Yeshua Bless You

No offense, but there are

Anonymous PP — Thu, 01 Jan 2015 18:54:16 +0000

In reply to What If Jesus Was Just A Teacher and Philosopher?

No offense, but there are certainly other types/models of Christianity, such as personal guidance that is more or less a personal private relationship.

A similar parable is given in

rmrd0000 — Thu, 01 Jan 2015 15:14:24 +0000

In reply to Resistance the parable is

A similar parable is given in Luke 19:11-27. In this case it is a man rejected by the people traveling to become King. He is crowned King. He gives money to ten subjects to see how they would use the money. We are told the stories of three of the ten. One doubles the money. Another has a 50% increase. The third makes no profit. As in Mathew, the money is taken away from the third man, over the objects of the subjects who feel this is unfair. Again we hear the King say the line about to one who has much. Much more will be given. Again we are to admire the King. In fact the King demands that all who are against him be killed.

Luke goes on to Jerusalem where he is about to meet his end. Unlike the King in the parable in Luke, Jesus did not kill those who opposed him.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+25%3A14-30%2CLuke+1...

Those hearing this tale in Jericho where Jesus spoke would immediately have thought of Archelaus, the son son Herod. Archelaus was rejected by the Jews. He was also a horrible ruler. He slaughtered Jews for not bowing to his Authority. Would Jesus have made the mistake of identifying with Archelaus or was he testing the audience to realize the true bad actor in the parable? The King was not a good man. Archelaus was the reason Jesus family left Judea fearing the evil ruler. This was noted in Mathew 2:22