[AndyTheBear]

You find them “ambitious” concepts? I offer that this is reflection on you, not on the concepts. If you do not feel that communities have those shared interests, I’d be curious to know why. But in short, it appears that from the perspective of substantive argument you are abandoning the field.

Of coarse communities have such concepts. Which is why I think of humans as more than mere biochemical machines. Which in turn stands as evidence inconsistent with the predictions made by naturalism.

Too bad Christianity as a religion has so little to do with what Jesus said.

Wait a minute...you are saying its too bad that Christians aren't following "revealed truth" now?

That would have been more convincing had Jesus not also called the Jews sons of Satan. In John 8:44 Jesus says to them, “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.”

Jesus was not calling "the Jews" the sons of Satan, but particular Jews. You do get that Jesus was a Jew right? He was calling out religious leaders of the time for being corrupt hypocrites who loved the power and authority and honor of their station, but were not true to the Word of God. Do you have some reading comprehension difficulty I should know about? I am amazed you missed this.

Now suppose, I as an American Christian call out some T.V. preacher for only being interested in money and high living, and for not following the ways of Jesus. Are you going to then accuse me of hating American Christians? Get Real!

It is the explicit articulation of anti-Semitism in the New Testament, especially in the Gospel of John, that generated the unspeakable sufferings of the Holocaust.

Uhm, perhaps I am the one with the reading comprehension problem. I have read this gospel and studied it quite a bit, and somehow completely missed this. Could you be more specific as to where this directive to persecute Jews is?

[EnderWiggins]

”Of coarse communities have such concepts. Which is why I think of humans as more than mere biochemical machines. Which in turn stands as evidence inconsistent with the predictions made by naturalism. “

Too bad then that these things are already perfectly consistent with a naturalistic world view. Why explain them using magic” when no such explanation is necessary? It reminds me of when Napoleon complained to Laplace that his epic volume on mathematics never once referred to God. Laplace responded simply, “Sire, I had no need of that hypothesis.”

”Wait a minute...you are saying its too bad that Christians aren't following "revealed truth" now? “

Well, in the first place, what I was saying is that you are being disingenuous by ignoring the vast majority of the New Testament (let’s not even get started on the Old) by pretending that two quotations from Jesus constitute the whole of “revealed truth” found in them. The entire set of books is supposed to be “revealed truth,” so you cannot run away from the cow to skim the cream.

But ultimately, of course they’re not following “revealed truth” since there is no reason to believe there is any such thing. They are following the product of ordinary human artifice under the false belief they are “revealed truths.” This is how such patent and atrocious immorality as the holocaust gains its temporary ascendancy. People falsely believe that God has given them permission to slaughter their fellows.

Do not mistake my arguendo acceptance of "revealed truth" for the sake of discussion as agreement that there really is such a thing.

”Jesus was not calling "the Jews" the sons of Satan, but particular Jews. You do get that Jesus was a Jew right? He was calling out religious leaders of the time for being corrupt hypocrites who loved the power and authority and honor of their station, but were not true to the Word of God. Do you have some reading comprehension difficulty I should know about? I am amazed you missed this. “

Why are you accusing me of a reading comprehension problem here when the early church father’s all understood that passage exactly as I have portrayed it? Even Augustine wrote a Diatribe Against the Jews and (like Martin Luther later) used exactly this passage along with the rest of the Gospel of John to justify their anti-Semitism. If I have such a problem, then I share it with the greatest theologians of Christianity.

Worse... based upon your previous post even you accept and embrace the image of the Jews from the Gospel of John as "Christ Killers." I imagine that embarrassment keeps you from acknowledging that you were already called out on your justification of the Holocaust as payback for the murder of Jesus. But your paper trail is already in place.

”Now suppose, I as an American Christian call out some T.V. preacher for only being interested in money and high living, and for not following the ways of Jesus. Are you going to then accuse me of hating American Christians? Get Real!”

No. I would instead accuse you of being out of lockstep with historical Christianity.

”Uhm, perhaps I am the one with the reading comprehension problem. I have read this gospel and studied it quite a bit, and somehow completely missed this. Could you be more specific as to where this directive to persecute Jews is?”

If you have completely missed it, I cannot help you. I can only point out to you that historical Christianity and the Church fathers did not miss it. Although the actual “blood curse” ("His blood be upon us and upon our children.") is found in Matthew, it is in the Gospel of John that greatest efforts are made by the author to shift the responsibility for Jesus’ crucifixion most firmly from the Romans to the Jews. Throughout John, “the Jews” is used as a collective term for the entire Jewish people rather than a small number of Jewish leaders among the Sanhedrin or the Pharisees. It is simply an acknowledged and tragic fact of history that through Gospel of John, the image of "the Jews" acting collectively as the enemy of Jesus became fixed in the Christian mind.

Now... it appears that you have selected as you rationalization here that the Gospel of John has simple been tragically misunderstood by 2000 thousand years of Christianity. And my only response to that is to reflect upon the competence of its author. Certainly, a competent God might have anticipated that reaction and written a subtly different book, thus saving millions of “His chosen people.”

You know, I an humble enough to expect very little from God. But one thing I would expect is the ability to deliver a single volume of unambiguous prose.