Chit Chat

By Ted Belman

From now on comments on every post must relate to the content of the post.

Comments that don’t relate to the post must go here.

Any person who contravenes this demand will be put on moderation. Also their offending comment will be trashed.

The reason for this demand is so that people who want to read comments which pertain to the post, don’t have to wade through the chatter.

Everyone will be happier.

April 16, 2020 | 7,781 Comments »

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  1. @ dweller:

    He wrote in his own handwriting in the dirt (and in succession as they leaned over his shoulder, one at a time, to see what he wrote) the secret sin of every one of the men who tried to trap him by bringing him the woman caught in adultery, to see what he would do with her.

    And when each of them skulked away into the night, convicted & dumbstruck by his own conscience (thus unable to cast the first stone), he turned to the woman and asked her, “Has no man condemned you? then neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”

    (And you think that could’ve been invented by Titus or Josephus. . . . LSHMSFOAIDMT.)

    🙂 🙂 🙂 😛

    Of course !!!!! It’s a BS narrative not based on Jewish thought and no Jew would teach such a stupid and non Jewish concept. Thoughts are not condemned or sinful in Judaism only actions extending from thoughts. Nobody claimed that later christians like paul added to the basic narrative and story outlined by the Romans it’s obvious they were. The calim is the the basic narratives and characters were a Roman invention and others amended and edited other contributions into or onto the basic one. The application of an amorphous concept like conscience was a [fear-control] mechanism necessary to the exigencies’ ends served, required of this Roman concocted fabrication being: fear of punishment as a control mechanism. Conscience is a learned trait and will differ based on which culture and learning of those in that culture. You are not born with fixed parameters of conscience. I have never read anything so stupid, so inane, so anti human nature as the tripe found in the ‘sermon on the mount…’ ONLY A ROMAN OR A JEW WORKING WITH AND FOR THE ROMANS COULD HAVE WRITTEN SUCH GARBAGE. It’s obvious it was meant for mind control of a rebellious populous. Nothing in the NT gives greater credence to the Roman theory of NT authorship that the ‘sermon on the mt’.

    What you call “brilliant” I call stupid, inane and even anti-Human (Pacifistic) What a load of crapolla!!!!!!

  2. @ dweller:

    I’ve seen evidences suggesting that some of the gospels may indeed have been first written b’ivrit or b’amrit.

    Where? What? Show me the evidence!!!!! 😛

    The Gk culture may well have been resented by Jews.

    No reason, however, that the Gk language need’ve been. The Septuagint had been written in Gk. The common language of commerce throughout the Mediterranean region was Koine Gk — not scholarly nor upper-crust, but common Greek.

    Non hellenistic Jews hated greek culture and language. The would never have willing written their scriptures into the hated Greek at that time. The Septuagint was forced upon the Jews but the rabbis only translated the 5 books of Moses the Torah not the rest of what made up the Tanach which were translated by both Jews and christians and even scholarly gentile pagans. That no copy or copies of NT original documents exist in Hebrew or Aramaic the two basic languages used by the Jews of the time, should add credence to the theory that the NT was not written by Jews but Romans or Apostate traitorous Jews loyal to Rome.

  3. @ dweller:

    He wrote in his own handwriting in the dirt (and in succession as they leaned over his shoulder, one at a time, to see what he wrote) the secret sin of every one of the men who tried to trap him by bringing him the woman caught in adultery, to see what he would do with her.

    And when each of them skulked away into the night, convicted & dumbstruck by his own conscience (thus unable to cast the first stone), he turned to the woman and asked her, “Has no man condemned you? then neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”

    (And you think that could’ve been invented by Titus or Josephus. . . . LSHMSFOAIDMT.)

    Of course it’s a bull shit narrative not based on Jewish thought and no Jew would teach such a stupid and non Jewish concept. Thoughts are not condemned or sinful in Judaism only actions extending from thoughts. Nobody claimed that later christians like paul added to the basic narrative and story outlined by the Romans it’s obvious they were. The calim is the the basic narratives and characters were a Roman invention and others amended and edited other contributions into or onto the basic one. The application of an amorphous concept like conscience was a [fear-control] mechanism necessary to the exigencies ends needs, required of this Roman concocted fabrication being fear of punishment as a control mechanism. Conscience is a learned trait and will differ based on which culture and learning of those in that culture. You are not born with fixed parameters of conscience. I have never read anything so stupid, so inane, so anti human nature as the tripe found in the ‘sermon on the mount…’ ONLY A ROMAN OR A JEW WORKING WITH AND FOR THE ROMANS COULD HAVE WRITTEN SUCH GARBAGE. It’s obvious it was meant for mind control of a rebellious populous. Nothing in the NT gives greater credence to the Roman theory of NT authorship that the ‘sermon on the mt’.

    What you call “brilliant” I call stupid, inane and even anti-Human (Pacifistic) What a load of crapolla!!!!!!

  4. @ dweller:

    “You say your guy was literate…”

    Apparently he was. The gospel says he was. When he visited his childhood shul, they called him forward for an aliyah. Says he came forward and read from the scroll.

    And how do you know this factoid? 😛

    He could apparently read and write yet no lasting work of his teaching in his own hand???? If true improbable. He would most certainly want his message and teaching disseminated accurately and widely both during his very short lifetime and after his warranted demise. You venerate a fictional work with a quarter million textual and syntax errors, contradictions and outright altering the jewish biblical scripture to create the lie that youshka was the awaited and promised messiah. A fiction of grafting a heretical and pagan belief system into traditional Judaism.

    When did I do that? I don’t recall saying that about him. It was common for people to call him that. But in those days, it was less of a title than a nominative of respect, like “Sir,” or kind of like the way cockneys call every other adult man “guv’nah.”

    Not impressed there are no more cockneys in Britain and as for the British use of “guv’nah.” hasn’t been in colloquial use for a half century. You seem to be forever in a literary time warp or you read too much Agatha Cristie and your post acid brain can’t catch up to reality.

  5. @ dweller:

    Sheer speculation.

    When you come up with something more than that, come back & see me.

    I have!!!!! You reject out of hand, deny obfuscate, create straw-man arguments, lie outright,refuse to read all or most of material I supply to debunk your positions and beliefs.

    Comparison of the anonymity of the authors of the federalist papers to the NT is a red herring. An attempt by you to obfuscate and dodge the question I posed to you. The Federalist papers had Little to no influence on the written constitution or it’s ratification by the states. In any event we know with certainty the authorship of most with a good idea re: the rest. In any event the true authorship of the ‘Federalists’ while only an academic and historical curiosity, the authorship of the NT does have import especially if knowing the authors of the gospels dispels many myths attributed to the book like your claim the “The Jews authored the same book called the ‘NT’. You make claims relating to the actual historicity of both characters and events depicted in your bible but can’t back up your claims period!!!!!! If you claim you base your beliefs just on faith then there is little to discuss or debate. You have elevated a work of fiction of mythical proportions to an article of belief and faith but it’s still a work of fiction until proven otherwise.

    Who authored and wrote the gospels and other writing making up the (not) divinely inspired work you call the bible and NT???? Did for example your friend paul ( the lying dwarf) write all books in the NT attributed to him none of them or only some of them?

    Shirley such a scholar (sarc/) like yourself can come up with simple yes, no or I don’t know ans. 😉

  6. @ dweller:

    dweller Said:

    “You didn’t answer this basic question other than to attribute them to Jews. What Jews? Name them?”

    Why?

    Who wrote the NT??????

    Who wrote the NT??????

    Just say you don’t know Fegele!!!!

    Toldja: 1st century Jews.

    How do you know that????

    What’s your source for that unequivocal statement of fact by you? I asked who authored the NT and you replied “speculation”. I assume you are playing word games between authorship and writer. You attribute authorship to some source other than the actual writers? Like divinely inspired?? RONTFLMAO

  7. @ bernard ross:

    “The New Testament mentions that the followers of Jesus were first called Christians within a few years after his death.”

    “At Antioch, yes. But not by themselves nor among themselves. Only by their non-believing neighbors, who constantly overheard them referring to Christ-this, Christ-that & Christ-the-other-thing — so those neighbors simply assumed that these people must be . . . ‘Christians’. [Du-uh!]”

    “Pure lies, the citation mentioned the NT and not the neighbors, you made up that bit of BS about neighbors, give a citation for that.”

    I don’t lie on this site (‘purely’ or otherwise). What the citation meant was that the NT said they were called “Xtns” by the neighbors. See: Acts 11:26.

    “you are frantically grasping for any straws.”

    I “frantically grasp” for the FACTS, which I need — NOT for the straws, which I don’t need.

    “They never used [the name of “Xtn”] for themselves, however, because Christ himself had never called them (or anybody else) ‘Christians’…”

    “Your logic is ridiculous… whatever christ called his followers before his death has nothing to do with what those followers and others called themselves after his death. “

    Yes, my logic is ridiculous to one ignorant of the facts. OTOH, to one who does know the terrain, the logic is impeccable.

    The JC who lived in the flesh — and was loved & followed by Jews — was not ‘God.’

    The post-Nicene JC is followed by goyim, who have made a religion out of him (something he never wanted) in which he is ‘God Incarnate’ — the “very God of God.”

    To all intents & purposes, they are two different persons. Followers of the latter JC designate themselves & their fellows “Xtns.” It’s clear that they have taken all sorts of liberties with his actual intentions, but he isn’t here in the flesh to set them straight.

    “Looks like the neighbors agreed with me and the dictionaries”

    “Yes, like you, they acted out of their ignorance. Of course, you have MORE than ignorance motivating you. You also have malevolence.”

