Posted on 02/08/2013 6:58:50 PM PST by daniel1212
The word Jesus stuck in my throat like an elephant tusk; no matter how hard I choked, I couldn't hack it out. Those who professed the name commanded my pity and wrath.
I began researching the Religious Right..
Ken Smith encouraged me to explore the kind of questions I admire:
Ken and his wife, Floy, and I became friends.
I started reading the Bible. I read the way a glutton devours.
I counted the costs. And I did not like the math on the other side..
Then, one ordinary day, I came to Jesus, openhanded..
(Excerpt) Read more at christianitytoday.com ...
Interesting what a google search can turn up.
She mentioned Syracuse in the article and I began so suspect that she lived in Syracuse, otherwise, she would not have been able to establish a friendship easily with the pastor and his wife.
That led me to suspect Syracuse University as her place of employment.
Sure enough......
http://www.ipcsav.org/article/false-identity/
“At the age of 28 years, Rosaria was finishing a PhD in English Literature & Cultural Studies and working as a teaching associate in the Women’s Studies Department at Syracuse University, one of the strongest such departments in the nation. “
Matthew was a Tax Collector, so it is logical to assume he was literate.
Sorry; i know it is normally 300 words for an excerpt, but when i tried to post more than 100, even without marking it as an excerpt, thew software state CT could only be 100 words.
I guess that is how much they want to get the word out about faith.
Mark? I have no reason to believe he had no education.
Where would those kinds or revolutionary teachings have come from then? What human could have come up with the teachings of Jesus?
Would not the uniqueness of them and their importance to mankind, be enough to verify that they were not of human origin?
And if they were of human origin, how could the information have been lost of who that person was who came up with them, when the other writings of many other great philosophers managed to survive?
I really don’t believe that the people in those days were as uneducated and illiterate as everyone likes to make them out to be.
There’s this perception that people who lived then were just ignorant dolts. That they were illiterate, therefore stupid.
Even if they were illiterate, that does not by default equate to stupidity. It simply means illiterate.
Smart people can be illiterate if they never had the opportunity to learn to read and write.
In the Religion forum, on a thread titled My Train Wreck Conversion..., I despised Christians. Then I somehow became one. , jongaltsr wrote:
I accepted Jesus as a matter of fact when I was a child. As I grew up to many things made me rethink his existence. To many facts are missing,, undocumented, and lacking and form of proof.
If you're referring to Jesus' mention in every December issue of Newsweek "Who was the real Jesus?" and suchlike, you must first understand the nature of historical biography in the era of 2,000 years ago.
They didn't have typewriters, and weren't on contract to fill out a 300-page book, as biographies are written today. Read any of the biographies that existed at that time: None of the historical figures that were written about included much more than a brief mention of their childhoods. It was not considered relevant to who they were.
NOT one document was EVER survived or even mentioned where as enough writings of everyone else of any importance has survived. Jesus was not even mentioned by anyone with the exception of Paul and the Disciples, and THAT only occurred over two Decades after his was supposedly crucified.
Josephus? Ever heard of Josephus, the Jewish historian who wrote history for the Romans?
As to the historical veracity of the accounts, they seem correct. They have their political milieu correct, the right people doing the right historical things at the right time. The culture and tradition of Jewish life was captured in exacting detail--a non-Jew wouldn't have finessed it so correctly. So...the accounts DO seem to have been written down or at least dictated by Jews who themselves were there, in that location, at that time.
As to Paul...he was considered BY THE DISCIPLES THEMSELVES to be a disciple. He convinced them, and that will be good enough for me.
As an aside, are you aware that (IIRC the order) Socrates taught Plato who taught Aristotle...and that Socrates didn't leave anything written behind?
Oops.
I mean, if you're going to apply your own standard of historical validation, are you not now compelled to disbelieve in the existence of Socrates? (Mr. Hemlock Drinkin', "I'm lookin' for an honest man as I carry this lantern in broad daylight" kinda guy.)
It was Plato and Aristotle that wrote about this mythical Socrates that, according to you, we know could not have existed.
Oh, by the way, his students Plato and Aristotle only left behind FOUR (4) manuscripts attesting to his existence. Only four.
