Did Jesus Actually Exist?

@Frank Apisa,

Quote:

I'm not a big fan of religion...especially of Christianity. But after listening to that rant, Z, if we had to have a dictator, I'd sooner pick the pope than you. You seem a bit out of control.

You only speak like that because you lack the prerequisite insight which fuels the topic. And the fact that I never volunteered myself for your internet dictatorship-election, makes your comment irrelevant.

1 Reply

@Olivier5,

Quote:

If that's the point you were trying to make, you failed. What you did instead, was try to abuse history to make an ideological point. That's pretty disgusting in my book.

Abuse history? Roman Catholic church has killed 100,000,000 people in her reign of terror. Add up Hitler, Mao Zedong, Pol Pot, and countless others, and we'll maybe start getting close to the numbers of these poor persecuted Christians. Give me a break.

Quote:

Yes, "the meek will inherit the Earth". In fact they have: we call it democracy. "Give onto Ceasar" provided the foundation for the idea of a secular state. And "turn the other cheek" has been used quite effectively to shame the aggressive tendencies of countless oppressors, e.g. by Gandhi.

Yeah, keep quoting Ghandi. The same guy who said "Among the many misdeeds of British rule in India, history will look
upon the Act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest." That pacifist? That dude right there? Unless you're implicating that he thought depriving Indians of skeet shooting was "the blackest form of misdeed," then we'll just go ahead and assume he didn't think India "turning the other cheek" was the greatest answer to a completely oppressive problem.

Anything else, Captain?

2 Replies

@ZarathustraReborn,

ZarathustraReborn wrote:

Quote:
I'm not a big fan of religion...especially of Christianity. But after listening to that rant, Z, if we had to have a dictator, I'd sooner pick the pope than you. You seem a bit out of control.

You only speak like that because you lack the prerequisite insight which fuels the topic. And the fact that I never volunteered myself for your internet dictatorship-election, makes your comment irrelevant.

Jeez...you know why I speak like that??? Are you clairvoyant?

If you are...you need an adjustment. I may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but I have lots of prerequisite insights into the **** that fuels this topic. As we say here in New Jersey...I got 'em right heah! (That comment was accompanied by a grabbing of my crotch...in case you do not have the prerequisite insights into understanding Jersey.)

You gotta cool it, Dude.

The possible answers to this issue are not as cut and dry as you want to make them.

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@ZarathustraReborn,

ZarathustraReborn wrote:

Quote:
If that's the point you were trying to make, you failed. What you did instead, was try to abuse history to make an ideological point. That's pretty disgusting in my book.

Abuse history? Roman Catholic church has killed 100,000,000 people in her reign of terror.

I am pretty sure the number does not exceed 98,465,328 people. Stop exaggerating. It doesn't help your cause.

1 Reply

@ZarathustraReborn,

There are countless other passages about Jesus in the Talmud.

The passage about Yeshu being hanged on Passover is almost universally considered as about the crucifixion. There are others which may be about other guys, as the chronology does not seem to work very well for some of them, but as you said yourself the rabbis who wrote the Talmud could not care less about chronology.

Bottom line: "Yeshu the Nazarine" and "Yeshu ben Pantera" in the Talmud always refer to our guy. "Pantera" is the nickname of a roman legionary who acording to the Talmud was Jesus' real father.

My point is that these passages are always polemical: they are meant to re-assure observant Jews that they belong to the 'right' religion and should not 'foolishly' convert to Christianity. Now, if those rabbis had had any reason to believe that there was no such guy as Yeshu, historically, they would have used that as great polemical material. Yet they didn't... Instead they chose to present him as a sorcerer, a mischievous student, or the son of a whore.

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@ZarathustraReborn,

Quote:

Roman Catholic church has killed 100,000,000 people in her reign of terror.

LOL. You're pulling your punches too much! Why stop at 100 million? They must have killed 100 BILLION people at least... Scrap that: 100 trillions!

Kidding aside, would you care to prove your claim? Like where and when did these 100 million live???

