Cege

The earliest Christians had only Paul's preaching and epistles to gain their knowledge of Christianity. Paul doesn't mention, in his surviving epistles at least, a virgin birth but just birth by a woman (Paul doesn't even mention her name).

If the apparent contradiction is based on Jewish lineage and the early Christians were a majority of former pagans not of Jewish descent, how would early Christian converts even know there was a contradiction?

Chili

They were inspired Ben, and do not have to think. Thinking is required by people who do not know and they were the actual mythmakers who have us thinking about that for nearly 2000 years and we still do not know.

Chili

I have a problem with that because the HS is redundant in heaven where all is known. Remember how the old [spirit filled] temple must be destroyed and raised in three days to contain the kingdom of God as it was in the beginning and to which now the twelve tribes must be added to make it Isreal wherein lies their city of God called the New Jerusalem . . . which is the 'improved' old Jerusalem because the temple is rebuilt. Jerusalem is the consciuos mind and the New Jerusalem the now illuminated conscious mind that is completely refurbished under the twelve pillars of faith.

You call it heaven but Iwould call that Limbo. Naa, the divine marriage took place in Cana where Jesus was about 40 years old as the reborn Joseph. Before that Joseph was married to Magdalene, in his own kind of way, and he feared the Jews because Mary was not Jewish and he was about to leave Judaism behind like bad dis-ease because Mary perplexed him and made him tremble without getting a hard-on, which is something he was not used to. She actually was the water that tasted sweeter than wine and that is why he trembled this time. . . . after they crucified his sin nature he was a better person, yes, but that is what it took to make him the Christ.

True enough, circumcision is required to be a son of Jacob in Israel but did they not move to Rome where Vatican City is their glorious city of God?

Just giving your story a little twist, if that''s OK with you.

Amaleq13

Yes but I wasn't talking about the earliest Christians. By "early" I meant those who first encountered the Gospel geneaologies.

The apparent contradiction is being born of a virgin and being of Davidic descent through Joseph.

Doug Shaver

You may read it as you wish. Or, you may demonstrate the greater parsimony of your historicist explanation.

storytime

Why is assumed that the term "conceived" indicates pregnancy? Why can't it describe how order of governance was established at the beginning of Israel at Sinai? The Levites were elected at the beginning, no other tribe. The Jesus sect then wanted to reinstate that particular body of Christ - the anointed and which was "conceived" by God - who was the Holy Spirit.

Look at it this way - What was "conceived" in Mary was how the Jewish writers wrote the script. It was their idea conceived to show a sectarian ideology in Levite heritage, not that it was true but that it was their way of relating how one authority in what they supposed to be the hiarchy was truth. Why else did Jesus debate the Pharisees? Wasn't it his purpose to show his ideology as truth and they as the liars?

And why is it assumed that "before they came together" Mary was with child means she and Joseph were unmarried? I think it points more to the tribal separations which came together when Joseph and Marry were wed - Levite and Judah tribes. I mean, lets face it, all we can do is speculate so it seems to me that this is a pruely Jewish story where Jews argued, debated and fought over leadership. Much like todays religions where one denomination declares itself truth and another false. Much like religious people who declare Baptist belief as truth and Mormon's as false doctrine.

storytime

It's OK with me. Except, I read the meaning a bit differently, and what it took to make Jesus "the Christ" was within his lineaged heritage per Levite covenant. This covenant separated the Levites as priests and of which both John the Baptist and Jesus were fulfilling their obligatory duty. (In Matt. Jesus tells John, "It has come to us to fulfill all these things.") Both were first born sons in Levite heritage. The first born were "sacrifice" to God in their time and service to the community of tribes. Both John andn Jesus are seen as members of the "body of Christ". So you see, it isn't just one man that constitutes the body, but many members(think unionized effort) who devote their time and effort in "sacrifice" for the good of Israel. It wasn't Jesus' purpose to minister to non Jewish people, as his priesthood by law was ordained within the confines of his nation called Israel. "I am sent to none but the lost sheep in the House of Israel." (Mt.15:24)

Where then does that leave Christianity as we know it? It's still unacceptable to Jewish tradition due to Jewish law, and correctly noted as illegitimate, or illegitimate son. However, the door is always open for uncircumcised Gentiles to convert to the "way, truth and life" of Jesus in his Judaism.

And what is the chance of that happening? :huh:

Chili

Christianity is the condition of being wherein we are worthy to be called Christian because we each have our own mind of Christ. This would be why Catholics and Jews are not Christians but at best Christians-in-becoming which is not until after Jesus comes to show them the way to Christ. From this follows that when a Catholic or a Jew becomes Christian he will no longer be Catholic or a Jew but a Christian much in the same way as Jesus left Judaism behind when he became Christ.

Christianity as we know it are self proclaimed Christians who really do not know what they are doing but only know that doing something good every now en then makes them feel good for which the precondition is feeling bad.

This would make Christianity as a religion always wrong because it clearly is the end of religion.