    “Yes, the dictionaries the encyclopedias, common usage, etc are all wrong and Dweller (LOL) is right”

    If you find that inconceivable, then you should do as I suggested: Approach the Xtn clergy for THEIR take on it. Seems like the consensus among them should settle the matter.

    “Liars deserve malevolence.”

    If that’s true, then I suggest you be on the lookout for malevolent persons. They will no doubt be drawn to the likes of you, Master Liar.

  8. @ bernard ross:

    “But then, I know the actual definition of the word [‘Christian’], while the others here use it only as an epithet.”

    “Chris·tian, noun… a believer in Jesus Christ and his teachings.”

    “If that were the case, then Christ would have called them by that name. Never did.”

    “baloney as usual, no reason to make such a ridiculous assumption, its in your mind. Followers of a person, creed, theory are often named after the person, its the common usage AND the dictionary definition.”

    No, QTC, as usual, I was right on the money.

    Christ could’ve easily called them “Xtns.” Yet you will not find a single instance of his ever calling anybody a ‘Xtn’ in any of the gospels. There’s a reason for that; it wasn’t an oversight. Those who loved him he called simply his friends — because his mission included neither the founding of a new religion nor the revitalizing of an old one. In fact, his EARTHLY purpose was to free man from the need for religion at all.

    People made a religion based on his person only centuries later.

    “christian…someone who believes Jesus is the Christ or Messiah.”

    “I told you: the Nicene Creed is far more specific, and mere belief in JC as Moshiach is insufficient to be a Christian. If one doesn’t believe that Christ is ‘God,’ then he/she cannot be a Christian. If you don’t like the fact that this doesn’t fit your scheme, take it up with the Christian community. Maybe they’ll change things to please you. . . .”

    “you are wrong and the dictionaries are right, and furthermore you asked my definition and I agree with the dictionaries.”

    Yeah, I’m wrong — because you say so, right? I asked your definition not because I expected you to be right, but only so I’d have clarity about where you were going with it. Take it up with Xtn clergy; that’s the logical place to go for this. You and the dictionaries are most assuredly wrong; the dictionaries should’ve taken it up w/ the Xtn clergy too.

    Frankly if calling oneself a Christian didn’t require — as it INDEED does require — subscription to the Nicene & post-Nicene creeds or other affirmations of the notion of Christ’s ‘divinity,’ then my ONLY problem w/ calling myself by that name would be the presumption in taking a name that only Christ is fit to deliver.

    The fact is that to be a Xtn you have to believe Yeshua haNitzri is ‘God.’

    — I don’t, and I don’t think HE did; nor do I think that he ever wanted anybody ELSE to think he was. His first disciples were all Jews and THEY sure-as-blazes didn’t think he was ‘divine.’ Unique in certain ways, but not ‘God.’

    “you cited christians as existing in 64 CE, they were as everyone states christian before the nicene creed.

    Told you: the neighbors hadda call ’em something, so they called ’em “Christians.” Not correct, but given circumstances, understandable. Among themselves they called their growing faith “The Way,” nothing more. It wasn’t yet (and wouldn’t begin to be for at least another 75 yrs) a separate & distinct religion. All the Judean believers still regarded themselves as Jews, and the Jewish community & Jewish authorities likewise viewed them still the same way.

    “follower of christ equals christian, DUH again”

    You DO put the “duh” in dumb, for sure.

    And who decides whether somebody is (or isn’t) a “follower of christ”? You think the mere declaration to that effect will cover it (no fuss, no muss)? — just like that? “Say da secret woyd, an’ win anudda FIF-tee dahlas.”

    Mt 7:21-23.

  9. dweller Said:

    “You didn’t answer this basic question other than to attribute them to Jews. What Jews? Name them?”

    Why?

    Who wrote the NY??????

    Who wrote the NT??????

    Just say you don’t know Fefele!!!!

    Toldja: 1st century Jews.

    How do you know that????
    What’s your source for that unequivocal statement of fact by you? I asked who authored the NT and you replied “speculation”. I assume you are playing word games between authorship and writer. You attribute authorship to some source other than the actual writers? Like divinely inspired?? RONTFLMAO

    Sheer speculation.

    When you come up with something more than that, come back & see me.

    I have you reject out of hand, deny obfuscate, create straw-man arguments, lie outright,refuse to read all or most of material I supply to debunk your positions and beliefs.

    Comparison of the anonymity of the authors of the federalist papers to the NT is a red herring. An attempt by you to obfuscate and dodge the question I posed to you. The Federalist papers had Little to no influence on the written constitution or it’s ratification by the states. In any event we know with certainty the authorship of most with a good idea re: the rest. In any event the true authorship of the ‘Federalists’ while only an academic and historical curiosity, the authorship of the NT does have import especially if knowing the authors of the gospels dispels many myths attributed to the book like your claim the “The Jews authored the same book called the ‘NT’. You make claims relating to the actual historicity of both characters and events depicted in your bible but can’t back up your claims period!!!!!! If you claim you base your beliefs just on faith then there is little to discuss or debate. You have elevated a work of fiction of mythical proportions to an article of belief and faith but it’s still a work of fiction until proven otherwise.

    Who authored and wrote the gospels and other writing making up the (not) divinely inspired work you call the bible and NT???? Did for example your friend paul ( the lying dwarf) write all books in the NT attributed to him none of them or only some of them?

    Shirley such a scholar (sarc/) like yourself can come up with simple yes, no or I don’t know ans. 😉

    “You say your guy was literate…”

    Apparently he was. The gospel says he was. When he visited his childhood shul, they called him forward for an aliyah. Says he came forward and read from the scroll.

    And how do you know this factoid? 😛

    He could apparently read and write yet no lasting work of his teaching in his own hand???? If true improbable. He would most certainly want his message and teaching disseminated accurately and widely both during his very short lifetime and after his warranted demise. You venerate a fictional work with a quarter million textual and syntax errors, contradictions and outright altering the jewish biblical scripture to create the lie that youshka was the awaited and promised messiah. A fiction of grafting a heretical and pagan belief system into traditional Judaism.

    When did I do that? I don’t recall saying that about him. It was common for people to call him that. But in those days, it was less of a title than a nominative of respect, like “Sir,” or kind of like the way cockneys call every other adult man “guv’nah.”

    Not impressed there are no more cockneys in Britain and as for the British use of “guv’nah.” hasn’t been in colloquial use for a half decade. You seem to be forever in a literary time warp or you read too much Agatha Cristie and your post acid brain can’t catch up to reality.

    He wrote in his own handwriting in the dirt (and in succession as they leaned over his shoulder, one at a time, to see what he wrote) the secret sin of every one of the men who tried to trap him by bringing him the woman caught in adultery, to see what he would do with her.

    And when each of them skulked away into the night, convicted & dumbstruck by his own conscience (thus unable to cast the first stone), he turned to the woman and asked her, “Has no man condemned you? then neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”

    (And you think that could’ve been invented by Titus or Josephus. . . . LSHMSFOAIDMT.)

    Of course it’s a bull shit narrative not based on Jewish thought and no Jew would teach such a stupid and non Jewish concept. Thoughts are not condemned or sinful in Judaism only actions extending from thoughts. Nobody claimed that later christians like paul added to the basic narrative and story outlined by the Romans it’s obvious they were. The calim is the the basic narratives and characters were a Roman invention and others amended and edited other contributions into or onto the basic one. The application of an amorphous concept like conscience was a [fear-control] mechanism necessary to the exigencies ends needs, required of this Roman concocted fabrication being fear of punishment as a control mechanism. Conscience is a learned trait and will differ based on which culture and learning of those in that culture. You are not born with fixed parameters of conscience. I have never read anything so stupid, so inane, so anti human nature as the tripe found in the ‘sermon on the mount…’ ONLY A ROMAN OR A JEW WORKING WITH AND FOR THE ROMANS COULD HAVE WRITTEN SUCH GARBAGE. It’s obvious it was meant for mind control of a rebellious populous. Nothing in the NT gives greater credence to the Roman theory of NT authorship that the ‘sermon on the mt’.

    What you call “brilliant” I call stupid, inane and even anti-Human (Pacifistic) What a load of crapolla!!!!!!

    I’ve seen evidences suggesting that some of the gospels may indeed have been first written b’ivrit or b’amrit.

    Where? What? Show me the evidence!!!!! 😛

    The Gk culture may well have been resented by Jews.

    No reason, however, that the Gk language need’ve been. The Septuagint had been written in Gk. The common language of commerce throughout the Mediterranean region was Koine Gk — not scholarly nor upper-crust, but common Greek.

    Non hellenistic Jews hated greek culture and language. The would never have willing written their scriptures into the hated Greek at that time. The Septuagint was forced upon the Jews but the rabbis only translated the 5 books of Moses the Torah not the rest of what made up the Tanach which were translated by both Jews and christians and even scholarly gentile pagans. That no copy or copies of NT original documents exist in Hebrew or Aramaic the two basic languages used by the Jews of the time, should add credence to the theory that the NT was not written by Jews but Romans or Apostate traitorous Jews loyal to Rome.

  10. @ bernard ross:

    “Outside of christianity there is no authentication and for me christianity is not a credible source.”

    Whether true or not, that seems not to be a problem for the Jewish community generally. And that includes most rabbis & Jewish educators — across the spectrum. You think you’re more Jewish than they?

    — And actually one could make about JUDAISM the same claim that you made above in re Xty: Outside of it there is no ‘authentication.’ (So what?)

    “Did you get your NT from your supposed Jewish authors”

    Everybody does; NT was authored by Jews about Jews.

