The Empty Tomb

[The Luke]

In particular, the chapter-and-verse references (either from the Gospels or the so-called Gospels) that back your claims of:

-   Jesus was born December 25th
-   Exactly three wise men/magi found Him
-   The magi found him immediately after His birth
-   All of the disciples got renamed

Not to mention that other stuff you included in that laundry list.

MCWAY, I'm not able to quote chapter and verse from scripture... while you were rereading and memorizing the gospels, I read other books.

Why don't you try reading the book I recommended; that has every reference you could possibly want. I don't know why you're so insistent on placing the burden of proof on me, an atheist, when EVERY expert on ancient religions worldwide accepts the plagiarism obvious in the Jesus story.

-read the Gnostic Gospels (some of these mention the 25th December birthday)
-read the Nag Hammadi texts
-read the Qumran (Essene) texts (not one single mention of Jesus at all... and Jesus was supposedly an Essene)
-read the Judas gospel (in which Judas is the closest disciple)
-read the Magdalene gospel (I think it's this one specifies 3 wise men)
-read about the Capocratians
-read about the Cathars
-read the Book of Enoch (excluded from the Old Testament)
-read the Book of Jasher (excluded from the Old Testament for political reasons)
-read about the Mandean "Swamp Kurds"
-read about the Johannite heresy
-read about the Arian heresy

-read what smarter people than you think

...then consider, as I've pointed out continuously, that there is a second, alternative version of the Attis story in which his life mimics that of the later Jesus story.

This "other Christ" is pretty common in the ancient world... he normally goes by the name Dionysus (Graeco Roman world) or Mithras (Persia and the Middle East); in some parts of the ancient world this same precursor Christ went by the name Attis... completely separate and distinct from the mythological non-mystery version of Attis you keep referencing.

I've met any reasonable burden of proof for my argument; you're now demanding I give you exact quotes and lines... what's next? Do you want me to read them for you?

For god's sake, even the name is a forgery: "Jesus" or "Ieosus" is Greek, not Hebrew and a gemmatrial number pun at that.


The Luke

[no one]

FWIW, you wouldn't be so universally despised on getbig if you didn't come across like such a dick in every post.  The fact that you're gay of course doesn't help either.

the irony of this post is staggering.

[The Luke]

the irony of this post is staggering.

...especially as "You're so gay that (insert explicit homosexual fantasy situation here)" comprises at least 80% of all Pandaemonium's posts.


The Luke

[MCWAY]

MCWAY, I'm not able to quote chapter and verse from scripture... while you were rereading and memorizing the gospels, I read other books.

Why don't you try reading the book I recommended; that has every reference you could possibly want. I don't know why you're so insistent on placing the burden of proof on me, an atheist, when EVERY expert on ancient religions worldwide accepts the plagiarism obvious in the Jesus story.

If you read other books, then you should be able to produce the references backing your claims (or at least, find them on the web and bring them here) rather than continually making pitiful excuses like this.


You made the claim that the Gospels have Jesus' born in December 25th, with exactly three wise men, who find Him immediately after His birth.

I asked you to support your claim, either referencing the Gospels or the so-called "gospels" to back your statement; yet, you continue to flake on this matter.

Your claim of "EVERY expert on ancient religions......" is dubious to say the least, as I've listed several religious experts (and can easily get more) that emphatically DO NOT "accept" the alleged plagiarism that you claim.

-read the Gnostic Gospels (some of these mention the 25th December birthday)
-read the Nag Hammadi texts
-read the Qumran (Essene) texts (not one single mention of Jesus at all... and Jesus was supposedly an Essene)
-read the Judas gospel (in which Judas is the closest disciple)
-read the Magdalene gospel (I think it's this one specifies 3 wise men)
-read about the Capocratians
-read about the Cathars
-read the Book of Enoch (excluded from the Old Testament)
-read the Book of Jasher (excluded from the Old Testament for political reasons)
-read about the Mandean "Swamp Kurds"
-read about the Johannite heresy
-read about the Arian heresy

-read what smarter people than you think

Perhaps, you should take your own advice. Or did you also forget that I've cited the direct passage from scholars, detailing the aspects of these figures you mentioned and shown that they DO NOT match Jesus Christ in form or function.

...then consider, as I've pointed out continuously, that there is a second, alternative version of the Attis story in which his life mimics that of the later Jesus story.

The two stories on Attis have him killed by a boar or (as is shown, when you look up Attis in encyclopedias), chopping off his nuts and bleeding to death. Neither of which matches the account of Jesus Christ.

And, as stated earlier (and referenced from Frazer's book), Attis' "crucifixion" consists of his being tied to a felled pine tree, AFTER he bleeds to death. Whether it's death by wild pork or by de-balling himself, neither form of Attis' demise was for man's redemption of sin.

This "other Christ" is pretty common in the ancient world... he normally goes by the name Dionysus (Graeco Roman world) or Mithras (Persia and the Middle East); in some parts of the ancient world this same precursor Christ went by the name Attis... completely separate and distinct from the mythological non-mystery version of Attis you keep referencing.

Dionysus.........This would be YET ANOTHER of Zeus' bastard sons, who gets sown into Zeus' leg while in the fetal stage, after his mama gets BBQed by jealous Hera.
 
Then, there's Rocky....er.....Mithras, who literally is born of rock from the side of a cave or born of incest (his father and paternal grandmother), depending on which version you prefer. His alleged saving the earth involved killing a bull.

Again, there's no death to save man from sin. Neither of those two die by crucifixion or is born of a virgin. And, no cattle were harmed in Christ's death on the cross for man's redemption.

I've met any reasonable burden of proof for my argument; you're now demanding I give you exact quotes and lines... what's next? Do you want me to read them for you?

You have met nothing of the sort. When I make a claim, I support it with references (i.e. the one to Frazer's book, giving the account of Attis; the reference to Matt. 2, showing Jesus' age when the wise men find Him; for purposes of refuting Deicide's blurb, the reference to the Jewish virtual library and the writing of Josephus, that show Moses as the author of the Pentateuch, etc.).

You, on the other hand, cower behind a generic grocery list of books, failing to address the specific points to support your statements.

For god's sake, even the name is a forgery: "Jesus" or "Ieosus" is Greek, not Hebrew and a gemmatrial number pun at that.

The Luke

The name isn't a forgery. Or, did you forget that the New Testament (the Gospels, in particular) was WRITTEN IN GREEK. The Hebrew name for Jesus is "Yeshua".

[The Luke]

It's obvious that no one can have a meaningful conversation on this subject with an affirmed true believer such as yourself.

Do you actually want me to go to the trouble of "copy and pasting" each and every reference? As a fundamentalist are you actually forbidden from reading a second book by yourself without your pastors supervision?

You mis-reference one book which supposedly meets your burden of proof, yet my reference to several books doesn't meet that (presumably) same burden?

You keep insisting on the discrepancies between the MYTHOLOGICAL versions of Attis and Jesus (which I gladly concede)... but I have specifically insisted that I was referencing the MYSTERY RELIGION version of Attis (who does mimic Jesus).


Then last but most egregious of all you assert that the name Jesus is not itself plagiarized... when it most definitely is and can be shown to be so.


The Luke

[MCWAY]

It's obvious that no one can have a meaningful conversation on this subject with an affirmed true believer such as yourself.

From your initial post, your goal wasn't to have a "meaningful conversation". It was to put believers, like Coach, in their place with your alleged claims, regarding the historicity of Jesus Christ.

Do you actually want me to go to the trouble of "copy and pasting" each and every reference? As a fundamentalist are you actually forbidden from reading a second book by yourself without your pastors supervision?

You were all too eager to post that mess earlier to tell off Coach. But, when it's time to back up those words, all of a sudden, the strain of using a search engine and clicking a mouse has become far more than your tired fingers can bear.
 

You mis-reference one book which supposedly meets your burden of proof, yet my reference to several books doesn't meet that (presumably) same burden?

And this "mis-reference" would be.........

I said that the Attis story doesn't match the account of Jesus Christ and provided references to make my point.

You claimed that the "mystery religion" matches that of Jesus Christ. So, where are your references to such? And, just in case you missed it, no one is expecting you to plaster ENTIRE books here.

You keep insisting on the discrepancies between the MYTHOLOGICAL versions of Attis and Jesus (which I gladly concede)... but I have specifically insisted that I was referencing the MYSTERY RELIGION version of Attis (who does mimic Jesus).

....with absolutely NOTHING to support your claim presented.

Then last but most egregious of all you assert that the name Jesus is not itself plagiarized... when it most definitely is and can be shown to be so.


The Luke

Then, where are your specifics to support that?. As I said, the Hebrew word is "Yeshua"; translate that to Greek, you get Jesus.

[The Luke]

MCWAY,

Is there any point in me doing again the research you are unwilling to do?

