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.
@ bernard ross:
Suggest you and the AH read all of this!!!!
THE JESUS PUZZLE Pieces in a Puzzle of Christian Origins
by Earl Doherty
Part One – PIECES IN THE PUZZLE
MAIN ARTICLES: The Jesus Puzzle
Presenting the basic case for the non-existence of an historical Jesus and a different origin of Christianity.
@ mrg3105:
Would it, then, be accurate of me to conclude that you HAVEN’T read the gospels any time recently?
Don’t know which disciples you refer to. All the disciples directly referenced specifically in the gospels HAD met him. As for the third party rumours and translated paraphrases, show me some examples from the text, and state please why you think these in particular the work of the authors rather than the compilers.
No reason to assume this. Paul died ca 66-68, so all his letters are pre-destruction.
Furthermore, none of the gospels (nor anything else in the NT canon) makes the slightest reference, even in passing, to the traumatic & catastrophic destruction of the city as an actual event. Nor are any of NT’s allusions to any practices of the Temple priesthood, or of the populace in relation to the Temple couched in the ‘PAST’ — as distinct from in the Present.
So it seems reasonable to conclude that the writing (all of it except, quite possibly, The Revelation) was done BEFORE destruction of the city.
@ mrg3105:
I think you’re wrong about most of those areas. And I know you’re wrong about the subterranean area of the Temple Mount complex. It has assuredly not been picked over; the Waqf (to say nothing of its bulldozers & backhoes) has seen to that.
Well, again, THAT would have been no earlier than the start of the 8th century, well after the 5th century’s multifarious sack of Rome. Any manuscripts located in Rome before the 5th century are long gone.
dweller Said:
LOL, whatever they all were, they were not called jewish but were called christians. Therefore their neighbors did not recognize their behavior as jewish but rather as christian. a silly storm in a teacup to which you assign substance where none exists. another of your red herrings. No one but you is calling the christians, jews.
@ yamit82:
a quack may have his own definiton of what is the definition of a doctor but it is his “neigbors” and society which provide the definition of a doctor that counts. In the holocaust it was not the rabbinical definiton of a Jew that counted but the german defintion of a Jews that carried the show. christians can say anything about themselves just as they said about the Jews but it does not make what they say true,, in fact history shows that what they say wrt Jews should be taken to be lies as that has been their primary MO wrt Jews. Dweller probably disagrees, or says they are not real christians or yada yada yada but it will be as empty as the rest of his fables .
dweller Said:
If you attempt to prove that the early christians were jews then it makes sense that they would have observed jewish norms, etc. and the talmud would likely have had a better handle on what were Jewish norms in Jewish history as opposed to the source from the jew libelers.
dweller Said:
As ususal, you are an absolute and unaabashed, unashamed LIAR!
You asked me to define christian, just like you just asked me to define the word follower, and I supplied you the dictionary definition from 3 dictionaries citing a “follower, etc. of Jesus” which both satisfied your request of me and also satisfied the common definition of christians. You then tried to say that the dictionaries are incorrect and the Christians definition of themselves should be used I disagreed but stated it was moot as the jew killing christians of 2000 years called themselves christians even though you said they were not real christians and used the nicene creed as your definition but they also subscribed to the nicene creed AND called themselves christians. You first said it is what christians call themselves and then said it was defined as subscribing to the nicene creed. I disagree and hold that the common dictionary definition is correct AND it is as commonly understood: Christ = Christian, DUH??. However, even by your standards you are wrong because the 2000 year jew killing christians subscribed to the creed AND called themselves Christians. I beleive you feel they are not christian because they did not behave according to christian principles according to your definition. Its all baloney, those who did the killings called themselves christians, subscribed to the nicene creed; also I stated that if you call yourself a christian you are defining yourself as a christian.
On the separate issue of also vacillating like a fake on the NT: first you say the NT, jesus etc is factual according to jewish sources but you never name a jewish source who attests to the facts of Jesus and the facts of the NT. I said there is no authentication of the NT as a Jewish document except as filtered through christianity and that it was irrelevant whether Jews wrote it or not, which cannot also be determined, because it does not create fact. Your retort was that the fact of jesus existence is evidenced by the existence of “brilliant sayings” ascribed to him by the same NT. I said that “brilliant sayings do not a Jesus make. You then said that your belief in Jesus was as the son of the Hebrew G_D and a woman, that he is the Jewish messiah, was resurrected etc. was a result of your intuition. therefore you meandered from Jewish sources, to brilliant sayings, to intuition but in the end you still had a ridiculous fable with no jewish authentications and whose only credibility came from a collective of liars, swindlers and Jew killers JUST LIKE YOU!!!!!
It appears that you are incapable of putting pen to paper without engaging in serial and chronic lying.
dweller Said:
I responded that in the real world the shoe is always on the other foot and that how i felt and how you feel has no bearing on the facts but is connected with your confusion between reality and your opinions; you do not know the difference, you do not know that opinions and feelings are unconnected to facts. I suggested you may have a psychosis and gave you the definition of delusions etc. You are completely illogical and base all your arguments on the fables touted by the jew libeler and jew swindler collective of 2000 years.
dweller Said:
you first said that they were not christians because christ did not call them christians which I debunked as absurd as only egomaniacs refer to their followers in their own name and we have no proof of the existence of your nitzri, therefore referring to what he did is absurd. The handle affixed by everyone else was a more accurate rendition of whoever they were because they were distinguished and recognized by others as “followers of christ”, hence like most people called christians by others according to their most recognized features. However, this is also a meaningless red herring as per your usual MO distracting from the substance as even if they were Jews it would not make the written fairy tale a document of a jewish religious character as opposed to aan attmpt to write a fairy tale or bedtime stories.
dweller Said:
this is a common belief but it is actually also not authenticated in fact. We have no proof that even those early christians who may have fashioned themselves as Jews, were in fact Jews or just folks grafting on like the next 2000 years of grafting, grifting, and hijacking. Perhaps the reason why the yeshu fables sound so absurd to most Jews is because it is a fable.