    But then, I can say that because I’ve read both the gospels AND other Jewish works. The comparison only confirms the assertion.

    “You don’t know that [self-styled ‘christians’ persecuted Jews] simply BECAUSE they were [followers of Christ]. Objectively speaking, it makes FAR more sense to conclude that they did those things because they were EVIL, and used Xty as cover for it. (Historically a very common phenomenon, actually.)”

    “you are a pathetic deceiver.”

    Oh, please. If I were a ‘deceiver,’ you’d never know you’d BEEN deceived. That’s the nature of deceit.

    “For almost 2000 years christians, christian churches and orgs did it. That’s enough of a ‘coincidence’ for me. For much of their evil they claimed a basis in their dogma e.g. inquisition.”

    It’s no coincidence. It is PRECISELY their pinning their behavior to scripture that enables one to know with certainty & clarity that they were anything BUT ‘Christian’ in thought, word & deed.

    (Of course YOU cannot know that because w/o examining the NT you have no template to compare their ‘christian’ deeds TO.)

    “If you take this tack you are a disingenuous fraud… “

    If I take WHAT tack? — crystal clear logic? — what tack are you talking about?

    “you might as well deny the holocaust.”

    I see that you are really not a Jew. What you ARE is a Jew-wannabe; we’ve seen this before on this site.

    Talking that shit is merely how you presume to establish your “Jewish bona-fides,” because you’ve sensed that, in the past, you’ve fallen down on the job in that department.

    You’re barking up the wrong tree, however, because talking that way has no potential for removing the inadequacy. You’re only kidding yourself in the attempt. Trying to find a Jew to look down upon, or to write out of the Tribe, or to label a ‘Christian,’ etc, etc, is nothing but a pitiful, pathetic attempt to shore up your own sagging Jewish insecurities . (The pattern is glaring & unmistakable.)

    But it will NEVER make you more of a Jew; doesn’t work like that.

    Nor will it ever make you a better Jew.

    Will not even (because it cannot) make you a JEW at all.

    Not if you live to be as old as God himself.

  11. @ bernard ross:

    “The key to making your case [which you have yet to do] is showing a correlation between the Gospel teachings and the persecution of the Jews.”

    “rubbish, I never mentioned the gospels as a key.”

    “Don’t play word games with me. You effectively said the NT was the key. You’re clearly changing your tune, but the REASON is that you’ve run out of wiggle room in your protested justification for not reading NT as the purported source of Xtn anti-Jewish persecution. So now you claim that the gospel or NT ‘wasn’t’ the key to the persecution.

    NOW it’s not that the NT is ‘evil’ but that it’s immaterial, right? Whatever it takes to keep from opening the book & seeing for yourself just what’s in there. You’re SO scared. (God, that’s weird!)

    — It’s a friggin’ BOOK; it’s ink on the page, nothing more. You treat NT with precisely the same irrational fear that grips some people over spiders.”

    “It is you who are obsessed with the NT and the gospels.”

    Not an obsession. A journey and a delight.

    ” I have no interest in them [the gospels].”

    You have an enormous interest in AVOIDING them. (And such a ‘disinterest’ could WELL be characterized as obsessive w/o doing violence to the language.)

    “It is YOU who keep returning to your gospels like a Jehovahs Witness trying to get the Jews to read your fairy tales.”

    Not at all; there’s really no comparison. For one thing, I don’t lay the gospel on Jews or anybody else. I told you before: it wasn’t having the gospels laid on Me that brought me to clarity in the matter; I saw my way to daylight quite independently of any attempts at proselytizing me (which attempts had invariably ended in colossal failure for JW’s & other proselytizers). So why then would I presume to lay NT on somebody else???

    Moreover, most Jews don’t have your terror of NT. They may not have use or time for it, but they aren’t phobic over it either. You are very different from most Jews, who can take it or leave it.

    I say that you should read the gospels for yourself because as long as you disparage christians or their faith, or insist on lumping them all together w/ the persecutors — WITHOUT your having a first-hand knowledge of (what they see as) the BASIS for their faith — you cannot be on the same page for the discourse.

    If a professor discovered that a student had systematically failed to read the essential texts required in his course, he’d flunk him/her instantly. Wouldn’t matter — one way or the other — WHAT the student’s opinions on the subject matter consisted of. All that would matter is the obvious fact that he hadn’t learned the material, and his motives & sincerity in taking the course would be, at best, suspect.

  12. @ bernard ross:

    “You are…touting the assertions of those known liars and jew killers here to Jews on this site.”

    “Balderdash. I never tout the assertions of those I know to be liars. Jesus is not a known liar — altho this website IS, from-time-to-time top-heavy with known slanderers, and you are frequently one of them.

    If you think you can show some examples of haNitzri’s ‘lying,’ I’m waiting to see them. If you can’t, then that makes YOU a known liar as well as a known slanderer.”

    “I am not referring to the so called assertions of … jesus… I am not talking about dogmas and documents but about behaviors.”

    Well, if your definition of ‘christian’ has to do with being a follower of Jesus, then you SHOULD be paying attention to the remarks of Jesus, because if the ‘behaviors” you allude to don’t match his teachings, then even by YOUR dictionary definition, those “behaviors” may NOT rightly be called ‘christian.’

    That is THE central issue where soi-disant Christianity is concerned. Everything else is peripheral at best.

    “They have claimed that the basis of the despicable behavior is their dogma and the teachings of Jesus but I make no reference to that claim. “

    Of course you don’t. And here we see that you have exposed yourself at last. You’re not interested in acknowledging that their behavior isn’t ‘christian,’ even by the definition you use. You need to hate christians, the judgmental pleasure in it is simply too great for you to let it pass. So you pronounce the matter ‘irrelevant’ — when it is not merely quite relevant; it is indeed critical, CRUCIAL.

    “The claims of these nutters is irrelevant.”

    Wrong. It’s clear from the teachings of him whom they presume to ‘worship’ that those nutters are NOT his followers. They have absolutely proven that they are NOT ‘Christians.’ Q.E.D.

  13. @ bernard ross:

    “in the same deceitful way that you revise and edit my comments.”

    I don’t do that. (It does seem to be a favored gambit of yours, however.)

    The first conversation is as I noted it — post #43, pg 13 [prev pg]; there were two different exchanges, not one. The only thing wrong with that first one you displayed was that you had taken my words out of context, so you could get in a dig, which would’ve otherwise been out-of-place. It was YOU who had done the editing.

    I had merely restored the context; nothing more. No ‘revising,’ etc.

    “I have read [the gospel accounts], and I’m telling you — flat-out — that Jewish persecution is NOT an outgrowth of anybody’s adherence to the teaching in the Gospel. Quite the contrary, it is an outgrowth of the FAILURE to adhere to it; indeed the overwhelming and systematic failure to adhere to it.”

    “there is no assertion of yours which I would take at face value as you demonstrate the same deceitful MO as those you seek to defend.”

    “There’s no deceit in me. Your claims are sheer projection.”

    “I just showed you one of your many deceits”

    No, you didn’t. There was no deceit there whatsoever. Not on MY part.

    ” just like your church.”

    My “church”??? — what are you talking about? I don’t have any ‘church.’ I think you must be losing your strawberries. (Or maybe they’ve just gotten moldy from excessive handling?)

    The only people I’m defending are the gospel writers.

    “You are defending the assertions of the existence of Jesus and disciples, his virgin birth, his resurrection, his Jewish messiahship, his second coming, his son of godship born of a union between G_D and a woman, ………..”

    Assertions all made originally by JEWS about Jews.

    “Where did you get these ideas from, I have never read of them in a Jewish scripture?”

    Since when do you READ Jewish scripture?

    Try it sometime. (First part is Tanach. Second part is Brit haChadashah.}

    Once you’ve done your homework we can talk.

  14. @ bernard ross:

    “You cannot rely on a dictionary for such a definition [of ‘Christian’]. Dictionaries are notorious for having their own axes to grind in these matters (just as YOU quite obviously do), and it’s reflected not only in how they presume to define words, but also in the very words they choose to include and exclude .”

    “not dictionaries? I wonder who you think would give a more objective definition?”

    “The only legitimate definition of ‘Christian’ is the one which THEY maintain for themselves .”

    “and YOU are suggesting that the christians, their churches DONT HAVE AN AXE TO GRIND?”

    “Of course they do, in the sense that they have an interest in determining the basis of their membership. Are YOU suggesting that they shouldn’t be able to determine and maintain their own standards, like any other ‘club’ or institution?

    — Maybe you would leave THAT up to the publishers of dictionaries???

    Your self-serving arrogance is BEYOND astounding — it’s downright offensive: You think that as a Jew you have the option to determine who is and isn’t a Jew — yet you deny that same prerogative of self-identification to the Christian community.

    This is the height of chutzpa.”

    “the axe they grind is nothing to do with their membership “

    It IS to do with their getting to decide who is — and who isn’t — a “Christian.”

    It IS to do with WHO gets to establish the definition.

    You don’t.

    I don’t.

    And dictionaries don’t either (unless they ask the Christian community).

    “Deceitful little man!”

    YOU call me ‘deceitful’? — YOU call me ‘little’?

    — That’s like being called ugly by a TOAD.

    “You are a fraud.”

    For what? — For refusing to let you commandeer the discussion and take it off on an impertinent tangent? (I thought you had a thing about NOT going off on tangents. Oh, I get it; tangents are ok, but only when they fit your purposes, is that it?)

    ‘Fraud,’ indeed.

    The subject was the definition of “Christian.”