Is there any point in me quoting exact passages from books you won't read?

Is there any point in me continuing to explain the difference between the MYSTERY ATTIS and the MYTHOLOGICAL ATTIS?

If you honestly can't distinguish between these two separate namesakes I'd be interested to know if you do distinguish between the asexual Christian Jesus and the homosexual Cappocratian Christian Jesus?


I won't engage any further in your churlish facetiousness... but in case there are others reading this thread who are might be persuaded by your obstructionist arguments what I will do is school you so harshly on one of your points that your militant ignorance is exposed to all and sundry:


Regarding the name "Ieosus" (or "Iesous", supposedly Jeshua in Hebrew):

Jesus was fond of plagiarizing the sermons and miracles of other dying-resurrecting godmen, but sometimes he made symbolic statements that made little sense without the enlightening secret teaching to explain them. Modern Christianity is devoid of such teachings, but those in the know can readily explain them.

For example, Jesus gave one such symbolic sermon in which he explained that he was both the Alpha and the Omega the first and the last, and that no one comes to the heavenly father except through him "I am the way" blah blah blah... makes no real sense in anything except a symbolic sense.

Or does it?

Before the introduction of numerals/digits ancient peoples used letters to signify numbers (Roman numerals etc). Greeks and Hellenized Jews often utilized a secretive Greek number system called Gematria to encode hidden messages they wanted to keep hidden from the unenlightened (the illiterate; the ignorant; the Romans).

...using this code: Jesus = IhsouV (Iesous in modern lettering) = 10+8+200+70+400+200 = 888

Similarly, if you add all the numerical equivalents of the letters in the Greek alphabet, starting with "Alpha" adding all the way up to "Omega" the sum total is 3,999 arranged in three rows:
-a first row starting with 1 going up to 8
-a second row starting with 10 going up to 80
-a third row starting with 100 going up to 800
                                                              ...8 + 80 + 800 ....888
 
"I am the Alpha and the Omega", well apparently he meant "literally".

When Pythagoras gave a similar sermon the Pythagoreans all took it at face value, only in the secret teachings of Pythagoras was the mathematical significance revealed (usually in the form of an extended gospel in which extra verses relate the secret discussions between Pythagoras and his favored disciple when the other disciples have gone to sleep).

This is very persuasive evidence that the mathematical/codified hidden teachings of Jesus were similarly sewn into the unenlightened Jesus story in order that they may be "enlightened" to higher initiates thereby revealing the mystery. 

We know that such extended higher-initiates-only gospels existed as early church fathers alluded to them in their writings... unfortunately, modern day Christianity is devoid of these teachings... literally an unenlightened version of the mystery religion, intended for the unenlightened.

Anyone interested in further gematria study should check out:
http://jesus8880.com/chapters/index.htm



The Luke

[Deicide]

MCWAY,

Is there any point in me doing again the research you are unwilling to do?

Is there any point in me quoting exact passages from books you won't read?

Is there any point in me continuing to explain the difference between the MYSTERY ATTIS and the MYTHOLOGICAL ATTIS?

If you honestly can't distinguish between these two separate namesakes I'd be interested to know if you do distinguish between the asexual Christian Jesus and the homosexual Cappocratian Christian Jesus?


I won't engage any further in your churlish facetiousness... but in case there are others reading this thread who are might be persuaded by your obstructionist arguments what I will do is school you so harshly on one of your points that your militant ignorance is exposed to all and sundry:


Regarding the name "Ieosus" (or "Iesous", supposedly Jeshua in Hebrew):

Jesus was fond of plagiarizing the sermons and miracles of other dying-resurrecting godmen, but sometimes he made symbolic statements that made little sense without the enlightening secret teaching to explain them. Modern Christianity is devoid of such teachings, but those in the know can readily explain them.

For example, Jesus gave one such symbolic sermon in which he explained that he was both the Alpha and the Omega the first and the last, and that no one comes to the heavenly father except through him "I am the way" blah blah blah... makes no real sense in anything except a symbolic sense.

Or does it?

Before the introduction of numerals/digits ancient peoples used letters to signify numbers (Roman numerals etc). Greeks and Hellenized Jews often utilized a secretive Greek number system called Gematria to encode hidden messages they wanted to keep hidden from the unenlightened (the illiterate; the ignorant; the Romans).

...using this code: Jesus = IhsouV (Iesous in modern lettering) = 10+8+200+70+400+200 = 888

Similarly, if you add all the numerical equivalents of the letters in the Greek alphabet, starting with "Alpha" adding all the way up to "Omega" the sum total is 3,999 arranged in three rows:
-a first row starting with 1 going up to 8
-a second row starting with 10 going up to 80
-a third row starting with 100 going up to 800
                                                              ...8 + 80 + 800 ....888
 
"I am the Alpha and the Omega", well apparently he meant "literally".

When Pythagoras gave a similar sermon the Pythagoreans all took it at face value, only in the secret teachings of Pythagoras was the mathematical significance revealed (usually in the form of an extended gospel in which extra verses relate the secret discussions between Pythagoras and his favored disciple when the other disciples have gone to sleep).

This is very persuasive evidence that the mathematical/codified hidden teachings of Jesus were similarly sewn into the unenlightened Jesus story in order that they may be "enlightened" to higher initiates thereby revealing the mystery. 

We know that such extended higher-initiates-only gospels existed as early church fathers alluded to them in their writings... unfortunately, modern day Christianity is devoid of these teachings... literally an unenlightened version of the mystery religion, intended for the unenlightened.

Anyone interested in further gematria study should check out:
http://jesus8880.com/chapters/index.htm



The Luke

There is no persuading MCWAY that he may even be remotely wrong on any of his points. If he were to concede error his life would disintegrate, hence his inability to admit any mistake whatsoever. He claims he has beaten all of my arguments; he claims he has beaten all of Minimalist's arguments; he claims to have beaten a Rabbi's arguments concerning the OT; he claims to have beaten Ishtar's arguments concerning mystery religions....and he claims to have beaten your arguments.

Fact is, when he comes upon an obstacle such as the Tacitus passage having NEVER been mentioned until the 15th century CE/AD, the height of movement to return to a higher standard of Latin resembling the Golden Age literature (though admittedly Tacitus is a Silver Age author) than the mediaeval sort practised for centuries, it makes a forgery/interpolation that much more likely. Why didn't Christian authors seize upon this passage for over a millenium? MCWAY's usual argument is: absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, but this is a bullshit argument; absence of evidence is most certainly absence of evidence, it is simply not PROOF of absence.

[MCWAY]

There is no persuading MCWAY that he may even be remotely wrong on any of his points. If he were to concede error his life would disintegrate, hence his inability to admit any mistake whatsoever. He claims he has beaten all of my arguments; he claims he has beaten all of Minimalist's arguments; he claims to have beaten a Rabbi's arguments concerning the OT; he claims to have beaten Ishtar's arguments concerning mystery religions....and he claims to have beaten your arguments.

I asked him to give specific references to his claims which, to date, he has not.

As for your arguments, the mere fact that you had to haul tail to Koko and drag your buddies into the equation speaks volumes.

Fact is, when he comes upon an obstacle such as the Tacitus passage having NEVER been mentioned until the 15th century CE/AD, the height of movement to return to a higher standard of Latin resembling the Golden Age literature (though admittedly Tacitus is a Silver Age author) than the mediaeval sort practised for centuries, it makes a forgery/interpolation that much more likely. Why didn't Christian authors seize upon this passage for over a millenium? MCWAY's usual argument is: absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, but this is a bullshit argument; absence of evidence is most certainly absence of evidence, it is simply not PROOF of absence.

Wrong!! My argument was that the early Christian fathers DID NOT DOUBT Jesus' existence. Their arugments with non-Christians centered on Christ's divinity, thus making Tacitus' reference WORTHLESS for making such a case. Tacitus never claims that Jesus was divine or the Messiah. All he says was that Christians were named after Jesus, Pilate had Him killed, and that Christianity resurfaced after supposedly being repressed.

There is nothing for them to "seize", when making the case for Jesus being the Messiah. So, this silly claim of your is merely more floundering from you, after your previous claim about Josephus being the sole non-Christian reference to Jesus got shot to pieces.

As did your claim that Tacitus' Annals is "commonly regarded as forgery", which I addressed some time ago. But, just to jog that short memory of yours.....

But there are good reasons for concluding with the vast majority of scholars that this passage is fundamentally sound, despite difficulties which result in no small measure from Tacitus' own compressed style. The overall style and content of this chapter are typically Tacitean. The passage fits well in its context and is the necessary conclusion to the entire discussion of the burning of Rome. Sulpicius Severus's Chronicle 2.29 attests to much of it in the early fifth century, so most suggested interpolations would have to have come in the second through fourth centuries. As Norma Miller delightfully remarks, "The well-intentioned pagan glossers of ancient texts do not normally express themselves in Tacitean Latin," and the same could be said of Christian interpolators. Finally, no Christian forgers would have made such disparaging remarks about Christianity as we have in Annals 15.44, and they probably would not have been so merely descriptive in adding the material about Christ in 15.44.3. Robert Van Voorst, "Jesus Outside the New Testament".

