Kevin's Watch

rusmeister wrote:

Cybrweez wrote:Cail, I believe rus's point is that Christ's sacrifice didn't happen in 30AD, but outside of time? So the question, what happened prior to Christ, only makes sense w/in time. But talking about an event outside of time.

I believe the difference is those who lived b4 Christ's sacrifice looked forward to Messiah, trusting in His salvation, tho not knowing its exact shape. The Hebrew Scriptures speak of salvation by faith as well.

The crucifixion happened in time and was a definite historical event - the descent into Hades is a trans-time event (an event not under the domination of time); I guess you could say that Christ's death (Who WAS/IS God) enabled the Him to "step outside of our temporal reality" in a sense, to destroy death; destroy Hades (as distinct from an eternal hell/destruction). Thus, Orthodox crosses frequently depict a skull and bones under the cross, symbolizing their defeat by Christ.

A lot of things here are mystical - they have been presented to us in terms that we can understand, so can not be pinned down as empirical facts in a scientific manner - you have to accept the authority that teaches it or not.

Well Your first statement is open for debate..."The crucifixion happened in time and was a definate historical event"

I have doubt...

Let's start there...have you historical evidence for this statement?

Dromond wrote:

rusmeister wrote:

Cybrweez wrote:Cail, I believe rus's point is that Christ's sacrifice didn't happen in 30AD, but outside of time? So the question, what happened prior to Christ, only makes sense w/in time. But talking about an event outside of time.

I believe the difference is those who lived b4 Christ's sacrifice looked forward to Messiah, trusting in His salvation, tho not knowing its exact shape. The Hebrew Scriptures speak of salvation by faith as well.

The crucifixion happened in time and was a definite historical event - the descent into Hades is a trans-time event (an event not under the domination of time); I guess you could say that Christ's death (Who WAS/IS God) enabled the Him to "step outside of our temporal reality" in a sense, to destroy death; destroy Hades (as distinct from an eternal hell/destruction). Thus, Orthodox crosses frequently depict a skull and bones under the cross, symbolizing their defeat by Christ.

A lot of things here are mystical - they have been presented to us in terms that we can understand, so can not be pinned down as empirical facts in a scientific manner - you have to accept the authority that teaches it or not.

Well Your first statement is open for debate..."The crucifixion happened in time and was a definate historical event"

I have doubt...

Let's start there...have you historical evidence for this statement?

The same general evidence on which we accept the accounts of the destruction of Pompeii. or any other historical event. Eyewitness reports.
I hold that they have the same value. You either believe that they have value as primary sources or you do not. If you have a special bias against the existence of Jesus Christ, you might as well wonder if there really was a Diocletian or whether Plato really wrote all that stuff attributed to him.

rusmeister wrote:

Dromond wrote:

rusmeister wrote: The crucifixion happened in time and was a definite historical event - the descent into Hades is a trans-time event (an event not under the domination of time); I guess you could say that Christ's death (Who WAS/IS God) enabled the Him to "step outside of our temporal reality" in a sense, to destroy death; destroy Hades (as distinct from an eternal hell/destruction). Thus, Orthodox crosses frequently depict a skull and bones under the cross, symbolizing their defeat by Christ.

A lot of things here are mystical - they have been presented to us in terms that we can understand, so can not be pinned down as empirical facts in a scientific manner - you have to accept the authority that teaches it or not.

Well Your first statement is open for debate..."The crucifixion happened in time and was a definate historical event"

I have doubt...

Let's start there...have you historical evidence for this statement?

The same general evidence on which we accept the accounts of the destruction of Pompeii. or any other historical event. Eyewitness reports.
I hold that they have the same value. You either believe that they have value as primary sources or you do not. If you have a special bias against the existence of Jesus Christ, you might as well wonder if there really was a Diocletian or whether Plato really wrote all that stuff attributed to him.

I expected stronger from you, Rus... that's as weak an answer as I've ever seen.