    But you haven’t got the intellectual discipline to stay on-point because you can’t set aside the sense of omnipotent, judgment-gorged pleasure you get from your own adrenaline-charged, malevolent hatred.

    Choke on it.

  15. @ bernard ross:

    “they cribbed the jewish bible and then revised it tosuit their needs and fraud.”

    Prove it.

    “Didnt you know…..?”

    Oh, I surely DO know (since you asked).

    It’s not cribbed; it’s occasionally confused, but not cribbed. (And occasionally so is the Jewish take on it confused; it happens. BFD.)

    Yes, I do know the landscape — in fact, I know the terrain well enough to know that YOU most certainly don’t know it from Coney Island.

    ” If you dont know what Jews know”

    I do know what Jews know; have known from a very young age.

    I also know what they DON’T know.

    And YOU most assuredly know NEITHER.

    “I wont do your homework.”

    ROFLMAO. I always do my homework.

    It is YOURSELF who hasn’t done his homework. (And we both know it.)

    In fact, if I were a betting man, I’d put my chips on the likelihood that you have not only not read the “New” Testament

    — but that you ALSO haven’t yet read the Old.

  16. @ bernard ross:

    “[The Jewish authorship of NT] merely attests to the fact that jews might be capable of writing fiction, fairy tales, myths, cartoons etc. the authorship of the NT does not give credence to the existence of the Jesus character.”

    “No, that’s right; it doesn’t. The sayings themselves provide the credence. Moreover, while other Jews might well be capable of fiction, cartoons, and all sorts of bubbe meises

    — that is NOT the case when the genre of the material in question consists of sustained, steady, heavy-duty metaphysics freely expressed by the speaker, ‘on-his-feet,’ in the moment, without brooding prior deliberation, and in common, non-scholarly language. NO other Jews (nor other ANYBODIES) could’ve pulled that off.”

    “Therefore, you believe the purported facts of the NT as a result of literary assessments of the main characters sayings in the novel? In other words you think the main characters ‘sayings’ are so brilliantly wonderful that no other person could be responsible for writing those sayings other than a virgin birthed, jewish messiah, son of [the one true] God and Jewish woman?”

    “Wonderful” was YOUR word, just as “pretty” was your word. I told you it’s not about aesthetics, but about authenticity.

    I don’t think the remarks of the central figure are FAKED. Don’t think they are FABRICATED. They are clearly Jewish, clearly 1st century Judean, clearly all-of-a-piece, and clearly extraordinarily wise, penetrating & to the point.

    And if they aren’t faked or fabricated, then knowing what those remarks are about — knowing the substance and import of those authentic remarks — I find it extremely unlikely that they were just plunked down in the middle of a ‘novel’ or other work of fiction.

    Somebody who was willing to do such a thing with them would not at the same time have been capable of fully comprehending their import in the first place, thus wouldn’t know which ones to include & which to discard, etc.

    However, I don’t expect you to grasp that for yourself because you haven’t examined the ‘novel’ for yourself. Doesn’t matter how good I may be at describing the color blue to a man who’s been blind from birth — if you’ve never actually seen it, then all you have is what you want to believe about it. There’s just no substitute for seeing it for yourself

    — and there never will be.

  17. @ yamit82:

    “…’The True Authorship of the New Testament‘…”

    Sheer speculation.

    When you come up with something more than that, come back & see me.

    @ yamit82:

    “Who wrote the NT???”

    Toldja: 1st century Jews.

    “You didn’t answer this basic question other than to attribute them to Jews. What Jews? Name them?”

    Why?

    Who really wrote the Federalist Papers? For a long time, it was believed to be somebody who styled himself “Publius.”

    If we never found out that the authors’ actual names were Madison & Hamilton & Jay

    — would it matter? Get a grip.

    “What do you really know about them?”

    What do I need to know?

    It’s not about them; it’s about the scripture.

    “You say your guy was literate…”

    Apparently he was. The gospel says he was. When he visited his childhood shul, they called him forward for an aliyah. Says he came forward and read from the scroll.

    “You say your guy was… a rabbi (sic)…”

    When did I do that? I don’t recall saying that about him. It was common for people to call him that. But in those days, it was less of a title than a nominative of respect, like “Sir,” or kind of like the way cockneys call every other adult man “guv’nah.”

    Formal smicha — representing the mastery of a defined body of learning — would not become associated with the title of “Rabbi” until Yavneh. That wouldn’t happen till at least half-a-century after his death & resurrection.

    ” what did he write in his own hand???”

    He wrote in his own handwriting in the dirt (and in succession as they leaned over his shoulder, one at a time, to see what he wrote) the secret sin of every one of the men who tried to trap him by bringing him the woman caught in adultery, to see what he would do with her.

    And when each of them skulked away into the night, convicted & dumbstruck by his own conscience (thus unable to cast the first stone), he turned to the woman and asked her, “Has no man condemned you? then neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”

    (And you think that could’ve been invented by Titus or Josephus. . . . LSHMSFOAIDMT.)

    “If written by Jews why not in Hebrew or Aramaic???”

    I’ve seen evidences suggesting that some of the gospels may indeed have been first written b’ivrit or b’amrit.

    “Why Greek the hated culture and language of Jews?”

    The Gk culture may well have been resented by Jews.

    No reason, however, that the Gk language need’ve been. The Septuagint had been written in Gk. The common language of commerce throughout the Mediterranean region was Koine Gk — not scholarly nor upper-crust, but common Greek.

    Judea had a long history of interaction w/ the Gk language, and with Gk- & Gk-dialect-speaking persons going as far back as the first encounters with the Philistines, who had originated in the Aegean islands & maybe Mycenean Hellas or the Minoan culture of Crete.

  18. @ honeybee:
    @ yamit82:

    “They were double crossed then by the then christinans who sided with Rome snitched on the Jewish rebels. “

    He’s lying — and flagrantly bearing false witness against his neighbor — and he knows it.

    There is no contemporaneous testimony or other evidence from the era indicating that the Nazarene Jews of Judea “sided with Rome” OR “snitched on the Jewish rebels.”

    If there were such evidence you can bet the farm that he would’ve produced it instantly.

    The reality is much simpler. The early victories tempted the rebellion to over-confidence and then to piggyback the leaders’ personal fantasies into the war effort.

    So, instead of remaining the legitimate War of National Liberation that it started out as (and which had had the support of all elements of the Judean populace, INCL the Nazarene Jews), the spiritual leader of the rebellion, Rabbi Akiva, HIJACKED the rebellion and made it a War for Moshiach.

    Akiva publically declared the rebellion’s military leader, Bar Kochba, to be the Messiah — and promptly started losing support of large sectors of the populace. The Sanhedrin, which had supported the war along with everybody else, now withdrew its endorsement. Virtually the entire Judean rabbinate backed away as well. Only Rabbis Gershom, Acha, and Akiva himself remained in favor.

    Moreover, having been declared Moshiach, Bar Kochba demanded that all of his troops acknowledge him as the Messiah. What were the Nazarene troops to do? — they already had a Messiah in Jesus. No way they could deny their conscience. So they left the forces of the rebellion.

    There is no evidence, however, that they ever went over to the Roman side.

    By hijacking the war & making it about Moshiach, Akiva & Bar Kochba abandoned & BETRAYED the discipline of the war’s original purpose, weakened greatly its base of support & sealed the fate of the rebellion.

    The war could’ve been won had the rebels just managed to hold out a little longer. As it was, it went on for three-&-a-half years, and other captive peoples throughout the empire had been taking heart over what what shaping up in Judea, and were staring brushfire rebellions of their own. There was only so far that the empire could’ve spread itself before it would’ve begun to crack. The expenditure of blood & treasure was totally unprecedented since the days of Hannibal, and the signs of stress were already surfacing throughout Roman society.

    Had the rebellion succeeded, Rome would’ve very likely collapsed a couple centuries earlier than she did. More significantly, Jewish sovereignty would not have been lost — and replaced by Jewish persecution — for the next EIGHTEEN centuries.

    It’s clear that the parties who warrant the lion’s share of the blame for that loss are Akiva and Bar Kochba.

    But as is TYPICAL for Capt Huff’n’puff, he prefers to scapegoat “The Christians.”

    “That was the final straw between the Jews and the sectarian cult. The cult did everything to defame the Jews to try to make themselves Roman compliant and threw in the Jews…”

    What a stinking, steaming pile of pig plop. That ‘sectarian cult’ was composed of Jews. If you have evidence that the ‘sectarian cult’ ‘defamed’ the Jewish community in which they & a hundred generations before them had been raised, then PRODUCE it.

    Otherwise, go piss up a rope.

    “…till Constantine reinvented them and adopted and molded them to his purposes.”

    Apples & Oranges. Those whom Constantine in the 4th century “reinvented” & molded were all GENTILES.

    The movement of the Way, which had been made up of Nazarene JEWS within Judea, faded from view during the 2nd century, when Hadrian — AFTER the Bar Kochba War — made the city & environs of Jerusalem (their HQ) off-limits to “circumcised persons.”

    The first 15 bishops of Jerusalem had — w/o exception — all been Jews, but after Hadrian’s order, the bishops of Jerusalem, quite understandably, ceased to be chosen from among Jews. (Yes, the first “Christians” were all Jews.)

  19. @ honeybee:

    It was a rebellion where most of the Jews stayed home and tried to stay out of it which made them easy victims to the Romas who slaughtered them wholesale.

