I no longer consider myself a christian

[Charmonium]

Some individuals obviously do. And they label all religion whether Christian, Islam, Buddhist, Hindu, or Wandjina as the same as Abrahamic extremists.

That's true. But I include atheists with religious extremists because even a negative belief is still a belief. You can no more prove that god doesn't exist any more than you can prove that he does.

 

[WelshBloke]

Not only that but what most people don't realize is that many of the stories in the old testament are rewrites of Babylonian myths. When Israel was conquered by the Babylonians in the 6th century BC, many were taken to Babylon where they had to learn the customs and religion. The best known example of this is the story of the flood which is really part of the Gilgamesh epic. Another example is the story of Moses where he's set adrift in a basket on a river. This is almost identical to another story in Mesopotamian mythology about Sargon.

Of course none of this proves anything one way or the other about the historical accuracy of biblical stories, but it starts to make a lot of sense if you take a more objective, historical view of the text.

The point is that there really aren't any new ideas but that every culture will adapt and modify the expression of those ideas.

I suppose this comes back to Mais point about Christianity being the chosen religion'. People would think you were mental if you genuinely believed in the literal truths of the Norse mythology but somehow the Christian mythology needs to be handled with kid gloves.

 

[Charmonium]

First and foremost, nobody knows what Jesus was saying because Jesus didn't exist. Period. Not even the Jesus-freaks can find a historical mention of Jesus.

I'm pretty sure he's mentioned by Roman (and Jewish) historian Josephus and I think there are some mentions in the Talmud. But from a purely historical point of view, the record is pretty thin. Personally I don't think it's any more likely that Jesus is a fiction any more than Buddha or Mohammed but there is probably more objective historical support for the latter 2.

 

[WelshBloke]

That's true. But I include atheists with religious extremists because even a negative belief is still a belief. You can no more prove that god doesn't exist any more than you can prove that he does.

That's such a weird view. Do you think that people who don't believe in leprechauns are extremists as well? What about unicorns? I mean there's a pretty much infinite list of things that might or might not exist.

 

[GagHalfrunt]

I don't think anyone really has a problem with religion.

Speak for yourself. Anyone that believes in fairy tales is disturbed, anyone that hears voices in their heads is viewed as mentally unbalanced and potentially dangerous. All religion comes down to some people believing that other people who heard voices in their head were speaking to actual gods. Seriously, that's what it is. It's all "And the lord did speak unto me and he said...." Now if you passed a person standing on a street corner screaming for all to hear that he a direct line to god and who claimed that some all-powerful invisible man in the sky was speaking to him directly dictating a message for all humanity on how to live their lives, who you pause and think "wow, cool, finally some help making sense of this crazy mixed-up world" or would you think "This guy is a fucking retard and I better get away from here before he snaps"? You'd get the hell out of there ASAP and you'd drag your women and children with you. But demented people like that who lived 10,000 to 2,000 years ago, rather than being shunned, rather than being locked up, medicated and maybe helped, got called "prophets of the lord" and people are still living their lives according to their insane rantings. And people don't really have a problem with that? Any person with a brain should have a problem with that.

If any so-called Christian walked by a person in the year 2015 speaking in tongues about murdering your own children and enslaving your enemies they would hopefully view it as a load of nonsense, but when a different psycho said pretty much the same thing in 2015 BC those same people view it as the unadulterated word of god. That is fucking frightening.

 

[GagHalfrunt]

I'm pretty sure he's mentioned by Roman (and Jewish) historian Josephus and I think there are some mentions in the Talmud. But from a purely historical point of view, the record is pretty thin. Personally I don't think it's any more likely that Jesus is a fiction any more than Buddha or Mohammed but there is probably more objective historical support for the latter 2.

Jospephus wrote about Jesus 100 years AD. He was not there, he didn't know Jesus and he didn't know anyone who knew Jesus. That's the freaking point. ALL of the writing about Jesus came from 50 to hundreds of years later. Not one single speck was written at the time he supposedly lived. Not one single speck came from a person who met Jesus. Not one single speck came from a person who met a person who met Jesus. So where did it come from and how is it possible that a living god who performed miracles, died and was resurrected got no mention ANYWHERE until more than 50 years later? Not one person who supposedly met Jesus EVER mentioned him or preserved a single memory of him in any way, in any medium.

