What makes a Christian?

[vijeno]

Has the claim to be a Christian any value any more?

Just the fact that there are a lot of denominations (200? 500? 100.000? It doesn't matter), and there is next to nothing that they all have in common, doesn't mean that the term "christian" means nothing.

All definitions are fuzzy. As an example, think of what a human being is. A mammal capable of language? Yeah, but some are in a coma or babies or otherwise not capable of understanding or speaking - but still human. A human who lacks an arm is still a human. You will be very hard pressed to find one definition, or set of criteria, that really matches all human beings, without including beings that we would all agree are not human.

The adherence to definitions is not a black/white on/off switch. It's a bell-curve. Right in the middle, you got the catholic and protestant mainstream, by sheer numbers. Far far off on one end, you have your gnostics and rosicrucians, etc. etc. I'm sure we could make a beautiful diagram!

As a tentative definition, I'd say a christian is someone who believes in Jesus Christ in some way. Some mystics probably don't "believe", they rather "meld with" some "christ consciousness". Some would say they don't "believe", they "know".

I'd say most christians, though not all, are trinitarian. Most believe that Jesus was somehow divine. A lot believe he was born of a virgin. And so on...

 

[Heyo]

Just the fact that there are a lot of denominations (200? 500? 100.000? It doesn't matter), and there is next to nothing that they all have in common, doesn't mean that the term "christian" means nothing.

All definitions are fuzzy. As an example, think of what a human being is. A mammal capable of language? Yeah, but some are in a coma or babies or otherwise not capable of understanding or speaking - but still human. A human who lacks an arm is still a human. You will be very hard pressed to find one definition, or set of criteria, that really matches all human beings, without including beings that we would all agree are not human.

Humans are pretty well defined by their DNA. There is still some variation but the bell curve is very narrow and with little chance of classifying a human as a chimp or a chimp as a human.

The adherence to definitions is not a black/white on/off switch. It's a bell-curve. Right in the middle, you got the catholic and protestant mainstream, by sheer numbers. Far far off on one end, you have your gnostics and rosicrucians, etc. etc. I'm sure we could make a beautiful diagram!

As a tentative definition, I'd say a christian is someone who believes in Jesus Christ in some way. Some mystics probably don't "believe", they rather "meld with" some "christ consciousness". Some would say they don't "believe", they "know".

I'd say most christians, though not all, are trinitarian. Most believe that Jesus was somehow divine. A lot believe he was born of a virgin. And so on...

That's basically my point. The "DNA" of Christianity is the belief in Jesus Christ. Everything else is variable.

 

[paarsurrey]

Humans are pretty well defined by their DNA. There is still some variation but the bell curve is very narrow and with little chance of classifying a human as a chimp or a chimp as a human.

That's basically my point. The "DNA" of Christianity is the belief in Jesus Christ. Everything else is variable.

" The "DNA" of Christianity is the belief in Jesus Christ "

Aren't the terms "Jesus" and "Christ" both Hellenistic and Paulines as Yeshua- the Israelite Messiah never used both of them for himself ever, please? Right?
So, the correct DNA for a follower of Yeshua is belief in Yeshua- the Israelite Messiah, it transpires, please, right?

Regards
_______________
Note: "(Jesus) Yeshua- the Israelite Messiah did not and could not die a cursed death on the Cross", to atone the sins of anybody, one gets to know from many clues in the Gospels itself, please. Right?

 

[Heyo]

" The "DNA" of Christianity is the belief in Jesus Christ "

Aren't the terms "Jesus" and "Christ" both Hellenistic and Paulines as Yeshua- the Israelite Messiah never used both of them for himself ever, please? Right?

I have used the Greek/English translations to keep it easy on the Westerners Christians.

So, the correct DNA for a follower of Yeshua is belief in Yeshua- the Israelite Messiah, it transpires, please, right?

Even that formulation has to be explained as the Hebrew use of the word "Messiah" is different from the Christian understanding.