@ mrg3105:
You seem to have missed the point. Mr Ross, who identifies as a ‘Jew,’ presumes to decide who is or isn’t a Christian, using definitions he finds convenient, and without recourse to how christians define themselves — and sees nothing wrong with that.
I simply asked him how he’d feel if the shoe were on the other foot, and self-professed Christians were to decide the ‘definition’ of JEW without asking Jews. Your question here of how Christians would know who is a Jew is quite beside the point.
Acts 11:26 does not use the word neighbors. (It is, however, a reasonable conclusion that those by WHOM the disciples were designated ‘Xtns’ were indeed their neighbors.)
I doubt that the Antioch disciples OR their Antioch neighbors were Jewish. If both the disciples AND the neighbors were Jews, the latter wouldn’t have called them ‘Xtns,’ because the Jewish disciples (whether in Judea or abroad) were still regarded as an integral part of the Jewish community by both the community & its leadership.
The posting record will clearly show that my reason for citing the verse in the first place was strictly as a response to Ross’s demand for a cite supporting my prior assertion that the designation of ‘christian’ was not yet adopted by the disciples, but rather was one used as a handle to identify them — by the other people of Antioch, who’d overhear them alluding repeatedly to Christ. (Had they heard them referring constantly to Apollo, they would’ve been assumed to be ‘Apollonians.’)
‘Christian’ was not, however, a name that they took for themselves at that juncture (mid-1st century), as they (the Jewish disciples) still regarded themselves as very much a part of the Jewish community, and the Jewish leadership, albeit perplexedly, was agreed — and would be so agreed for the better part of a hundred years.
Irrelevant. Book of Acts is not Talmud.
@ bernard ross:
Christian
(kr?s?ch?n)
adj.
1. Professing belief in Jesus as Christ or following the religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus.
2. Relating to or derived from Jesus or Jesus’s teachings.
3. Manifesting the qualities or spirit of Jesus, especially in showing concern for others.
4. Relating to or characteristic of Christianity or its adherents.
n.
1. One who professes belief in Jesus as Christ or follows a religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus.
2. One who lives according to the teachings of Jesus.
dweller Said:
Are you asserting that those associated with swindling, libeling, torturing and slaughtering the Jews for 2000 years have equal credibility with jewish sages? Liars, swindlers and libelers are not usually given credibility by intelligent people….. the facts of the NT are derived from or filtered through a cultural collective of such a nature and therefore has no credibility. Interestingly there are no other sources which authenticate the fables.
dweller Said:
LOL, It matters not how much you adore your fairy tale and believe in its factual nature because there is nothing that proven liars and libelers can assert to me that would be given any credibility by me. However, as stated at the very beginning it is obvious that the 2000 year history of christians towards Jews has no bearing on your accepting the narratives as factual. There is also the ludicrous obviously pagan fable about gods mating with women grafted onto the Jewish messiah concepts. No terror involved, obviously, in spite of your paranoiac protestations. Dont try to put lipstick on a pig, its a lousy story touted by liars,con artists, swindlers and jew killers…KISS
The pandera fable is non existent in judaism in spite of all your and your collectives attempts to graft it on. BTW, nothing extraordinary in your descriptions so far.
dweller Said:
LOL, everything asserted as factual about a fictitious character is an assumption
Bernard Ross Said:
What I stated is a fact and your ludicirous tales that jews wrote a fairy tale called the NT creates no facts. neither does your adoration of the “sayings” of your fictitious character create the fact of his existence.
the notion that the Hebrew G_D mated with a woman and out popped a Jewish messiah (who no one heard of at the time other than the fairy tales you cite) is simply ludicrous and only someone with a deep need to prop up his belief system would engage in such foolishness.
dweller Said:
LOL, once again the empty suit resorts to ad hominem because his ludicrous arguments are absurd.
mrg3105 Said:
Dweller hoisted on his own petard….. I see no mention of neighbors 😛
mrg3105 Said:
when caught in a simple trap he resorts to obfuscation, red herrings, mountains of garbage and ad hominem… you will find that he NEVER admits to being wrong which is an indication of a psychological disorder, perhaps OCD.
dweller Said:
You should certainly know the answer to this as YOU are a follower of Jesus and hence YOU are a christian in spite of your protestations to the contrary. This explains why you looked walked and quacked like a christian. Like the liar and thief in the dock you are unable to define yourself here as a Jew or as honest. Apparently you have trouble finding dictionaries for even the simplest of words. I have given you 3 dictionary definitions of christians and now here is one of follower
Most simple people are able to understand that a CHRISTIAN is a FOLLOWER of Christ just like the dictionaries said. I wonder why you are trying to deny the obvious with an enormous mountain of obfuscating posts which changed NOTHING? I notice that you have a new dishonest Pauline marketing technique of asking questions which serve to distract from you and instead focus attention on the party currently decimating your ludicrous arguments. You did this with me and with mrg105
dweller Said:
apparently you are wrong again as I had no trouble revealing one of your cons right here.