There are two remarks in this passage whose authenticity is certain.The first concerns the burning of Rome and the persecution of the Christians; the second concerns the Christ. The first reflects the point of view of the contemporaries of Tacitus. It is a question of the hatred and contempt excited by the Christians and the infamies with which they were reproached, whilst it is precisely the accusation launched by Nero against them which seems to have unchained this hatred and contempt. The second must originate in some documentary source, since it contains no such word as "dicunt" or "ferunt," which would authorize us to suppose that Tacitus is only relating gossip. There is in this remark a characteristic idea—namely, that Christianity had been crushed out by the death of Christ, and had only reappeared about the year 64, simultaneously in Rome and in Judea. This resurrection of the execrable superstition in Judea can only be understood if we suppose that Tacitus does not make any distinction between the two manifestations of Messianism—Christianity and Judaism.


The words "not only in Judea" would imply, then, the sudden outbreak of nationalism which caused the revolt and the Jewish war. We can here form an idea of the character of the source: it was not Christian, since it presumed an eclipse of Christianity after the death of Jesus; neither was it Jewish, for no Jewish document would have called Jesus "Christ," nor would it have presented Judaism as solidary with Christianity. - Maurice Gougel, "Jesus The Nazarene"


And, while you're talking about obstacles, you have YET to address who supposedly added this reference in Tacitus' works, or (more importantly) why a Christian author would put language in text, DEGRADING his fellow Christians and his faith.

Furthermore, contrary to your screwy statements, Tactius' work was mentioned well before the 15th century.

All of the late Italian manuscripts - some 31 at the last count - are copies of a single mediaeval manuscript, also in the Laurentian library, where it is number 68.2.  It is referred to as M. II or 'second Medicean', to distinguish it from the unique codex of Annals 1-6.  Bound with it are the major works of Apuleius, written slightly later than the Tacitus but at the same place.

The copies are discussed by Mendell.

This MS is written in the difficult Beneventan hand.  It was written at Monte Cassino, perhaps during the abbacy of Richer (1038-55AD).    It derives from an ancestor in written in Rustic Capitals, as it contains errors of transcription natural to that bookhand.  There is some evidence that it was copied only once in about ten centuries, and that this copy was made from an original in rustic capitals of the 5th century or earlier, but other scholars believe that it was copied via at least one intermediate copy written in a minuscule hand.

How the MS came to leave Monte Cassino is a matter of mystery.  It was still at Monte Cassino, and was used by Paulus Venetus, Bishop of Puzzuoli, sometime between 1331 and 1344.  However Boccaccio had certainly seen the text by 1371, and the MS is listed among the books given by him at his death to the monastery of S. Spirito in Florence.  Whether he had 'liberated' it, or acquired it from another collector who had done so has been extensively debated, without final result. - Roger Pearse, Tacitus and His Manuscripts (from http://www.tertullian.org/rpearse/tacitus/index.htm#8 )

To top it all off, neither you nor your buddies from Koko addressed the issue of why someone (Gnostic or otherwise) would invent a story about Jesus, painting Him as Messiah, using characteristics that WOULD NOT BE ACCEPTED by the Jews, by and large.

So, before you keep running off at the mouth about obstacles, you might want to clear a few of your own. Good luck!!!

[MCWAY]

MCWAY,

Is there any point in me doing again the research you are unwilling to do?

Is there any point in me quoting exact passages from books you won't read?

Is there any point in me continuing to explain the difference between the MYSTERY ATTIS and the MYTHOLOGICAL ATTIS?

If you honestly can't distinguish between these two separate namesakes I'd be interested to know if you do distinguish between the asexual Christian Jesus and the homosexual Cappocratian Christian Jesus?


I won't engage any further in your churlish facetiousness... but in case there are others reading this thread who are might be persuaded by your obstructionist arguments what I will do is school you so harshly on one of your points that your militant ignorance is exposed to all and sundry:

You'll excuse me if my teeth aren't chattering in dread from your feeble threat of schooling me.

Spare me the blubbering and excuse-making!!!! You got asked simple questions or ask to support your statements with specific references and you hide behind a barrage of excuses.

Regarding the name "Ieosus" (or "Iesous", supposedly Jeshua in Hebrew):

Jesus was fond of plagiarizing the sermons and miracles of other dying-resurrecting godmen, but sometimes he made symbolic statements that made little sense without the enlightening secret teaching to explain them. Modern Christianity is devoid of such teachings, but those in the know can readily explain them.

For example, Jesus gave one such symbolic sermon in which he explained that he was both the Alpha and the Omega the first and the last, and that no one comes to the heavenly father except through him "I am the way" blah blah blah... makes no real sense in anything except a symbolic sense.

As the saying goes, "Put up or shut up"!!!

Or does it?

Before the introduction of numerals/digits ancient peoples used letters to signify numbers (Roman numerals etc). Greeks and Hellenized Jews often utilized a secretive Greek number system called Gematria to encode hidden messages they wanted to keep hidden from the unenlightened (the illiterate; the ignorant; the Romans).

...using this code: Jesus = IhsouV (Iesous in modern lettering) = 10+8+200+70+400+200 = 888

Similarly, if you add all the numerical equivalents of the letters in the Greek alphabet, starting with "Alpha" adding all the way up to "Omega" the sum total is 3,999 arranged in three rows:
-a first row starting with 1 going up to 8
-a second row starting with 10 going up to 80
-a third row starting with 100 going up to 800
                                                              ...8 + 80 + 800 ....888
 
"I am the Alpha and the Omega", well apparently he meant "literally".

When Pythagoras gave a similar sermon the Pythagoreans all took it at face value, only in the secret teachings of Pythagoras was the mathematical significance revealed (usually in the form of an extended gospel in which extra verses relate the secret discussions between Pythagoras and his favored disciple when the other disciples have gone to sleep).

This is very persuasive evidence that the mathematical/codified hidden teachings of Jesus were similarly sewn into the unenlightened Jesus story in order that they may be "enlightened" to higher initiates thereby revealing the mystery. 

We know that such extended higher-initiates-only gospels existed as early church fathers alluded to them in their writings... unfortunately, modern day Christianity is devoid of these teachings... literally an unenlightened version of the mystery religion, intended for the unenlightened.

Anyone interested in further gematria study should check out:
http://jesus8880.com/chapters/index.htm

The Luke

Whereas, anyone interested in your actually backing your earlier claims with some specifics would have better luck beating Tiger Woods at golf.

Of course, lost in all this gibberish is what this alleged mystery was and what relevance it had toward the salvation of mankind, the very reason Jesus came to Earth in the first place.

Jesus gave His disciples specific instructions to spread His word to ANYONE and EVERYONE, who would receive it. And, one of the reasons He spoke in parables is so that ALL could understand his messages.

[Deicide]

All I can say is that it is amazing that you can speak rationally about supplements and nutrition but seem to regard ancient near eastern mythology as fact.

 

[The Luke]

Deicide,

What's wrong with this guy?

He hones in on one tiny aspect of something I posted and asks for references... I post the title and authors of a scholarly book (The Jesus Mysteries by Gandy and Freke) which notes; references; sources and cross checks everything I asserted.

He won't read it... he insists I copy and paste the relevant quotes.

But at the same time he DISMISSES everything I directly quote/reference!

This type of arguing could disprove gravity if the naysayer demanded the Gravitational constant to some arbitrary number of decimal places!



MCWAY,

... I understand you are a person of faith, but no one is attacking the teachings of Jesus here. It's just a commonly verifiable fact that everything (EVERYTHING!) in the Jesus story was plagiarized from older religions and that such plagiarism undermines the slim possibility of an actual historical Jesus.

That doesn't nullify the message... all it should do is dent your fanatical belief that you alone are right.

Perhaps it would be best if you googled the Christian doctrine of "Diabolical Mimicry".

The doctrine explains that the reason for Jesus story being prefigured by some 30-odd other godmen by as much as 3,000 years in some cases is actually because the Devil, mindful of prophecy, created these god-men figures in order to undermine the originality of Jesus when he did eventually arrive.

If the early Church Father Justin Martyr went to the trouble of devising this ridiculous doctrine, there must be something to the claims of plagiarism leveled by pagans. The doctrine of Diabolical Mimicry (which openly concedes the fact that other gods prefigured the Jesus story) remains the official Vatican policy on the matter...