 

[PruePhillip]

Yes I've read that too, often writen by Christians with an axe to grind and no historical savvy but using coincidence to big up their cause.

The fall of Rome was partly because they had not been expanding and hence not captuting people to fill the slave gap as slaves died off.

Your comment "But slavery disapeared from Christian Rome" is not correct, it did not disappear, but it did reduce because Rome was becoming complacent.

Rome essentially due to climate - with large populations pushing into Europe from the East and the South.
This put further pressure on northern tribes to also being migrating south into Roman held territory. This was compounded by plague.
There were simply not enough Romans.
Slaves made up between 10 and 20% of the population.

Do you have slave figures for the European 'dark ages' and middle ages?

As an aside - the main reason slavery crept back into European society for a while was that during the age of discovery Europeans were dealing with a world where EVERYONE had slaves. It sort of normalized the practice again. But by the early 1800's England had banned slavery, and went on to ban it all over the world - even in Africa, the heart of slavery (though I know, it still exists there today, but I digress.)
But Paul in his letter to Phllemon defended the slave as someone of value as himself, indeed, equal to himself. That letter had impact.

 

[ChristineM]

Rome essentially due to climate - with large populations pushing into Europe from the East and the South.
This put further pressure on northern tribes to also being migrating south into Roman held territory. This was compounded by plague.
There were simply not enough Romans.
Slaves made up between 10 and 20% of the population.

Do you have slave figures for the European 'dark ages' and middle ages?

As an aside - the main reason slavery crept back into European society for a while was that during the age of discovery Europeans were dealing with a world where EVERYONE had slaves. It sort of normalized the practice again. But by the early 1800's England had banned slavery, and went on to ban it all over the world - even in Africa, the heart of slavery (though I know, it still exists there today, but I digress.)
But Paul in his letter to Phllemon defended the slave as someone of value as himself, indeed, equal to himself. That letter had impact.

Romes climate was similar in at the time of Christian Rome to the time of the roman republic.

The Germanic regions were sparsely populated by rome, only garrisons and administration. It was the loathing towards the roman conquers and their complacency that led the Visigoths to sac and cause the downfall of western Rome, emigration and tourism were to northern Europe were not big on the average migrants to live list.

Even after Rome had passed it days of greatness, it is thought that 25% of all people in Rome were slaves. A rich man might own as many as 500 slaves and an emperor usually had more than 20,000 at his disposal.
https://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/ancient-rome/roman-slaves/
​

There are various estimates non say slavery disappeared from christian rome.


Your aside. Yes christians had a major hand in making slavery illegal though it wasn't all Christians who led the protests. But you also need to remember, it was christians running the slave trade.

 

[IndigoChild5559]

No, not entirely, but the slave economy slowly evaporated. Some say Medievel Serfs were slaves but that's a different thing.
Slavery came back with the rise of Islam, and Western exposure to slave cultures during the age of discovery.

In addition to serfs, there were slaves.

 

[amorphous_constellation]

But anyways, there is the Nicene Creed and the Apostle's Creed that most denominations swear allegiance to. Most swear by the Bible, and most of those denominations swear by the King James Version of the Bible, although this isn't always true. If you believe Christ is your lord and savior but don't attend church or read the Bible I would still consider yourself a Christian, even if a nominal one.

Christians believe Christ is God made flesh. That he's perfect. He is God incarnate. At least to trinitarian Christians. That's all that really matters to them.

I think your reduction here seem demonstrative of how the framework is scaled, but I think I can easily show that even with this, the complications presented by the religion are fairly irreducible, even at that foundational level. The moment, with Christianity, that you ask a question about how it works, then there are a million conclusions you could make, even with hardly any scripture, even when asking what the foundational standards are.

But going forth from that, and adding in an understanding of the bible, and history, and what the rule-making interpreters said, or coming to your own conclusions, all seem to quickly displace the primary value of faith. Trying to understand the bible, in an antiquated version of english, itself a hard thing to understand, translated from hebrew, which is again hard to understand and interpret, about how one set of texts radically reformed another, cannot possibly be easy or straightforward.

