Searching for GOD...

[Ricky Spanish]

Wrong... Christianity, throughout the history of Monotheism, has been the ONLY religion ever to come up with a God of love and forgiveness.

Read your history properly. I suppose in time everyone will eventually tire of your constantly getting things wrong.

Hang on John 13:34 claims "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another".

Khat was just pointing out that this command was nothing new... Jainism and Hinduism have had this rule embedded in their teachings for millennia before Christianity.

Oh, and it also shows your ignorance about the earlier religions. Especially Jainism which is a nontheistic religion.. "Read your history properly". Not some half-cocked jerk reaction!!

[Ricky Spanish]

They did not have a saviour in those other religions and anything resembling Christ was added later after Christ in those religions. Just as Pagans changed their religion to omit the bad bits like making sacrifices of children to their idol gods.

Does anybody care to make a stab at what the fuck this means?

They didn't need a "saviour".  They take responsibility for their own actions!

How can you "add" something that was prevalent before your "thing"?

Which particular Pagans are you referring to here missus?

Also Idol: "An idol is an image or other material object representing a deity to which religious worship is addressed or any person or thing regarded with admiration"

How many Idols are representative of Christianity?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Hang on John 13:34 claims "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another".

Khat was just pointing out that this command was nothing new... Jainism and Hinduism have had this rule embedded in their teachings for millennia before Christianity.

Oh, and it also shows your ignorance about the earlier religions. Especially Jainism which is a nontheistic religion.. "Read your history properly". Not some half-cocked jerk reaction!!

Wait a cotton picking moment. Do Jainism or Hinduism include the 'As I have loved you'? rather than the so broadly universal it can be easily dismissed as a cliché 'Love one another'.

It seems to me in certain religions love one another could be on a caste basis ....or letting someone serve their Karma from a previous existence......that is far removed from the close relationship Jesus has with his disciples.

[Ricky Spanish]

Pick as much cotton as you like mate..  The "Golden Rule" had existed for millennia before "Jesus" was conceived..

[Ricky Spanish]

He created hell for the devil. The rest is your own imagination and the Roman Catholic Churches imagination.

Those who go there choose to do so.

Forgiveness and love is shown in providing away for you not to go there.

So as you treat others here, is how you will be treated there.

Who created Hell for the devil? In fact, do you even know what Jesus would have understood as a "devil/satan"?

[Ricky Spanish]

For it's time it would be impossible to make it up. Christ's suffering on the cross wasn't a work of fiction.


No man is capable of going through all that without God being with him.

I'm sure all the Jews the Romans crucified at the time felt the same!!

[Ricky Spanish]

Your ignorance is shameful.

Why show yourself up as being completely without knowledge of the crucifixion of Christ?
You could have googled it and found yourself to be wrong.
Christ received the full punishment anyone could receive.

Even a spear in his side to check he was dead.... rather than have is legs broken to hurry the process of dying by suffocation.

His wounds were such that he died well before the need to break his legs.

How would you tell Christ in the throws of agony his death did not matter when he was innocent and committed no crime.
That in itself was different from anyone else who died of crucifixion. But why should that matter to you?
Why should a little thing like the fact he was innocent make you look different up on his suffering?

O' dear... If you knew your history you would realise so many things about the crucifixion stories that don't make sense and some that do.

Can you make a stab at which parts of the stories make historical sense, against those which don't?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Pick as much cotton as you like mate..  The "Golden Rule" had existed for millennia before "Jesus" was conceived..

Yeh, and that's fine if you want to ignore the context and Jesus' words 'as I have loved you'. But hey I guess that's just inconvenient to your argument so why not forget it, right?

[Rhiannon]

Yeh, and that's fine if you want to ignore the context and Jesus' words 'as I have loved you'. But hey I guess that's just inconvenient to your argument so why not forget it, right?

And you know this was a factual event that's been accurately recorded how, exactly?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

And you know this was a factual event that's been accurately recorded how, exactly?

What we know is that it is entirely consistent with the faith of the early church which sees Jesus as central, the example of what it is to be truly human and divine.

What warrant have you other than that other sweeping generalisation 'it's all(possibly) crap' for discounting the words 'as I have loved you'?

You seem to be quite happy for the words 'love one another' to appear, unspecified and unrecorded never mind accurately.

[Rhiannon]

What we know is that it is entirely consistent with the faith of the early church which sees Jesus as central, the example of what it is to be truly human and divine.

What warrant have you other than that other sweeping generalisation 'it's all(possibly) crap' for discounting the words 'as I have loved you'?

You seem to be quite happy for the words 'love one another' to appear, unspecified and unrecorded never mind accurately.

Yes, it is consistent with the early church. Probably. And?

I don't discount the words but I discount the notion that they are factual. They might be. They might not. And how much do we know of how Jesus loved the disciples, what that would mean in practice?

I'd be happy for them to appear where, exactly?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Yes, it is consistent with the early church. Probably. And?

I don't discount the words but I discount the notion that they are factual. They might be. They might not. And how much do we know of how Jesus loved the disciples, what that would mean in practice?

I'd be happy for them to appear where, exactly?

Well the Gospels are about Jesus ministry where he was in the close company of others on the same mission. The golden rule is a fine general rule. There is however nothing in a science oriented belief to guide....and yet you seem to be happy with it's take, the golden rule exists as a generality in other faiths and you seem to be happy with that. The NT has a specific take of people in close proximity working on a ministry based on teaching, moral discourse and healing.

Secondly subsequent Christians have knowledge of his death and what it means.
is
The notion of this sacrificial love is at the heart of Christianity. If it  at the heart of other religions then it is very implicit or very general or imputed by generalists under the influence of what is revealed in Christianity.