Loremaster wrote:

rusmeister wrote:A lot of things here are mystical - they have been presented to us in terms that we can understand, so can not be pinned down as empirical facts in a scientific manner.

That does not make sense. On the one hand you are saying that there are things that can be understood but then they cannot be understood. Science is a rational logical process; to say that there is a system that is beyond this means it is illogical and beyond rational thought.

How can something that is understood be beyond rational analysis?

you have to accept the authority that teaches it or not

UNCRITICAL THINKING

Dogmatic Thinking Characterized by the unwillingness to suspend belief and reflect on the sufficiency of the belief's premises, and ignoring the consequences of believing or acting on those beliefs. Refuses to recognize or acknowledge groundless assumptions.

Mystical Thinking Evidence used to reach conclusions is ephemeral, ineffable, intuitive, unverifiable, sporadic, and subjective.

Critical Thinking means correct thinking in the pursuit of relevant and reliable knowledge and values about the world.
Critical Thinking is reasonable, reflective, responsible, and skillful thinking that is focused on deciding what to believe or do.

A person who thinks critically can ask appropriate questions, gather relevant information, efficiently and creatively sort through this information, reason logically from this information, and come to reliable and trustworthy conclusions about the world that enable one to live and act successfully in it.

A person who practices Critical Thinking can achieve a productive, successful, ethical, happy, and, ultimately, a satisfying and fulfilling life. I believe it is impossible to achieve self-actualization without practicing critical thinking.

C'mon LM, I expect better from you! (Although there is a great deal of truth in the value of critical thinking.)
When I talk about a religion, I am talking about a thing that does not claim to be a science. It deals both with things that we can analyze and things that we can't. Thus, theology is based to a great extent on the parts that we can. But because it deals with their intersection with the things that are beyond the purview of science, you can't apply science to those things. If something is super-natural, then by definition it cannot be examined in a rational fashion via the natural sciences.

The purpose of critical thinking is to at last arrive at truth - to see something. It's like Lewis said -

"You cannot go on seeing through things for ever. The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it. . . . If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To see through all things is the same as not to see.”

And just for good measure:

In every age the men who want us under their thumb, if they have any sense, will put forward the particular pretension which the hopes and fears of that age render most potent. They 'cash in.' It has been magic, it has been Christianity. Now it will certainly be science. . . . Let us not be deceived by phrases about 'Man taking charge of his own destiny.' All that can really happen is that some men will take charge of the destiny of others. . . . The more completely we are planned the more powerful they will be.”

Rus, put simply (really simply, I know I'm leaving a lot of nuance on the table), all religion is about salvation. Whether we're talking Orthodoxy, Catholicism, Judaism, or whatever. And every religion has a set of guidelines (if you will) on how to achieve salvation.

Christ's Passion and death did occur in 30 AD-ish, and I feel that the historical record is strong enough to support that. I'll even accept the idea that on another plane of existence, it happened "outside of time". That doesn't change the fact that for the mortals here on Earth, it happened in 30AD-ish. Ali's right, the Jews are still waiting for the Messiah to show up. They don't accept that Christ was the guy. Then there are all the people who existed prior to Christ's time that weren't aware of the Biblical story; those who lived outside of the Middle East.

If your answer is, "I don't know what their fate is", that's cool. But what I'm seeing is an avoidance of the question, and (quite frankly) a really condescending attitude towards anyone who doesn't accept your flavor of religion.

That's not the Christianity I was taught, and that's also certainly not a way to convince people to be open minded to your beliefs.

When truth is nothing but the truth, its unnatural, it's an abstraction that resembles nothing in the real world. In nature there are always so many other irrelevant things mixed up with the essential truth.

-Aldous Huxley

Dromond wrote:

rusmeister wrote:

Dromond wrote: Well Your first statement is open for debate..."The crucifixion happened in time and was a definate historical event"

I have doubt...

Let's start there...have you historical evidence for this statement?