I think you should find a proper shrink for self diagnosis. 🙂
Dweller Said:
The jew killers of 2000 years also called themselves christians. Please make up your mind as to whom you wish us to listen to, not that its relevant
dweller Said:
LOL, you are fading into desperation, grasping at every straw when your argument is shown as rubbish. They called themselves christians so they obviously defined themselves as christians too, DUH???? you are the only one who is obsessed with these silly word games which have no purpose other than to distrat attention from your worthless arguments.
Bernard Ross Said:
What I, and you, are “OK with” has not a shred of bearing on the facts. Reality, the real world, demonstrates that it operates as I stated and not as you would hope, wish and desire in order to prop up your nitzri pandera. In the real world it is the designations and names of others which determine facts: e.g. the nazis did not use the definitions of rabbis when they killed jews, they used their own set of rules and that set determined the facts of the real world of the jews. The goyim do and have indeed determined who is a jew. The dictionary and I am right and you are wrong. You must learn to distinguish between your delusions and what obtains in the real world, as to definitions dictionaries can help you find your way. As for your current quandary perhaps this will help 🙂
Bernard Ross Said:
😛 😛 😛
Bernard ross Said:
My “preferences”, and yours, are irrelevant therefore no need to mention them at all. I would expect an omnipotent G_D to be capable at least of what I can conceive and then more. Its quite simple, no need for a lot of fairy tales, stories and myths which are obviously invented to prop up yur yeshu pandera fairy tale.
dweller Said:
LOL, fictious traits of fictitious half gods from fictiitous fairy tales…. your narrative appears to be dissembling into an I (heart) pandera lovefest replete with all the usual claims of the usual proselytizers: the ones who called themselves christians and lied and slaughtered jews for 2000 years. One cannot have a credible discussion with those who claim their intuition, voices and christians for the source of their belief in ridonculous fairy tales.
Bernard Ross Said:
LOL, running away from the obvious question to your claim that you got your NT from jewish sources. Lets hear your next word twisting exercise to escape the simple and obvious. Still waiting to hear which “jewish source” NT you cite and quote. 🙂
dweller Said:
your nitri, ppandera, brilliant saying composite fiction is certainly NOT the Jewish messiah. that claim is as ridonculous as the claim of the existence of your nitzri which can only be found in narratives emanating from, or passing through, the hands of Christianity; a source of no credibility: proven liars, libelers, swindlers, torturers and slaughterers of the Jews. However, you have no problem with their credibility.
Bernard Ross Said:
I think you use the “same common sense and reasoning capability” as the other Christians who hijacked the Jewish bible and slaughtered the Jews to get rid of the witnesses. It appears that you both follow the same fictional character.
dweller Said:
your pandera fantasies appear to have collided with your other fetishes and fantasies. Did they teach you these things at the Pauline academy of “celibacy” ? You should wear a raincoat when engaging in such weird hallucinations. I suppose you must have this form of escapism when your arguments fall to pieces and you are left holding yourself in public view.
@ honeybee:
Not me I prefer women with experience.. Who wants a middle aged virgin?????
@ mrg3105:
@ yamit82:
@ dweller:
What is this obsession with Virgins ?????????
mrg3105 Said:
Meaning you do??? 😛
dweller, there is something you don’t get.
The reason you don’t get it is not your fault because by and large the current generations of observant Jews don’t get it either, never mind all the xtian ‘scholars’.
Your mode of thinking is based in Greek culture. This Greek cultural influence that was translated into conquered Egypt, Rome, and eventually became the standard of the Xtian churches is based on the literal thinking. I.e. Wysiwyg.
‘Jewish’, or more correctly Godly-Torah thinking is DIFFERENT, referred to as kodesh, and is literary.
For this reason where as Xtian texts are prose, the Torah is a SONG, all of it, Talmud included. Its an accounting report vs poetry.
Unfortunately since the closing of the Babylonian Talmud the recognition of this feature of Jewish mental modality has been steadily eroded and now lost. It is for this reason that modern generations find the Jerusalem Talmud version so ‘difficult’ to learn. The Babylonian Talmud you see was already affected by the Hellenistic thinking patterns because Jews under the Parthian and even Sassanian empires were still influenced by the Greek culture.
The problem of deriving ANY meaning from Xtian texsts is that they were written by people speaking Greek and largely immersed in Greek culture, yet still remaining within the occupied Judea with a majority culturally conservative practitioners.
‘Jesus’ is depicted as being Torah-observant, so it is likely that whatever he said or did went unnoticed outside of Aramaic-speaking demographic and only later via the rumour-mill found its way into the Greek-speaking demographic.
MUCH WAS LOST IN THE PROCESS.
This is why it is a useless exercise to ‘argue’ with Xtians. There is no basis to derive an argument from! Xtian texts are not composed to derive arguments from! They are not structured like the Torah and Talmud. Its like a master builder trying to argue over the merits of a dwelling with an interior decorator using the engineering drawings. Xtian texts are the interior ‘decorations’, entirely subjective and endlessly variable.
It is because of this that Xtianity has been so successful in propagating itself. It doesn’t need the rigid legal structure of the Torah, and is able to affix its doctrine to virtually any indigenous form of belief, tailoring that to its own political needs. This is why some forms of xtianity practised today, of the 40,000 mentioned, are almost undifferentiated from paganism.