 

[Charmonium]

That's such a weird view. Do you think that people who don't believe in leprechauns are extremists as well? What about unicorns? I mean there's a pretty much infinite list of things that might or might not exist.

Exactly. That's why you have to treat all ideas that don't have any empirical support the same.

The trap that you can fall into though is becoming a nihilist or solipsist. You can make an argument for not trusting the information you get from your senses, but that's a very deep, dark rabbit hole.

 

[Charmonium]

Jospephus wrote about Jesus 100 years AD. He was not there, he didn't know Jesus and he didn't know anyone who knew Jesus. That's the freaking point. ALL of the writing about Jesus came from 50 to hundreds of years later. Not one single speck was written at the time he supposedly lived. Not one single speck came from a person who met Jesus. Not one single speck came from a person who met a person who met Jesus. So where did it come from and how is it possible that a living god who performed miracles, died and was resurrected got no mention ANYWHERE until more than 50 years later?

That's true, but it's a little strange to have a myth about some specific person arise that quickly and be that widely disseminated in such a short period of time.

It's just a matter of how you look at the probabilities. I don't think most academics seriously contest the existence of someone named Jesus from about that time and place. But obviously no one can prove it one way or the other. You take your best guess until you have more information.

 

[GagHalfrunt]

That's true, but it's a little strange to have a myth about some specific person arise that quickly and be that widely disseminated in such a short period of time.

Not really. The Emperor decided that he wanted to believe in Jesus and he pretty much forced the belief on everyone under his power. Christianity spread at the point of a sword, convert or die.

I'm going to keep repeating this in the hopes that it sinks in for somebody here. Even ignoring the fact that NO aspects of Jesus's supposed life can be traced to any person named Jesus, they can all be traced somewhere else. It's not just that the Christians can't prove they really happened to Jesus, it's that the skeptics CAN DEFINITELY prove that they predate Jesus. All of it. The life story of Jesus that the Christians so desperately want to believe is all stolen, every word of it was used in different myths and different tales of folk lore for other gods in other religions. The Christians just re-wrote it and tried to pass it off as their own. There is no aspect of Christianity that is original and there is no facet of the life of Jesus that can't be traced to earlier stories.

 

[norseamd]

First and foremost, nobody knows what Jesus was saying because Jesus didn't exist. Period. Not even the Jesus-freaks can find a historical mention of Jesus. Not one single reference, not one single word. Why does it not strike you as odd that a person supposedly performing miracles made ZERO IMPRESSION on the world around him? Butchers, bakers, politicians, criminals, artists, writers all get mentioned in the writings of the day and in some cases have their actual words preserved, but not Jesus. The first mention of Jesus was more than 50 years after Jesus supposedly lived and it was by a person who admitted it was a dream. ALL the writings and quotes attributed to the fictional entity known as Jesus were written later by people who were not there at the time, never met Jesus, never met anyone who claimed to have met Jesus and never met anyone who claimed they met someone who claimed they met someone who knew Jesus. It's all fiction and we can trace the actual origin of 99% of the Jesus myths. Nothing in the bible is original, it's all just reconstituted myths and fairy tales and stolen snippets of other religions that had been passed around that region for thousands of years. Even the ridiculous story of a god who was the son of a god who was born of a virgin, died and was resurrected was used by at least a dozen different religions and fables before the Christians stole it as the life story of their invented man in the sky.

Do you even know how the bible came to be the bible? There was no official version of Christianity for 325 years after the supposed death of fictional Jesus. There were tribes and pockets passing around their own legends and their own beliefs each of them inventing Christianity into what they personally wanted to believe. Exactly like happens today, but that's a different thread for a different time. Emperor Constantine wanted greater control of Christianity and he demanded that the leaders of the factions, the televangelists of their day, come together and hammer out ONE story that they would all agree to believe in. And they got together and literally horse-traded the bible into existence like the US Congress passing a pork-laden appropriations bill. They argued and they bought each other off, "okay, you can have the part about hating gays if you let us have the part about enslaving women as concubines, deal? Deal!!" So they took a collection of silly writings, fables, myths, other religions, the insane rantings of people with voices in their head, outright fabrications to give themselves power and they DECIDED that from then on they would believe it was the word of god and they would tell their followers that it was the word of god. And not even your religion can deny that. The bible was VOTED into existence by men preserving their own favorite stories by mutually agreeing to pretend they were the word of god.

