lpetrich

How much they actually did know is apparent from The Jesus The Jews Never Knew, by Frank R. Zindler. They had no direct knowledge of Jesus Christ, and that Roman-soldier story may have been invented as a put-down of the Virgin Birth.

Although the Gospels record JC's disputations with various Pharisees, there is not a trace of them in the Talmud, which has numerous disputations between various rabbis. And given their being master quibblers, they would have been anything but the pushovers one finds in the Gospels.

In fact, JC's style is much more like that of the Cynic philosophers than like those rabbis.

Malachi151

Why would anyone think that the story of the birth of Jesus had any basis in fact at all?

If one has any real understanding of Biblical myth one should immediately consider the story of Jesus' birth a complete and total fabrication, based on nothing at all but the story teller's imagination.

First of all, we don't even know if this Jesus fellow did exist at all, and thus the birth story would obviously be a compelete fake, but assuming that he did exist, we don't have anything that looks like a real historical account of him until he was in his 30s.

If one is to assume that he was a real person (and also not really the "son of god/god himself") then one would logically assume that his birth was completely normal and unknown and that he "rose to fame" through his teachings and activism in his later life.

Unless you actually believe that his birth was heralded by a star and that wise men were sent to great him, etc, then there is no reason to believe the story at all.

He was probably just some dude, who got a following of people, and then after he died they made up a meraculous birth story about him, just as is typically done with all hero figures.

This is actually one of Thomas Paine's best points of Biblical criticism IMO.

abe smith

Sorry for the delay, lpet! Weekend hiatus... "kay; for my Congratulations He's A Girl paper, the long address on-line is (link)

www.c-c-c-.freeserve.co.uk/r113-10.htm


That shd get you there; or could try {search google}
"Congratulations"AND"AbeSmith"

If you still can't get there; I could send it to you as an email; but not-sure I have the tech competence to do that.

The essence of my argument is as stated above ^^^: that in order to be a MALE human being, "you" have to have a human male Y chromosome; and that the ONLY SOURCE of that Y male chromosome is from "your" human biological male FATHER, who sticks it to "your" human female mother so that one of his sperm cells ("spermatozoon"), which happens to be carrying (about 50% chance of this) the MALE Y chromosome swims its way from her vagina ("her Cochin-China") up through her uterus into one of the Fallopian tubes, where (generally ) sperm cell meets Mom's (unfertilized) ovum and pierces it; fertilization occurs; the (now) zygote tootles-on-down back to the uterus (doing some early divisions as it travels..... and so on and so on...

By the way, ALL! Get it straight willya frchrisesake: "The IMMACULATE CONCEPTION" is NAWT about the non-sexual (lie) conception of Jesus; <<<<<<which is called "the Virgin Birth" aka 'the Incarnation".

The phrase "Immaculate Conception" refers (only) to MARY, jesus's MOTHER, who (the late 19th cent dogma invented & imposed on credulous Catholics teaches) was allegedly conceived in HER MOTHER, free from the hereditary stain of (Adam's) Original Sin = "immaculate" = spotless.; Original Sin allegedly inheres in EVERY human being at conception, EXCEPT for Mary herself and of course her allegedly-divine Son Jesus.

lpetrich

The link: www.c-c-c.freeserve.co.uk/r113-10.htm
(Third "-" removed; it now works)
The search term (inside the []'s): ["Abe Smith" Congratulations]

Thanx, Abe Smith. Some comments:

It was Pope Urban VIII who proscribed heliocentrism in 1632 and compelled Galileo to recant.

There is a way that Jesus Christ can have a Y chromosome: God can work a miracle.

God can wave his magic wand and say, "Let Jesus Christ be biologically male, complete with a Y chromosome in his genome."

abe smith

Yes: their "god" can be a LIAR and a CHEAT; but if The Lord & Saviour of Mankind (sic) is an ARTIFACT, then who cares anything about all that? and why should I believe it, or bother?

The human genome is an historic physical/material ALIVE *DOCUMENT* made bit by bit by natural selection
and passed-on down from the first unicellular, or even NONcellular organisms;
you can't FAKE that stuff.
Their "god" may be a fake; but the human genome is NOT a fake; it is one of the REAL entities; and Plato knew nothing about it.

pope fiction

:notworthy

Rational BAC

If you accept the possibility of a an all-powerful (or even very powerful) Supreme Being------it is very easy to accept the possibity of a virgin birth.

If you do not accept the possibility of a Supreme Being ---who can do pretty much anything He damned well pleases to---then of course a virgin birth would be impossible.

Biff the unclean

If 17 year old Mary Goldberg who lives two doors down from you told the story that she was pregnant with God's second begotten son you would not believe her. In fact I'll bet that you would think that anyone who fell for a story like Mary's would have to be an idiot.
Yet the exact same story told 2000 years ago you buy hook line and sinker. In fact you would probably feel ill served by someone who thought only an idiot would believe such a story.
Why do you throw away your standards?

pope fiction

Exactly, Biff. The fact that it was written 2,000 years ago doesn't add any validity to it. Believing that Mary was a virgin is like believing everything the government tells us.

PF

premjan

what if Mary was an XXY female? Then I suppose she could have had an XY male child without any fertilization. Of course, XXY individuals are normally typed as male (KlineFelter's syndrome), but is there any rule about it?

I believe XO males are also technically possible.