At best, you not only have faith in the son of god, and all the things you wrote about him, but you have faith that the equations between all these texts work out, so that your faith is correct. The average person cannot possibly understand the sheer math of the bible, beneath so much ancient language and custom, to lean on understanding

So your explanation reflects, for example, the kind of faith my mother has. But the fact is, the moment I started reading the bible she gave me, I quickly would both know more than her, and immediately have far more questions about it than she ever had.

And moving on to what the vast majority of Christians do, it is not, I think, actually to merely have faith in the foundational principles, but to augment it with something they read in the bible, and interpreted. This gets to the crux of why people say there are 'so many denominations.' This is because it is extremely easy, to read something in the bible, anywhere in the bible, and give it a unique interpretation, and then augment your faith with it. This will inevitably occur, and has always occurred, just via sheer complication

 

[PruePhillip]

Romes climate was similar in at the time of Christian Rome to the time of the roman republic.

The Germanic regions were sparsely populated by rome, only garrisons and administration. It was the loathing towards the roman conquers and their complacency that led the Visigoths to sac and cause the downfall of western Rome, emigration and tourism were to northern Europe were not big on the average migrants to live list.

Even after Rome had passed it days of greatness, it is thought that 25% of all people in Rome were slaves. A rich man might own as many as 500 slaves and an emperor usually had more than 20,000 at his disposal.
https://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/ancient-rome/roman-slaves/
​

There are various estimates non say slavery disappeared from christian rome.


Your aside. Yes christians had a major hand in making slavery illegal though it wasn't all Christians who led the protests. But you also need to remember, it was christians running the slave trade.

I have read that climate was a big thing in the final push into the Eastern Roman empire - not Europe's climate but that of the far east.
And Roman slaves weren't like the archetypal cotton pickin' African slave in the American southern states.
But if people bring up 'white man' and 'slavery' just point out that if Europe didn't exist the world would be full of slaves today - some in Central America eaten, and those in Arab nations castrated without modern surgergy.

 

[Heyo]

Even after Rome had passed it days of greatness, it is thought that 25% of all people in Rome were slaves. A rich man might own as many as 500 slaves and an emperor usually had more than 20,000 at his disposal.
https://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/ancient-rome/roman-slaves/
​

Yes, but there were even more slaves at the height of the empire. Slaves were gained from the defeated populations during the expansions. The economy rested on them and when the expansion stopped, the economy tanked.
That's what happens when a society depends on unlimited growth.

 

[ChristineM]

I have read that climate was a big thing in the final push into the Eastern Roman empire - not Europe's climate but that of the far east.
And Roman slaves weren't like the archetypal cotton pickin' African slave in the American southern states.
But if people bring up 'white man' and 'slavery' just point out that if Europe didn't exist the world would be full of slaves today - some in Central America eaten, and those in Arab nations castrated without modern surgergy.

And still slavery did not disappear from christian Rome.

A point of interest, although western rome fell in 476ad it was not until almost 1000 years later that eastern Rome fell off n 1453.

That's not even 600 years ago.

 

[ChristineM]

Yes, but there were even more slaves at the height of the empire. Slaves were gained from the defeated populations during the expansions. The economy rested on them and when the expansion stopped, the economy tanked.
That's what happens when a society depends on unlimited growth.

Yes of course, i have mentioned that the number of slaves reduced as rome became more lithargic.
The point of the discussion between @PruePhillip and myself is the claim that slavery disappeared under Christian rome. I argue that it didn't.

 

[loverofhumanity]

Correct, there isn't, its over 45000,
Quick Facts About Global Christianity - Center for the Study of Global Christianity
Now getting close to 50,000 and increase at around 5 new denominations per week.

There are also 200+ different versions of the bible in the English language, each is different, some considerably so. Who knows how many in other languages.

Yes there are a lot of denominations of Christianity in the world , i wonder why some people are so keen to deny it

I think it’s because it exposes a major flaw. And that is if Christians obeyed or are obeying Christ’s commandment to love one another why are they so disunited and divided? If they truly loved each other then they would not allow their differences to divide them. Which means Christians should not be preaching love to others.

