J-D

I presume you are implying that you think you have succeeded in doing one or the other (or perhaps both) of these things. You haven't. You haven't even tried to. And you have responded to suggestions that you should make the attempt by attacking them as misconceived and then sheering off at a tangent.

djrafikie

Hello
I study english language.
Would you like me to explain all of this for you?
Or would you like to look a little bit more information first?
I am a strong believer in a level playing field.

I am happy to explain as much about the root of the english language and the origins of our word usages, as well as the loss of many of our older languages, as you would like to hear.

It fits in with your hypothesis only in the most extremely loose way imaginable.

(that was a nice way of explaining that you are deeply misled).
I assume you are talking only about the WORDS themselves, rather than the actual faith systems themselves.. if thats not the case, you are still quite dreadfully wrong.

~M~

mountainman,

how would you explain the 'Christian art' found prior to 313 or Constantine's rule?

mountainman

Give me any art citation before the explosion
of the emperor-centric "christ figures" of the
fourth century, and I will provide an explanation.

The art of Dura-Europa has already been posted
to this forum. Pick something else, if you can find
something else.

Best wishes,


Pete

mountainman

Explain away. Noone else want to else
want to examine their postulates at the
present moment.

mountainman

The hegemony associated with the term "pagani"
is clearly christian, and the archeological precedents
of the use of the term in the epigraphic and papyri
record commence in the mid-fourth century.


Pete

djrafikie

Yes, but now you are arguing semantics.
You were previously oviously referring to a religion called paganism (which is a misnomer in any case) and now you are arguing the roots of a word. The origin of the word proves nothing regarding the veracity of the existence of a whole number of pre-christian faiths which even academics refer to under the blanket term of "paganism" for the sake of expediency.

The veracity of proof regarding the existence of "christianity" must be outlined. There are a LOT of indicators which argue very convincingly for the existence of christianity. If you would like to outline which evidences you accept that would be helpful.

Although I would point out that simply because you choose personally to discount these various factual articles this doesn't make them any more or less valid. Unless you are you of course, however we are outlining the form of the debate, not outlining your personal beliefs, so acceptance of existant arceological proofs is pretty much taken as necessary to the debate. I myself am likely to list the origins of many of the symbols used in christianity because nearly all of them have been lifted from existant "pagan" faiths, and even alphabets which were in use in various countries as it spread across the western hemisphere.


I would argue that christianity absorbed a huge number of elements of other faiths, and as modern christianity contains many elements which can be traced to absorbition far more recently than the fourth century this doesn't prove that it was invented in the fourth century, only that the preachers of the faith were intelligent enough to realise that familiarity and a lack of requirement to shed enjoyable festivals would make the religion far more palatable.

aa5874

Mountainman, I found a post from Richard Carrier ,on IIDB, with regards to the words 'messiah' and 'christos.' This is an excerpt;

So, based on Carrier, the words, 'Christ' or 'Christians' would not be unique to Jesus, son of the Holy Ghost, or his followers, anyone who believed he was the Christ, just at a cult level, and had followers could be called Christians and this could be from at least one hundred years before the son of the Holy Ghost or, possibly earlier, after the writing of the book of Daniel.

It appears to me that there may have been militant Christs before the offspring of the Holy Ghost since the Jews were looking for a Christ that was a military leader.

And even using the NT, the son of the Ghost called himself the son of man and was addressed as one of the prophets by the people in general, never as Christ.

So, in my opinion, the words 'Christ and 'Christians' preceded the 4th century, but it is yet to determine when the son of the Holy Ghost became a 'Christ' and actually had followers called Christians.

spin

Carrier doesn't talk about "christians" in this context. A look at the LXX confirms the claim regarding "christos" in pre-christian times. However, "christians" is a hybrid word, the root coming from Greek but the suffix is Latin. The word is only found in context of those ancient believers of Jesus.


spin

aa5874

But doesn't 'Christian' mean follower of or believer in 'Christ'? As far as I gather,the greek word 'christos' means 'messiah' or 'anointed one' and a follower or beliver in 'christos' is a 'christian', just as followers or believers in the son of the holy ghost, Jesus the 'Christ' are called 'christians'.