th Pagan Christ

[rusmeister]

This one modern priest has a million priests who have gone before him who ALL disagree with him, and only a few hundred - or even thousand at most - that actually agree. That makes his credentials rather worthless to me. They are credentials from an institution that he is now defying. Why on earth should I take someone seriously for his credentials when he is bent on contradicting the teachings of the institution that gave them to him?

Hmmm... Maybe for the same reason you might want us to take seriously someone who has gone through the public education system, become a part of that system, then defied that system?

Now you can tell me why that's different. You have discovered a greater truth about pub ed. We should all assume your wisdom on this is accurate, and, at the very least, read all about it. But Harpur shouldn't get the same consideration from you. Yes, you have put the shoe on the other foot! Harpur supporters are steamed at you for doing to them what they do to you regarding pub ed. You have the last laugh. Which is, of course, the very best reason for not reading Harpur!

The analogy doesn't work, Fist.
I don't think the Anglican Church to be the Orthodox Church. I defend the larger Christianity when I can, when it coincides with Orthodoxy, and not when it doesn't. I think the Anglican Church went wrong from its inception, and had been part of a Church that had gone wrong before that. It's be more like learning that all public schools are messed up except in Maine, where they had a special charter that ran them independently on a purely local level with no connection to state or federal institutions. It would mean that people like Gatto (and I) really ARE right - except in Maine, and that the complaints against public schools don't apply there. THAT is a more accurate analogy if you insist on it, and that's why it's different.

[drew]

Jesus IS a divine entity, is not something we can be/become no matter what we do. We can only be Jesus-like, imperfectly emulate, partake of a small portion. Not be. Even in heavenly spiritual perfection we will be less than Christ's/Gods.

But is that what the Gospels tried to teach us?
According to this author, the answer is 'No'.

He tries to say that the twisting of the gospels, and the historicism of Bible Stories led the Church to teach that Jesus is THE divine entity.
And this is almost what Buddhism DOES teach.
Buddhist are not trying to become Buddha, they are trying to attain Nirvana, the same as the Buddha did. He found the enlightenment of of finding God, within himself.

[rusmeister]

It is no necessary indication of tenuosity of faith to perceive an attack on something one values and defend it. If someone attempts to get your mother publicly painted as a prostitute - or worse - you would not think your love of her tenuous for wanting to defend her.

I wouldn't have to defend my mother. Her behavior itself would prove that such claims are false.

If your mother was being painted in the media, if she was fired from her job, if people who did not know her WELL began treating her like a pariah and her personal life suffered, I think you would want to clear your mother of the false charges.

So why should 'you conform to "my" standards'? Because that is the only way we can talk at all. There is no reason on earth for me to engage in discussion with people who are hypo-critical in regards to their own position. I'm ready to accept criticism of my position and answer to it - to respond to the objections. Only it seems the other side is not equally willing to do the same.

So rational discussions are to be on your terms only? Wow...and I thought I was an elitist. Fortunately, I do not suffer from hypocrisy.

This is what I was saying about demanding standards of scholarship when it comes to what we like, such as evolutionary theory, and denying them when we come to the objective aspects of Christianity, such as its history. The only way you can prove a charge of hypocrisy wrong is by really being willing to question yourself; to lay the objections against you out on the table. I say that I do; that's what I deal with all the time here - objections against my faith. Hypocrisy means insufficient self-criticism. I defend my faith precisely because I HAVE criticized it. (You may not be personally familiar with much of that; you're new (to me) around here.)

I don't expect to be friends with people here - although courtesy is always appreciated - but I do find, and hope to find here, at least some people genuinely interested in truth and who think it important enough to fight for. It's the people who think truth unimportant that I don't want to have anything to do with, and I am honored to associate with people who do think it important, even if we disagree strongly enough to fight. I'd rather be friends with a Muslim warrior than a subjectivist professor. At least the Muslim knows that truth is worth fighting for, and even dying for.

What I have seen here, though, is that you automatically consider anyone who disagrees with Chesterson as being "wrong", regardless of their reasons for holding this position. I will be honest--I have never even heard of Chesterson, which highlights how unimportant he is.

