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03-26-2007, 05:17 PM | #11 | ||
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But we know that, unless appeal is made to the suprenatural, that God made no such appearance. Isn't this the identical argument that Gamera and Ben C. Smith (among others) appeal to for evidence of a Historical Jesus??? Seems like the props have been kicked out from under the HJ arguments. Jake Jones IV |
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03-26-2007, 07:45 PM | #12 | ||
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Two: God never "appeared" to any Jew directly as a human; angels are asserted to have had human form at times but that would be an issue of interpretation. Three: the cognitive process around the complex neuro-psychological events and processes is historically and culturally determined. Obviously, hypermanic fugues with euphoric peaks and seizures in 1st century Palestine would be captured and processed through local religious imagery. If the individual was bright, had what I call "shamanic credentials" (there appears to be personality traits in humans that makes other people "recognize" them as such - this is as true of the mezolitic Inuit as with Branch Davidians) and bore up well, his imaginative capture of his inner events would leave cultural imprint. Quote:
Where is anything supernatural about such or a similar scenario ? Seems to me thousand times more probable than a Temple worshipping Jewish holy man James worshipping a Platonic hypothesis crucified in the abstract. Jiri |
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03-26-2007, 10:27 PM | #13 | ||||
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Assuming, for sake of argument that Jesus and Paul were both historical, I have suggested above that at best Paul heard a rumor that a Jew known as Jesus-Christ was crucified and appeared in visions, and plugged this scant information into a Hellenistic redeemer cult of some type. In the traditional datings, there doesn't seem to be time to develop the full blown Pauline Christology starting with a failed Jesus scenerio. Quote:
Are you advocating that the origins of Christianity are to be found ultimately in pathology? Quote:
I don't see any supernatural being invoked in your response. Quote:
Thanks, Jake |
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03-26-2007, 11:40 PM | #14 | ||||
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Give me a break. Paul considered Jesus real, just like be considered Belair real, and the angel Michael real, and the third layer of heaven real, etc., etc. Paul didn't teach that angles were myths either, so does that mean that angels were real? Quote:
Take also the example in Ephesians: Quote:
The author then seeks to explain where he was ascending from, and he says that he ascended FROM HADES! What the hell, this is CLEARLY a mythological view by our standards. Here is the place where they would have said that Christ was ascending from the tomb, or whatever, if he were talking about a historical figure, but he never places him on earth at all, he never says that he was on earth. Here is the scripture that was being referred to: Quote:
And what is the body of Christ according to this? The believers constitute the body of Christ. |
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03-27-2007, 07:45 AM | #15 | |||||
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Winston Churchill, we know today was bi-polar, and his insomnia and depressions were the stuff of legends and rumours. Yet, he was not impaired in any sort of way; quite the contrary, his 'manic' energy was the right anti-dote to the 'manic' demons of Hitler, who everyone ouside his inner circle perceived (since his rise in 1920's) as deeply abnormal, 'sexless' psycho. The fact of the matter is, that all reports of direct contact with God, or special relationship with God today (in the last 150 or so years) are routinely refered to psychiatry. God, or other supernatural entites, do not interact with normal, healthy-minded people. Was it any different 2000 years ago ? The figure of a bright village lad in Galilee, who had an episode, believed himself to suddenly to have a mission, and his family knowing that he went off the deep end, are not the kinds of stories that would evolve from contemplating a Pie in the Sky. Quote:
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Jiri |
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