    Not until Bar Cochba did most participate and they had advanced planning to their ends. They were double crossed then by the then christinans who sided with Rome snitched on the Jewish rebels. That was the final straw between the Jews and the sectarian cult. The cult did everything to defame the Jews to try to make themselves Roman compliant and threw in the Jews where ever they could get away with it till Constantine reinvented them and adopted and molded them to his purposes.

  20. @ bernard ross:

    Nothing Nada not even a smidgeon.

    According to this version the jewish wars against Rome were continuous not only in Judea but throught the empire of Rome. The war according to this vrsion was against slavery and the jewish sectoral divide. Rome needed a compliant religion to counter the crazy Jews who were really threatening the Roman empire so they invented j and a compliant obedient to authority religion christianity.

    Excerpt:

    The Pharisees were against the institution of slavery. (Ref. Jose. Pg. 487)
    Also, pages 488, 600, and 601.

    In the opening page of “The Vita” Josephus says that the rulers of the Pharisees were
    akin to that of the Stoics. (Ref. Jose. Page 14)

    “The Pharisees were in a capacity of greatly opposing Kings.” (Ref. Jose. Pg. 358)

    “He (Tiberius Caesar) abolished foreign cults at Rome, particularly the Egyptian and
    Jewish.” (Which, were both one in the same as the Egyptian ‘religion’/philosophy at
    that time was Judaism at Alexandria in the form of the Pharisees that were there). And,
    “Jews of military age were removed (from Rome) to unhealthy regions, on (or ‘under’)
    the pretext of drafting them into the Army; those (Jews) too old or too young to serve –
    including non-Jews who had adopted similar beliefs – were expelled from the City (of
    Rome) and threatened with slavery (themselves) if they defied the order.”* (Ref. Suetonius,
    “The Twelve Caesars,” under ‘Tiberius’, pg. 128, Penguin Classics, paperback edition)
    *Their sympathies were obviously towards the abolishment of slavery

    “Because the Jews at Rome caused continuous disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus,
    he (Claudius Caesar)* expelled them from the City (of Rome).” (Ref. Suetonius, “The
    Twelve Caesars,” under ‘Claudius’, pg. 197, Penguin Classics, Paperback edition)
    *During Claudius’ rule, so circa 41-45 CE. Suetonius knew well what the truth was;
    however, he was a part of the Roman effort to disguise the truth – otherwise he would
    not have been allowed to write his histories for the public.

    What Suetonius is really saying here is; a) the basic story for the Gospel of Mark (Ur
    Marcus) was already written, and b) the messiah had not yet been named ‘Jesus’, but
    only ‘Christ’ – after their ancestor Mitheridates Chrestas. And, c) the person who was
    playing “Chrestus” or Christ in that original version was instigating trouble with the
    Jews on purpose. Additionally, d) Abelard Reuchlin says that this person was Arrius
    Piso’s grandfather. Also at this time, e) we start seeing several of the members of the
    Piso family being executed by Claudius Caesar. Perhaps one of those that he had
    killed was the one who was instigating that trouble at Rome. Suetonius’ writing about
    this f) could be his way of ‘honoring’ that person who was playing ‘Chrestus’ in the
    original version of the Gospel of Mark back then (circa 41-45 CE).

    It was for the reasons stated that the war was being fought, that the New Testament was
    brought into being – mainly that all of the sects of the Jews other than the Sadducees were
    at odds with the Romans over the issue of slavery. For which, these remaining Jews were
    resolved and most determined to put an end to the practice of that institution which
    enslaved fellow humans within the Roman empire. But in as much as the Romans needed
    to put down the potential for revolt among the slaves themselves, they soon realized that
    they had to give them (the slaves) reasons and strength to endure that hardship and
    situation of being slaves; even in the face of the prospect of obtaining their freedom
    should that ever be offered to them. So, the slaves were given a “philosophy” that they
    could not resist, one that would ‘raise them up’ in their own minds, and promised them
    rewards in an afterlife that was eternal. Under the condition that they be subject in all
    ways to their masters.

  21. yamit82 Said:

    What Jews? Name them?

    My understanding is that the only purely Jewish writings from that era, untouched by foreign elements, is the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is also my understanding that none mentioned Jesus or his disciples.

  22. @ bernard ross:

    “NT may not be characterized as a strictly ‘Christian’ source, as it was written by Jews — compiled by Xtns, but written by Jews — who did not regard the Nazarene as ‘God incarnate.’

    Moshiach, yes. ‘God,’ no.

    — Christians surely do undeniably relate to NT and invariably RELY on it, but by their own definition — and theirs is the only legitimate one — NT may not rightly be designated an entirely ‘Christian’ source. Indeed, under the circumstances, it is best characterized as both Jewish AND Xtn.”

    “The authorship of [NT] is undetermined and whoever the authors were does not give credibility as to whether the purported facts therein are true or false.”

    The authorship of NT is not undetermined. It was written by Judean & Anatolian Jews, and it is standard research practice to accept original sources on their face until such time as other original sources present differing accounts. Then one may compare details.

    If you don’t have other contemporaneous narratives from the era to challenge the gospel accounts, then the latter STANDS.

    “However, it is a moot point because the NT never came to us through Jewish sources.”

    You don’t know that.

    “Even if the authorship was Jewish the christian churches are the source of its distribution to the public”

    Not to the Judean public, not for the first three centuries. There was no separate & distinct Xtn religion for that period, only a sect of Judaism (one of several) — and the Jewish religious authorities had a free hand to control what was published, so long as it did not foment political discord.

    “The primary Jewish source attesting to the facts of Yeshua haNitzri is the Gospel narrative, since its Jewish authorship makes it more Jewish than Christian.”

    “The NT gospels comes to the world through the christians.”

    “THE christians”???

    The period during which it came to the world “thru THE christians” was one in which everybody was subject to the common state ethos, so everybody (except a Jew) was nominally a ‘christian.’ But to call them all ‘christians’ — as if the name were an indicator of their faith — is misleading.

    The vast majority of subjects or citizens in any polity are not typically believers in its common religion. They are simply swept along with whatever the local practice consists of; they tolerate it for the sake of social acceptance. In fact, for the great bulk of the past 1800 years, the vast majority of persons were not even literate and could not have even read the NT (or, for that matter, the Tanach), or known what was or wasn’t in it.

    ” There is no jewish source which authenticates the facts asserted in the gospels.”

    Have you got a non-Jewish source that ‘authenticates’ the facts asserted in re the life & times of Elijah? Abraham? Samuel? Ezekiel?

    — If not, how do you know they’re not ‘fairy tales’?

  23. @ yamit82:

    “The only people I’m defending are the gospel writers. If you think THEY are ‘deceivers’, show me the evidence of that.”

    “Who are the real authors???”

    Told you already: 1st century Jews. Their names are immaterial, notwithstanding the spurious claims of the notorious Bart Ehrman. There could be many reasons for using a pseudonym (not the least of which is the protection of the author’s own life). It HARDLY been unheard of for authors in any era to use pen names.

    “Show me anything your mythological messiah guy wrote in his own hand…”

    And if I did, how would you confirm or deny that it WAS his own hand? Your question is disingenuous, and we both know it. I could ask you the same thing about any writer of Tanach. “Have you got handwriting samples of Moshe Rabbenu? If not, what’s your proof of his authorship of the Pentateuch?”

    Get a life.

    “The ice is rapidly melting beneath your feet.”

    Wishful thinking.

  24. dweller Said:

    There’s no deceit in me. Your claims are sheer projection.

    The only people I’m defending are the gospel writers.

    Who wrote the NT???

    You didn’t answer this basic question other than to attribute them to Jews. What Jews? Name them? What do you really know about them?

    You say your guy was literate and a rabbi(sic) what did he write in his own hand??? That would be an important asset to have in christians favor. Yet Nada? If written by Jews why not in Hebrew or Aramaic??? Why Greek the hated culture and language of Jews?

  25. @ dweller:
    yamit82 Said:

    Who are the real authors???

    It appears that Dweller avoided your questions as he avoided so many of my comments.

    It appears that some of the New Testament writers, such as the authors of 2 Peter, 1 Timothy and Ephesians, felt they were perfectly justified to lie in order to tell the truth.
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bart-d-ehrman/the-bible-telling-lies-to_b_840301.html

    that should ring a familiar bell 😛
    So who wrote down the “brilliant sayings” of Jesus, like your sermon on the mount, was it Jesus, or was it one of his disciples also unproven to exist, or was it a ghost writer pretending to be his disciple, etc etc etc…..
    on this thin thread you hang your belief in Jesus as a virgin birthed Jewish messiah born of a union between a god and a woman, resurrected from the dead and coming back to finish the job…..

    why didnt you just go the whole hog and jump from the son of a god to being a god?

  26. dweller Said:

    “I have read [the gospel accounts], and I’m telling you — flat-out — that Jewish persecution is NOT an outgrowth of anybody’s adherence to the teaching in the Gospel. Quite the contrary, it is an outgrowth of the FAILURE to adhere to it; indeed the overwhelming and systematic failure to adhere to it.”

    there is no assertion of yours which I would take at face value as you demonstrate the same deceitful MO as those you seek to defend.

    now here is the actual conversation:
    bernard ross Said:

    Dweller Said:

    Jewish persecution is NOT an outgrowth of anybody’s adherence to the teaching in the Gospel. Quite the contrary, it is an outgrowth of the FAILURE to adhere to it; indeed the overwhelming and systematic failure to adhere to it.
    Bernard Ross said:
    I am not interested in whether the followers of Jesus, the christians, their churches, etc adhered to their dogma or not. I merely observe that the christians and their churches have been libeling, swindling, torturing, slaughtering, revising the bible of, defaming and delegitimizing, Jews for 2000 years and still doing it today. Their dogma has been claimed by them consistently as the basis for their despicable, serial and institutionalized behavior over the 2 milleniums. Do I care whether they scrupulously followed their dogma… NO!!!!!

