The Evolution of Religion

Jesus the bastard.

Was jesus really the son of god? Christians today equate jesus with god. Why? What if the history behind jesus was far more different then christian's would like to accept? There are many quote's about mary being a whore and commiting adultry. Was the whole son of god born out of fear? The whole christian faith is based upon the belief of jesus being the son of god, or god incarnate.

Short timeline.

Mary commit's adultry, get's pregnant, out of fear of being stoned to death, which was law at the time, she decide's to claim she's still a virgin and that this unborn child is the son of god. Baby jesus is born, which by that time word has spread. Everyone automagically worship's him as the son of god. This kid grow's up being told he's the son of god and begin's to believe it. How could he not? Everyone's worshipping him, everyone's proclaiming he's god/son of god. So over the course of his childhood, he's brainwashed into believing he truelly is the son of god. Ah, the miracles performed by jesus? Cheap magic trick's. Many magician's can perform those same tricks. I even saw one walk on water! Pretty neat trick ... just wish I knew how it was done lol.

So if jesus isn't the son of god and is just some normal ordinary man, then wouldn't that mean the whole christian faith is also born of a lie? The moral teaching's of jesus may be acceptable, but jesus as god ... obviously not.

Sorry if I don't go more in depth right now. Getting ready to go out. Will do more tomorrow.

atheism.about.com...

1 And he went out from thence, and came into his own country; and his disciples follow him. 2 And when the sabbath day was come, he began to teach in the synagogue: and many hearing him were astonished, saying, From whence hath this man these things? and what wisdom is this which is given unto him, that even such mighty works are wrought by his hands? 3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon? and are not his sisters here with us? And they were offended at him.

'There are many quote's about mary being a whore and commiting adultry.'
Produkt
I really would like to see just one. You say there are many. I have only read three bibles, the KJAV, NIV, and Good News versions. Maybe they are all in the bible you read. Please back up your very confident sounding claim with some substance. I will be impressed if you can provide a single such bible verse, and amazed if you post 'many' of them.
I anxiously await some substance to back up your hearsay.

Sure, take a look at the jewish talmud. Mind you the jews have been around preaching the word of god alot longer then the christians. But first, take a look at the myths surrounding the birth of jesus. They even have a few passages in the bible itself to take a looky at.

www.religioustolerance.org...

www.despatch.cth.com.au...

When the early christians started preaching this kid was god, the jew's weren't too happy that some whore got away with lying.

Considering how many Jews don't believe Jesus or any of his entourage ever existed, I was surprised to see the quotes in your second link. The first link didn't appear to have any references to Mary's fidelity.
I have to admit, I have had premarital sex myself, so I am not one to judge. But, if Jesus existed, and was conceived before their marriage had taken place, I see nothing wrong. Criticizing someone born out of wedlock seems to me to be meanspirited.
I was glad to see that there were no bible verses about it. Do you feel those who have had sex before marriage are evil? I sure don't.

Originally posted by Produkt
No one of religous belief has anything to add to any of this?

Just a thought: Produkt mentioned he was an Athiest in an earlier post, If I stand corrected an Athiest does nor believe on Religion? Would that belief in non-belief then be a belief? Follow my meaning

When I finished reading this thread, I honestly felt like punching my computer. Normally I just ignore the nonesense and illogical dribble that people come up with to find ways out of God, but I think I'll stand my ground this time.

Produkt, you preach of psychology and its effects on religion. But I know tons about psychology, and the first thing I remembered is that "People Fear What They Do Not Know" and that "People Will Denounce Something If It Puts Limits On Their Life". If you are such a psychology buff, you should know this right off the bat.

One of your main arguements is about some alien coming to Earth and watching us and our pathetic religion right? In your mind, you are picturing an AETHEIST alien, no? Well then of course the aetheist alien will think we are foolish, you might as well stick yourself (produkt) up into space and the same thing will result. Well how about a religious alien, an alien that believes in a higher being that created him. I believe he would laugh at the aetheists and their lame excuses to avoid God.

For those of you who question Jesus' existence:

-Here is a quote from a professor at Manchester University.

"Some writers may toy with the fancy of a 'Christ-myth', but they do not do so on the ground of historical evidence. The historicity of Christ is as axiomatic for an unbiased historian as the historicity of Julius Ceaser. It is not historians who propogate the 'Christ-myth' theories."
- F.F. Bruce, Rylands Professor of biblical criticism and exegesis at Manchester University.

-This quote is from a famous Roman Philosipher, who is relied heavily on by historians who need information from the Roman era.

Cornelius Tacitus (born A.D. 52-54):

"But not all the relief that could come from man, not all the bounties that the prince could bestow, nor all the atonements which could be presented to the gods, availed to relieve Nero from the infamy of being believed to have ordered the conflagration, the fire of Rome. Hence to suppress the rumour, he falsely charged with the guilt, and punished with the most exquisite tortures, the persons commonly called Christians, who were hated for thier enormities. Christus, the founder of the name was put to death by Pontious Pilate, procurator of Juedea in the reign of Tiberius: but the pernicious superstition, repressed for a time broke out again, not only through Judea, where the mischeif originated, but through the city of Rome also. " Tacitus, Annals XV, 44.

-This is a letter from a famous Jewish war tactician to his friend.

Josephus, a Jew who commanded a force during a Jewish revolt against Rome and who after defeat wrote a history of Israel twice mentions Jesus. Josephus had no reason to be a friend of Jesus, writes this

"About this time there lived Jesus, a wise man, if indeed one ought to call him a man. For he was one who wrought surprising facts and was a teacher of such people as accept the truth gladly. He was over many Jews and many of the Greeks . He was the Messiah.
When Pilate, upon hearing him accused by men of the highest standing amongst us, had condemned him to be crucified, those who had in the first place come to love him did not give up their affection for him.
On the third day he appeared to them restored to life, for the prophets of God had prophesied these and countless other marvelous things about him, and he has still to this day not disappeared"

-This is from an enemy of the Christians who himself acknowledged the existence of Jesus of Nazareth.