If you want a more modern perspective, the Torah is a homage to the Supreme Engineer of the Universe. NT is the insult to His Intelligence.
Its an insult to my vastly simpler intelligence also.
dweller Said:
What I wrote is not speculation, but out of the Talmud. The subject of conception and birth is fairly well examined in th eTalmud without the reference to xtianity.
Do you know why only Jewish, usually irreligious, academics read xtian texts? They lack authority and don’t require thinking.
When you read the Torah and the Talmud, you know who is speaking most of the time, and even anonymous points are there for a reason. This is not the case with xtian texts. Entire serials are anonymous! And, its a mish-mash of statements that lead nowhere.
Your problem is that you are a Greek-thinker. That is, you are a by-product of a culture that has been conditioned by Greek-like thinking since antiquity. Jewish thinking at the time of the Roman occupation was different to Greek thinking, and remained so until the closing of the Talmud. Rashi I think was a ‘stray’ neshama of a tanna or an amora reborn out of his time. In any case, no rabbi would make statements like that you made.
Consider Moses was worthy to receive the Torah, yet the Torah is at pains to show he was a very mortal and ordinary person. More than that, it omits the entirety of his life that made him extraordinary enough to merit being selected for the role and mission he would later undertake. This is EXTREME humility on Moses’ part since it was written by his own hand!
According to xtian texts we know nothing of ‘Jesus’ except a couple of years of his life during which he did what that was so extraordinary? He performed ‘miracles’? He told people not to pay taxes? He came out of a blood-loss induced coma?
This is BS.
I simply asked where is it written that God said what you assert. It doesn’t.
Even if it did, there is not one place in xtian texts where the God-made-rules that require two ACCEPTED witnesses to be present are satisfied as a requirement. Why would God make the rules and then brake them without telling the Jews?
dweller Said:
No, these areas have been picked over by local and foreign black market artefact hunters who are far more cost-efficent and effective than archaeologists. In Iraq and now Syria war has probably ended any chance of discoveries for ever, and if not, radical Islam has.
When I say Vatican, I mean the physical area and the state. It has been a repository of materials since establishment, and has collected massive archives. I do not believe for a rega that Vatican’s archives have been completely revealed.
Again, I hadn’t before had the interest in Xtian texts except on very specific and infrequent occasions, like that in this discussion, to compare what I have learned vs what they say. However, every time I find the ‘message’ mangled. That is, the ‘deciples’, who it seems had never met ‘Jesus’, have accumulated third party rumours and paraphrases translated from Aramaic to Greek, and had written these down, adding own interpretation. Because this was done post-destruction of Jerusalem, they were likely isolated from surviving and highly traumatised rabbinic centres, so to me it sounds like they made stuff up as they went along without consultation. The Church ‘Fathers’, living centuries after the supposed events as described, and being utterly ignorant of the Jewish cultural context, edited the whole thing to sound more to their political purpose, and continued to do so perhaps as late as early medieval period (i.e. first few Crusades).
For this reason I asked if anyone had done a line-by-line analysis of various Xtian texts from the Talmudic perspective, i.e. placing the interpretation into the appropriate historico-cultural context.
dweller Said:
Firstly, it seems to me you shouldn’t use words you don’t understand because it is definitely against the rules of this forum to insult people in the way you have twice.
Secondly, since even the Jews, i.e. rabbis. don’t know who is a Jew, how would the Xtians know?!
What it says is that ” Acts 11:26 New International Version (NIV)
26 and when he found him, he brought him to Antioch. So for a whole year Barnabas and Saul met with the church and taught great numbers of people. The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch.”
The contemporary use of ‘neighbours’ means Jewish neighbours. Acts was therefore written by a Jew who was at least thus culturally aware. There isn’t a problem with the fact it is a single statement. This is the norm in the Talmud where important points are only stated once in its entirety.
@ yamit82:
You’d call it whatever you could get away with calling it, Bozo.
You follow the path of least resistance.
— That’s how a river becomes crooked.
It’s not complicated. Just takes a little common sense. In a genuinely open-minded individual, a little goes a long way. In a malicious dork, OTOH, all bets are off. For such types, I guess we need a Grand Inquisitor after all: to keep everybody “thinking right.”
That’s why the BR’s of the world will always need the Huff’n’puffs to keep ’em on the straight & narrow(-minded).
LMSS. There’s a cult online, right here — and YoursTruly is conspicuously quite APART from it.
Repeat 5 times per day: There is no god but Kahane, and Huff’n’puff is his prophet.
@ yamit82:
Not a whit. Thoroughly straightforward & right on the mark as targeted.
Bilge. I have no axes to grind in the matter of Jewish persecution — from ANY quarter. What I said had nothing to do with me, but w/ him alone; yet I could’ve been talking about YOU just as well as ross — you’re as much of a phony as he is. You work harder than he does at shoring up your Jewish credentials (which you wouldn’t feel compelled to do if you were secure in who & what you are).
The artificiality of it has always just the faintest whiff of decay about it. (Sometimes, not-so-faint.)
@ mrg3105:
“Edited part”? — what are you saying? There isn’t a syllable of what I just said (or remotely approximating what I just said) in the text itself. The remark was entirely conclusive on my part.
Again, though, Mr G, in the interest of assuring at least that we are on the same page, I’m obliged to ask if you’ve bothered to read thru the narrative for YOURSELF (and if so, how recently). There are, arguably, some here (not all, surely, but some) who are — not virtually, but quite literally — PHOBIC about doing so.