...if the Vatican experts conceded this point some fifteen centuries ago, why can't you? Why can't you concede a FACT that even the apostles themselves conceded (Peter recognized and witnessed the miracles of Simon Magus in the Gnostic "Acts of the Apostles").


The Luke

[MCWAY]

Deicide,

What's wrong with this guy?

He hones in on one tiny aspect of something I posted and asks for references... I post the title and authors of a scholarly book (The Jesus Mysteries by Gandy and Freke) which notes; references; sources and cross checks everything I asserted.

No, I honed in on SEVERAL aspects of the thing you posted and ask for the specifics, chapter and verse.

He won't read it... he insists I copy and paste the relevant quotes.

How thoughtless of me to ask that you strain them fingers of yours to click a mouse.

Did you read Van Voorst's "Jesus Outside The New Testament"?

Did you read Goguel's "Jesus The Nazarene"?

Did you read Matthew 2, which shows that Jesus about two years old (not a newborn) when the Magi find them?

Did you watch "Who Is This Jesus" Is He Risen?" (I have a thread with the video, just for your convenience)?

But at the same time he DISMISSES everything I directly quote/reference!

This type of arguing could disprove gravity if the naysayer demanded the Gravitational constant to some arbitrary number of decimal places!


MCWAY,

... I understand you are a person of faith, but no one is attacking the teachings of Jesus here. It's just a commonly verifiable fact that everything (EVERYTHING!) in the Jesus story was plagiarized from older religions and that such plagiarism undermines the slim possibility of an actual historical Jesus.

Yet, for some strange reason, you are having the darndest time backing that up, especially when shown that every figure you mentioned that supposedly was used to form Jesus Christ DOES NOT MATCH whatsoever. With those figures not matching, that undermines the slim possibility of Jesus plagiarizing from them.

And, lost in all this, is the reason why whoever supposedly made up the character of Jesus Christ (with all this "secret" knowledge) would be so culturally inaccurate as to make:

- His birth appear to be illegitimate
- His earthly guardian a carpenter
- His hometown one of the WORST spots in Israel
- One of His closest associate a TAX COLLECTOR (for all this "secret" knowledge, apparently these folks forgot how much the Jews loathe taxmen)
- His death the most cursed and humiliating form of execution in existence ("Cursed is everyone who hangs from a tree").
- Women be the first to see Him resurrected (see Dr. Lamerson's paragraph, posted earlier, on that one).

That's merely the short list. As for your previous claim that "EVERY expert on ancient religions worldwide accepts the plagiarism obvious in the Jesus story", that falls short of being accurate as well.

That doesn't nullify the message... all it should do is dent your fanatical belief that you alone are right.

Perhaps it would be best if you googled the Christian doctrine of "Diabolical Mimicry".

The doctrine explains that the reason for Jesus story being prefigured by some 30-odd other godmen by as much as 3,000 years in some cases is actually because the Devil, mindful of prophecy, created these god-men figures in order to undermine the originality of Jesus when he did eventually arrive.

Been there; done that. Doesn't help your case one bit.

Also from "Who Is This Jesus? Is He Risen?":

Well, I think the so-called myth of the dying/rising God in antiquity, to compare that meaningfully with the New Testament, you would have to look at each particular myth. And I dare say, what you would find is that no particular myth of a dying/rising God fits in very well at all with either the specifics of the Christian account of the Jesus resurrection, if you will, the structure of credibility that the Christian resurrection accounts has. (MCWAY: Already done that; still trying to see how Attis' relieving himself of his nuts, Mithras killing cattle, or Osiris getting ripped to pieces by Set saves me from sin)

When you look at the New Testament, many times you will see expressions like Son of God.  Or, there will be phenomenas like healings.  And people will try to say, “Well, we can document these things outside the New Testament; there's nothing unique about the New Testament.”  And, oh, maybe thirty/forty years ago, there was a Rabbi who taught at the University of Chicago named Samuel [Sam] Mill.  He wrote a very interesting article called, Parallel-a-mania.  And in this article, he took biblical scholars to task, basically because they so delighted in finding similarities or parallels to the Bible, outside the Bible, but they tended not to also look at the differences.  And, if you combine the similarities with the differences, generally speaking, these extra biblical parallels become much less significant than what one might think when one reads some breathless academic account that we've discovered a parallel to Jesus in the story of Hercules - Dr. Robert Yarborough, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, ""Who Is This Jesus? Is He Risen".


Often, people have said in this last century of scholarship that the reason the Christians believed in Jesus' resurrection was because out there in the wider world, there were all these dying and rising gods or goddesses and that the Christians borrowed from that to interpret.  In fact, I think hardly any scholars these days believe that.  There are one or two who still do, and are pushing that line, but the key thing is that all those early Christians were Jews, and the idea of the dying and rising god was a strictly pagan notion.  You can study Judaism from one end to another and you don't find any of that.  And the whole idea of early Christianity remained a thoroughly Jewish thing.  Even when you get Christianity going out into the wider world, from time to time, two or three centuries down the track, people will say, “Well this is a bit like Osiris”, or whoever, but they're usually pretty careful to distance themselves from that.  And even Paul, some people have said, when he talks about dying and rising with Christ, that's actually a very different thing.  The scholars who have studied Romans 6—where that theme comes in Colossians 2 and 3 and so on—have concluded that there is actually no borrowing there from the mystery religions, as they are called, or from those dying and rising cults.  It seems, rather, that the best explanation is that built into God's creation is this sense that you sow the seed in the ground and then something new comes up, and so on and so on.  So when people were thinking in the ancient world about fertility, they naturally wanted to kind of embody that and talk about it, so they had their gods being buried and rising like the corn sleeping in the earth and coming out again in the spring.  But the extraordinary thing is there is no evidence whatever for that in Judaism.  And there's no evidence whatever for that in Jesus' either teaching or thinking, or in the early stories about Him.  It just doesn't happen.  It is as though that, which is latent in the rest of creation, suddenly comes through dramatically in the human being, Jesus, and the Christian explanation for that, of course, is that Jesus is the embodiment of the creator God. - Dr. N.T. Wright, Canon Theologian, Westminster Abbey

If the early Church Father Justin Martyr went to the trouble of devising this ridiculous doctrine, there must be something to the claims of plagiarism leveled by pagans. The doctrine of Diabolical Mimicry (which openly concedes the fact that other gods prefigured the Jesus story) remains the official Vatican policy on the matter...

Other gods prefiguring the "Jesus story" and Jesus supposedly being crafted from thoe gods are two different issues entirely.

Perhaps you have forgotten that Christianity competed with other religions (i.e. Mithraism) within the Roman empire.

I listed the major and most significant differences between Christianity (particularly, Jesus Christ) and these figures, from whom Jesus was allegedly crafted in specific detail, in terms of birth, life, purpose, death, and resurrection. Add to that the unlikelihood that someone fabricating the life of Jesus would do so by using the aforementioned attributes, and that further nullifies the notion of Christ coming from such "god-men", as you call them.

...if the Vatican experts conceded this point some fifteen centuries ago, why can't you? Why can't you concede a FACT that even the apostles themselves conceded (Peter recognized and witnessed the miracles of Simon Magus in the Gnostic "Acts of the Apostles").


The Luke

Since you're bringing up apostles, there's the little matter of John's testimony, regarding Christ.

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have handled, concerning the Word of Life, the life was manifested, and we have seen and bare witness and declared to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us--that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you may also have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. - 1 John 1:1-3.

It appears you didn't take that into consideration. Throw into the mix the non-Christian references to Christ (which depict Him as the founder of the movement and who put him to death) and the odds of Jesus being forged from Attis, Dionysus, Mithras et. al. are slim and none (and I don't like Slim's chances  ).

[The Luke]

These replies are becoming too lengthy...

I notice that you evade/skirt my points with deflections rather than rebuttals.... so in order to keep this thread readable for the other people following it I'll instead do just the opposite.

I'll poke holes in the specifics of your deflections, point by point:

Did you read Van Voorst's "Jesus Outside The New Testament"?

...just from the title I can discern the bias of Christian apologists.

FACT:
There is no Jesus outside the New Testament. He is a fictional re-imagining of the dying-resurrecting Mystery Religion godman. The ONLY contemporary literature in which Jesus appears is the New Testament and the Gnostic Gospels (but with varying stories and different disciples)... but closer inspection will show that none of these can be any earlier than 70 AD. (Mark's gospel is the earliest with Luke, Matthew, and John all being variations on Mark's gospel, and we know from the writings of Church fathers that there was an extended version of Mark's gospel with the astrological/gematrial mysteries of the SYMBOLIC storyline explained... just the same way the revelatory process of the Mystery Religion worked).

Every (EVERY!) other historical reference to Jesus is either centuries later or a proven forgery... every one of them. That's why all the impartial historians agree that there is NO direct historical evidence for Jesus... no Roman records, no Jewish records, no Egyptian records... nothing.