    HMMMM?????
    bernard ross Said:

    and they were in a position to revise it and edit it in the same deceitful way that you revise and edit my comments.

    dweller Said:

    There’s no deceit in me.

    I just showed you one of your many deceits, just like your church.
    dweller Said:

    The only people I’m defending are the gospel writers.

    You are defending the assertions of the existence of Jesus and disciples, his virgin birth, his resurrection, his Jewish messiahship, his second coming, his son of godship born of a union between G_D and a woman, ………..
    Where did you get these ideas from, I have never read of them in a Jewish scripture?

  27. Bernard Ross Said:

    “You are…touting the assertions of those known liars and jew killers here to Jews on this site.”
    Dweller said: Balderdash. I never tout the assertions of those I know to be liars. Jesus is not a known liar

    Have you contracted Alzheimers or gone nuts? I am not referring to the so called assertions of the mythical jesus… how can I call a mythical character a liar? The known liars are the christian culture, churches, orgs who have been libeling, swindling, torturing and slaughtering Jews for almost 2000 years and continuing today through the BDS churches. I am not talking about dogmas and documents but about behaviors. The same collective asserting the Jesus narratives have been systematically lying about Jews for millenia. Therefore, their assertions cannot be given credibility. I dont give a flying frack as to their dogmas or their adherence to their dogmas but their behavior. They have claimed that the basis of the despicable behavior is their dogma and the teachings of Jesus but I make no reference to that claim. The claims of these nutters is irrelevant.
    BernardRoss Said:

    “the key is showing a correlation between the behavior and declarations of christians, their orgs, their churches, etc. and the persecution of the jews.”
    Dweller said:
    You’re clearly changing your tune,….. You effectively said the NT was the key.

    It is you who are obsessed with the NT and the gospels. I have no interest in them. I have always linked the behaviors of the christians and their churches to their lack of credibility in their assertions regarding the mythical JC. There is no authentication of JC etc except through the hands of Christianity. It is YOU who keep returning to your gospels like a Jehovahs Witness trying to get the Jews to read your fairy tales. Outside of christianity there is no authentication and for me christianity is not a credible source. Did you get your NT from your supposed Jewish authors or did it come indirectly through a christian or roman source?
    dweller Said:

    you don’t know that they did that stuff BECAUSE they were ‘christians.’

    LOL, you are a pathetic deceiver. For almost 2000 years christians, christian churches and orgs did it. That’s enough of a “coincidence” for me. For much of their evil they claimed a basis in their dogma e.g. inquisition. If you take this tack you are a disingenuous fraud… you might as well deny the holocaust.

  28. dweller Said:

    NT may not be characterized as a strictly ‘Christian’ source, as it was written by Jews —

    The authorship of the fairy tale is undetermined and whoever the authors were does not give credibility as to whether the purported facts therein are true or false.
    However, it is a moot point because the NT never came to us through Jewish sources. All the purported facts of the existence of jesus, his disciples, his virgin birth, his resurrection, his Jewish messiahship, his second coming, his son of godship born of a union between G_D and a woman, his godship are filtered through christian sources. Even if the authorship was Jewish the christian churches are the source of its distribution to the public and they were in a position to revise it and edit it in the same deceitful way that you revise and edit my comments. For centuries the controller of the info you revere has been the christian culture, churches, orgs. The christian culture cannot be considered a credible source wrt Jews as they have a “dog in the race,” an “axe to grind” as proven by their long and despicable history of libeling, swindling torturing, slaughtering, burning the books, revising the jewish bible, of the Jewish people. Christianity has already proven its agenda and motives to Jews. We have no NT or gospels that has not been filtered through Christian sources before entering into the public knowledge base. Its not rocket science.
    From where do you get your information that Jesus existed, was a Jew, was the son of god born of a union of the Hebrew G_D and a woman, was the Jewish Messiah, was resurrected, is coming back?
    dweller Said:

    The primary Jewish source attesting to the facts of Yeshua haNitzri is the Gospel narrative, since its Jewish authorship makes it more Jewish than Christian.

    The NT gospels comes to the world through the christians. There is no jewish source which authenticates the facts asserted in the gospels. Even if Jewish writers concocted the fairy tales it would not prove the asserted facts in the fairy tale are true.
    Bernard Ross Said:

    the authorship of the NT does not give credence to the existence of the Jesus character.”
    Dweller said: No, that’s right; it doesn’t.

    dweller Said:

    The sayings themselves provide the credence.……..
    the genre of the material in question consists of sustained, steady, heavy-duty metaphysics freely expressed by the speaker, “on-his-feet,” in the moment, without brooding prior deliberation, and in common, non-scholarly language. NO other Jews (nor other ANYBODIES) could’ve pulled that off.

    Therefore, you believe the purported facts of the NT as a result of literary assessments of the main characters sayings in the novel? In other words you think the main characters “sayings” are so brilliantly wonderful that no other person could be responsible for writing those sayings other than a virgin birthed, jewish messiah, son of a hebrew god and woman?
    LOL 😛 😛 😛

  29. yamit82 Said:

    Of course a Jew can believe in Jesus. Just like a vegetarian can enjoy a rump steak

    Rump steak ???? No such thing, you mean Rump Roast. Tough piece of meat, requires a special touch.

  30. dweller Said:

    The only people I’m defending are the gospel writers.

    Who are the real authors???

    Show me anything your mythological messiah guy wrote in his own hand and not some made up hearsay attributions which would never be accepted in any Western court of law as credible evidence.

    The ice is rapidly melting beneath your feet. 🙂

  31. @ yamit82:

    “You have YET to establish that the gospel accounts constitute ‘mythology,’ and ONLY mythology

    “Those who make the claim that it’s not mythology and historical fact must prove and substantiate their claim.”

    Nonsense. History is typically accepted on its face until it is challenged. then it is for the challenger to cast doubt on the assertion.

    ” It’s not up to the skeptic and non believer to prove theirs.”

    Oh, yes it is.

    “You do not have an historical basis to substantiate your claims”

    You don’t have a historical basis to challenge them.

    ” and the objective weight of evidence is against you and your claims.”

    Since when has objectivity EVER counted for spit with you???

    SHOW me your contrary “evidence.”

  32. @ bernard ross:

    “I have read [the gospel accounts], and I’m telling you — flat-out — that Jewish persecution is NOT an outgrowth of anybody’s adherence to the teaching in the Gospel. Quite the contrary, it is an outgrowth of the FAILURE to adhere to it; indeed the overwhelming and systematic failure to adhere to it.”

    there is no assertion of yours which I would take at face value as you demonstrate the same deceitful MO as those you seek to defend.

    There’s no deceit in me. Your claims are sheer projection.

    The only people I’m defending are the gospel writers.

    If you think THEY are ‘deceivers’, show me the evidence of that.

    But you’ll have to read the gospels for yourself to DO that.

  33. @ bernard ross:

    “You should revisit the film which shows you how this can be done.”

    Sorry, but I spent an hour-&-a-half on Atwill’s film in a good faith effort; had to take time away from other things to do so. Can’t give it any more time than that.

    The fact that he thinks the history could be manipulated tells me nothing. (I already knew that it could be SUPPRESSED, so why couldn’t it be manipulated?) But the mere fact that it could be manipulated doesn’t mean that it in fact WAS manipulated.

    “The characters in the gospels and NT have not been shown to exist and therefore their assertions are as meaningless as the assertions of roger rabbit.”

    The 25,000 lb elephant sitting mute in the middle of the living room, however, and which you keep walking around w/o acknowledging, is the sayings of Jesus of Nazareth. You can dismiss the gospel characters; you cannot dismiss the. . . elephant. There’s no way those sayings were fudged, forged, faked, or transplanted — not if you understand what the sayings mean.

    “The key to making your case is showing a correlation between the Gospel teachings and the persecution of the Jews.”

    “rubbish, I never mentioned the gospels as a key.”

    Don’t play word games with me. You effectively said the NT was the key.

    “the key is showing a correlation between the behavior and declarations of christians, their orgs, their churches, etc. and the persecution of the jews.”

    You’re clearly changing your tune, but the REASON is that you’ve run out of wiggle room in your protested justification for not reading NT as the purported source of Xtn anti-Jewish persecution. So now you claim that the gospel or NT ‘wasn’t’ the key to the persecution. Now, it’s not that the NT is ‘evil’ but that it’s immaterial, right? Whatever it takes to keep from opening the book. You’re SO scared. (God, that’s weird.)

    — It’s a friggin’ BOOK; it’s ink on the page, nothing more. You treat NT with precisely the same irrational fear that grips some people over spiders.

    “Those like yourself have an invested need in pretending that real christians didnt do the dirty deeds…”

    So you know who the real ones are? Got ’em all in your rolodex, do you?

    As for me, there’s nothing to ‘pretend’ about. (But then, unlike yourself, I’m not paranoid.) My only “invested need” is my love for the truth, and wherever the truth leads.

    “its a lie… “

    You cannot HONESTLY say that, because you haven’t read NT for yourself , so you have no template against which to compare & evaluate the behavior of soi-disant “christians.” ABSENT that template, you have only what it suits you to believe about those people other than that they did evil things to Jews.

    But you don’t know that they did that stuff BECAUSE they were ‘christians.’ Objectively speaking, it makes FAR more sense to conclude that they did those things because they were EVIL, and used Xty as cover for it. (Historically a very common phenomenon, actually.)