It’s unmistakably clear from their posts that they react to the proposition of reading the gospel for themselves in much the same way that some react to the presence of a spider. They are gripped by a terror that leaves no room for reflection or reason in that same moment.
Thus one ends up invariably having to deal w/ circular discourse coming from them. (After the first couple of go-’rounds, it gets tired, fast.) Makes it difficult if not impossible to communicate when both parties aren’t EVEN on the same page. Perhaps you’ve encountered this already in our forum and know what I mean.
@ mrg3105:
What IS obvious is that this is all sheer speculation. There may be a place for that, but ONLY if offered in addition to — not as a substitute for — examining primary sources.
1. Have you actually read the gospel narrative as written?
2. Have you access to a differing contemporaneous account of the same story?
Would you have responded with the same question if my remark had been made by Rashi or Ibn Ezra or Nachmanides? (No, I don’t presume to consider myself some species of sage; not hardly. Just reconnoitering the terrain here.)
I’ll tell you what, Sir:
Define, b’vakasha, “said” — as you use it here [above]. For example, do you mean:
Spoke?
In words of language?
Silently?
Aloud? generating sound physically audible to a human ear?
By means of vocal chords? (if not via vocal chords, then by what means?)
In a manner capable of being recorded for human posterity?
ANY of the above? SOME of the above? (If so, which of the above?)
NONE of the above? OTHER means & parameters altogether? (If so, what other means or parameters?)
@ mrg3105:
That may be so as a rule. I’m not, however, making a judgment on the practice generally; rather, am referring specifically to the context of this discrete circumstance, where the narrative leaves no doubt as to her actual condition. She has neither “HAD” nor BEEN “had.”
No sale; no way, no how. There are PARALLELS, with similarities; also differences. Both women are told they are to bear a son; both are incredulous at the news, one because she knows that, notwithstanding her fondest wishes, she’s well past the age for it; the other because she knows damned well that she’s had no experience capable of producing a child.
Sarah erupts in a giggle fit by which Yitzchak will get his name; Miriam, upon receiving Gavriel’s reassurances, responds with “be it done unto me according to Your word,” proceeding later w/ a song of praise [Lk 1:46-55] whose latter part resembles, in some respects, the reply of Miriam bat Amram v’Yocheved to the singers at the shore of the Red Sea:
“My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior; because He has regarded the lowliness of His handmaid; for behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed; because He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is His name; and His mercy is from generation to generation on those who fear Him.
“He has shown might with His arm, He has scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart. He has pulled down the mighty from their thrones, and has exalted the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich He has sent away empty. He has given help to Israel, his servant, mindful of His mercy. Even as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his posterity forever.”
You will if you simply read the narrative as written. He’s aware of her quite understandable perplexity.
@ mrg3105:
“Testify”? Who convened the Beit Din? When did a few lines of scripture — or any other writing — become a court proceeding?
So you’re saying, in effect, that to be contacted by an angel is, by definition, to be a “prophet”? If so, then I guess Miriam was a prophet. In which case, what of it?
Why shouldn’t it? I must say, this makes no sense to me. The mother of Christ is not the proprietary ‘property’ of RCC any more than she is their chattel property; nor are the gospels which allude to her, in any sense of the word, ‘church property.’
Neither RCC nor any other religious (or non-religious) institution is the ‘caretaker’ of the narrative here — let alone, the reality — only a bunch of people (ok, a large, organized bunch of ’em) w/ opinions. But whether Miriam was or wasn’t, objectively, a “prophet” is a matter which stands independent of what the RCC or anybody else thinks on the subject. It is what it IS.
“Where” what? — Where is the expression, “he went in unto her,” found in Tanach? A few dozen places (at least), as you know quite well. Why the question?
@ mrg3105:
Syria & Anatolia are dotted with caves that will do with a lot more picking. So are the Judean hills. And the Dead Sea area. And then there are the chambers & corridors beneath the Temple Mount complex. To say nothing of the hiding places of the Aramaic-speaking Assyrian Christians of Iraq, etc.
As to the Vatican: Prof Schiffman (Lawrence Schiffman, leading Jewish historian, V. Provost, Yeshiva U. & Chair, Intl Committee for Interreligious Consultations, Jewish dialogue partner of RCC) maintains that “almost all of the manuscripts in the Vatican’s archives [incl the entire Vatican Hebrew collection] are available for viewing online, and others are available in microfilm.”
Perhaps more significantly though, “You have to realize that the Vatican didn’t exist in the first century of the Common Era. The Vatican only came into being around the year 700. And Rome was sacked by the Visigoths, the Vandals, the Saracens and the Ostrogoths in and around the 5th century, so whatever vessels [or manuscripts] might have been there were destroyed. The Vatican wasn’t established until hundreds of years later. In fact, the popes only took up residency there in 1377.”
Several more assumptions there, the last of which sounds, w/ all due respect, more tendentious than probative. If you have concrete examples supporting the proposition that the “hearsay” writers (as distinct from the editors) were “culturally ignorant,” or that they’d ‘abandoned’ their culture, I’ll have a look at them.
@ bernard ross:
Of course not. He had a specific and express mission to complete, and limited time in which to fulfill it. That mission had no military component.
Strictly an assumption as to Jesus.
They had no plan. Not merely were they (as noted) “at odds w/ each other,” but they actually ended up expending significant resources in fighting each other. Rome had an inadvertent ally in each of the three armies.
