New Testament Fairy Tales

Originally posted by Iron7
Assuming Christianity is real, the Bible can still be flawed because it was written by man, gods inspiration or not.

But there are true tales in it as well. Can be hard to interpret which is a metaphor or which is real.

The bible could be flawed even of God himself literally wrote it.

After all, he also created lucifer...he should have known beforehand..if there is free choice, and lucifers betrayl truely surprised him, then it is not a perfect being as the bible suggests. If he did know and there is no free choice, then god is both sides of the coin, good and evil, and is therefore neutral, making all paths open and part of gods plan anyhow.

Originally posted by jiggerj
And then there's this from the NT.

Matthew 27: The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53They came out of the tombs, and after Jesus’ resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

Really? I mean, REALLY? And the mature religious adults with an IQ over 80 believe this happened? Come on now.
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Religion has been an ongoing conspiracy against the masses for thousands of years. Isn't it time to really look at what you're buying into?

edit on 9/4/2012 by jiggerj because: (no reason given)

And what is happening now in the world that you have time to sit on the internet and boggle about on such a topic that is not at all pertinent to the reality of the current world situation.

Be a man, we've got real work to do and we have the strategy to do it. Your strategy is to waste time. Well thank you we're happy you found the desolation of smaug. Dumber bigger and , You Jigger are part of the coalition of stupid and mundane and that is scary. "Jesus began to be troubled and deeply said to them "My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death." United States senate not quite the same as athens, lets have a discussion about politics, not strip club topics for old men.

Originally posted by jiggerj
In another thread it was suggested that I read the New Testament. Admittedly, it's been years since I've done this, but I used to read it often. Like the religious today, I allowed my eyes to glaze over the utterly ridiculous parts. I don't do that anymore. For instance, the following are considered the wise words of Jesus:

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes?

If this is such great advice why don't we all just quit our jobs. Let's teach our kids that when they grow up they have no need to save money for the future, no need to spend money on food and clothing. Yep, real super advice.
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And then there's this from the NT.

Matthew 27: The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53They came out of the tombs, and after Jesus’ resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

Really? I mean, REALLY? And the mature religious adults with an IQ over 80 believe this happened? Come on now.
-------------------------------------
Religion has been an ongoing conspiracy against the masses for thousands of years. Isn't it time to really look at what you're buying into?

edit on 9/4/2012 by jiggerj because: (no reason given)

What is unfortunate is that most people don't understand Christianity is a Mystery Religion. Even what that means has been fairly well lost over time. The first part of your post - it is obvious to me, is saying don't WORRY about these things. Live your life, don't fret over what you're going to sustain yourself with or clothe yourself with. Of course you're going to eat and you're going to clothe yourself, but by concerning yourself as to with what you're going to do so - especially to overly concern yourself with those things, is folly. Also, there's deeper meaning, but there's no sense in considering at this point, as you need to grasp the first-layer meaning before you can delve further.

The second part, to express shock that anyone would believe such a thing is to express small-mindedness. Would it not be better to question how it could be? Was there some advanced technology they didn't understand then and we still don't understand today? Would this not be possible from Gods who came from the heavens to be able to resurrect people? You interpret the bible 1) on the surface only, and 2) as if there were a preamble whi h stated, "God has only the capabilities of what humans had between 6000-0 B.C. Ic you're going to analyze at such a literal and only at q literal level, then at least don't pretend the Bible assumes God has no special abilities which earthly humans didnt/dont have. Your argument is extremely weak.

The Bible may be entirely made up, but if you're right, it's only as a guess and not because you actually analyzed anything usefully.

Originally posted by jiggerj

Originally posted by NewAgeMan
reply to post by jiggerj

 

"Don't worry" is bad advice is it?

edit on 4-9-2012 by NewAgeMan because: (no reason given)

You take the 'Don't worry' out of its context. If I remember, Jesus also added something about how the birds and animals are always fed. What he failed to mention was that animals have to work for it. Their necessities are not handed to them. Lions have to hunt. Birds have to build nests. Ever see a bird flying away from a nest, returning with food for the young, flying away, returning... That's a LOT of work!

As to the other, I don't take everything at face value and by word of mouth some things can get slipped in that were based on little more than rumor, but what might be referred to there is an earthquake that occured the day of the cross whereby bodies fell out of tombs, with the bodies alive part added, but spiritually anything's possible.