Quote:

Add up Hitler, Mao Zedong, Pol Pot, and countless others, and we'll maybe start getting close to the numbers of these poor persecuted Christians. Give me a break.

Actually, if you add Hilter's crimes to Stalin's and Mao's, you're pretty much up there already. All done in a few years only, by a few atheists at least for the last two... Atheism is thus the worse thing that ever happened to mankind, by your own reasoning.

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@Frank Apisa,

Quote:

I am pretty sure the number does not exceed 98,465,328 people. Stop exaggerating. It doesn't help your cause.

Quote:

Kidding aside, would you care to prove your claim? Like where and when did these 100 million live???

http://www.truthbeknown.com/victims.htm

Christianity has been a repressive force against the advancement of civilization.

Arnold Toynbee: "When the Greco-Roman world was converted to Christianity, the divinity was drained out of nature and concentrated in a single, transcendent God. Man's greedy impulse to exploit nature used to be held in check by his awe, his pious worship of nature. Now monotheism, as enunciated in Genesis, has removed the age-old restraint."

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@ZarathustraReborn,

So when a country such as the US does anything, like killing Indians, it's because of the Roman Catholics???

When the Turks invade central Europe, it's because of the popes?

You are manipulating history. I rest my case.

1 Reply

@ZarathustraReborn,

ZarathustraReborn wrote:

Quote:
I am pretty sure the number does not exceed 98,465,328 people. Stop exaggerating. It doesn't help your cause.

Quote:
Kidding aside, would you care to prove your claim? Like where and when did these 100 million live???

http://www.truthbeknown.com/victims.htm

Christianity has been a repressive force against the advancement of civilization.

Arnold Toynbee: "When the Greco-Roman world was converted to Christianity, the divinity was drained out of nature and concentrated in a single, transcendent God. Man's greedy impulse to exploit nature used to be held in check by his awe, his pious worship of nature. Now monotheism, as enunciated in Genesis, has removed the age-old restraint."

And then there was the article in the National Enquirer!

Ya gotta lighten up, Z. Have a bit of fun with this thread.

BOTTOM LINE:

NOBODY can say definitively that Jesus existed or did not exist. Somebody (or a collection of some bodies, perhaps with one dominant person leading) obviously started a minor sect of Judaism…which Paul used to become Christianity. It happened…and all we can do at this point is to make guesses about its Genesis…and those guesses will most likely be influenced by our personal prejudices and disposition on the issue.

Somebody invented the wheel, Z. Somebody tamed fire. Somebody found and smelted copper and iron. Probably several people did all those things reasonably concurrently.

We cannot identify that person (or persons) but it happened.

Lighten up and just enjoy the thread.

Christianity has done lots of bad ****...and plenty of good stuff also. We are as indebted to it for its contributions and we correctly are angry with it for its abominations.

1 Reply

@Olivier5,

What is the easiest way to motivate man's conscience if not through the propellant of a fabricated moral reality supplemented by an infallible, perfect, divinely-teleological being who condones your evil actions? Hitler roused the public through speeches on Jews being "Christ Killers." We used Christ and Christianity as a reason to invade Afghanistan. Bush said: ‘God told me to strike at al Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East."

I could go on and on, but I have a job. (Not that you all don't.)

1 Reply

@Frank Apisa,

Listen, bud-- I wouldn't be here arguing if I felt that to be the case. This isn't a 50/50 good and evil split here, and no one who isn't a bald faced apologist would disagree with me here. We live in a tyrannical world ran by global-elites who use existing infrastructures to morally exculpate their misdeeds. Period. Christianity is just the current pawn, therefore the current battle. Nothing more, nothing less. Freedom is dependent on correct information-- a choice based on impartial or incorrect facts isn't a choice at all.

1 Reply

@ZarathustraReborn,

ZarathustraReborn wrote:

Listen, bud-- I wouldn't be here arguing if I felt that to be the case. This isn't a 50/50 good and evil split here, and no one who isn't a bald faced apologist would disagree with me here. We live in a tyrannical world ran by global-elites who use existing infrastructures to morally exculpate their misdeeds. Period. Christianity is just the current pawn, therefore the current battle. Nothing more, nothing less. Freedom is dependent on correct information-- a choice based on impartial or incorrect facts isn't a choice at all.

