Q and A about what it means to follow Christ

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solwitch wrote:

Attending theological seminars, I can tell you this. The raw was taken out of the Bible... Many uncultured or uneducated individuals whom practice any religion related to the mainstream bible don't know the holy book was edited.


I think what bothers me the most is how some preach without any knowledge or knowing of the history of his or her religion. If people only knew the actual rhymes and fairy tales, the origin of their existence.

Did you folks know that the cross actually had a piece of wood between the crotch of the many men AND woman that have been crucified? No... I didnt think so...

Edit: Almost forgot... People set themselves up for failure... Amen.

You have my attention. I would like to know what in the Bible was edited. Point me to scholarly articles if you can.

Regarding the rest--even assuming some of the Bible has been edited, can you say that it changes the message? The message that God wants us to call upon Him and have Him be the center of our lives?

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Tribulation wrote:

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solwitch wrote:

Attending theological seminars, I can tell you this. The raw was taken out of the Bible... Many uncultured or uneducated individuals whom practice any religion related to the mainstream bible don't know the holy book was edited.


I think what bothers me the most is how some preach without any knowledge or knowing of the history of his or her religion. If people only knew the actual rhymes and fairy tales, the origin of their existence.

Did you folks know that the cross actually had a piece of wood between the crotch of the many men AND woman that have been crucified? No... I didnt think so...

Edit: Almost forgot... People set themselves up for failure... Amen.

You have my attention. I would like to know what in the Bible was edited. Point me to scholarly articles if you can.

Regarding the rest--even assuming some of the Bible has been edited, can you say that it changes the message? The message that God wants us to call upon Him and have Him be the center of our lives?

If you have netflix, check out Tudors. It covers the king who changed it and goes into it (though it is mostly about why he changed it and the king himself). The show is solid by itself too. Lots of nuance and implications.

Disputes about religion are always funny.

If someone says they see a great elephant in the sky with pink and green stripes, you don't argue if the stripes aren't actually black and white or ask them to prove it, you give a polite cough and carry on with your day. Let them argue if the elephant exists or not. Some people seem to enjoy it.

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SkyCore wrote:

All your values (aka crappy things) are a subjective viewpoint from a limited mind. On the highest level; pain, love, life, death, and most everything is irrelevant. It is our own ego (sense of self) which blockades our inner sight from witnessing the complete oneness of the universe.
Without the bad, there cannot be good. At the root, it is this separation which we think is important. But in the holistic vision, us mortals are little more than animals with primitive desires and emotions.

Sounds like a Yoga Sutra or maybe a George Harrison song...

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Bars wrote:

Disputes about religion are always funny.

If someone says they see a great elephant in the sky with pink and green stripes, you don't argue if the stripes aren't actually black and white or ask them to prove it, you give a polite cough and carry on with your day. Let them argue if the elephant exists or not. Some people seem to enjoy it.

This was not supposed to be a dispute thread, unfortunately it has indeed been hijacked.

I do invite anyone to still ask questions.

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Tribulation wrote:

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Bars wrote:

Disputes about religion are always funny.

If someone says they see a great elephant in the sky with pink and green stripes, you don't argue if the stripes aren't actually black and white or ask them to prove it, you give a polite cough and carry on with your day. Let them argue if the elephant exists or not. Some people seem to enjoy it.

This was not supposed to be a dispute thread, unfortunately it has indeed been hijacked.

I do invite anyone to still ask questions.

All right, fair enough.

How do you know you're following Christ?

First off, there's no conclusive evidence such a person has actually existed. There are no non-religious, hard historical sources - unlike for Buddha or Muhammad. There probably was a person who acted as the seed of what would become the New Testament, but we don't really know.

Second, the Bible was written by many different people who lived a long time ago, then it was translated and interpreted by other people who lived in other times, and the story was told and retold and interpreted and translated in one big fucking game of telephone where everyone spoke different languages and lived sometimes centuries apart. Bottomline: the Bible is a highly unreliable source of information.

Third, there are a whole lot of people who tell us they just somehow know what Christ wants and what following him entails, but - again - these are people. They are unreliable. Some of them might be crazy, some might be running a scam (religion is probably the most lucrative business in human history!), some rare ones might, just might be getting direct faxes from the divine office, but how do you know?

What does it even mean to be following Christ? How do you know you're following him? I doubt he sends you faxes from heaven and, frankly, if he does, this would be a bit concerning. As they say, when you speak to God, that's being religious, when God speaks to you, that's schizophrenia.

This may seem as an attempt to disguise my dispute with you as a question, but it isn't. I have no desire to argue about religion, as I already said. I am genuinely curious how is it possible for someone to think in such a vastly different way compared to the workings of my own mind.

I'll shoot too.

Could you define belief, and knowledge? If either of these words have different definitions or criteria for your faith than for your more mortal beliefs and knowledge (say, about airplanes) then I ask for 3-4 total definitions as needed.

How important is evidence to your beliefs and knowledge of the spiritual/mortal?

To whatever extent this last question still applies (as you may reject this framework in answering the previous), would you say that you have been persuaded to believe what you believe on the basis of good evidence? Put another way, have you ever been in a state of non-belief (for more than just a fleeting doubt, say, at least months) and been persuaded to, or back to 'following Christ'?

The one thing that really bothers me about god is how he's so anthropomorphic. It's just too convenient.

This gonna be gud.

As for a question, why do you need/want god to exist?

Peace,

-Boem-

There is no proof jesus ever existed. Flavius josephus was -6year old (born 6 years after jesus birth) when jesus "died".

First writings about him are all decades after his "death".
This is Paul creation and Christianism should be called Paultianism Imo.

About the cult itself, I like the message that poverty is better than being a greedy fuck.

My question: When God killed all the newborn of egypt, murdering poor little infants by thousands, don t you think it was a little cruel for those innocent egyptians families who were not really responsible for the pharao actions? How does a christian cope with the fact their god can be cruel at time?