The vast majority of scholars who write on the subject accept that Jesus existed

although scholars differ about the beliefs and teachings of Jesus as well as the accuracy of the accounts of his life, and the only two events subject to "almost universal assent" are that Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist and was crucified by the order of the Roman Prefect Pontius Pilate.

Historical Jesus scholars typically contend that he was a Galilean Jew living in a time of messianic and apocalyptic expectations.[13][14] Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist, whose example he may have followed, and after John was executed, began his own preaching in Galilee for only about two to three years prior to his death. He preached the salvation, cleansing from sins, and the Kingdom of God, using parables with startling imagery, and was said to be a teacher and believed in faith healing.[15] Some scholars credit the apocalyptic declarations of the Gospels to him, while others portray his Kingdom of God as a moral one, and not apocalyptic in nature.[16] He sent his apostles out to heal and to preach the Kingdom of God.[17] Later, he traveled to Jerusalem in Judea, where he caused a disturbance at the Temple.[13] It was the time of Passover, when political and religious tensions were high in Jerusalem.[13] The Gospels say that the temple guards (believed to be Sadducees) arrested him and turned him over to Pontius Pilate for execution. The movement he had started survived his death and was carried on by his brother James the Just and the apostles who proclaimed the resurrection of Jesus.[18] It developed into Early Christianity (see also List of events in early Christianity).

Stick to talking about something you actually know about or are willing to give true logical open thought and discussion on the subject.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_Jesus

 

[Charmonium]

Not really. The Emperor decided that he wanted to believe in Jesus and he pretty much forced the belief on everyone under his power. Christianity spread at the point of a sword, convert or die.

Dude - that was 300 years later, a point I think you yourself have made previously.

As Norse points out, most people who study this stuff for a living don't seriously argue that Jesus didn't exist. So unless you're going to start claiming that everyone in Academia is biased, you need to do what you would do with any other question of fact - give due deference to people who are experts on the subject.

 

[Dr. Zaus]

There's nothing that amazing in that 'old book of stories' once you ignore the obvious fabrications.

To my mind: moving beyond tribalism into respecting persons is an amazing.

Yeah but ideas should have some basis in logic or fact and should be open to challenge.

From an evolutionary perspective it's wrong for any individual, but right on the aggregate.

My argument: we need that spiritual foundation to get to where we can be scientific.

Zizek does a reasonable job of pointing out the atheism inherent in the Christian world view.

Just because a story is old means nothing, it certainly doesn't inform modern scientific thinking

The sociology of science is an interesting matter; However, we need sophisticated thinking.

You can make an argument for not trusting the information you get from your senses, but that's a very deep, dark rabbit hole.

I think a smart way out is later Dewy in his ontological pragmatism.



*

Why Christianity is the chosen religion?

They killed people and had more offspring.

Despite that, Jesus taught the crazy-good idea of respecting everyone as a person.

First and foremost, nobody knows what Jesus was saying because Jesus didn't exist. Period.

Stopped at the first sign of misrepresentation of where secular historians are today.

The bible was VOTED into existence by men preserving their own favorite stories by mutually agreeing to pretend they were the word of god.

I must ask, then, the 'so what?' question.

 

[lxskllr]

Jesus' existence is a sideshow to the discussion. It adds no relevance as to whether or not religion is bullshit (it is).

 

[Dr. Zaus]

Jesus' existence is a sideshow to the discussion. It adds no relevance as to whether or not religion is bullshit (it is).

Everything in the social world is bullshit. Ideologies are harmful in many ways.

However: Is what Jesus was getting at valuable?

 

[highland145]

Everything in the social world is bullshit. Ideologies are harmful in many ways.

However: Is what Jesus was getting at valuable?

For the sake of discussion, assume the Trinity is fiction. The ideals to live by in the Bible are golden.

 

[norseamd]

Jesus' existence is a sideshow to the discussion. It adds no relevance as to whether or not religion is bullshit (it is).

Exactly.

The anti-religionists are so fundamentalist in their war against religion that they are not much different than those religious fanatics.

Let Dixycrat explain.