The same general evidence on which we accept the accounts of the destruction of Pompeii. or any other historical event. Eyewitness reports.
I hold that they have the same value. You either believe that they have value as primary sources or you do not. If you have a special bias against the existence of Jesus Christ, you might as well wonder if there really was a Diocletian or whether Plato really wrote all that stuff attributed to him.

I expected stronger from you, Rus... that's as weak an answer as I've ever seen.

Look, Dromond, I could launch into stuff like the Dead Sea scrolls, yadda yadda - it is well confirmed that numerous gospels and epistles referencing Christ were written between AD 50 and AD 90. Extraordinarily improbable for a non-existent person. The narratives of the gospels themselves defy from a literary standpoint, that they were simply fiction - something that didn't exist in any form as we see it in the gospels until the eighteenth century. The evidence is as solid as that of most other historical figures. The only reason to reject it is that it happens to also be connected to the religion that once dominated in the part of the world you come from - hardly an objective reason for doing so while accepting all of the rest of the history.

Cail wrote:Rus, put simply (really simply, I know I'm leaving a lot of nuance on the table), all religion is about salvation. Whether we're talking Orthodoxy, Catholicism, Judaism, or whatever. And every religion has a set of guidelines (if you will) on how to achieve salvation.

Christ's Passion and death did occur in 30 AD-ish, and I feel that the historical record is strong enough to support that. I'll even accept the idea that on another plane of existence, it happened "outside of time". That doesn't change the fact that for the mortals here on Earth, it happened in 30AD-ish. Ali's right, the Jews are still waiting for the Messiah to show up. They don't accept that Christ was the guy. Then there are all the people who existed prior to Christ's time that weren't aware of the Biblical story; those who lived outside of the Middle East.

If your answer is, "I don't know what their fate is", that's cool. But what I'm seeing is an avoidance of the question, and (quite frankly) a really condescending attitude towards anyone who doesn't accept your flavor of religion.

That's not the Christianity I was taught, and that's also certainly not a way to convince people to be open minded to your beliefs.

On 'the answer', I don't know the fate of most - who could? - but the Jewish forefathers (Adam, Abraham, Isaac, etc) are honored and equal to the Christian saints, so we believe that they have been/are being saved, and can pray to them (talk to them, ask them to pray for us) like other saints. Regarding others, of course we don't know. That's the whole point. God is the judge, not we. But we do believe that everyone has had opportunity for salvation, however that looks like and however God judges it.

I wonder if by condescending you are referring to the inevitability that anyone who claims to have found the true faith that really is the most accurate understanding of the universe and our place in it would conflict with modern pluralistic views that seek to accommodate all by saying that it really doesn't matter what you believe. You seem to be among the latter, as I am among the former, and it is clear that both of our views cannot be true. Thus, whether anyone is right, someone must definitely not be right. That cannot fail to offend somebody, but is by no means inconsistent with Christianity. The martyrs attest to the offense which their truth brought to others, although it is only offense in the way that anyone who learns must err, and be offended in the discovery of the error (or the assertion of error).
I find that the knowledge of many here of the depths of the Christian faith to be quite shallow. If I attempt to communicate some of that depth, I may seem condescending, although I do not wish to do so. One can be right, and have no personal pride in the fact, but still firmly assert their rightness. Still, I apologize for any seeming condescension.

On a personal level, I hold no superiority to others in any moral sense, and readily concede that others here are doubtless my superiors. When in the Communion prayer, I say that I am the chief of sinners, that is not a mere empty expression. I believe there is a unique way in which I really am the worst.

Let me stick my in here:

The Israelites, and the Judeans, were covered under Law. They obeyed the Law as given by Moses, and therefore are covered. (Actually you have to get fairly far into the Old Testament to find anything concerning an afterlife at all. All throughout Kings we read "and at the end of his days he rested with his ancestors".