You are applying the wrong criteria. I myself think Chesterton wrong - the Catholic Church is NOT the Church that has maintained what was taught from the beginning, although it is closer than most today. I also think his some of his political solutions wrong. But there's no point in discussing that when people can't see the enormous ways in which he was right. And most people do NOT engage Chesterton at all. I think Dale Alhlquist right when he said, "to debate Chesterton is to lose" - because no one dares debate him directly. Here it has always been "put it in your own words" "give us Cliff notes" "I won't read pages and pages...". I do think such people have decidedly not proved Chesterton wrong for the simple fact that they have read little to nothing of him, and often do not understand him - don't know the context of what he's talking about - usually because they won't READ the context - only a highlighted quote, if that.

The most important person in the world could be someone you've never heard of. Indeed, if being heard if (by you, for example) is the criterion for being important, then we are in trouble. 'Being heard of' much more suggests knowing whoever the owners of schooling and mass media consider to be important. You may never have heard of Nicholas of Myra, or John Chrysostom, yet without them you might never heard of Christianity, which I think you would admit has had a profound influence on nearly all of us, directly or indirectly.

Gotta run, I'll try to answer other comments tomorrow, if I can.

[Fist and Faith]

THAT is a more accurate analogy if you insist on it, and that's why it's different.

It's always different, eh?

[Hashi Lebwohl]

But [and as I said, I ain't got a dog in this fight] that is not how True christianity [in Rus's sense] can work.
It isn't necessarily anti-christian in attitude, but it is non-christian in fact.

The point I have been trying to make, albeit clumsily, is that rusmeister does not get to define what Christianity is for anyone except himself.

He goes on to say, that he researched many ancient cults, or Mystery Religions, who all teach that God is Within man. And the Allegory of this theme was taught by, the Sumerians, the Chaldeans, and the Egyptians. It is at the core of nearly all Pagan religions. (which I imagine is where he got the title).

Exactly. Christianity derives a good portion of itself from earlier, pagan religions. This doesn't invalidate it as a religion for me and it certainly doesn't invalidate my faith--quite the contrary, it makes it stronger because I know the history behind what I believe.

[drew]

Exactly. Christianity derives a good portion of itself from earlier, pagan religions. This doesn't invalidate it as a religion for me and it certainly doesn't invalidate my faith--quite the contrary, it makes it stronger because I know the history behind what I believe.

Thank you.
Exactly the point that ,I and especially, Tom Harpur was trying to make.

[aliantha]

I bet you had no idea you'd generate this much debate, didya, drew?

[Cambo]

You know, Rus, your reaction to the very concept of this book strikes me as ironically similar to that teacher in this video you posted in the Orthodoxy thread:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmHzYWO6b0k

"For one thing I object to the title. It says Pagan Jesus, and that's just wrong. There were no Pagans, and in that book there is no Jesus!"

[rusmeister]

But [and as I said, I ain't got a dog in this fight] that is not how True christianity [in Rus's sense] can work.
It isn't necessarily anti-christian in attitude, but it is non-christian in fact.

The point I have been trying to make, albeit clumsily, is that rusmeister does not get to define what Christianity is for anyone except himself.

I could equally say "Hashi does not get to define terms like "religion", "pagan", or even "valid" etc, for anyone except himself."
That is to say that if we do not have an objective and commonly understood agreement of what a thing is, we won't be talking about the same thing, as Vraith basically said. We'll be talking past, rather than to, each other, because we will mean different things by the same set of sounds, just like the example I offered of the Russian and English understandings of the word "most" (Russian: "мост").

He goes on to say, that he researched many ancient cults, or Mystery Religions, who all teach that God is Within man. And the Allegory of this theme was taught by, the Sumerians, the Chaldeans, and the Egyptians. It is at the core of nearly all Pagan religions. (which I imagine is where he got the title).

Exactly. Christianity derives a good portion of itself from earlier, pagan religions. This doesn't invalidate it as a religion for me and it certainly doesn't invalidate my faith--quite the contrary, it makes it stronger because I know the history behind what I believe.

I would say rather that Christianity - which was, on the whole, a much more monolithic thing in earlier centuries than it has since become, baptized, or accepted into it that which did not contradict its dogmas and which illustrate truth, which even pagans had some of, but which Christianity revealed in its fullness. This is different from the view you present that makes it appear that the Christian Church did not know how to express some things, so it went looking to pagans for help. There were quite a few things that pagans were NOT wrong about, and the Church had little difficulty acknowledging those things and accepting the local aspects under which they were represented.