And yet, historians don't question whether he ever existed.
This is hypocrisy when we have 5,200+ manuscripts detailing Christ. Oh, and they were written about as long after the fact as Socrates' vicarious writings were, too. (Just something to consider.) Shows you how biased the discipline of history has become, eh?
Even Herod’s records of crucifixions make no mention of Christ or anyone but criminals, political enemies, captured soldiers but no religious profits.
Prophets [sic].
The Jewish scholars certainly believed he existed. They still do, today--they just don't accept him. But they don't discount that he existed.
The Roman historian Josephus, as I'd mentioned, seemed to have heard of him. 'nuff said.
Nor is there any mention anywhere that Jesus EVER wrote - period. It is also noted that NONE of his disciples were ever capable of writing. No scribes were ever mentioned which many illiterate (most were so).
Matthew was a tax collector. Why would a tax collector be illiterate, in your view? Wouldn't that make the process a bit more difficult and prone to dispute?! Wouldn't a TAX COLLECTOR have to write down the person's name, and amount, and date paid? Oh, and province, and where born, where living?
Only Paul wrote but 1. he was not a disciple, 2. He was a Roman Citizen and well educated in Greek and other languages. His writings are prolific.
Incorrect. Paul was a disciple. Paul was HIGHLY educated--in Phillippians, he used polysyndeton and chiasm. I took three years of Spanish and cannot very easily do any of that in Spanish, and yet Paul did it in a language that was not his native Hebrew--he did it in Koine Greek! (Why don't YOU try that?) ;)
I have become closer to the fact that there is definitely a God. I see it not only in everything around me but also in the actual evolution of mankind and every creature on this planet.
We're in agreement. The evidence is quite overwhelming.
Look, I think you're an okay guy, it's just that you need to enroll in a serious Bible study at the college level, and take some Koine Greek. Like I did, back when I was sounding a lot like you. ;)
Jesus may have existed. I can’t say - but his teachings (or whoever originated the concepts attributed to him), definitely were extremely important to mankind.
Please think of it this way: There's no question he existed. The Hebrew scholars to this day aren't arguing against THAT, and they carry forth the arguments made by their forefathers.
Add to that the writings of Josephus, who noted the events in that province at that time.
Add to that the fact that the apostles scattered, reaching the entire Mediterranean world at great personal sacrifice to themselves, and over many years--the remainder of their lifetimes! How many people do THAT, if they haven't experienced some event they feel compelled to share? I'll answer that:
Look at other religions...I'll take Islam (although, pardon me, I COULD also have chosen Mormonism on this account): The apostles of Islam did the two common things men do when they're part of a false religion: (1) they use their apostleship to travel and gain access to women for sex, and (2) they use their apostleship to gain access to wealth.
N.B.: Christ's apostles...did neither.
...and that's how you can tell. Look at their actions, for that's how you will know them. Christ's apostles gained nothing but death at the hands of the militant Klingon, uh, Roman Empire. (I said that to draw a more accurate mental picture in your mind of the militocracy that Rome was.)
That they were going to be executed was not a surprise to them. They knew they would be. Bone up on your history, and you'll see that some of them were pretty well "warned off" by the authorities several times before they were cashiered. They chose to ignore the warnings.
Now, WHY would they do that? Pursue something arduous, risky, gets no "p*ssy" (to put it crudely in the colloquial), gains no wealth, takes you far from home and family, puts you amidst strange heathen peoples with their strange barbarian tongues--especially when you're a good, well-educated Jewish young man who's always been taught to more or less distance yourself from the heathen?
Must've been SOME compelling reason. Dontcha think?
As a final thought, C.S. Lewis and Lee Strobel have pointed out that Jesus left no room in our minds that he could be anything other than the Son of God, a delusional madman, or a liar. (IIRC, someone help me with that line of argument, it's really facinating when you consider it.)
Always HTH on this issue!
Sauron
I just read an article that said that in those days fisherman in Galilee were fairly prosperous...middle-class at least.
I agree with you that there are a lot of misconceptions out there.