As for "Juju" the jungle man, I don't have a clue if he's in heaven, Hell, or Limbo, or is just sent back to take another stab at it.

rusmeister wrote:

Dromond wrote:

rusmeister wrote: The same general evidence on which we accept the accounts of the destruction of Pompeii. or any other historical event. Eyewitness reports.
I hold that they have the same value. You either believe that they have value as primary sources or you do not. If you have a special bias against the existence of Jesus Christ, you might as well wonder if there really was a Diocletian or whether Plato really wrote all that stuff attributed to him.

I expected stronger from you, Rus... that's as weak an answer as I've ever seen.

Look, Dromond, I could launch into stuff like the Dead Sea scrolls, yadda yadda - it is well confirmed that numerous gospels and epistles referencing Christ were written between AD 50 and AD 90. Extraordinarily improbable for a non-existent person. The narratives of the gospels themselves defy from a literary standpoint, that they were simply fiction - something that didn't exist in any form as we see it in the gospels until the eighteenth century. The evidence is as solid as that of most other historical figures. The only reason to reject it is that it happens to also be connected to the religion that once dominated in the part of the world you come from - hardly an objective reason for doing so while accepting all of the rest of the history.

Rus, we're so far apart here I'm just going to agree to disagree and not post any further on the matter.

Maybe another time on another point.

Dromond, you don't believe that the crucifixion ever took place? Or is it sometime else-I'm not following you or rus...


edited, much later... this has always been my question

Frankly I think there is little doubt that someone named Jesus was crucified in Jerusalem approx. 2000 years ago.

Only questions at this point probably should be:

1. Was he in fact the Messiah? Hard to prove scientifically one way or the other.

2. Were the events recorded in the New Testament actually as large as they sounded, or was this crucifiction just a relatively minor event in the annuals of Roman and Judean history (much as the hanging and such were back in the days of the American West) in which a young Rabbi was hanged for blasphamy and sedation.

RR, I think #2 is true, altho it doesn't effect #1's answer. To the Romans and Jews, it wasn't a big deal (only a minority at the time believed it was a big deal).

Rawedge Rim wrote:Frankly I think there is little doubt that someone named Jesus was crucified in Jerusalem approx. 2000 years ago.

To be honest, I'd be very interested in seeing some sort of non-biblical corroboration of that.

Personally, I do believe it likely. But I also believe that it was something along the lines of your question 2. (Both good questions I thought btw.)

Personally I think that there may well have been a young Rabbi, a moral philosopher, who was probably opposed to Roman rule and attempted to unify Judean support and maybe passive (or active, who knows), resistance to Roman occupation. IIRC there were a number of such movements at the time, more than one of which claimed to be lead by a moshiach, attempting such unification.

The fact that even the earliest of the Gospels is believed to have been written at some remove in time from Jesus' death, and the latest perhaps as much as 70 years later suggests that historical accuracy may have suffered.

(IIRC, some sects of Judaism suggest that there is such a messiah living in each generation of people, so Jesus could well have been such a one if your beliefs lean that way.)

(Kinslaughterer, our resident archeaologist, has an excellent take on the historical and political circumstances surrounding this time...haven't seen him for a while though...probably off digging up Clovis garbage heaps or something...)

Anyway...I've always thought that there were many morally and socially valuable points within the Christian philosophy...but, coming back to your first question, that doesn't make it "divinely" inspired.

--A

Actually Kins is, I believe, back in West Virginia-I think going to grad school and working on some local stuff. I'll PM him in our fantasy baseball league and see if he can get to this thread.

(I hope some people get the point of the song I posted-can we somehow as as caring humans work for unity here, in the Tank, and throughout the world instead of stomping on and dividing every little darn thing? Just asking...)

(When I made that post, I made a mental note to ask you if you'd heard from him...now that you mention it, I do vaguely remember him saying something about more studying.)