[rusmeister]

You know, Rus, your reaction to the very concept of this book strikes me as ironically similar to that teacher in this video you posted in the Orthodoxy thread:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmHzYWO6b0k

"For one thing I object to the title. It says Pagan Jesus, and that's just wrong. There were no Pagans, and in that book there is no Jesus!"

Quite correct, Cambo - we are both dogmatic about something. There is something, right or wrong (obviously wrong in the video) that we ill not compromise on - just as Hashi is equally determined that I do not get to insist on a common definition for what makes something Christian or not.

I say that you all here have dogmas; that everybody has them, and my solid impression is that most here are unaware that they, too are dogmatic. The modern idea that religious people have dogmas and non-religious ones don't is simply silly - it is the absence of thought.

[drew]

I bet you had no idea you'd generate this much debate, didya, drew?

Well... originally, I wanted to just talk about this book an its concept

But I don't mind that it has sparked a debate about whether it should be considered Christian, or anti-Christian.

After all,

"Eh? Two views? There are a dozen views about everything until you know the answer. Then there's never more than one." Bill Hingest ("That Hideous Strength" by C.S. Lewis)

I would agree that this book would not fall into a Orthodox Christian category, nor would I say that it is a Caotholic book.

But its still a Christian book.

I know.
I'm the only one here who has read it.

[rusmeister]

I bet you had no idea you'd generate this much debate, didya, drew?

Well... originally, I wanted to just talk about this book an its concept

But I don't mind that it has sparked a debate about whether it should be considered Christian, or anti-Christian.

After all,

"Eh? Two views? There are a dozen views about everything until you know the answer. Then there's never more than one." Bill Hingest ("That Hideous Strength" by C.S. Lewis)

I would agree that this book would not fall into a Orthodox Christian category, nor would I say that it is a Caotholic book.

But its still a Christian book.

I know.
I'm the only one here who has read it.

Hi Drew,
Saying something is "Christian" or "anti-Christian" is practically meaningless between us, since we don not agree on what "Christian" means. However, I can assert that it is against what the combined witness of the Church, and even of most of the branches that broke off from it, have asserted for two millennia, and the authority for determining the author's position is the author himself.

Again, I accept you as sufficient authority to report what the author said, so I believe you and that what you say is what the author says. I don't need to read the book to respond to that. I am responding to the claims which you repeat. Most of the specific points you have listed are decidedly opposed to the position that the Christian Church has held throughout history, and therefore it is reasonable to describe it on that basis as "anti-Christian". If "Christian" can be redefined to exclude what all of Christendom held as dogma for two thousand years in favor of what a tiny minority wishes to advocate today, then the word "Christian" means nothing. So you may assert that the book is "Christian". I can only say that your definition is out of line with nearly all of protestantism, including Anglicanism, as well as Orthodox and Catholic. That covers, well, pretty much all of the world and pretty much all of history. It's like trying to redefine "evolution" to fit creationist understandings, so your definition cannot be accepted in any historical context. The claims have always been known as "heresy", which is properly understood as a fatal error - one that destroys not only the system it is introduced into, but ultimately itself as well. It's like doubting carbon dating. I can do that, but if I do, then everything founded on it in evolutionary theory collapses like a heap of bricks. I can no longer even be an evolutionist, at least as far as reason is concerned, although I can be one on the basis of unreason. So it is heresy in terms of evolutionary science to doubt carbon dating. It is considered an established and proved thing, and most scientists are ready to offer the reasons for this, and accepting and propaganda of a denial of the validity of carbon dating would leave most of evolutionary theory in smoking ruins.

Other questions I have asked still remain unanswered - like the familiarity of people with the history of the early Church and the struggles between the heresies and orthodoxy - most are eager to defend this sort of book without any skepticism or questioning at all, for the reasons I have already described. (I'll admit a little pleasant surprise that Vraith got the nature of the problem, given how much we usually lock horns.)

[drew]

But that's one of the things the author is trying to say.

Yes; it goes slightly against what the Christian Church has been teaching for centuries and centuries.

But according to his research; which I might add, is VERY thorough; he feels that what the Christian Church has been teaching for those centuries and centuries is NOT what was being taught at the very beginning.

THe Orthodox and Catholic church did not start up the day after the Resurrection; it took a century or two before they took up their positions.