I think you may have missed the part where I suggested you lighten up a bit.

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@ZarathustraReborn,

Quote:

Bush said: ‘God told me to strike at al Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East."

Okay I get it now: whenever any arsehole says his actions are motivated by God, the real guilty party is... the Catholic Church. Or Jesus maybe.

When some dude kills his wife and says Jesus made him do it, you believe him, right?

1 Reply

@Finn dAbuzz,

I never stated that a cult leader by the name of Jesus that was the foundation of the Christian faith could not had existed just that the odds seem in the ball park of 50/50 at best.

As far as the supernatural elements of the Jesus stories I agree with President Jefferson is bullshit and he seems sure that such a man exist but not as a man/god.

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@Olivier5,

I wrote:

What you don't believe can kill you.

Olivier5 wrote:

And therefore, what you believe can also kill you. Your point is thus irrelevant.

To you, perhaps. I prefer to keep an eye on the things I know of.

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@neologist,

Quote:

I prefer to keep an eye on the things I know of.

Whatever that means... I do that a lot, too. Don't worry for me.

1 Reply

@Olivier5,

Olivier5 wrote:

What you did instead, was try to abuse history to make an ideological point. That's pretty disgusting in my book.

You can't get much more disgusting. History was so beautiful, but what man would want her now?

1 Reply

@izzythepush,

I take exception to instrumentalising science to score cheap ideological points, and in this case to historical revisionism, yes. Stupid me.

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@Olivier5,

Quote:

Okay I get it now: whenever any arsehole says his actions are motivated by God, the real guilty party is... the Catholic Church. Or Jesus maybe.

When some dude kills his wife and says Jesus made him do it, you believe him, right?

That's like me saying, Marxism isn't a bad idea-- people have just used it as a means to enslave/kill millions. Ok, fine-- no idea purely abstracted can have any ill effect. But, oh, wait. Actions are almost always propelled by ideals which are inoculated into the social terrarium and exploited by those intelligent/destructive enough to seize the inherent potential power they hold.

Yes, Christianity is to blame if that man who killed his wife was raised in a fundamentally Christian household which taught him that literal Biblical stories should be transliterated into divine, morally inspired realities. These are doctrines that many Christian faiths fully support (fundamentalism/mythical-literalism). But unfortunately, the sad case of the fact is that, yes, you could use the Bible to moralize your way into uxoricide if necessary. You could moralize your way into genocide, infanticide, and a whole other array of fun sounding "icides" to boot.

And I use the word Roman Catholic, not because all sects which committed Christian crimes considered themselves Catholics, but the reality is that Christianity as we know it is ALL Roman Catholic. Their Bible, their vote, their day of worship, their holidays, their rituals, their adaptation of every god man under the sun from Zarathustra, Attis, Dionysus, Osiris, and a myriad other options to list. It's all Roman Catholic.

1 Reply

@ZarathustraReborn,

Quote:

And I use the word Roman Catholic, not because all sects which committed Christian crimes considered themselves Catholics, but the reality is that Christianity as we know it is ALL Roman Catholic.

Huhuh? So it’s not a manifestation of the anti-catholic prejudice so frequent in anglo societies?

The holocaust, if it must be blamed on Christians rather than to the “death of God”, is more easily linked to Luther and his virulent anti-semitism than to Catholicism. (The popes in fact used Luther’s anti-semitism against him, to prove he must come from the devil)

Likewise, capitalism is not a catholic thing. Weber linked it convincingly to Protestantism. Not that I dislike capitalism, personally, but you seem to.

And Christians are not the only murderers around. Again, atheists have killed more people in the last century alone than in 2 thousand years of Christianity.

So listen to Frank: cool off. You seem to think that there's just one big villain in this world: the Catholic Church. That's prejudiced.

1 Reply

Did Jesus Actually Exist?

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