Might as well have been the Keystone Kops.
You don’t know that; you compulsively gravitate toward whatever it suits you to believe, and persistently try to belittle whatever challenges that. The discipline of maintaining an open mind is alien to you.
Menachem & the Sicarii destroyed the Temple archives early during that first war. What else went up in smoke along WITH those mortgage contracts?
@ bernard ross:
And what’s it mean to BE a “follower of Jesus”? — to simply say you are? Because if it DOES, Jesus says he has a problem with that.
Yes, but they don’t always proceed to TAKE the names they are given.
They WEREN’T. It is precisely their actions that PROVE it. They wouldn’t’ve done those things to the very flesh-&-blood of their purported Master if they’d loved him.
Bullshit; I did not say we must listen to what people call themselves. I said we must listen to how they DEFINE themselves; how they define the names they take (and accept) for themselves. (Check the posting record.)
Oh, please. If I were a con artist, YOU wouldn’t have the hope of a snowflake in hades. I’d have you so buffaloed & bamboozled you couldn’t tell if you were comin’ or goin.’ It’s precisely because I shoot straight and DON’T run games on you, that, in your imbecilic paranoia, you can even ENTERTAIN the suspicion that I might be as much of a con artist as YOU are.
You are one sick puppy.
@ bernard ross:
Not so; it absolutely does NOT call them Christians. NT says they were first called Christians at Antioch. If it were itself presuming to identify them by that name, it would have called them “christians” from that point forward; it doesn’t.
The Book of Acts goes on for another 17 chapters till it ends — w/o ever again using the word, “Christians.” It simply continues using the term “the disciples” to refer to them, as it had UNTIL then.
No, shmendrick, I think we should listen to THEM.
So then, you’re ok with letting goyim decide who is a ‘Jew’? — that works for you, does it? What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. . . .
@ bernard ross:
Why? Which one of them have YOU read?
How would YOU know, if you’ve never read it?
Oh? — identify one, and show with particularity how it constitutes a ‘fairy tale.’
I didn’t ‘decide’ it.
— He decided it.
All I did was figure it out — using the common sense & reasoning capability that He gives every man as a birthright.
YOU could figure it out too, if you didn’t have your brains lodged between your cheeks. And I don’t mean the cheeks that sit on your face
— I mean the cheeks you sit on.
@ bernard ross:
Not psychobabble. He was clairvoyant. When they came up close to him, he read them; couldn’t help but read them. His channels of perception were clean as a whistle; glatt kosher.
Nah. Told you, I’m not clairvoyant.
But I sure-as-hell CAN see thru you. Your own POSTS give you away as a decidedly envious, vindictive, malicious, and thoroughly obnoxious putz.
ROFLMAOBSST. Now, that truly IS psychobabble.
1. There is no such thing as a ‘Jewish messiah.’
There is only one Messiah — THE Messiah — who is nobody’s ‘possession,’ but was promised TO:
A. the Jews; and promised as well, TO:
B. the World, thru the Jews.
If he is the Messiah, then he is a Jew — not a ‘Jewish messiah,’ as distinct from some other ‘Messiah.’
2. You can’t be ‘half-pregnant,’ and you can’t be a ‘half-god’ (no matter WHAT it was that God did or didn’t do with you).
Of course, if you think it IS possible, then you might be thinking like a ‘Christian.’
And since you’ve done it so much already, I can’t say it would surprise me if you did it again.
@ bernard ross:
No; actually HE told it to me. He tells it to MAN constantly & without surcease. His intentions for the redemption of a fallen world couldn’t have been more clear if He’d commandeered Facebook to announce them. Jn 3:16
Obviously you WOULD prefer that He simply abandoned the notion of redemption altogether & started over from scratch. It’s apparent that the only divine attribute that means anything at all to you is omnipotence. Doesn’t occur to you, does it, that He might actually care about what comes of His creation. . . .
(Must say, it’s not hard to imagine what your idea of a Father consists of.)
Oh, He’s most creative. Unlike yourself, however, He isn’t strictly a maker/destroyer. His creativity embraces guidance, correction, redemption & love.
It’s patently clear who it is that’s TRULY the little man here. Clear beyond cavil.
@ bernard ross:
No; actually HE told it to me. He tells it to MAN constantly & without surcease. His intentions for the redemption of a fallen world couldn’t have been more clear if He’d commandeered Facebook to announce them. Jn 3:16
Obviously you WOULD prefer that He simply abandoned the notion of redemption altogether & started over from scratch. It’s apparent that the only divine attribute that means anything at all to you is omnipotence.
— Doesn’t occur to you, does it, that He might actually care about what comes of His creation. . . .
(Must say, it’s not hard to imagine what your idea of a Father consists of.)
Oh, He’s most creative. Unlike yourself, however, He isn’t strictly a maker/destroyer. His creativity embraces guidance, correction, redemption & love.
No concoctions, no schemes on my side of this exchange. And it’s patently clear who it is that’s TRULY the little man here. Clear beyond cavil.
@ honeybee:
When hair starts growing on the palms of his hands?
dweller Said:
Syria, Anatolia and Greece have been well picked over by now. Its a process of elimination.
No, the editing came well after the writing by the culturally-ignorant. You could say it was ‘dumb & dumber’, the illiterate in Hebrew and Aramaic, editing the Greek of those who based understanding of ‘Jesus’ culture on hear-say.