Lucian of Samosata

A second century satarist, who spoke scornfully of Christ and the Christians. He connected them with the synagogues of Palestine and alluded to Christ as: "the man who was crucified in Palestine because he introduced this new cult into the world ... Furthermore, their first lawgiver persuaded them that they were all brothers one of another after they have transgressed once for all by denying the Greek gods and by worshipping that cruicified sophist himself and living under his laws." - The Passing Peregrinus

-In the bible, Jesus is accused of being "The King of the Jews":

A historical artifact in the British Museum has a letter written by Maraben Serapion who wrote about the Jews who executed "their wise king".

-The Encyclopedia Brittanica which has inrefutable information.

"No serious historian would doubt the historical evidence for the existence of Jesus. On occasions some have tried but only by ignoring the overwhelming evidence that supports the existence of Jesus. These independent accounts prove that in ancient times even the opponents of Christianity never doubted the historicity of Jesus, which was disputed for the first time and on inadequate grounds by several authors at the end of the 18th, during the 19th, and at the beginning of the 20th centuries" - Encyclopedia Britannica

I hope that clears a few things up.

Perhaps, after 2000 years of getting things wrong, some of us are coming full circle to where Jesus started, i.e. we are learning and so will grow. Evolution. We are finally getting it right about Jesus's words to us: pray alone (no grandstanding), look and act your best (don't be a brown nose of piety by drawing attention to your outward appearance--a childish "look what I can do!), love yourself (for how can you love others as yourself if you don't love yourself), practice forgiveness and compassion. Forget the miracles and adolescent talk of end times, etc. Grow up spiritually! It's about time.

Originally posted by Produkt
Myth's and how stories get exaggerated.

This is a good place to jump into this discussion--I often read posts of this general idea but I can never create a response because the subject is so broad!

First of all, I must reiterate--I am not religious. I do believe in God and Christ and life and resurrection (spiritual, not zombified). However, I do not like the word 'supernatural' applicable to anything--IMO, nature encompasses the material plane so therefore there is nothing 'super' of it. It's the end, the border. I also understand (from experience) that the ethereal plane is equally and comparably just as 'real' and nature is. Therefore, to my view, spiritual things are just as natural as the tree in my front yard.

Religous people nowaday's believe in noah's flood right? Well ... How come they don't believe in say, the chinese dragon's? Well, this is easily explained. Stories, over time have gotten so completely exxaggerated. The human species has a certain knack for story telling. We thrive on entertainment, just look at how popular television, movie and the music industrie's are. We thrive on mysticism and fantasy.

I think that is not so much purposefully fantasy as it is an unavoidable obsession with the unknown, the undetermined/unverified. We are curious as humans because that is how we are made to be. It is how we learn. But we are also impatient and pragmatic and so tend to blow a little hot air into our empty sails of information..

As far as myths and our penchant for storytelling--without these things, we would know even far less than we do now about the past. Scientists and archeologists would have a lot less framework for seeking experimentiation and exploration without the clues and mysteries derived from heirloom stories.

Making stories more exciting, more colorful, and amplifying their enigmatic quality is a method used (perhaps largely unconsciously) by storytellers through the ages: it is quite effective in investing the information permanently in their listener's minds. This is necessary for the next generation of storytellers (which, until recent times were the main historians for any community/culture)--one must know a story in order to pass it along.

No doubt, like the game gossip, the stories got tweaked along the way. Add that to the obscurity of science that existed and you wind up right here and now with what we've got.

Regardless of what science says about geology et al., every culture has a flood story (or close to every one). Every culture! That is hard to explain and still agree with science's false confidence.

Now, I totally put faith in science, but I it doesn't replace God for me, it helps define what 'God' means and has formed a realistic, logical understanding for me about all these things. Science just isn't as complete as it would like to think. Every proven hypothesis brings more opportunities to find something out. Each answer breeds numerous questions.

Perhaps we don't understand the sediment layers as well as we assume or hope that we do. Just the same as religion/mythos--they are both shrouded in more 'unknown' than known, and apparently on opposing (opposite) sides--perhaps these will meet in the middle at full understanding and clear cut 'reality'?

Personally, I think that the world wide flood was caused by the ice melting 13,000 or so years ago. Geologists can show us potential and probable upheavals and changes from such an event--these, if studied with an open mind, paint a clear picture of what probably happened in the previous age.

I also read the bible and trust it as 'truth.' However, literal interpretations according to modern understandings render it nonsense.

The bible actually doesn't contradict physics, although as the article posted earlier in the thread stated, religion definitely does. And they call it 'supernatural.' Doing this, in ignorance, maintains a definite level of continued ignorance; and even worse, it causes many to dislike even the thought of certain avenues of learning. And that's probably one of the true 'sins' of the universe's Divine law. To keep one's self from learning, from knowing--that's bad enough, but to hinder others seems to be bordering on heinous. Unintentional and well-intentioned, it is still a travesty, IMO.

I'm curious, but where in the bible does it say to stay in the darkness and remain ignorant? There may be some priests and pastors that preach to never disbelieve God, but this is far from "cutting off knowledge". They simply mean that whatever trials and tribulations you come across, don't lose faith in your God. Mind you, these are only the opinions of priests and pastors, not God himself. The bible teaches to seek love, light, truth, and knowledge.

Study up on the subject before you jump to conclusionz.

[edit on 13-3-2006 by TheBlueSoldier]