As for your question, I'm not sure we can. Well...that's not strictly true...I'm not sure we can yet. While it seems that we're as much at odds as ever, I think that really we're living in an era of unprecedented global co-operation. International aid, disaster relief, all things well nigh impossible, if not unthinkable, a few hundred years ago.

To you Danlo, I recommend Common Values by Sissela Bok, who argues that we can share values across racial, religious, ethnic and cultural boundaries, and that doing so would benefit us as a species and planet.

--A

Avatar wrote:

Rawedge Rim wrote:Frankly I think there is little doubt that someone named Jesus was crucified in Jerusalem approx. 2000 years ago.

To be honest, I'd be very interested in seeing some sort of non-biblical corroboration of that.

Personally, I do believe it likely. But I also believe that it was something along the lines of your question 2. (Both good questions I thought btw.)

Personally I think that there may well have been a young Rabbi, a moral philosopher, who was probably opposed to Roman rule and attempted to unify Judean support and maybe passive (or active, who knows), resistance to Roman occupation. IIRC there were a number of such movements at the time, more than one of which claimed to be lead by a moshiach, attempting such unification.

The fact that even the earliest of the Gospels is believed to have been written at some remove in time from Jesus' death, and the latest perhaps as much as 70 years later suggests that historical accuracy may have suffered.

(IIRC, some sects of Judaism suggest that there is such a messiah living in each generation of people, so Jesus could well have been such a one if your beliefs lean that way.)

(Kinslaughterer, our resident archeaologist, has an excellent take on the historical and political circumstances surrounding this time...haven't seen him for a while though...probably off digging up Clovis garbage heaps or something...)

Anyway...I've always thought that there were many morally and socially valuable points within the Christian philosophy...but, coming back to your first question, that doesn't make it "divinely" inspired.

--A

Hey, Avatar,
I already referenced the Dead Sea Scrolls as a recent discovery corroborating a lot of Scripture.
As to 'the moral philosopher', I have raised at least several dozen times that there is no way that a person can take the things attributed to Christ and infer 'good moral teacher' from them - at the very least it involves ignoring His claims to actually be the creator of the Universe and to be able to forgive 3rd party sins - which would be something that only God Himself could do (ie, your wife cheats on you, and I say, "That's OK - I forgive her").
I think that despite all criticism, Lewis's 'Trilemma' (Liar, Lunatic or Lord) is still spot on.

If we discount memoirs because they are removed in time by 20-40 years, we will have to discount nearly all personal memoirs and most of accepted history on the same grounds.

A humongous difference between your perception of personal beliefs and traditional Christian claims is that they are not claimed to be personal at all, but to be objective claims not invented by the claimants or chosen due to personal preference. IOW, we didn't make it up - we merely discovered what generations of our ancestors had also discovered.

IIRC, the "biblical" portion of the scrolls is purely of the old testament, and that it is generally accepted (with the obligatory voice or two of dissent ) that they have no real connection with Christianity or the early Christians, and are a Judaic collection. So I certainly wouldn't call them a non-biblical corroboration of the existence, let alone divinity, of Jesus.

And yes, I ignore (or at least for these purposes discount) the claims you mention, not least because I am not sure he made those claims...only that the gospels say he made them, between 30 and 70 years later.

--A

Actually, those scrolls are not all old testament, and there are 'Christians' who incorporate them as sources...or such is the case according to a professor I had for cultural anthropology class. They are not in any way connected to Western Christianity since at least 150-200 CE [perhaps earlier, but definitely by then] I don't know what if any relation/contact/interaction they had with the Orthodox...it never came up.

No, they weren't all old testament...there were also the "non-biblical" texts, divided into Apocryphal and Sectarian manuscripts. But those weren't texts from the new testament either.

They were commentaries on the OT, rule books of the community, psalms and hyms, and benedictions and liturgical texts.

Just did a quick look up...apparently none of the scrolls mention Jesus, nor any of his followers or events described in the NT. So I think my point that they fail to serve as external corroboration stands.

--A