 

[amorphous_constellation]

Yes, but there were even more slaves at the height of the empire. Slaves were gained from the defeated populations during the expansions. The economy rested on them and when the expansion stopped, the economy tanked.
That's what happens when a society depends on unlimited growth.

I'm not entirely sure about that, because didn't all the societies back then also just trade or sell slaves, even if there wasn't a war? It doesn't seem like it required expansion exactly. Nor is it exactly clear what the economy of the ancient civilizations was even based on, if we are talking about growth. Because building mega-lithic structures, even if they took a couple hundred years, did not actually produce anything tangible, no matter how extravagant they were. Also I have questions on how ancient banks / inflation might have worked.

 

[amorphous_constellation]

Romes climate was similar in at the time of Christian Rome to the time of the roman republic.

Are you sure. Wasn't there some big thing about the desertification happening back then, toward the east

 

[Heyo]

I'm not entirely sure about that, because didn't all the societies back then also just trade or sell slaves, even if there wasn't a war?

Yes, but those slaves were expensive. If you get them as spoils of war, they are cheap.

It doesn't seem like it required expansion exactly. Nor is it exactly clear what the economy of the ancient civilizations was even based on, if we are talking about growth.

Food, mostly, but also raw materials and luxury items. Rome was a pre-industrial empire, comparable to 18th c. Europe.

Because building mega-lithic structures, even if they took a couple hundred years, did not actually produce anything tangible, no matter how extravagant they were.

We are talking Rome here. Viaducts, aqueducts, theatres, arenas, palaces, multi-level apartment blocks, wealth and culture Europe didn't regain for 1500 years later.

 

[amorphous_constellation]

We are talking Rome here. Viaducts, aqueducts, theatres, arenas, palaces, multi-level apartment blocks, wealth and culture Europe didn't regain for 1500 years later.

Ok, yeah I guess a couple things there have utility, but it kind of seems like other things really didn't. I mean I think the basilicas, churches, palaces, and arenas look incredible, but how much labor, and how long, did some of those things take to make? Would humans suffer any real privation had they never made them, is what I am asking.

 

[Heyo]

Ok, yeah I guess a couple things there have utility, but it kind of seems like other things really didn't. I mean I think the basilicas, churches, palaces, and arenas look incredible, but how much labor, and how long, did some of those things take to make? Would humans suffer any real privation had they never made them, is what I am asking.

Would you really need a TV, internet, a car, ...? Those are things that aren't essential but they are only possible because of the wealth in an industrialized nation.

 

[Soapy]

Why do all the non-religious claim there's 41,000 denominations of Christianity? There isn't. The people that count that number use every nation's religion as a different denomination. There isn't 200+ versions of Catholicism, there is one Catholic church. In reality there is probably only 400-500 different major Christian denominations.

But anyways, there is the Nicene Creed and the Apostle's Creed that most denominations swear allegiance to. Most swear by the Bible, and most of those denominations swear by the King James Version of the Bible, although this isn't always true. If you believe Christ is your lord and savior but don't attend church or read the Bible I would still consider yourself a Christian, even if a nominal one…..

Christians believe Christ is God made flesh. That he's perfect. He is God incarnate. At least to trinitarian Christians. That's all that really matters to them.

TRINITARIAN CHRISTIANS believe what was quoted above.

And yes, the mass majority of ‘Christians’ are trinitarian.

I ‘class’ myself as a Christian but I do not believe that Jesus is Almighty God.

I believe that Jesus is ‘The Last Adam’ - the second and last man to be created sinless, righteous, and holy, not PROCREATED from the seed of a sinful human male.

Prior to his creation in the body of the Virgin Mary, GOD SENT AN ANGEL to the virgin to announce to her that GOD had found favour in her and that through her A CHILD WOULD BE BORN who would be ‘HOLY’ and CALLED ‘The Son of God’ BECAUSE the child would be created by virtue of the Spirit of God overshadowing her.