We do have a huge library of texts written during Jesus' time by the Qumran Essenes. Their leader, James the Just, was supposedly Jesus brother... yet not one single reference to or mention of Jesus can be found in any of these texts, which were in production all the way up to 70 AD.
 

Did you read Goguel's "Jesus The Nazarene"?

...just from the title I can tell it as written by a Christian apologist. Jesus didn't come from Nazareth.

FACT:
Nazareth was founded in the third century as Christianity swept across the Roman empire. There is not one single mention of Jesus being from Nazareth in the gospels (canonical or gnostic). Nazareth did not exist in Jesus time (archaeologists have proven this) and appears on no Roman town lists or census records.

The misunderstanding arises from a mistranslation of the phrase: "Jesus the Nazorite" ...not a person from Nazareth (which didn't exist) but a member of a sect of Jewish mystics called Nazorites who were ritually trepanned (grooves drilled in the skull).

Did you read Matthew 2, which shows that Jesus about two years old (not a newborn) when the Magi find them?

...don't know the reference as I'm not a Bible-basher. Doesn't matter anyhow as lots of Gnostic texts written a century before Matthew mention the magi being witness to the birth (I'll dig up the reference). It's not so much a matter of timing the important part is that the solar-deity (Jesus in this case) is recognized as a miracle child by those in the know.

Arguing minutiae is pointless anyway as the gospels are full of glaring inconsistencies:

FACT:
Including the Gnostic gospels (which have better proven provenance than any of the canonical gospels), Jesus has 16 different disciples altogether. None of the gospels can agree on a similar list of twelve. This is to be expected as the individual disciples of a Mystery Religion godman aren't important... only that he have one for each of the zodiac signs and is betrayed by one of them to the evil tyrant, and another (secret/latent) female disciple to represent the hidden lunar zodiac sign (usually this role is filed by Isis, or the godmans fallen-woman/former-prostitute mother/wife  in less literalist cultures: Jesus has Mary Magdalene).

Did you watch "Who Is This Jesus" Is He Risen?" (I have a thread with the video, just for your convenience)?

...the "Is he Risen?" gives it away as Christian propaganda, but if you provide the link I'll watch it.

Yet, for some strange reason, you are having the darndest time backing that up, especially when shown that every figure you mentioned that supposedly was used to form Jesus Christ DOES NOT MATCH whatsoever. With those figures not matching, that undermines the slim possibility of Jesus plagiarizing from them.

...No, YOU keep referencing the MYTHOLOGICAL versions of these gods. The MYTHOLOGICAL version is a story filled with dramatic allegories (which lose something in the translation).

The MYSTERY RELIGION versions of these gods are always the same basic "Jesus" story as the basic story is an encoded ASTROLOGICAL solar-deity mystery religion.

This type of argument is analogous to discussing the historical evidence for Vlad "Dracula" Tepes, Prince of Wallachia with someone who insists he was an immortal vampire because he's read Bram Stoker's novel.

Read what the experts think.

And, lost in all this, is the reason why whoever supposedly made up the character of Jesus Christ (with all this "secret" knowledge) would be so culturally inaccurate as to make:

- His birth appear to be illegitimate

...the godman is always a virgin birth, always semi-illegitimate, always endowed with royal pedigree by proxy through an adopted father.
That's why the New Testament keeps harping on about Jesus being of the line of David.

 
- His earthly guardian a carpenter

...the godman is often the adopted son of a "tekton", and often a tekton himself. Usually translated from the Greek as carpenter but more accurately rendered as "smith": a stonesmith (mason); woodsmith (carpenter); or wordsmith (literate scribe)... these are the trades that understood measure and numbers yet still being the common man... the godman is a populist deity who offers heavenly salvation to those oppressed on earth.
 These gods (such as Simon Magis) often associate with REDEEMED sinners; tax collectors, prostitutes etc.

- His hometown one of the WORST spots in Israel

...as I mentioned, it is an archaeological fact that Nazareth was founded in the third/fourth century. The Nazorites (mystic sect) were actually well respected for their Kabbalist learning and piety.

- One of His closest associate a TAX COLLECTOR (for all this "secret" knowledge, apparently these folks forgot how much the Jews loathe taxmen)

...former or REDEEMED sinners always form the retinue of the godman.

- His death the most cursed and humiliating form of execution in existence ("Cursed is everyone who hangs from a tree").

...dude, it's always crucifixion. It's astrologically symbolic (the constellation of Orion transfixed on the Tree of Life {axis of the earth}: born; dying and renewed with the solar cycle and the precessional Great Year)
-(mystery version) Dionysus
-(mystery version) Horus
-(mystery version) Bacchus
-(mystery version) Attis
-(mystery version) Mithras
...all die on the cross in their MYSTERY RELIGION guise.

...the humiliation is to prove the possibility of redemption for even the lowest of common people. Jesus isn't the first to die for the redemption of sin... Christians push that as an original twist, but ALL the Mystery Religion godmen die unjustly for others sins, only to rise after three days.

- Women be the first to see Him resurrected (see Dr. Lamerson's paragraph, posted earlier, on that one).

...No, the latent/hidden disciple who is often both the godman's mother and wife (it's astrological not literal) is always the first to see the risen godman. In the Jesus story it's Mary Magdalene and then the the Virgin Mary... the Christians separated the aspects of the hidden lunar disciple/mother but kept the names the same. Originally they were the same person as they represent the same star, but in its ascending and descending intervals. (Remember this is all astrological) 

And that's merely the short list.

Been there; done that. Doesn't help your case one bit.

...THAT is your response to the FACT that Church Fathers explained the prefiguring of Jesus by pagan gods via the actions of a time-traveling Devil? (The Doctrine of Diabolial Mimicry)

That's weak MCWAY... really WEAK. That's tantamount to denying gravity while holding on to the ledge for dear life.

DENIAL DON'T MAKE IT SO! If it did, I'd be thin.

Other gods prefiguring the "Jesus story" and Jesus supposedly being crafted from thoe gods are two different issues entirely

...by that logic George Orwell's "Animal Farm" is a treatise on animal husbandry.

Perhaps you have forgotten that Christianity competed with other religions (i.e. Mithraism) within the Roman empire.

...the technical term is "plagiarism", followed by a concerted campaign of book-burning and re-writing of history.

I listed the major and most significant differences between Christianity (particularly, Jesus Christ) and these figures, from whom Jesus was allegedly crafted in specific detail, in terms of birth, life, purpose, death, and resurrection. Add to that the unlikelihood that someone fabricating the life of Jesus would do so by using the aforementioned attributes, and that further nullifies the notion of Christ coming from such "god-men", as you call them.

...again, you can't seem to get your head around the fact the MYTHOLOGICAL versions of these deities differ from the MYSTERY RELIGION versions.

One is ALLEGORICAL, one is ASTROLOGICAL... you wouldn't only read "Mein Kampf" for an accurate, balanced assessment of Hitler's character would you?

Since you're bringing up apostles, there's the little matter of John's testimony, regarding Christ.

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have handled, concerning the Word of Life, the life was manifested, and we have seen and bare witness and declared to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us--that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you may also have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. - 1 John 1:1-3.

It appears you didn't take that into consideration. Throw into the mix the non-Christian references to Christ (which depict Him as the founder of the movement and who put him to death) and the odds of Jesus being forged from Attis, Dionysus, Mithras et. al. are slim and none (and I don't like Slim's chances  ).

...the problem with all this is the timing.

We now know that the gospel switches the Pharisees for the Sadducees, which is incorrect but it doesn't stop there:

FACT:
-the "slaughter of the innocents" never happened (it was a title applied to a massacre that took place about a 150 years earlier)
FACT:
-John the Baptist (an apparently real historical figure), didn't leave his ministry to Jesus as the gospels assert... he left it to Simon Magis, a wizard and Tantric-Sex proponent (who also had 12 disciples and a former prostitute consort; healed the lame; healed the sick; healed the blind; walked on water; raised the dead; was crucified and resurrected after 3 days)
FACT:
-despite writing reams of copy on the subject, Paul (formerly Saul of Tarsus), the founder of modern (Pauline) Christianity didn't know anything about the virgin birth; the miracles; the raising the dead etc

...eyewitness testimony, supposedly written down by the witness two hundred years after the event doesn't ADD to the credibility of these deeply flawed documents... and it certainly doesn't win any arguments with those who know better.


MCWAY,

Just accept the fact: THE ENTIRE JESUS STORY IS PLAGIARIZED!

They just removed the intricate inner mysteries; the equivalence with other gods (just as Muslims do with the "one and only Allah"); the anti-Roman references (Pilate, an actual historical bastard of the highest order, is "forced" into killing Jesus... but left in the codified anti-Roman "Book of Revelations"), and made blind faith a virtue in lieu of a deeper understanding of the symbolism.