Yes
Clearly they are an ‘involved party’ or this conversation should not be happening 🙂
Where?
We prefer to think of the Talmud Torah as mind-conditioning rather than ‘hair-splitting’.
I think this part is edited, ‘lifted’ from Sarah’s story.
No idea what all this means
This may be a little too obvious, but the only confirmation of conception is the pregnancy and subsequent birth. Had she been raped, but NOT conceived, and Joseph or his parents would have insisted on verifying she is a virgin, she could have claimed she ‘fell form a horse’. Explaining a pregnancy is a bit more complicated. This is why first birth is considered a definite evidence of a woman not being a virgin and not the actual sexual act.
And this God said to whom?
Yes, this is the edited part that made him appear ‘regal’
honeybee Said:
Oh, I think I can safely say that I do know something about Nashim 🙂
Ask Arnold Schwartzneger
No
@ yamit82:
It’s quite clear, even from your brief excerpt, that what the RAMBAN found strange was not the idea that God could beget a son; rather, the notion that God could BE a man.
@ yamit82:
Albo was a philosopher. He had opinions about all kinds of things. This was merely another opinion.
Nu?
@ yamit82:
You confuse laughter with jeering. (Emotionally it has much in common w/ puking; strikingly similar.)
I seriously doubt that you even remember what good-natured laughter felt like.
@ yamit82:
No, ‘fraid not.
If I did that, then I couldn’t join him.
@ yamit82:
The Talmud also contains serious discussions over the relative sizes (and merits) of various rabbis’ whoozisses. The Talmud is a grab bag of all sorts of stuff; some of it is treasure, some is drecklichkeit.
The Talmudic references to the mother of Jesus are not contemporaneous to the period, and are offered strictly as an afterthought. ‘Nuff said.
@ yamit82:
Sure, no problem; right after you describe for me how He wrote the dibrot on stone tablets.
@ yamit82:
Already did: “Typical liberal modus operandi… is to deny or ‘spiritualize’ what appears contradictory, embarrassing, or less-than-comprehensible on its face, as written.”
Brown either backpedals or says, in effect, ‘don’t take it all literally’ — or ‘we [RCC] have to catch up w/ the world.’ Now, THAT’s what YoursTruly calls a cop-out. But then, that’s why you like him. . . .
On a certain level, Liberal RC’s have quite a lot in common w/ liberal Jews.
Not so. I told you not only the liberal approach, but I also told you my OWN [repeated here]:
Yeah. Their definition specifically of the designation, Christian, as applied to believing persons. Whom would YOU want them (or anybody else) to go to to ascertain a sound definition of “Jew”?
None of that (the stuff composing Brown’s reply) has any bearing on whether an individual may be deemed a “Christian.” The one prime deal breaker is the insistently asserted ‘divinity’ of JC; the rest is peripheral.
There’s no such creature as “physical” cowardice as distinct from an “intellectual” variety of cowardice (or any other kind). There is only cowardice. Somebody who is subject to cowardice in one situation is subject to it in ANY.
And except within the realm of your OWN desperate fantasies, you have never established me to be anything of the sort. And you know it.
dweller Said:
If you were just mentally ill which you are I would pity you and never laugh but you are also stupid and so I do laugh at you and your stupidity trumps your mental illness.
With you I don’t have to force laughter it comes naturally. You are way up there in the comic relief dept.
You provide me and a few others I believe a certain type of entertainment.
dweller Said:
Thought you would misinterpret me
Have some Hemlock Please. !!!!!! Does that help????
mrg3105 Said:
nobody appeared to have ever heard of him until the christians told us he existed.
BTW, good points in general.
yamit82 Said:
LOL, the chronicles of yeshu…….
I have never seen Dweller so excited and enthusiastic than about his nitzri. 🙂
the JW got nothing on him
@ honeybee:
OK you have a good point I won’t puke just laugh myself into hysterics….. This guy is not real maybe a hologram?
Nobody can be as silly as him with a straight face. 😛
@ yamit82:
No; you’re puking because you’re trying so HARD to laugh; big difference.
Nicest thing you’ve ever said to me. Todah rabah.
yamit82 Said:
He was a mean vile megalomaniac according to the following:
The true yesu of the Bible cried out, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6).
yeshus’ statement to the Syro-Phoenician woman who asked for healing for her daughter? Jesus said, “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs” (Matthew 15:26).