In prophesy GOD stated that He would send a saviour - a SERVANT - who would do His bidding and that He would CHOSE that servant:

• “Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him, and he will bring justice to the nations.” (Isaiah 42:1)

God states that he [will] put His Spirit on this servant whom He [will] choose and delight in.

This is reflected exactly in the later scriptures wherein GOD says of Jesus:

• ‘This is my Son in whom I am well pleased!’

It is interesting to note that the word for ’Son’ and the word for ‘Servant’ are akin if the servant is fully dutiful to his master.

And, indeed, GOD does ‘Put His Spirit’ on this dutiful Servant - John the Baptist stating:

• ‘I myself did not know [Jesus of Nazareth even though he was my cousin], but the One who sent me [Almighty God] to baptize with water told me, ‘The man on whom you see the Spirit descend and rest is He who will [be] baptize[d] with the Holy Spirit.’ (John 1:33)

It is evident, therefore, that John the Baptist was not lying nor was mistaken that Jesus of Nazareth was a man since God Himself has directed John to observe the interaction - and in no way could it be said that ALMIGHTY GOD could be said to be ‘Pleased’ with ALMIGHTY GOD nor call Himself a ‘SERVANT’ nor a ‘SON’.

And note also that God, in Isaiah, stated that it would be ‘HIS SPIRIT’ that was put onto this Servant/Son.

And, it would be BECAUSE of this ‘Anointing’ that this servant/son would ‘bring justice to the nations’ as a credited apostle spoke:

• “You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, announcing the good news of peace through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all. You know what has happened throughout the province of Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached— how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.“ (Acts 10:36-38)

At the time of the speech, Jesus of Nazareth had been anointed by the spirit of God and thus earned the Greek title ‘Christ’ (or ‘Messiah’ in Hebrew words: ‘He who is anointed’) and has died, resurrected, made immortal, and raised up to Heaven along with being GRANTED ‘ALL THINGS’ by Almighty God. So please do not mistake the order of things as many do saying that Jesus ALWAYS had ALL THINGS!!

And, indeed, what does ‘God was with him’ mean?

Does it mean that Jesus [Christ] WAS GOD because God was with him…?

If I am WITH YOU, does that just mean that I AGREE WITH YOU… that I ‘UPHOLD YOU’?

And isn’t that what God said in prophesy:

• ‘My servant whom I uphold’

So, ALMIGHTY GOD - a SPIRIT BEING in a Spirit realm - created a physical world and put (amongst other things) a HUMAN BEING in it to rule over it.
The first man God created was tested as to his rulership and failed… he was initially sinless, holy, righteous in the eyes of God… he did all that God commanded him to do … up until he was tested by one from his own kind… and he sinned.

Since that time - after God relented from His anger at the failing of this man He had entrusted with rulership - God sought ANOTHER man who would be holy, sinless, righteous also - but none was found.

But God foresaw that this might happen and had set a promise in place that salvation would come by way of another of mankind who would not be from a natural procreated offspring of man but by:

• THE SEED OF A WOMAN!!!!!

What did that mean? Well, I explained it at the start of thereabouts. Sin is through the male procreation - but Jesus was not born by the procreation by a male but by GOD just as the first man was born by God directly: ‘a last Adam’!:

• ‘For by the misdemeanour of one man sin entered the world …. And by the sacrifice by one man sin [will be] destroyed’ (paraphrased)

This ‘Man’ is Jesus the Christ of God!

And his reward for his sacrifice and sinlessness, holiness, and righteousness: To become THE RULER OF ALL THINGS OF CREATION.

So, just as Almighty God is ruler over the kingdom of the spirits - so Jesus Christ, a glorified man, is ruler over the physical creates world.

This is what it means when it is said that:

• ‘Jesus is Lord of All’ (all of CREATION!)

 

[ChristineM]

Are you sure. Wasn't there some big thing about the desertification happening back then, toward the east

We are talking 250/300 years, not 1000s