Christianity is constituted so that warrant for its faith is based on the premise that God manifests that He is the living God, including that those who believe on Him out of a honest and contrite heart realize effects in heart and life which correspond to His promises, and though this includes trials, it also includes positive things which defy reasonable naturalistic explanations, though my experience with atheists is they simply cannot allow any possibility even for any supernatural explanations.
While there certainly can be natural reasons for claims (yet God uses nature) as well as fabrications, there are also those which testify more clearly to a supernatural cause. Watch many here: http://www.cbn.com/700club/features/Amazing/ (which does not sanction everything that Robertson says).
Add to such the thousands of classical hymns about a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus, which i think is unique in scope and depth.
As regards “that NONE of his disciples were ever capable of writing,” this may indicate you simply read atheistic type material. In contrast, see scholars here: http://bible.org/seriespage/did-some-disciples-take-notes-during-jesus%E2%80%99-ministry
“NOT one document was EVER survived”
This is a good point. However, not one document from this period has survived. You know Plato, Aristotle, Herodotus, etc, everything that we know of this period of time, is contained in copies that date to the latter part of the medieval ages, some thousand or so years after they were first written.
With the exception of one - scripture. The earliest complete copy we have is the Codex Vaticanus which dates to 320 AD. We have copies of various books in the Old Testament that date back to before the time of Christ.
With respect to the new - we have fragments and copies that date to the early 2nd century and mid 2nd century, some 50-100 years after Christ. This is unprecedented.
“Jesus was not even mentioned by anyone with the exception of Paul and the Disciples, and THAT only occurred over two Decades after his was supposedly crucified.”
Who is the first independent person to mention Julius Caesar, and when did he write?
“It is also noted that NONE of his disciples were ever capable of writing. No scribes were ever mentioned which many illiterate (most were so).”
Absence of Evidence is not evidence of absence. What evidence do you have that they could not write?
“Jesus may have existed. I can’t say - but his teachings (or whoever originated the concepts attributed to him), definitely were extremely important to mankind.”
There are secondary sources that refer to Jesus - look up Josephus, look up Suetonius. The same historians that provide the evidence we have for Julius Caesar, are the same historians that mention Christ.
Ultimately it is always about attraction rather than promotion. By living the Word, Pastor Ken and his wife Floy showed what a Christian walk looks like. An amazing story thanks for sharing it
You need to study the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth. In truth every single one of your statements is false. Too bad you haven’t taken the time to find out the truth
He revealed Himself to me in miraculous ways. He let me know that Jesus is real, and led me through my salvation experience step by step. He taught me many things that first night He saved me, and also during the next few days. It was only as time progressed, and I studied The Bible for myself that I came to understand and realize that the many things He led me through and showed me are important truths written about in The Bible.
There isn't any way that I cannot know that it was The LORD who saved me, partly because I know that I did not know, nor could have known the truths that He showed and taught me about in those first few days. The Bible is packed with information that most people, even Christians, unless they have really studied it thoroughly, are not aware of. Even the things that did not make sense to me have since come to make perfect sense to me as I studied The Bible and found and learned about them.
If you will seek Him with all of your heart He is faithful and will reveal Himself to you, as well as lead you into the truth about The Bible, and your need for a saving relationship with Him, which can come only through His Son Jesus Christ. You can come to Him without understanding that the things in The Bible are true, if you are sincere about wanting to know truth and want to follow it with all of your heart. He will show you everything that you need to know. He will meet you as you are, and where you are at.
The thing that most people are not aware of is that they are thirsting for love. Even more than knowledge, which is good and necessary, it is real and lasting love your heart is longing for. Do you want to know love? If you do, you will find it in Jesus Christ, the one who died for you on the cross, and it will last forever.
You must have been told these things you are spouting and you have fallen for the deception. But, if you believe this due to your own research, you need learn better research skills.
Bell, I noticed that SBG didn’t get back to you. Just click on her name at the end of her post. That takes you to her profile. There is a link there to her group’s webpage, where you can listen to her sing and also see pictures etc. She has a lovely voice.
Wow! What wonderful testimony. Lot’s of lessons in that story.
Great point!! I hd to look it up and you are RIGHT!
Thank you for the info. Will do tomorrow. God bless!
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