By saying that you don't take everything at face value (and I don't even know if you're religious), if you are like most Christians, then what I hear you saying is that the part about the saints rising from the dead is probably not true and not believable, but still believe that one man did it - Jesus.

Understand that the apocalypse is happening right now, but that is why you are saving your twinkies and kool-aid for the proper bunch of God haters to official sell out to the corporation version of the world (that is what civilization should have a beef with.)

Birds did not have to worry about HAARP and chemical poisoning they were at least allowed to hunt and fish for food. That is what Jesus meant.

reply to post by jiggerj

How can a perfect god be so obscure in his messages?

By having nothing to do with the actual authors [of the NT].

reply to post by ALightBreeze


Just curious why it was necessary for you to start a new account, when you'd previously posted in this thread that your "research" had led you to believe that the new testament was a flavian work of fiction?

reply to post by dogstar23

The Bible may be entirely made up, but if you're right, jigger,it's only as a guess and not because you actually analyzed anything usefully.

Fair and accurate.

In the popular mind, and in the minds of most scholars, the origin of Christianity is clear: The religion began as a movement of the lower-class followers of a radical Jewish teacher during the first century C.E. For a number of reasons, however, I did not share this certainty. There were many gods worshiped during Jesus' era that are now seen as fictitious, and no archeological evidence of his existence has ever been found. What contributed most to my skepticism was that at the exact time when the followers of Jesus were purportedly organizing themselves into a religion that urged its members to "turn the other cheek" and to "give to Caesar what is Caesar's," another Judean sect was waging a religious war against the Romans.

This sect, the Sicarii, also believed in the coming of a Messiah, but not one who advocated peace. They sought a Messiah who would lead them militarily. It seemed implausible that two diametrically opposite forms of messianic Judaism would have emerged from Judea at the same time. This is why the Dead Sea Scrolls were of such interest to me and I began what turned into a decade-long study of them.

Like so many others, I was hoping to learn something of Christianity's origins in the 2,000-year-old documents found at Qumran.

Originally posted by DeadSeraph
reply to post by ALightBreeze

 

Just curious why it was necessary for you to start a new account, when you'd previously posted in this thread that your "research" had led you to believe that the new testament was a Flavian work of fiction?

You'll have to ask the PTB why my last one was banned. I have no idea.

reply to post by MarkScheppy


That would be unfortunate, to say the least. Suffice it to say that indeed God created man in His Image, and placed the animal kingdom under man's dominion. But we still have to be good shepherds. We have to treat those resources with equality and not consume more than we need or more than what the Earth can reconstitute, or else we are in trouble.

Not to mention greed, but if we over-utilized our resources to such an extent, we'll find the entire globe like England in the Industrial Revolution, where many many paradigms were changed due to having to.

This is where we are at now, a cross-roads. Not of an era, but of the sum of our existence, through-out all time. This is last test of character and we'll better see to it that we pass it rightly. And if we don't then God help us if that happens.

As a word of wisdom and warning. That when a civilization is undergoing this level of cultural and ideological paradigm reconciliation, that one wrong decision or one wrong assumption, could lead to its extinction, not for just a random percentage, but the entire percentage of the population.

We're going to need everything we've ever learned anywhere in time to get us over this hump.

reply to post by SaturnFX


I know Saturn, it's kinda hard to visualize Lucifer working for God.

Just read the book of Job, you'll clearly see the hierarchy which could also be metaphorical or parabolic in interpretation, to see that commandments were given and followed.

In the Book of Job, ha-Satan is a member of the Divine Council, "the sons of God" who are subservient to God. Ha-Satan, in this capacity, is many times translated as "the prosecutor", and is charged by God to tempt humans and to report back to God all who go against His decrees. At the beginning of the book, Job is a good person "who feared God and turned away from evil" (Job 1:1), and has therefore been rewarded by God. When the Divine Council meets, God informs ha-Satan about Job's blameless, morally upright character. Between Job 1:9–10 and 2:4–5, ha-Satan merely points out that God has given Job everything that a man could want, so of course Job would be loyal to God; if all Job has been given, even his health, were to be taken away from him, however, his faith would collapse. God therefore grants ha-Satan the chance to test Job.[11] Due to this, it has been interpreted that ha-Satan is under God's control and cannot act without God's permission. This is further shown in the epilogue of Job in which God is speaking to Job, ha-Satan is absent from these dialogues. "For Job, for [Job's] friends, and for the narrator, it is ultimately Yahweh himself who is responsible for Job's suffering; as Yahweh says to the 'satan', 'You have incited me against him, to destroy him for no reason.'" (Job 2:3)

Source: en.wikipedia.org...