Blind faith is for children MCWAY, open your eyes... there's nothing to be afraid of.

I'll dig up those quotes from the Gnostic texts when I get a chance, and I'll get a few youtube links for the non-readers.


The Luke
 

[Deicide]

These replies are becoming too lengthy...

I notice that you evade/skirt my points with deflections rather than rebuttals.... so in order to keep this thread readable for the other people following it I'll instead do just the opposite.

I'll poke holes in the specifics of your deflections, point by point:
...just from the title I can discern the bias of Christian apologists.

FACT:
There is no Jesus outside the New Testament. He is a fictional re-imagining of the dying-resurrecting Mystery Religion godman. The ONLY contemporary literature in which Jesus appears is the New Testament and the Gnostic Gospels (but with varying stories and different disciples)... but closer inspection will show that none of these can be any earlier than 70 AD. (Mark's gospel is the earliest with Luke, Matthew, and John all being variations on Mark's gospel, and we know from the writings of Church fathers that there was an extended version of Mark's gospel with the astrological/gematrial mysteries of the SYMBOLIC storyline explained... just the same way the revelatory process of the Mystery Religion worked).

Every (EVERY!) other historical reference to Jesus is either centuries later or a proven forgery... every one of them. That's why all the impartial historians agree that there is NO direct historical evidence for Jesus... no Roman records, no Jewish records, no Egyptian records... nothing.

We do have a huge library of texts written during Jesus' time by the Qumran Essenes. Their leader, James the Just, was supposedly Jesus brother... yet not one single reference to or mention of Jesus can be found in any of these texts, which were in production all the way up to 70 AD.
  ...just from the title I can tell it as written by a Christian apologist. Jesus didn't come from Nazareth.

FACT:
Nazareth was founded in the third century as Christianity swept across the Roman empire. There is not one single mention of Jesus being from Nazareth in the gospels (canonical or gnostic). Nazareth did not exist in Jesus time (archaeologists have proven this) and appears on no Roman town lists or census records.

The misunderstanding arises from a mistranslation of the phrase: "Jesus the Nazorite" ...not a person from Nazareth (which didn't exist) but a member of a sect of Jewish mystics called Nazorites who were ritually trepanned (grooves drilled in the skull).
...don't know the reference as I'm not a Bible-basher. Doesn't matter anyhow as lots of Gnostic texts written a century before Matthew mention the magi being witness to the birth (I'll dig up the reference). It's not so much a matter of timing the important part is that the solar-deity (Jesus in this case) is recognized as a miracle child by those in the know.

Arguing minutiae is pointless anyway as the gospels are full of glaring inconsistencies:

FACT:
Including the Gnostic gospels (which have better proven provenance than any of the canonical gospels), Jesus has 16 different disciples altogether. None of the gospels can agree on a similar list of twelve. This is to be expected as the individual disciples of a Mystery Religion godman aren't important... only that he have one for each of the zodiac signs and is betrayed by one of them to the evil tyrant, and another (secret/latent) female disciple to represent the hidden lunar zodiac sign (usually this role is filed by Isis, or the godmans fallen-woman/former-prostitute mother/wife  in less literalist cultures: Jesus has Mary Magdalene).
...the "Is he Risen?" gives it away as Christian propaganda, but if you provide the link I'll watch it.

...No, YOU keep referencing the MYTHOLOGICAL versions of these gods. The MYTHOLOGICAL version is a story filled with dramatic allegories (which lose something in the translation).

The MYSTERY RELIGION versions of these gods are always the same basic "Jesus" story as the basic story is an encoded ASTROLOGICAL solar-deity mystery religion.

This type of argument is analogous to discussing the historical evidence for Vlad "Dracula" Tepes, Prince of Wallachia with someone who insists he was an immortal vampire because he's read Bram Stoker's novel.

Read what the experts think.
...the godman is always a virgin birth, always semi-illegitimate, always endowed with royal pedigree by proxy through an adopted father.
That's why the New Testament keeps harping on about Jesus being of the line of David.
...the godman is often the adopted son of a "tekton", and often a tekton himself. Usually translated from the Greek as carpenter but more accurately rendered as "smith": a stonesmith (mason); woodsmith (carpenter); or wordsmith (literate scribe)... these are the trades that understood measure and numbers yet still being the common man... the godman is a populist deity who offers heavenly salvation to those oppressed on earth.
 These gods (such as Simon Magis) often associate with REDEEMED sinners; tax collectors, prostitutes etc.
...as I mentioned, it is an archaeological fact that Nazareth was founded in the third/fourth century. The Nazorites (mystic sect) were actually well respected for their Kabbalist learning and piety.
...former or REDEEMED sinners always form the retinue of the godman.
...dude, it's always crucifixion. It's astrologically symbolic (the constellation of Orion transfixed on the Tree of Life {axis of the earth}: born; dying and renewed with the solar cycle and the precessional Great Year)
-(mystery version) Dionysus
-(mystery version) Horus
-(mystery version) Bacchus
-(mystery version) Attis
-(mystery version) Mithras
...all die on the cross in their MYSTERY RELIGION guise.

...the humiliation is to prove the possibility of redemption for even the lowest of common people. Jesus isn't the first to die for the redemption of sin... Christians push that as an original twist, but ALL the Mystery Religion godmen die unjustly for others sins, only to rise after three days.
...No, the latent/hidden disciple who is often both the godman's mother and wife (it's astrological not literal) is always the first to see the risen godman. In the Jesus story it's Mary Magdalene and then the the Virgin Mary... the Christians separated the aspects of the hidden lunar disciple/mother but kept the names the same. Originally they were the same person as they represent the same star, but in its ascending and descending intervals. (Remember this is all astrological) 
...THAT is your response to the FACT that Church Fathers explained the prefiguring of Jesus by pagan gods via the actions of a time-traveling Devil? (The Doctrine of Diabolial Mimicry)

That's weak MCWAY... really WEAK. That's tantamount to denying gravity while holding on to the ledge for dear life.

DENIAL DON'T MAKE IT SO! If it did, I'd be thin.
...by that logic George Orwell's "Animal Farm" is a treatise on animal husbandry.
...the technical term is "plagiarism", followed by a concerted campaign of book-burning and re-writing of history.
...again, you can't seem to get your head around the fact the MYTHOLOGICAL versions of these deities differ from the MYSTERY RELIGION versions.

One is ALLEGORICAL, one is ASTROLOGICAL... you wouldn't only read "Mein Kampf" for an accurate, balanced assessment of Hitler's character would you?

...the problem with all this is the timing.

We now know that the gospel switches the Pharisees for the Sadducees, which is incorrect but it doesn't stop there:

FACT:
-the "slaughter of the innocents" never happened (it was a title applied to a massacre that took place about a 150 years earlier)
FACT:
-John the Baptist (an apparently real historical figure), didn't leave his ministry to Jesus as the gospels assert... he left it to Simon Magis, a wizard and Tantric-Sex proponent (who also had 12 disciples and a former prostitute consort; healed the lame; healed the sick; healed the blind; walked on water; raised the dead; was crucified and resurrected after 3 days)
FACT:
-despite writing reams of copy on the subject, Paul (formerly Saul of Tarsus), the founder of modern (Pauline) Christianity didn't know anything about the virgin birth; the miracles; the raising the dead etc

...eyewitness testimony, supposedly written down by the witness two hundred years after the event doesn't ADD to the credibility of these deeply flawed documents... and it certainly doesn't win any arguments with those who know better.


MCWAY,

Just accept the fact: THE ENTIRE JESUS STORY IS PLAGIARIZED!

They just removed the intricate inner mysteries; the equivalence with other gods (just as Muslims do with the "one and only Allah"); the anti-Roman references (Pilate, an actual historical bastard of the highest order, is "forced" into killing Jesus... but left in the codified anti-Roman "Book of Revelations"), and made blind faith a virtue in lieu of a deeper understanding of the symbolism.

Blind faith is for children MCWAY, open your eyes... there's nothing to be afraid of.

I'll dig up those quotes from the Gnostic texts when I get a chance, and I'll get a few youtube links for the non-readers.


The Luke
 

Luke you are wasting your time; MCWAY is a master of evasion or deflection and usually does so; he has done with with half a dozen others including myself. Eventually you will see that MCWAY is a fundy for life.

[loco]

Hey Luke!  Jesus is no myth.  Jesus Christ is very real.     



Scholarly response to the Jesus Myth Hypothesis:
 
"There are those who argue that Jesus is a figment of the Church's imagination, that there never was a Jesus at all. I have to say that I do not know any respectable critical scholar who says that any more."
Burridge, R & Gould, G, Jesus Now and Then, Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2004, p.34.
 