    “billions of real christians did the dirty deeds AND it was their despicable libels of their dogmas which was used as the basis for those deeds. they are the ‘real’ christians..”

    And how would you know that?

  34. @ bernard ross:

    “There is nothing from those sources wrt Jews that would have a single shred of credibility for me. If a serial liar and murderer makes assertions, I find it suspect. However, you compare and give equal credibility to Jewish sources with the credibility of serial chronic jew killers and libelers.”

    “The Gospel is a Jewish source. It was written by Jews — a fact readily acknowledged by Jews.”

    “Unproven”

    For YOU, anything you’d rather not believe will ALWAYS be ‘unproven.’ The contemporary Jewish community, however, IS satisfied that it is indeed proven.

    ” but more important: IRRELEVANT!”

    Irrelevant to what? You seem to be arguing purely for the sake of arguing.

    “Christian sources are the only source for this statement.”

    And what “christian sources” would those be?

    “There is no jewish source which proves that the ‘gospels’ and NT were attested to or supported by Jews or that Jesus or his disciples ever existed in reality.”

    But there IS a Jewish source, I told you: the gospel itself. It isn’t necessary for every source to be witnessed by another source. It might be handy to have such, but it’s not required. And there are no contemporaneous sources from the period which challenge either the gospel record or the gospel itself.

    ” Do not confuse a possible authorship by jews with being a jewish source in terms of validating the claims of the gospels or nt.”

    There is no confusion. The Jewish authorship of the NT is not a ‘possible’ authorship; it is a definite authorship. There is no serious challenge to the conclusion. (You certainly haven’t made one.)

    “Jews have written fiction, novels, propaganda, fairy tales before and since… its irrelevant AND unproven.”

    You’re trying to compare apples to oranges. The fact that Jews have written fiction & propaganda in the past is what is truly irrelevant. You can fake those things. You cannot fake the Sermon on the Mount. It’s a whole different beast.

  35. @ bernard ross:

    Without historical context nothing can really be determined

    THE JEWISH WAR AGAINST SLAVERY
    (pages 2-6)


    The True Authorship of the New Testament

    “Julius Caesar was an in-law of the Piso family”. His wife, Calpurnia, was a Piso. He had married her to cement an alliance with Pontus. When Cleopatra, also a Piso relative, seduced Caesar, it is possible that she was conspiring with her relative Pharnaces II, king of Pontus, to distract Caesar while Pharnaces prepared to wage war against Rome. But Caesar got wind of the activities of Pharnaces and rushed to Pontus with two legions, one of which was almost entirely composed of Judeantroops. Caesar turned the tables on Pharnaces. That defeat probably led to Caesar’s assassination, and the eternal hatred of Caesar by the people of Pontus. There is no new historical information here. It is well known that Caesar took two legions from Alexandria to conquer Pontus in 47 CE.

    Three years later, Julius Caesar was stabbed to death by Roman senators in the Forum. Several of the conspirators were Piso family members or close relatives.

    As an illustration of just one of the hidden messages that exist in the New Testament, consider Revelation 1:7 “Behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see him; even they who have pierced him.” He comes, they see, and they pierce him.

    Caesar went to Pontus, they saw him coming in a cloud of dust, and as a result of this they pierced him to death.

    This is just one small example of the hidden messages that exist in the New Testament and can be decrypted by a simple cipher based on the phrase VENI VIDI VICI. The infamous number 666, for example, is simply VIVIVI, which refers to VenI VidI VicI. Oh yes, you will say that 666 is really DCLXVI. Yes, it is, but it also can cleverly be represented as VIVIVI. Believe it or not; it really isn’t that important, but it’s an interesting possibility.

  36. @ yamit82:

    “…’Romans 13:1 Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.

    :2 Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.’

    This ain’t no Jewish ethic or principle.

    “Wasn’t ADDRESSED to Jews, loksh. It was addressed to Romans. That’s why it’s called “Letter to the ROMANS.” [du-uh!]

    If you wish to consider properly the action of a JEW, then you must consider the one who took a cat-o’-nine-tails to the money-changers in the Temple & kicked over their tables. “My Father’s house was to be a House of Prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves!”

    The money-changing institution had become effectively a Sadduccean tax-collecting agency for Rome, and the incident directly threatened the economic basis of the imperium.

    So much for ‘subjection to the governing authorities’.”

    christian version a lot of BS,

    So, you’ve seen another “version” of the incident??

    “Money changers… were a necessary function of the Temple services and support system.”

    Irrelevant. The issue was not their structured function, but what the institution had become.

    “There was also competition between them preventing exploitation in fees.”

    Didn’t prevent fees from winding up in the hands of Rome, w/ the Temple treasury getting a nice piece of the skim in return for the priesthood’s cooperation.

    “You jesus guy as depicted in the narrative was no more than a mad fanatic violent criminal who deserved to be hung.”

    Suddenly changing your tune, eh? “Submission to the governing authorities” — which you had declared [above] “ain’t no Jewish ethic or principle” — is suddenly acceptable after all. ROFLMAO. You’re the punch line of a joke, Huffy.

    ” It was he who acted with violence within the Temple grounds”

    No pacifist, eh? — How ‘bout that.

    ” a crime punishable with death by stoning immediately by any Jew.”

    No Jews took up stones to stone him.

    His action was aimed at bringing Rome into the fray, and they showed up right on cue — as their economic base was threatened by the incident, which set in motion (from that very moment) the climactic events to come.

    “He was a common criminal who destroyed private property and caused loses to legal businessmen and their livelihood…”

    From the upending of their shulchanot on a single occasion? Get real. FAR more loss to Rome, esp from the example it set.

    “Only your mythical freak seemed to be bothered by the activities of these legal and necessary businesses.”

    Oh? — Und vass you dere, Charlie? Dey tole you, did dey?

    “What’s so freaking noble about him??”

    I didn’t raise the matter to illustrate something “freaking noble” — but to dispose of your confused claim that “subjection to the governing authorities” “aint no Jewish ethic or principle.”

    And you have been most cooperative in helping me dispose of it. Thanks for the assist; I knew you’d be easy.

    “Never happened in reality though I am referring to your unsupported stupid narrative.”

    You do LIKE trying to have it both ways, dontcha. . . .

  37. @ yamit82:

    “Can a Jew believe in Jesus? Answer: Of course a Jew can believe in Jesus. Just like a vegetarian can enjoy a rump steak, a peace activist can join a violent demonstration, and a dictator who preaches martyrdom can surrender himself to his enemies. As long as logic and clear thinking are suspended, anything makes sense!”

    It’s AN answer, but a thoroughly fa’blonget one.

    God has chosen the ‘foolish’ things of the world to confound the ‘wise’; and God hath chosen the ‘weak’ things of the world to shame the ‘mighty.’ And the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are NOT, to bring to nothing the things that ARE — that no flesh should glory in His presence.

    CAN A JEW BELIEVE IN JESUS?

    Answer: Depends ENTIRELY on what he believes ABOUT Jesus.

  38. @ bernard ross:

    “The Jewish intra-communal quarrel is not now, and has never been, over NT’s Jewish authorship but over the significance of that.”

    “an irrelevant tangent inserted to obfuscate by YOU! The NT authorship is irrelevant to the existence of the Jesus character. There are no jewish sources which attest to the existence of the character, his virgin birth, his resurrection, his second coming, his Jewish messiahship, etc.”

    What I said above was neither ‘tangential’ nor OTHERWISE ‘irrelevant’ but very much to the point. You just don’t want to acknowledge the Jewishness of Jesus; it’s not hard to see what you’re about.

    The primary Jewish source attesting to the facts of Yeshua haNitzri is the Gospel narrative, since its Jewish authorship makes it more Jewish than Christian.

    “You are going in circles, creating tangents and obfuscation, confusing fiction with reality, propaganda with truth…[blah, blah, blah, gobbledygook, ad naus.]”

    It is YOU who are running in circles, frantically attempting to obfuscate the glaring fact that you are TERRIFIED of reading the original narrative for yourself. Come on, Bernard, surely you can get Huf’n’puff (or some other big, strong man) to hold your hand while you read the scary words? Leave a nightlight on in the bathroom for a few days; you’ll get over it.

    “You are…touting the assertions of those known liars and jew killers here to Jews on this site.”

    Balderdash. I never tout the assertions of those I know to be liars.

    Jesus is not a known liar

    — altho this website IS, from-time-to-time top-heavy with known slanderers, and you are frequently one of them.

    If you think you can show some examples of haNitzri’s ‘lying,’ I’m waiting to see them.

    If you can’t, then that makes YOU a known liar as well as a known slanderer.

  39. @ bernard ross:

    “The simple, obvious point that YOU hope everyone forgets is that you have YET to tell us what you mean by ‘Christian’ sources”

    “Christian sources are sources which are christian…”

    In that case, NT may not be characterized as a strictly ‘Christian’ source, as it was written by Jews — compiled by Xtns, but written by Jews — who did not regard the Nazarene as ‘God.’ Moshiach, yes. ‘God,’ no.

    — Christians surely do undeniably RELATE to NT and invariably RELY on it, but by their own definition — and theirs is the only legitimate one — NT may not rightly be designated an entirely ‘Christian’ source. Indeed, under the circumstances, it is best characterized as both Jewish AND Xtn.

    Nor have you addressed how you would characterize those sources whose authors are independent scholars specializing in the literature associated w/ Xty but who are not adherents of any church, nor attached by any other affiliation or fealty to any prior intellectual outcome of their researches. Are THEY ‘christian sources’ TOO, by your lights?