All various religions and beliefs mirror this narrative and it seems to be fairly consistent as to context of the content of what they are all pondering...I suppose Ha-Satan is playing God's devil's advocate?

Originally posted by GrinchNoMore
No, No Book was officially put together, and called Bible.

As I have summed up pretty concisely above, a cannon of 21 of the 27 NT books, the same 21 in use today, was already existent and in use by the early Church dating back to Bishop Irenaeus's 'Against Heresies' by around 180AD. This is a little over 100 years after the death of Christ, and within years of the deaths of the Apostles.

Originally posted by GrinchNoMore
It is amazing how much effort the believers will put into defending the only hope they have

Its even more humorous trying to watch nonbelievers spin pseudo-history in a vain attempt to deny the authenticity of the Bible. Go through this site and just count up how often that people quote the Council of Nicaea as having something to do with the creation of the Bible...
You know where that story come from?
Dan Browns FICTIONAL story/movie the 'DaVinci Code'...

Go follow the links I provided in my posts above and argue your case from a perspective of REAL history, and maybe we'll have a good debate on the topic.

Originally posted by SaturnFX
After all, he also created lucifer...he should have known beforehand..if there is free choice, and lucifers betrayl truely surprised him, then it is not a perfect being as the bible suggests. If he did know and there is no free choice, then god is both sides of the coin, good and evil, and is therefore neutral, making all paths open and part of gods plan anyhow.

We could do a whole thread on this topic alone.
Yes, God knew that Satan (not Lucifer) would fall before he did, and he still created him. If you notice, fallen angles also don't get a second chance at receiving grace. Ever wonder why man gets a second chance and angles don't?

It could very well be a simple factor that Satan was allowed to lead us astray because if we had ultimately gone astray without the interference of the fallen angles, WE would not have been granted a second chance....

Everything happens in Gods plan for a reason, even if that reason is not clear to us at the time. He allows certain beings to be created to be 'bad guys' for a reason. This is specifically mentioned in the bible.

Romans 9:
 For Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”[g] 18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
19 One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?” 20 But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’”[h] 21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?

.

reply to post by defcon5


So all this and more IS a test of character...

It's a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done before. A far better resting place that I go to than I have ever known.

That is wise. Were I to invoke logic, however, logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Or the One....

Think about it...and may your way be as pleasant...

reply to post by jiggerj

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes?"

Yoda would say: Read you have, understand you did not.

Why money should be something important? It's something created to enslave, create dependency, hierarchies and relations of power.

All he was saying is that our life goes beyond our body needs or the concepts of needs we either adopt, create or help to perpetuate. He is implying about our soul, and how most of the things we value and live by are in fact insignificant in the grand scheme of things.

Matthew 27: The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53They came out of the tombs, and after Jesus’ resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

Now... regarding this one, I accept your point of view. It does sound like a fairy tale, specially when one reads it's literal sense and not as something figurative. But if you read things literally, then the old testament should also be mentioned by you. Because giants, gods, creating a woman from a hip among many others, don't sound too feasible if there is no margin left for interpretation left.

reply to post by trekwebmaster

This is just assumption on my part, I don't know if there is any biblical proof of this.

But, yes Spock, I suppose that life is just a big Kobayashi Maru.
Or put another way...
“"God created Arrakis to train the faithful. One cannot go against the word of God.”

If God wanted more 'yes men' he could have created more angels.
He chose instead to create us, in his image, and allow us to come to him of our own free will...

Originally posted by thomas_

Matthew 27: The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53They came out of the tombs, and after Jesus’ resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

Now... regarding this one, I accept your point of view. It does sound like a fairy tale, specially when one reads it's literal sense and not as something figurative. But if you read things literally, then the old testament should also be mentioned by you. Because giants, gods, creating a woman from a hip among many others, don't sound too feasible if there is no margin left for interpretation left.

