Posted on 01/03/2002 11:19:13 AM PST by ArGee
A very rich man decided that he wanted to show kindness to the people of the fair city where he lived. Since he was very rich indeed, he decided to throw a banquet for the entire city. He rented the largest sports arena in the city and began his plans. He planned for huge amounts of the best food possible, making allowances for every religious and medical diet. He advertised the banquet in every possible manner - television, radio, billboard, door-to-door canvassing. Considering that there might be some who could not travel, he arranged for free bus transportation to and from the event, and some special-needs vehicles for all who could not ride busses. He even scheduled the banquet to run for 24 hours a day for several days so that everyone could be sure of being served.
He planned long and hard and finally the big day came. The rich man ate quickly and then went about wishing all his guests well and personally making sure that all had every need met. After a while he went outside to tour the grounds and talk with those who had not yet gone in, and those who had already left. Everyone was happy. Many were profusely thankful. It was a glorious occasion.
At one point the rich man noticed a group of people sitting outside a locked door with most unpleasant looks on their faces. Sensing they were not happy, he went over to them. He did not introduce himself but simply asked them if he could be of service.
"We want to go in through this door," one of them replied.
The rich man explained to them that the hall was arranged to feed a large number of people as quickly and effortlessly as possible. This required order inside, and the entrances and exits had been carefully planned to be as efficient as possible. He then offered to go call one of the golf carts that were avaialbe to help people who could not walk far to take them to the entrance. But the man replied, "We do not want to go in the entrance. We want to go in this door. We don't understand why we can't go in any door we wish. We think the man who set this banquet up is mean and hateful for insisting we go in through the entrance. He has tried to bill himself as a very kind man by offering this banquet, but he is not kind at all if he will not indulge us and let us go through this door.
The rich man was distressed at these words, but still attempted to please these people. He tried once more to explain to them what was behind this particular door, and how if they went in this door they would disrupt the meal service being offered inside. He offered to drive them himself, not only to the door, but inside the hall to their tables if they would only go through the entrance to enjoy the meal. Again the man said, "No, but only a hateful man would keep us from going through the door of our choosing. And we will sit here and tell anyone who will listen to us what an awful man he is until he lets us in."
At that the rich man was enraged and he shouted, "Enough." Then he called a police officer to have them thrown off of the property and ordered that they not be allowed to return until the banquet was over and all the scraps had been hauled away. Then, mourning for their loss, he turned to visit with other guests.
Is what you said. This asserts that the religions 'good works' were over shadowed by the 'bad stuff'.
Oh... go ahead.
People have been rude to me before, and, Lord knows, it SURELY can't take up as much space on JimRob's disks as all of the proceeding ~991 other replies.
It is odd how many people today, speaking a different language, being from an entirely different culture and two thousand years later claim to know more about the life of Jesus, than those who walked with Him, spoke His language,and were from the same culture.
As for the sacrifices the believers went through, if that proves a religion's veracity then we'd all better convert to Scientology
I have to agree that sacrifices do not prove the truth of claims..ie the Branch Davidians. It would be difficult however to find men to die for a cause which they knew was a lie. Then their is Paul who publicly killed Christians who changed his mind claiming he saw the risen Lord. I do not know much about Scientology so I would do well to not comment.
Given the fact that Jesus' legs weren't broken (1) it should have taken him days to die on the cross (broken legs makes it much harder to breath in that position because it's distending your diaphram muscles, BTW leg breaking as an act of mercy was in Roman law) there's immediately a good chance that he was alive. There's the spear wound of course (which noice, got the centurion in trouble(2) , more evidence that certain people didn't want Jesus to die). Of course then there's the fact that they cut him down and stuck him in a tomb. According to Roman law (3) the crucified person is to stay on the cross until their bones fall off. Now, if Jesus gets better from that only idiots aren't believers.
I'm not sure who you're classifying as ignorant fishermen but it shouldn't be the prophets. Most of them were doing pretty well in the world (well enough for the crucifixion to take place in the estate of one of them(4) . As for whether they could fool the leaders how difficult that is depends on a lot of things. Jesus said he'd be back within their generation(5) . He didn't come back, something went wrong, whether yo believe or not it's clear that things didn't go according to plan, the apologists have confronted it and I'm not challenging their explanation just pointing it out (note it is possible that Jesus and a few followers just plain bailed, certain legends and archeological finds have been put together that show a group of early Christian went east, hooked through Persia and settled in India,(6) where a group that didn't know they were Christian but were was found during the missionary years of colonialism). If he was dead it's easy, they were in the desert, I live in the desert, you give me over night to transport and bury a body and the only way it's getting found is if somebody builds something there, of course if I seed it with lime they won't even find it then. Even alive it's not that hard to hide in the desert, as the Bedouins taught the Germans in WWI.