These quotes perpetuate Farerian cycles of oppression by placing those whom honestly seek to exist within a dialogic relation into what what Emmanuel Levinas calls 'alterity', that is this causes othering and de-humanizing of those exploring ways of being in the world that conform to the mythos of their culture. It is a violence done on both the level of laconian psychoanalysis, where in the social opposition creates desire for the behavior opposed, and the level of the Frankfurt school of critical theory's double negative hermeneutic, which is to say it perpetuates the consumption of hate. Based on Heidegger's concept of equipmentalilty, Farery suggest that an individual's own most potentiality for being fully authentic comes from no longer perpetuating cycles of violence by using repressor's tools, but in coming into a fully dialogic relation that relies on tools of understanding: this creates a thirdness that respects individual ontologies without destructive, self perpetuating, hate and fear mongering. The grand narratives that uphold the problematic social legitimations work against are only buttressed and emboldened by impotent verbal and social cloistering.

 

[lxskllr]

However: Is what Jesus was getting at valuable?

Common sense? Yea, that's valuable. If someone "learns" anything from Jesus, they're just about too stupid to breathe.

Here's the complete Gospel according to lxskllr...

Don't be an asshole.

Fits easily in your pocket, and makes it easy to teach other people. It doesn't even require a bunch of nonsense stories to memorize. Religion stripped down to the essentials, and crystal clear. Who could ask for more? I accept charitable donations. Cash, bitcoin, or (semi)precious metals accepted. Alternatively, a donation to the EFF or FSF is more than welcome.

 

[highland145]

 

[Dr. Zaus]

The ideals to live by in the Bible are golden.

And so I bring my children to church. I tell them what we know vs. believe.

Something may happen making faith as valuable to them it is to me.

But I hope to God it doesn't.

Edit:

norseamd... dude i'm really smart and shit.

 

[norseamd]

That's true. But I include atheists with religious extremists because even a negative belief is still a belief. You can no more prove that god doesn't exist any more than you can prove that he does.

Exactly.

Think I might have even heard an argument from atheists that because you can not prove a negative, god does not exist at all for sure. Basically some kind of hopelessly twisted logic mixed with bullshit.

 

[norseamd]

For the sake of discussion, assume the Trinity is fiction. The ideals to live by in the Bible are golden.

More or less the bible and also Sunday School teach you that Jesus is the son of God, holy and divine, but not a god himself.

Yet apparently according to Ecclesial doctrine God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit make up the Trinity and are all gods.

 

[highland145]

More or less the bible and also Sunday School teach you that Jesus is the son of God, holy and divine, but not a god himself.

Wrong.

 

[highland145]

DC :hi5;

Difficult to find around here.

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Stick to talking about something you actually know about or are willing to give true logical open thought and discussion on the subject.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_Jesus

From your own source: "There is no physical or archaeological evidence for Jesus."

At least read your own drivel. Not a single word I said was untrue or even disputed. There is not a single shred of evidence to point to the existence of Jesus, not one witness, not one firsthand account, not one secondhand account, not one written sentence. Nothing. ALL the writings on Jesus and his life were done by people who were not there and they had no evidence whatsoever from people who were there. Biblical scholars choose to believe it because they're biblical scholars and they have chosen to believe it, so of course they're going to accept the most useless testimony.

EVEN if a person named Jesus did exist, the biblical Jesus didn't. EVERY notable aspect of his life has been proven to have come from other earlier, sources. That is indisputable. The people who believe in the "historical Jesus" are the same as people who believe in religion. They're doing so with a total lack of evidence and taking EVERYTHING on faith. So I'm gonna keep asking this until a single wannabeliever can get some divine inspiration to come up with an answer: How is it possible that a god performing miracles made absolutely no impression on the world and inspired NOT ONE SINGLE PERSON TO RECORD ONE SINGLE ASPECT OF HIS LIFE IN ANY WAY AT ALL??

Take your time.

 

[GagHalfrunt]

I must ask, then, the 'so what?' question.

So what? The "word of god" is known to be completely invented by men who sat there and decided what they personally want to believe and all you can muster is "so what"? Seriously? The bible has all the integrity of a letter to Penthouse. If it's not the word of god why are you living your life according to that fairy tale instead of one with an old woman who lives in a shoe? At least the one about the shoe is original, the bible isn't.