There is more to this story here:

Gospel of Nicodemus (part 2)
Then Rabbi Addas, and Rabbi Finees, and Rabbi Egias, the three men who had come from Galilee, testifying that they had seen Jesus taken up into heaven, rose up in the midst of the multitude of the chiefs of the Jews, and said before the priests and the Levites, who had been called together to the council of the Lord: When we were coming from Galilee, we met at the Jordan a very great multitude of men, fathers who had been some time dead. And present among them we saw Karinus and Leucius. And they came up to us, and we kissed each other, because they were dear friends of ours; and we asked them, Tell us, friends and brothers, what is this breath of life and flesh? And who are those with whom you are going? And how do you, who have been some time dead, remain in the body?

And they said in answer: We have risen again along with Christ from the lower world, and He has raised us up again from the dead. And from this you may know that the gates of death and darkness have been destroyed, and the souls of the saints have been brought out thence, and have ascended into heaven along with Christ the Lord. And indeed to us it has been commanded by the Lord Himself, that for an appointed time we should walk over the banks of Jordan and the mountains; not, however, appearing to every one, nor speaking to every one, except to those to whom He has permitted us. And just now we could neither have spoken nor appeared to you, unless it had been allowed to us by the Holy Spirit.

Its not scriptural, but its still a good read. The first part of the Gospel of Nicodemus is similarly a good to read. I'm not sure of where the story of the 'harrowing of hell' originates (I'm not sure anyone knows for sure), as its barely mentioned in the bible, yet it became well known to the early Christians and was included in the Apostles Creed.

reply to post by defcon5

And they said in answer: We have risen again along with Christ from the lower world,

According to most Christians, heaven is up, not down...so what were they doing in a 'lower world'?

reply to post by AfterInfinity

Because up to that time, there was no Christ, and thus no salvation, everyone who died before the “harrowing of hell” went to hell. The harrowing was when Christ descended into hell to free those who had been imprisoned there before his death on the cross. Read the story, it explains itself.

reply to post by defcon5


But "God" knows everyone who will ever go to hell, if the Bible is perfectly accurate. And he still doesn't change anything. Which means he WANTS half of us to burn forever.

Furthermore, the king of hell, "Satan", was created by "God"...and you can bet that he knew exactly what he was doing when he made that happen. So he designed hell for us, designed a creation that would betray him and trick Adam and Eve and rule the fiery pits that would torment us for being exactly the way he created us...

Does this seem at all fair to you? From my perspective, we had the short end of the stick from the very beginning. And "God"s laughing at us all this time because we're too meek to call him on it.

See, the only part that doesn't make sense about the Bible and "God", is how we're still worshipping the jerk. It's no wonder we're all violent and barbaric...after all the time we spend selling our soul to a being whose existence is questionable, let alone its right to our souls, I'm not surprised that we no longer have the integrity to actually behave honorably.

Originally posted by AfterInfinity
reply to post by defcon5

 

But "God" knows everyone who will ever go to hell, if the Bible is perfectly accurate. And he still doesn't change anything. Which means he WANTS half of us to burn forever.

Furthermore, the king of hell, "Satan", was created by "God"...and you can bet that he knew exactly what he was doing when he made that happen. So he designed hell for us, designed a creation that would betray him and trick Adam and Eve and rule the fiery pits that would torment us for being exactly the way he created us...

Does this seem at all fair to you? From my perspective, we had the short end of the stick from the very beginning. And "God"s laughing at us all this time because we're too meek to call him on it.

See, the only part that doesn't make sense about the Bible and "God", is how we're still worshipping the jerk.

edit on 6-9-2012 by AfterInfinity because: (no reason given)

WE had the short end of the stick? Tell that to Satan

To address your philosophical questions: We are not made imperfect because we have no choice. We are imperfect because we are GIFTED choice. How do we, as mere humans know God's thoughts, when he created his first angel, who would eventually become our accuser (and liberator to others )?

Does a child of 2 understand why he or she must spend time in daycare, and is not allowed to eat candy all day or play in traffic? Does a child of 8 fully comprehend the life of an adult, and why it is necessary for his or her teacher to hold them accountable for their actions in a class room? How much more do we know about the mind of God considering the vastness of the universe? I'm guessing very little.

I use these parables loosely, but they apply in a similar manner to how I view our relationship with the creator, and even with the nature of evil.