Here's my base scenario:
Clearly some form of fix was in, this crucifixion didn't happen right, it wasn't on a road into Jerusalem, the public was far away(7) , the executioner expressed sympathy but didn't act mercifully, the victim wasn't left up there litterally to rot.
Just as clearly something went wrong, the spear wound screwed everything up. Now it was, arguably, a belly wound, belly wounds are almostalways fatal without modern medical attention, but they take a long time to die from (they're fatal because they usually release toxins from the stomack or intestines which slowly poison the wounded person, IMHO one of the worst ways to go).
I'm guessing Jesus wasn't dead when he went into the tomb. At some point that night somebody cracks the tomb open to get him somewhere to recover. Son of God or not, dead or just wounded, you'll probably need some time to recover from a day like that.
At this juncture I think this is where things go way off track. Jesus dies and now the few that were in on the fix (note, these folks still could believe his devineness and be working on something like this, recent events show that people will still follow a religious leader even when the veil has been lifted a little) got some problems. They believe him, and are figuring that he'll probably be back anyway, but it's not going to go the way he outlined. Triumphantly walking back into Jerusalem in a few weeks is now right out. What to do?
Have somebody open the tomb in public. Even when I was young I was always suspicious about this. Why open the tomb(8) . In the desert bodies stink, they stink bad. 3 days in an above ground tomb would not leave things pleasant, seeing the body would not improve one's faith (unless one was really messed up in the head), and the vomitting that would happen when the smell hits would greatly impede one's ability to even see the body. Ah, but if you already know there isn't a body it's a no brainer. Open the tomb, exclaim how it's empty, ah he is risen. Now what you have is a Jesus that still "walking the earth" but nobody can see him.
At least that's my hyper cynical explaination.
Where to start?
Your point is well understood and taken. Perhaps a better example next time.
I will not debate your points with you. You set yourself up to be better than my equal, but you are going in a very differen direction.
There is a lot I can say to a Jew, even one who believes as firmly as you do. And, while I do not speak Hebrew, I have friends who do and help me with my understanding of the original Hebrew in their first century settings. If you want, I could see if one of them would "speak" with you.
But, to go into the specific issues with you personally would distract from the thread. Your point has already been made. If you want to start another thread, or get something started in FReepMail, I will respond. But I don't think it would help anyone else on this thread but you and me.
Shalom.
The Bible is a very different kind of book than The Illiad. If that is not evident to you, then there isn't anything I'm going to say to convince you of it. Literary study is a discipline unto itself. I am not a master, but I have a rudimentary understanding of some of the types of literature.
Shalom.
I have a question that I have never had the time to research. Perhaps you will research it for me as a way to prove that the events in Exodus did not happen.
Egypt was the greatest empire of its time. So was Rome. I know why Rome fell. Why did Egypt? Do you know? Do you have time to find out?
Obviously, I don't have authority to assign homework to you. But, since you claim to have an open mind, I would think this question would be of interest to you. I'm not going to begin to suggest that you won't find an answer. I'm just curious what that answer will be.
Of course, it really isn't so important that you believe G-d did it. It was important for the Egyptians to believe it so they would not chase after the Israelites.
Shalom.
I'm presuming you know how to use Free Republic well enough to follow our thread back. If you do, then you will know that when I was referring to literary devices, I was not referring to the Bible.
If you can not see that, then you really should get a guide for your studies. It would explain a lot about why you keep confusing The Illiad and The Bible.
Just out of curiosity, do you read The Illiad the same way you read a math text? You did say you read every book the same as every other book, didn't you?
Shalom.
Wrong again.
Shalom.
No problem. Easy mistake.
Shalom.
Of course you will have missed out on the Rock God's heaven, and be relegated to the Rock God's hell. Do you not understand this simple point?
You are correct that it is almost universal for humans throughout history to invent religions that explain the unanswerable questions of life nad give life meaning. Of course, every culture invents a different God, no two of them the same, and therein lies the rub.
Even the most devout extremist religious nut only has a small chance of having grown up being exposed to the "right" God/religion out of the thousands that have existed. You might actually be making the right God more angry by following a competing God than by choosing to stay on the sidelines and follow no God. But most religious people think that everything they believe is so blindingly obvious...
No, it's a people problem. People do evil things to each other. That's why there are religions. Like guns, religions don't kill, people do.
God makes the determination. Our lives are an open book.
But how do you know what God is going to decide? How do you know how to live your life so that God will consider you "good?" The Old Testament doesn't give guidance to every situation.
The Jews in the gospel of John, 8th chapter, were ready to stone a woman caught committing adultry. They were basing that off the Jewish law and tradition. Would you have stoned her? If not, why not? And answer for me whether God would consider you "good" if you did one or the other. You either fail to follow the law (if you don't stone her) or you participate in a killing, which some might consider murder since you are without the authority of law (if you do stone her). The murder would clearly violate another law.
I don't have this problem with a professed faith in Jesus Christ.
True.
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