    ” I have given you multiple definitions of ‘christian’ which all relate to Jesus.”

    All useless. I have repeatedly showed you WHY those definitions are inadequate at best, and spurious at worst. Nor have you responded to my request that you ALSO define your use of the term, “Jewish sources,” which you also introduced into the discourse.

    “the Jewish community has no problem accepting the fact that the NT was first committed to writing by late-1st century Judean & Anatolian Jews.”

    “the popular acceptance of a ‘fact’ does not a fact make.”

    No, it certainly doesn’t. But if you wish to challenge the received wisdom, then it is you (as the moving party) who are saddled with the burden of proof.

    Until you do make your challenge and succeed in establishing the validity of your assertion, you will be at odds with the Jewish community as to the Jewishness of NT’s authorship and as to the Jewishness of all 1st century Judean “Christians.”

    “However…even if true, [the Jewish authorship of NT] merely attests to the fact that jews might be capable of writing fiction, fairy tales, myths, cartoons etc. the authorship of the NT does not give credence to the existence of the Jesus character.”

    No, that’s right; it doesn’t. The sayings themselves do THAT.

    Moreover, while other Jews might well be capable of fiction, cartoons, and all sorts of bubbe meises

    — that is NOT the case when the nature of the material in question consists of sustained, steady, heavy-duty metaphysics freely expressed by the speaker, “on-his-feet,” in the moment, without brooding prior deliberation, and in common, non-scholarly language. NO other Jews (nor other ANYBODIES) could’ve pulled that off.

  40. @ bernard ross:

    “Whether [somebody named] roger rabit actually said something brilliant or dumb does not prove his existence in the real world, the author of his character put it in his cartoon mouth.”

    The “author” of Yeshua haNitzri was God Almighty.

    — “Of myself, I can do nothing. the Father within me, HE doeth the works.”

    But you still don’t get it. Once again, we’ll plod:

    It isn’t known (except to BHO & the actual writer) just who it was that wrote Dreams From My Father. However, there can be no question but that WHOEVER wrote Dreams From My Father most definitely existed.

    Nor is it known (except to the aforesaid parties) the name of the individual[s] who wrote The Audacity of Hope. Yet it is likewise certain that whoever wrote The Audacity of Hope ALSO existed.

    However, it is abundantly clear that whoever wrote the ONE did most emphatically not write the OTHER. The two books do not constitute a body of work to which can reasonably (nor even remotely) be attributed the same authorship.

    The sayings of Jesus are not like that. Whoever spoke SOME of them spoke ALL of them. (There may have been subsequently some isolated tampering w/ the received text, but if so, the instances are minuscule & slight-to-negligible.) And WHOEVER that original ‘author’ may have been was, unmistakably, both

    A. 1st century Jewish; and

    B. sui generis, in a class by himself, as to both penetration AND expressiveness.

    That much is readily deducible by way of literary analysis. Anybody who’s studied lit-crit it will tell you it’s extraordinarily difficult to fake another writer’s style. There are only a VERY few writers who actually specialize in doing that, and they will be the first to confirm the tricky & perplexing nature of the task. And when the type of the writing to be faked is metaphysical teaching, it’s not merely hard but utterly out of the question.

  41. @ bernard ross:

    “Unlike yourself, I’m prepared to leave the matter [of the rabbinical suppression of the knowledge of Jesus from Jewish history] an open questiondespite what we know about the universality of human nature (and despite the fact that we know it had already been done before). . . .

    But then, I’ve read Jesus’ words for myself; so that makes me entitled to an opinion in the matter. . . .unlike PresentCompany, who dare NOT read those words (for fear that he’ll break out with leprosy or hives or something, and his whooziss will fall off?). . .”

    “The sayings, words and opinions of Jesus and yourself have absolutely nothing to do with the whether Jesus ever actually even existed.”

    Hogwash. They have everything to do with it. They bear witness to whoever spoke them. They couldn’t have been invented. You think YOU could’ve concocted them, shlemiel?

    “Only a know-nothing bigot, and a most extraordinarily malicious one… would be capable of lumping together the perpetrators of oppression & persecution of ANYONE (let alone, the Jews specifically) w/ the authors of the Gospel. If you read it for yourself you would know in an instant that they could not POSSIBLY be the same people.”

    “…’Whoever authored the gospel’ is irrelevant to the 2000 year libeling, swindling,torturing, slaughtering of the Jews.”

    Quite the contrary, the question is thoroughly relevant. If it was authored by Jews, then it cannot have been the cause or source of Jewish persecution — rather, if anything, the pretext for it. Nobody promotes or advocates his own agony.

    “only an ignoramous would be capable of finding the moral and metaphysical commentary of Jesus subject to systematic fabrication & fakery by ANYBODY”

    “the commentaries…are irrelevant to whether either character actually existed or were fabricated fairy tales. Its simple logic.”

    And what ‘logic’ would that be?

    SOMEBODY spoke or wrote those remarks. They didn’t materialize from the ether, and whoever spoke or wrote them EXISTED. They constitute an extraordinary BODY of Jewish commentary, and are not the work of some collection — random OR organized — of Roman, Greek, OR Jewish hacks.

  42. @ bernard ross:

    “The simple, obvious point that YOU hope everyone forgets is that you have YET to tell us what you mean by ‘Christian’ sources”

    “Christian sources are sources which are christian…”

    In that case, NT may not be characterized as a strictly ‘Christian’ source, as it was written by Jews — compiled by Xtns, but written by Jews — who did not regard the Nazarene as ‘God incarnate.’

    Moshiach, yes. ‘God,’ no.

    — Christians surely do undeniably relate to NT and invariably RELY on it, but by their own definition — and theirs is the only legitimate one — NT may not rightly be designated an entirely ‘Christian’ source. Indeed, under the circumstances, it is best characterized as both Jewish AND Xtn.

    Nor have you addressed how you would characterize those sources whose authors are independent scholars specializing in the literature associated w/ the historical phenomenon of Xty, but who are not adherents of any church, nor attached by any other affiliation or fealty to any prior intellectual outcome of their researches. Are THEY ‘christian sources’ TOO, by your lights?

    ” I have given you multiple definitions of ‘christian’ which all relate to Jesus.”

    All useless. I have repeatedly showed you WHY those definitions are inadequate at best, and spurious at worst. Nor have you responded to my request that you ALSO define your use of the term, “Jewish sources,” which you also introduced into the discourse.

    “the Jewish community has no problem accepting the fact that the NT was first committed to writing by late-1st century Judean & Anatolian Jews.”

    “the popular acceptance of a ‘fact’ does not a fact make.”

    No, it certainly doesn’t. But if you wish to challenge the received wisdom, then it is you (as the moving party) who are saddled with the burden of proof.

    Until you do make your challenge and succeed in establishing the validity of your assertion, you will be at odds with the Jewish community as to the Jewishness of NT’s authorship and as to the Jewishness of all 1st century Judean “Christians.”

    “However…even if true, [the Jewish authorship of NT] merely attests to the fact that jews might be capable of writing fiction, fairy tales, myths, cartoons etc. the authorship of the NT does not give credence to the existence of the Jesus character.”

    No, that’s right; it doesn’t. The sayings themselves provide the credence.

    Moreover, while other Jews might well be capable of fiction, cartoons, and all sorts of bubbe meises

    — that is NOT, however, the case when the genre of the material in question consists of sustained, steady, heavy-duty metaphysics freely expressed by the speaker, “on-his-feet,” in the moment, without brooding prior deliberation, and in common, non-scholarly language. NO other Jews (nor other ANYBODIES) could’ve pulled that off.

  43. @ bernard ross:

    “Whether [somebody named] roger rabit actually said something brilliant or dumb does not prove his existence in the real world, the author of his character put it in his cartoon mouth.”

    The “author” of Yeshua haNitzri was God Almighty. “Of myself, I can do nothing. the Father within me, HE doeth the works.”

    But you still don’t get it. Once again, we’ll plod:

    It isn’t known (except to BHO & the actual writer) just who it was that wrote Dreams From My Father. However, there can be no question but that WHOEVER wrote Dreams From My Father most definitely existed.

    Nor is it known (except to the aforesaid parties) the name of the individual[s] who wrote The Audacity of Hope. Yet it is likewise certain that whoever did write The Audacity of Hope ALSO existed.

    However, it is abundantly clear that whoever wrote the ONE did most emphatically not write the OTHER. The two books do not constitute a body of work to which can reasonably (nor even remotely) be attributed the same authorship.

    The sayings of Jesus are not like that. Whoever spoke SOME of them spoke ALL of them. (There may have been subsequently some isolated tampering w/ the received text, but if so, the instances are minuscule & slight-to-negligible.) And WHOEVER that original ‘author’ may have been was, unmistakably, both

    A. 1st century Jewish; and

    B. sui generis, in a class by himself.

    That much is readily deducible by way of literary analysis. Anybody who’s studied lit-crit it will tell you it’s extraordinarily difficult to fake another writer’s style. There are only a VERY few writers who actually specialize in doing just that, and they will be the first to confirm the tricky & perplexing nature of the task.

    And when the genre of the writing to be faked is metaphysical teaching, it’s not merely hard but out of the question.

  44. @ bernard ross:

    Can a Jew believe in Jesus?

    Answer:

    Of course a Jew can believe in Jesus. Just like a vegetarian can enjoy a rump steak, a peace activist can join a violent demonstration, and a dictator who preaches martyrdom can surrender himself to his enemies. As long as logic and clear thinking are suspended, anything makes sense!