The author, in his research and belief, thinks that the positions were taken slightly wrong. That pushing the historical part of the the life of Jesus; rather than the Allegorical part of Yeshua was not the intention of the Gospels and Epistles.

There is a big chunk of one of the chapters where he tries to explain that the Gospel of Paul proves that he did not really believe in the historical Jesus.

He goes on to talk about the specific names of the persons in the Bible, Names like Mary and Lazarus, what they mean, and how they contribute to the allegorical teachings.

But as I said, I don't believe everything that author says either.

I DO however, think that You, Rus, would very much enjoy this book.
No, I'm not trying to get you to change your religion, or your beliefs one bit. To s strong believer that God did indeed walk the Earth AS Jesus; it can still strengthen those convictions, once you see the many many allegorical teachings throughout the entire New Testament, one could look at it as an incredible divine intervention.

This book is NOT anti-Christian.
It may be anti-Christian Church...but it is NOT anti-Christian.

The part of your signature that I quoted, you must believe in...that there are many views on a given subject, and even in finding the answer, it is still open for interpretation.

[rusmeister]

But that's one of the things the author is trying to say.

Yes; it goes slightly against what the Christian Church has been teaching for centuries and centuries.

But according to his research; which I might add, is VERY thorough; he feels that what the Christian Church has been teaching for those centuries and centuries is NOT what was being taught at the very beginning.

THe Orthodox and Catholic church did not start up the day after the Resurrection; it took a century or two before they took up their positions.

The author, in his research and belief, thinks that the positions were taken slightly wrong. That pushing the historical part of the the life of Jesus; rather than the Allegorical part of Yeshua was not the intention of the Gospels and Epistles.

There is a big chunk of one of the chapters where he tries to explain that the Gospel of Paul proves that he did not really believe in the historical Jesus.

He goes on to talk about the specific names of the persons in the Bible, Names like Mary and Lazarus, what they mean, and how they contribute to the allegorical teachings.

But as I said, I don't believe everything that author says either.

I DO however, think that You, Rus, would very much enjoy this book.
No, I'm not trying to get you to change your religion, or your beliefs one bit. To s strong believer that God did indeed walk the Earth AS Jesus; it can still strengthen those convictions, once you see the many many allegorical teachings throughout the entire New Testament, one could look at it as an incredible divine intervention.

This book is NOT anti-Christian.
It may be anti-Christian Church...but it is NOT anti-Christian.

The part of your signature that I quoted, you must believe in...that there are many views on a given subject, and even in finding the answer, it is still open for interpretation.

Well, probably the best eye-opening work I would recommend would be Timothy Ware's "History of the Orthodox Church, which fairly directly contradicts the claims of your author:
www.fatheralexander.org/booklets/englis ... ware_1.htm

But there's a problem with any reading of any history. We bring our own hermeneutics to the reading just as the historian forms his history based on his.

But your saying "Goes slightly against" is an unacceptable understatement for what you have described. It flat-out contradicts, and not slightly, but completely.

Many of us feel many things. Give me hard facts, and I'll interpret them as best I can according to my reason. But I have seen such enormous evidence myself that what the Orthodox Church teaches now IS what was taught in the beginning; that there was clarification, but not CHANGE of doctrine over time, and so an author's feelings don't interest me in historical inquiry.

I find my faith strengthened through attending Divine Liturgy and praying, and have the sense to know that accepting attacks on my faith, however pleasantly masked, as something to somehow incorporate into it; to accept the insertion of heresy into a complex working system that is essentially a virus, would be simply foolish, like the evolutionist who doesn't want his knowledge/belief/faith to be fatally eroded by the denial of carbon dating. There is so much in the Orthodox Tradition that an offering of the works of an independent man who contradicts that Tradition is like trying to offer rags to the wealthy. I believe you when you say that the work has caused you to think of many things. And for me, CS Lewis caused me to think of many new things I hadn't thought of before - but he wasn't enough, and I couldn't make him my god. But a person who proposes to deny traditional Christian teaching, and knows nothing about St Seraphim of Sarov, John of Kronstadt, the New Russian Martyrs of the 20th century, Alexander Schmemann or Alexander Men' or the rest of Orthodox Tradition (and including all of other traditions that do not contradict it) has nothing to offer one who does. I appreciate the offer, but Mr Harpur is way out of his league. I think that cutting himself off from both the Anglican tradition, as well as Orthodox, is the cause of that.