[Rhiannon]

So only Christians are capable of sacrificial love?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

So only Christians are capable of sacrificial love?

No, But out of gods maybe only the Christian God has made divine sacrifice explicit.........and thus you, me, and other faiths are enriched by this revolutionary message.

[Rhiannon]

No, But out of gods maybe only the Christian God has made divine sacrifice explicit.........and thus you, me, and other faiths are enriched by this revolutionary message.

Why am I? And what does it have to do with other faiths?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Why am I? And what does it have to do with other faiths?

It is your cultural heritage.

Of course in your antichristian vehemence Christianity is wholly derivative of other religions but by some unknown process.....in your view has had no influence on other religions.

You can bet the Golden rule has been interpreted as 'you scratch my back and i'll scratch yours' in other times, places and indeed world views.

[Ricky Spanish]

Yeh, and that's fine if you want to ignore the context and Jesus' words 'as I have loved you'. But hey I guess that's just inconvenient to your argument so why not forget it, right?

Context?

You are making the very broad assumption that "Jesus" said these words.

Has it ever occurred to you that there may never have been a Jesus to have said these words, and they might have just have been made up to create a "Christ"?

Do you realise there is a huge difference between the Jewish "Jesus" and the Greek "Christ"?


Oh and that the "Golden Rule" had been around long before "Jesus" was executed by the Romans...

[Ricky Spanish]

Well the Gospels are about Jesus ministry where he was in the close company of others on the same mission. The golden rule is a fine general rule. There is however nothing in a science oriented belief to guide....and yet you seem to be happy with it's take, the golden rule exists as a generality in other faiths and you seem to be happy with that. The NT has a specific take of people in close proximity working on a ministry based on teaching, moral discourse and healing.

Secondly subsequent Christians have knowledge of his death and what it means.
is
The notion of this sacrificial love is at the heart of Christianity. If it  at the heart of other religions then it is very implicit or very general or imputed by generalists under the influence of what is revealed in Christianity.

Nahhh.. you're not getting away this bull shit.

~ The gospels, which were written after the epistles, and were written by people who had never witnessed "Jesus'" ministry, let alone had been his mates.

Even "St Paul" had never met Jesus and in his letters/"epistles" lets his followers know this as a fact means that the whole if the NT is just pseudographical and a heap of bollocks...

The "gospels" were created to give flesh to the christ!

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Nahhh.. you're not getting away this bull shit.

~ The gospels, which were written after the epistles, were written by people who had never witnessed "Jesus'" ministry, let alone had been witnesses.

Even "St Paul" had never met Jesus and in his letters/"epistles" lets his followers know this as a fact means that the whole if the NT is just pseudographical and a heap of bollocks...

The "gospels" were created to give flesh to the christ!

That the Gospels were written afterwards is rather irrelevant since we accept histories written down decades after events in other contexts. We have no similar problems with the Roman and Jewish historians,

The epistles talk about the disciples. St Paul states that those around at the time of Jesus can still be consulted.

There is nothing inconsistent with the epistles and the statement attributed to Jesus ''as I have loved you''.
Paul is an apostle of the risen Christ as Christians are disciples of the risen Christ.

Your post sets out to mislead and is the 'heap of bollocks'.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Context?

You are making the very broad assumption that "Jesus" said these words.

Has it ever occurred to you that there may never have been a Jesus to have said these words, and they might have just have been made up to create a "Christ"?

Do you realise there is a huge difference between the Jewish "Jesus" and the Greek "Christ"?


Oh and that the "Golden Rule" had been around long before "Jesus" was executed by the Romans...

And I'm saying that the Golden rule is a broad nice generalisation in an ideal world to the point of cliché and which could be interpreted as some new atheist thinkers have done as you scratch my back and i'll scratch yours.

[Ricky Spanish]

Of course it's relevant... If the letters of Paul are our first point of contact to the "christ" then how the next stories develop are just as important.

Do you realise that the stories of the Christ follow the letters of Paul by at least a generation?

How long is a generation, or two?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Of course it's relevant... If the letters of Paul are our first point of contact to the "christ" then how the next stories develop are just as important.

Do you realise that the stories of the Christ follow the letters of Paul by at least a generation?

How long is a generation, or two?

I presume it is how long you want it to be Thrud.

I noticed on TV the other day, Paul McCartney being interviewed by the great and the good on his life and times. How long since the Beatles? Over 50 years. My father died recently and would relate stories of his teens during WW2 and that was 70 years before.
All the epistles are are extant ancient letters. If it is literary sources we are thinking about I can certainly, given the amount of paper work I dispose of per year in the course of my work believe that there was more rather than less.

But let's look at this from your point of view. You think Jesus just preached the Golden rule....which somehow in his hands......is a bad thing...but the words as I have loved you are a later addition.

What do you think the motive was for adding 'as I have loved you' to the golden rule?

[Rhiannon]

I guess you could contrast Kier Hardy and Tony Blair to see how a message becomes whatever people want it to be over a comparatively short amount of time.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

I guess you could contrast Kier Hardy and Tony Blair to see how a message becomes whatever people want it to be over a comparatively short amount of time.

The message in Christianity is the risen Jesus though. A dynamic risen Jesus is different from a message which can be spun. If you take the risen Jesus as that then you are in difficulties and have missed the point. If you accept the risen Jesus as he is then it's your 'self-spin' that has to go.

[Shaker]

The message in Christianity is the risen Jesus though. A dynamic risen Jesus is different from a message which can be spun.