The classical historian Michael Grant writes:
"To sum up, modern critical methods fail to support the Christ myth theory. It has 'again and again been answered and annihilated by first rank scholars.' In recent years, 'no serious scholar has ventured to postulate the non historicity of Jesus' or at any rate very few, and they have not succeeded in disposing of the much stronger, indeed very abundant, evidence to the contrary." 
 
Michael Grant does not see the similarities between Christianity and pagan religions to be significant. Grant states that "Judaism was a milieu to which doctrines of the deaths and rebirths, of mythical gods seemed so entirely foreign that the emergence of such a fabrication from its midst is very hard to credit."
Grant, Michael (1995). Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels. Scribner, 199. ISBN 978-0684818672 .

 
R.T. France points out that Christianity was actively opposed by both the Roman Empire and the Jewish authorities, and would have been utterly discredited if Jesus had been shown as a non-historical figure. He argues that there is evidence in Pliny, Josephus and other sources of the Roman and Jewish approaches at the time, and none of them involved this suggestion.
 
In response to Jesus-myth proponents who argue the lack of early non-Christian sources, or question their authenticity, R. T. France counters that "even the great histories of Tacitus have survived in only two manuscripts, which together contain scarcely half of what he is believed to have written, the rest is lost" and that the life of Jesus, from a Roman point of view, was not a major
event.
 
R.T France disagrees with the notion that the Apostle Paul did not speak of Jesus as a physical being. He argues that arguments from silence are unreliable and that there are several references to historical facts about Jesus's life in Paul's letters, such as that Jesus "who as to his earthly life was a descendant of David" (Romans 1:3, TNIV).
France, RT (1986). Evidence for Jesus (Jesus Library). Trafalgar Square Publishing, 19-20. ISBN 0340381728.   
 
Supporting a historical Jesus
Bovon, François (2006). The Last Days of Jesus, trans. Kristin Hennessy; Louisville: Westminster, John Knox. ISBN 0664230075.
   
Burridge, Richard A. (2006). Four Gospels, One Jesus? A Symbolic Reading, 2nd edn., Grand Rapids:Eerdmans. ISBN 0802829805 .
 
Charlesworth, James H. (ed.) (2006). Jesus and Archaeology. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. ISBN 080284880X. 
 
Grant, Michael [1977] (1999). Jesus. London: Phoenix. ISBN 0-75380-899-4.   

Komoszewski, J. Ed ; et al (2006). Reinventing Jesus. Kregel Publications. ISBN 082542982X.   

Meier, John P. A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus, 3 vols., New York: Doubleday.   
(1991) The Roots of the Problem and the Person. ISBN 0-385-26425-9 .
 
(1994) Mentor, Message, and Miracles. ISBN 0-385-46992-6 . 

(2001) Companions and Competitors. ISBN 0-385-46993-4 . 

Sanders, E. P. (1993). The Historical Figure of Jesus. London: Allen Lane. ISBN 0-7139-9059-7.   

Theissen, Gerd; and Annette Merz (1998). The Historical Jesus: A Comprehensive Guide , trans. John Bowden, Minneapolis: Fortress Press. ISBN 0-8006-3123-4.   

Wright, NT (1996). The New Testament and the People of God. Augsburg Fortress Publishers. ISBN 0800626818.   

[loco]

Josephus Jewish Antiquities (c.93 C.E.)
(later interpolations in brackets)

"Now, there was about this time Jesus, a wise man [if it be lawful to call him a man], for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. [He was the Messiah.] And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him [for he appeared to them alive again at the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him]. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this date.1


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Pliny the Younger Letter to Trajan (c.111-117 C.E.)

"...they maintained that their fault or error amounted to nothing more than this: they were in the habit of meeting on a certain fixed day before sunrise and reciting an antiphonal hymn to Christ as God, and binding themselves with an oath not to commit any crime, but to abstain from all acts of theft, robbery and adultery, from breaches of faith, from repudiating a trust when called upon to honour it."2


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Tacitus Roman Annals (c.115-117 C.E.)

"They got their name from Christ, who was executed by sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate in the reign of Tiberius. That checked the pernicious superstition for a short time, but it broke out afresh--not only in Judea, where the plague first arose, but in Rome itself, where all the horrible and shameful things in the world collect and find a home."3


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Sanhedrin 43a (200-500 C.E.)

"On the eve of the Passover Yeshu4 was hanged. For forty days before the execution took place, a herald went forth and cried, 'He is going forth to be stoned because he has practiced sorcery and enticed Israel to apostacy. Any one who can say anything in his favour, let him come forward and plead on his behalf. But since nothing was brought forward in his favour he was hanged on the eve of Passover!"4


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Endnotes

1. Antiquities xviii. 33 (early second century) from F.F. Bruce, Jesus and Christian Origins Outside the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974), 37.
2. Pliny, Epistles x.96, from Bruce, p.26.
3. Tacitus, Annals xv, 44, from Bruce, p. 22.
Talmudic designation of Jesus.
4. "Sanhedrin," vol 3 of Nezikin, Babylonian Talmud, edited by Isidore Epstein, reprint (London: Soncino, 1938), 281.

[loco]

Josephus on Jesus - Testimonium Flavianum - Arabic Version
 
"At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus. And his conduct was good, and he was known to be virtuous. And many people from among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. And those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he had appeared to themafter his crucifixion and that he was alive; accordingly, he was perhaps the Messiah concerning whom the prophets have recounted wonders."
 
Arabic summary, presumably of Antiquities 18.63. From Agapios' Kitab al-'Unwan ("Book of the Title," 10th c.).
The translation belongs to Shlomo Pines. See also James H. Charlesworth, Jesus Within Judaism.

[loco]

Concerning Albinus Under Whose Procuratorship James Was Slain; As
Also What Edifices Were Built By Agrippa.

1. And now Caesar, upon hearing the death of Festus, sent Albinus
into Judea, as procurator. But the king deprived Joseph of the
high priesthood, and bestowed the succession to that dignity on
the son of Ananus, who was also himself called Ananus. Now the
report goes that this eldest Ananus proved a most fortunate man;
for he had five sons who had all performed the office of a high
priest to God, and who had himself enjoyed that dignity a long
time formerly, which had never happened to any other of our high
priests. But this younger Ananus, who, as we have told you
already, took the high priesthood, was a bold man in his temper,
and very insolent; he was also of the sect of the Sadducees, (23)
who are very rigid in judging offenders, above all the rest of
the Jews, as we have already observed; when, therefore, Ananus
was of this disposition, he thought he had now a proper
opportunity [to exercise his authority]. Festus was now dead, and
Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrim of
judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was
called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some
of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against
them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned: but
as for those who seemed the most equitable of the citizens, and
such as were the most uneasy at the breach of the laws, they
disliked what was done; they also sent to the king [Agrippa],
desiring him to send to Ananus that he should act so no more, for
that what he had already done was not to be justified; nay, some
of them went also to meet Albinus, as he was upon his journey
from Alexandria, and informed him that it was not lawful for
Ananus to assemble a sanhedrim without his consent. (24)
Whereupon Albinus complied with what they said, and wrote in
anger to Ananus, and threatened that he would bring him to
punishment for what he had done; on which king Agrippa took the
high priesthood from him, when he had ruled but three months, and
made Jesus, the son of Damneus, high priest.

Antiquities of the Jews by Flavius Josephus - Book 20, Chapter 9
http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?fk_files=2359&pageno=648

[loco]

Josephus on Jesus - Current state of the debate

Judging from Alice Whealey's 2003 survey of the historiography, it seems that the majority of modern scholars consider that Josephus really did write something here about Jesus, but that the text that has reached us is corrupt to a perhaps quite substantial extent. In the words of the Catholic Encyclopedia entry for Flavius Josephus, "The passage seems to suffer from repeated interpolations." There has been no consensus on which portions are corrupt, or to what degree.
Alice Whealey writes:

Twentieth century controversy over the Testimonium Flavianum can be distinguished from controversy over the text in the early modern period insofar as it seems generally more academic and less sectarian. While the challenge to the authenticity of the Testimonium in the early modern period was orchestrated almost entirely by Protestant scholars and while in the same period Jews outside the church uniformly denounced the text's authenticity, the twentieth century controversies over the text have been marked by the presence of Jewish scholars for the first time as prominent participants on both sides of the question. In general, the attitudes of Protestant, Roman Catholic, Jewish and secular scholars towards the text have drawn closer together, with a greater tendency among scholars of all religious backgrounds to see the text as largely authentic. On the one hand this can be interpreted as the result of an increasing trend towards secularism, which is usually seen as product of modernity. On the other hand it can be interpreted as a sort of post-modern disillusionment with the verities of modern skepticism, and an attempt to recapture the sensibility of the ancient world, when it apparently was still possible for a first-century Jew to have written a text as favorable towards Jesus of Nazareth as the Testimonium Flavianum.

