Damn! I wish I had thought of that.
Actually, there was a thing called The Enlightenment, but I doubt that you'd be interested.
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Jesus Christ: the greatest story ever told?
- Thread starter an anarchist
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Ben Dhyan
Veteran Member
I'm sorry Jaywalker Soule, I edited my comment prior to your post, This explains what I meant....Yes, souls that are unenlightened and claim enlightenment are indeed deluded. But then unenlightened souls that disbelieve in enlightenment are also deluded.Damn! I wish I had thought of that.
Actually, there was a thing called The Enlightenment, but I doubt that you'd be interested.
And btw, the wiki piece on the age of enlightenment is not the reality represented by the religious concept of 'enlightenment'!
How are you defining "enlightened?"
Nope, can't see it. You may be immoral, in your own opinion, but really, isn't that a problem for you to solve? If I think I'm doing something immoral, I stop doing it. That's what morality means to me. What does it mean to you?
And what does it actually mean to "redeem our souls?" Redeem is a word that means compensate (for faults) or to get back or retrieve. Well, I suppose if you think you possess a soul (something more than what you are physically), and you think you've lost it, I suppose you might want to get it back. But Id have to ask, how do you think you lost it in the first place? And wouldn't it be up to you to try to find it? lf I can't find my keys in the morning, it's my problem to deal with. I don't get to ask some magical critter to return them to me.
I can't even figure out what that means, "we need redemption." I redeem coupons -- but I don't feel at all like a coupon that somebody else can reap the value of. Do you?
And how does one person dying make some other person better, more worthwhile? If a child is dying of cancer in a hospital, do you suppose it would be a good idea to sacrifice some other child to make her better?
And three times as many (6 billion) do NOT believe that story. It certainly seems to me that if it's "too good not to be true," then really, wouldn't you suppose that more than just a quarter of the world thought anything about it at all?
Yes, stories are great. Of course, there a a lot of stories much older than this one that we still read today. Try the Epic of Gilgamesh (where you will find Noah, aka Utnapushtim), or writings on the temple walls of Egypt, or Homer, where you'll learn all about a lot of other Gods.
And all of those changed the lives of people who read them. Not because they were necessarily true, but because people read them -- and made assumptions about what they said, what they meant, and whether they were reliable.
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PruePhillip
Well-Known Member
So was is the historic context to Jupiter?
Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
Oh. Jove. The thunder God equivalent with Zeus.
Good for crops and harvest as with many of the Pantheon, and the eagle as the everlasting historic symbol of the Roman army and beyond to this day.
Ben Dhyan
Veteran Member
Able to cease thought so that the mind is not in a dualistic state of thinker conceptualizing. about reality but is in a state of pure awareness, oneness.
PruePhillip
Well-Known Member
Really, is there that connection with the Roman standard?
Shadow Wolf
Certified People sTabber & Business Owner
He had a lousy weekend knowing what would happen and assured fully of the outcome.
I fail to see how it even counts as a sacrifice, especially if Jesus is considered god.
And what's good about letting someone else suffer the consequences of our actions? And why did this god make this entire system like this to begin with?
I fail to see how it even counts as a sacrifice, especially if Jesus is considered god.
And what's good about letting someone else suffer the consequences of our actions? And why did this god make this entire system like this to begin with?
Brian2
Veteran Member
Can God become a man or is that impossible for God to do?
Brian2
Veteran Member
That's just like post 9 but less narcy
dybmh
ויהי מבדיל בין מים למים
God wouldn't because it would naturally lead to idolatry. Deuteronomy 4:15.
Umm....Mahabharata.
IndigoChild5559
Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
It's not a question of what God CAN do. It's a question of what God CHOOSES to do. If you accept the Tanakh (Old TEstament) then you have to accept that God is not a man. Not Caesar, not Jesus, period.
“God is not a man… or a son of man”- Num. 23:19;
“… For he is not a man, that he should repent”-1 Sam. 15:29
“He is not a mere mortal like me that I might answer him, that we might confront each other in court." Job 9:32
"For I am God, and not a man— the Holy One among you." Hosea 11:9
The same could be said of the Epic of Gilgamesh, Greek mythology, and much more.
I find it both inexplicable and horrendous. The omnipotent God wants to "redeem our souls" ─ I suspect I don't know what that actually means ─ so what does [he] do? [He] sends [his] son, or [his] chosen envoy (depending on which NT author you ask) to assure the world that the apocalypse is going to happen any day now, but in particular to die by crucifixion.
Of that I make some observations. The apocalypse was promised in the lifetime of some of Jesus' hearer by the Jesus of Mark, the Jesus of Matthew and the Jesus of Luke ─ the Jesuses of Paul and of John are, I think, simply silent on the point ─ and two thousand years down the track, nothing of the kind has happened. Instead, in a manner reminiscent of certain adolescent children, endless excuses are invented and tendered.
And why was any such adventure necessary in the first place? What could a human sacrifice to oneself with a particularly tormenting death of one's son / envoy achieve that an omnipotent God couldn't achieve just by snapping [his] fingers? I find human sacrifice a revolting idea, something that could never be justified.
And third, if "redeeming souls" was God's plan ─ indeed, whatever was the plan ─ why was it made dependent on worshiping a particular god? That reduces the whole program to the morality of a recruiting drive, not the gift of a loving father-god to the world [he] created.
And fourth, what exactly happened as a result of the crucifixion? How was the world different afterwards? It didn't stop war, plague, famine, crime, inequality, it didn't result in a better class of politician, it didn't put an end to children with birth defects, it didn't improve the status of women, or make sure all nations have national health schemes, or prevent tax havens. What did it achieve?
IndigoChild5559
Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
Personally I think the Lord of the Rings is the greatest story ever told
RestlessSoul
Well-Known Member
And those who deny the light call their wilful blindness wisdom. There being none so blind, as those who will not see.
RestlessSoul
Well-Known Member
Personally I think the Lord of the Rings is the greatest story ever told
Very few decent female characters in Tolkien. Even the Bible does better on that score, though perhaps not by much.
I think the story of the Bab may be the greatest Story ever told, as it also includes a Bonus story of the Messenger of Bahá’u’lláh promised by the Bab.
It would be an epic though as there is a six year span culmination in the execution of the Bab. All the epic situations faced by 18 disciples (Letters of the Living), then the fulfilling of the Bab's promise. There is epic battles of a few defending against multitudes, followed by 40 years of the Message of Baha’u’llah. Persecutions, banishments, imprisonment, torture, stuff for the greatest story ever told.
Regards Tony