when dealing with the Samaritan woman, yeshu forcefully stated, “You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews” (John 4:22) 🙂 😛
christians are always claiming, “he’s the lamb”, “our savior”, “the king of peace”, “the embodiment of love”, amongst the many other names they associate with a loving, merciful nature. yeshu a nice guy? Not in my book. Nor in any other person’s who is capable of compassion and rationality. Let’s examine who the hell the yeshu character really is. These verses will show not only is yeshu’ “loving” nature a joke but so are the christians who worship him. yeshu’ real mission to come to earth:
yeshu says that he has come to destroy families by making family members hate each other. He has “come not to send peace, but a sword.” Matthew 10:34
yeshu says, “Don’t imagine that I came to bring peace on earth! No, rather a sword lf you love your father, mother, sister, brother, more than me, you are not worthy of being mine. “The real beauty of this verse is that yeshu demands people truly love him more then they love their own family. I ask you how can we love someone that we can not see or interact with? Love is an emotion pertaining to physical existence not to faithful ideologies, yet god threatens you with Death just because your love for your mother maybe stronger than your love for him. Matthew 10:34
Families will be torn apart because of yeshu. “Brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death.” Matthew 10:21
yeshu condemns entire cities to dreadful deaths and to the eternal torment of hell because they didn’t care for his preaching. Matthew 11:20
yeshu, whose clothes are dipped in blood, has a sharp sword sticking out of his mouth. Thus attired, he treads the winepress of the wrath of god. (The winepress is the actual press that humans shall be put into so that we may be ground up.) Revelations 19:13-15
The beast and the false prophet are cast alive into a lake of fire. The rest of us the unchosen will be killed with the sword of yeshu. “An all the fowls were filled with their flesh.” Revelations 19:20-21
yeshu explains that the reason he speaks in parables is so that no one will understand him, “lest . . . they . . . should understand . . . and should be converted, and I should heal them.” Matthew 13:10-15
yeshu explains why he speaks in parables to confuse people so they will go to hell. Mark 4:11-12
yeshu is criticized by the Pharisees for not washing his hands before eating. He defends himself by attacking them for not killing disobedient children according to the commandment: “He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.” Matthew 15:4-7
Abandon your wife and children for yeshu and he’ll give your a big reward. yeshu asks that his followers abandon their children to follow him. To leave your child is abuse, it’s called neglect, pure and simple. Matthew 19:29
yeshu criticizes the Jews for not killing their disobedient children according to Old Testament law. Mark 7:9
yeshu says that those who have been less fortunate in this life will have it even worse in the life to come. Mark 4:25
yeshu sends the devils into 2000 pigs, causing them to jump off a cliff and be drowned in the sea. Clearly yeshu could have simply sent the devils out, yet he chose instead to place them into pigs and kill them. This is called animal abuse. Mark 5:12-13
yeshu kills a fig tree for not bearing figs, even though it was out of season. yeshu must not be as smart as christians would have us believe, for he was retarded enough to do something this silly. You’d think the son of god (god incarnate) would know that trees don’t bear fruit in dry season. Mark 11:13
Luke 12:47 yeshu okays beating slaves.
The true yesu of the Bible cried out, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6).
yeshus’ statement to the Syro-Phoenician woman who asked for healing for her daughter? Jesus said, “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs” (Matthew 15:26).
when dealing with the Samaritan woman, yeshu forcefully stated, “You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews” (John 4:22) 🙂 😛
christians are always claiming, “he’s the lamb”, “our savior”, “the king of peace”, “the embodiment of love”, amongst the many other names they associate with a loving, merciful nature. yeshu a nice guy? Not in my book. Nor in any other person’s who is capable of compassion and rationality. Let’s examine who the hell the yeshu character really is. These verses will show not only is yeshu’ “loving” nature a joke but so are the christians who worship him. yeshu’ real mission to come to earth:
yeshu says that he has come to destroy families by making family members hate each other. He has “come not to send peace, but a sword.” Matthew 10:34
yeshu says, “Don’t imagine that I came to bring peace on earth! No, rather a sword lf you love your father, mother, sister, brother, more than me, you are not worthy of being mine. “The real beauty of this verse is that yeshu demands people truly love him more then they love their own family. I ask you how can we love someone that we can not see or interact with? Love is an emotion pertaining to physical existence not to faithful ideologies, yet god threatens you with Death just because your love for your mother maybe stronger than your love for him. Matthew 10:34
Families will be torn apart because of yeshu. “Brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death.” Matthew 10:21
yeshu condemns entire cities to dreadful deaths and to the eternal torment of hell because they didn’t care for his preaching. Matthew 11:20
yeshu, whose clothes are dipped in blood, has a sharp sword sticking out of his mouth. Thus attired, he treads the winepress of the wrath of god. (The winepress is the actual press that humans shall be put into so that we may be ground up.) Revelations 19:13-15
The beast and the false prophet are cast alive into a lake of fire. The rest of us the unchosen will be killed with the sword of yeshu. “An all the fowls were filled with their flesh.” Revelations 19:20-21
yeshu explains that the reason he speaks in parables is so that no one will understand him, “lest . . . they . . . should understand . . . and should be converted, and I should heal them.” Matthew 13:10-15
yeshu explains why he speaks in parables to confuse people so they will go to hell. Mark 4:11-12
yeshu is criticized by the Pharisees for not washing his hands before eating. He defends himself by attacking them for not killing disobedient children according to the commandment: “He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.” Matthew 15:4-7
Abandon your wife and children for yeshu and he’ll give your a big reward. yeshu asks that his followers abandon their children to follow him. To leave your child is abuse, it’s called neglect, pure and simple. Matthew 19:29
yeshu criticizes the Jews for not killing their disobedient children according to Old Testament law. Mark 7:9
yeshu says that those who have been less fortunate in this life will have it even worse in the life to come. Mark 4:25
yeshu sends the devils into 2000 pigs, causing them to jump off a cliff and be drowned in the sea. Clearly yeshu could have simply sent the devils out, yet he chose instead to place them into pigs and kill them. This is called animal abuse. Mark 5:12-13
yeshu kills a fig tree for not bearing figs, even though it was out of season. yeshu must not be as smart as christians would have us believe, for he was retarded enough to do something this silly. You’d think the son of god (god incarnate) would know that trees don’t bear fruit in dry season. Mark 11:13
Luke 12:47 yeshu okays beating slaves.
yamit82 Said:
Are you crazy, when it’s to cold to open a window !!!!