Alice Whealey: Josephus on Jesus: The Testimonium Flavianum Controversy from Late Antiquity to Modern Times (Studies in Biblical Literature, Vol. 36). Peter Lang Publishing (February 2003) ISBN-10: 0820452416

[The Luke]

I'll keep this short...

loco,

Those references WERE good evidence of the historicity of Jesus... that is, until advances in infra-red wavelength laser imaging allowed the pigments of the texts to be analyzed and dated based on the degradation rates of the constituents.

All the explicit historical references (Josephus for example) have been PROVEN to be forgeries by this method.

All we have left are vague SECOND century references, and even some of those are forgeries. The only historians still stubbornly sticking to the historicity of Jesus are themselves true believer Christians.



You have to remember that the early church engaged in a centuries long campaign of deliberate rewriting history and burned most of the conflicting documents. The official version of church history is a self-serving lie; the conversion of the Emperor Constantine (he was NEVER a Christian), hundreds of visions and miracles, the lives of the apostles... all lies.

The many hundreds of Qumran texts (contemporary and written by the Essene Jews in Jerusalem) make NOT ONE SINGLE MENTION OF JESUS WHATSOEVER! (even though there are some references to James the Just)


But what none of this refutes is the FACT that EVERY SINGLE ASPECT of the Jesus story is plagiarized.

Every miracle... every prayer... every symbol... every detail.

How could Jesus be an original deity when he seemingly only ever fulfilled pagan prophecy?

The Doctrine of Diabolical Mimicry (google it) is the only defense Christians have ever offered to these facts... and it is blatantly, and indefensibly wrong.


Some other dude has referenced all the similarities...

&feature=related

Any evangelicals reading this should take the ten minutes to watch the vid...

Keep in mind NONE of the details are in question, and all of the similarities listed were openly conceded by early Church Fathers (Justin Martyr etc)


The Luke

[Deicide]

I'll keep this short...

loco,

Those references WERE good evidence of the historicity of Jesus... that is, until advances in infra-red wavelength laser imaging allowed the pigments of the texts to be analyzed and dated based on the degradation rates of the constituents.

All the explicit historical references (Josephus for example) have been PROVEN to be forgeries by this method.

All we have left are vague SECOND century references, and even some of those are forgeries. The only historians still stubbornly sticking to the historicity of Jesus are themselves true believer Christians.



You have to remember that the early church engaged in a centuries long campaign of deliberate rewriting history and burned most of the conflicting documents. The official version of church history is a self-serving lie; the conversion of the Emperor Constantine (he was NEVER a Christian), hundreds of visions and miracles, the lives of the apostles... all lies.

The many hundreds of Qumran texts (contemporary and written by the Essene Jews in Jerusalem) make NOT ONE SINGLE MENTION OF JESUS WHATSOEVER! (even though there are some references to James the Just)


But what none of this refutes is the FACT that EVERY SINGLE ASPECT of the Jesus story is plagiarized.

Every miracle... every prayer... every symbol... every detail.

How could Jesus be an original deity when he seemingly only ever fulfilled pagan prophecy?

The Doctrine of Diabolical Mimicry (google it) is the only defense Christians have ever offered to these facts... and it is blatantly, and indefensibly wrong.


Some other dude has referenced all the similarities...

&feature=related

Any evangelicals reading this should take the ten minutes to watch the vid...

Keep in mind NONE of the details are in question, and all of the similarities listed were openly conceded by early Church Fathers (Justin Martyr etc)


The Luke

Please expand on this. It sounds fascinating. 

Do you have any links? I would greatly appreciate them.

[The Luke]

If I remember correctly Deicide, they scanned the oldest surviving copy of Mark's gospel (the original gospel, from which the others are copied), which (working from memory here) has been dated to approximately 155 AD.

They found only one forged addition... the last line: "And ascended into Heaven".


This ties in well with the original Gnostic gospels (now recovered)... many of them, such as the Gospel of Thomas, made no magical claims about an ascension. In fact, Thomas goes to a wedding in the far east circa 60 AD and an elderly Jesus shows up as a guest at the wedding.

Lots of lost gospels have been recovered by infra-red scanning age-blackened papyrus books recovered from Roman-era city dumps.

These newly discovered "lost" gospels give us deep insight into the early Jesus cult.

And the original Jesus cult was Gnostic, not Pauline... symbolic, not literal... Cathar, not Catholic.

One researcher found an older copy of the Book of Revelations, wherein the recovered text asserted the number of the Beast to be 661 not 666... makes sense, 661 is the gematria code sum for the name Caesar Caligula (the Christian oppressing emperor when that text was produced), not 666 the gematria code sum for the name Caesar Nero (who burned Christians for starting the Great Fire of Rome).

Presumably the Christians had no problem with the religion-tolerant Emperor Claudius who reigned uneventfully betwixt these monsters. When presented with Christian blasphemers, Claudius asked only that they recite the prayer to the divinity of the emperor (learned by rote across the Roman world, and analogous to the Pledge of Allegiance in America today)... Claudius wasn't particularly fussed if they substituted the name of their own deity for the word "imperator", he dismissed any such nit-picking with the assurance that his own title was synonymous with the name of any non-Roman god... and decreed such a recital a valid legal defense to charges of blasphemy against the emperors divinity, (when accompanied by a pledge to forgo rabble rousing and keep the peace).

Buoyed by such tolerance, Christians felt no need to encode tacit propaganda against Claudius "for he who has wisdom"-hint-hint. to understand.


This was all covered in the press media... search for "infra-red" "papyrus" etc, you'll find something.
www.dailygrail.com is good for gathering links to such stories.


The Luke

[Deicide]

If I remember correctly Deicide, they scanned the oldest surviving copy of Mark's gospel (the original gospel, from which the others are copied), which (working from memory here) has been dated to approximately 155 AD.

They found only one forged addition... the last line: "And ascended into Heaven".


This ties in well with the original Gnostic gospels (now recovered)... many of them, such as the Gospel of Thomas, made no magical claims about an ascension. In fact, Thomas goes to a wedding in the far east circa 60 AD and an elderly Jesus shows up as a guest at the wedding.

Lots of lost gospels have been recovered by infra-red scanning age-blackened papyrus books recovered from Roman-era city dumps.

These newly discovered "lost" gospels give us deep insight into the early Jesus cult.

And the original Jesus cult was Gnostic, not Pauline... symbolic, not literal... Cathar, not Catholic.

One researcher found an older copy of the Book of Revelations, wherein the recovered text asserted the number of the Beast to be 661 not 666... makes sense, 661 is the gematria code sum for the name Caesar Caligula (the Christian oppressing emperor when that text was produced), not 666 the gematria code sum for the name Caesar Nero (who burned Christians for starting the Great Fire of Rome).

Presumably the Christians had no problem with the religion-tolerant Emperor Claudius who reigned uneventfully betwixt these monsters. When presented with Christian blasphemers, Claudius asked only that they recite the prayer to the divinity of the emperor (learned by rote across the Roman world, and analogous to the Pledge of Allegiance in America today)... Claudius wasn't particularly fussed if they substituted the name of their own deity for the word "imperator", he dismissed any such nit-picking with the assurance that his own title was synonymous with the name of any non-Roman god... and decreed such a recital a valid legal defense to charges of blasphemy against the emperors divinity, (when accompanied by a pledge to forgo rabble rousing and keep the peace).

Buoyed by such tolerance, Christians felt no need to encode tacit propaganda against Claudius "for he who has wisdom"-hint-hint. to understand.


This was all covered in the press media... search for "infra-red" "papyrus" etc, you'll find something.
www.dailygrail.com is good for gathering links to such stories.


The Luke

I will check it out. However, I thought that the Josephan passages had been proven to be forgeries via this method; I am more interested in the extrabibical evidence since the Gospels are obviously bunk.

[The Luke]

Deicide,

I wouldn't contend that the gospels are "bunk"... they are just aren't what evangelicals represent them as.

They aren't history, they aren't "divinely inspired"... they're just one example of a popular tradition of revelatory religious texts.

The problem seems to have started with the Pauline sect. Paul was promulgating a bare-bones version of the Jesus to Hellenized Jews (and gentiles); no mysteries, no hidden codes, no astrology... just miracles and parables.

After the Jewish revolt in 70 AD left the Essenes dead and Jerusalem in ruins, Paul was left with a structured "fundraiser" religion and no one to pass the money on to... the very same thing happened with Scientology. L Ron Hubbard died leaving the money raising infrastructure in place... hence the con outlasted the conman.

Similarly, Scientology is now rewriting history and expunging any evidence that Hubbard was anything other than perfect and infallible: they're lining up prophecies to fulfill the newly minted "facts" of Hubbard's life.

L Ron Hubbard, science fiction writer, self-help guru, charlatan and all-round fraudster is only a book-burning and an Inquisition away from being a god himself.


The Luke