Did Jesus REALLY exist?

Post Reply New Topic

Well, I'm a Lutheran, and from my own religious tradition's opinion, the OT is primarily law, while the NT is largely gospel, one displaying God's wrath, while the other emphasizing his grace and love. That, and we believe in gradual revelation; that is in this case, the writers of the OT were without the whole picture of God, perceiving him as wrathful with their limited understanding of the Almighty, and believing that unexplained calamities were due to God's anger at sinfulness.
No, I don't expect that to be a satisfactory answer, but that's how we explain this discrepancy.

See my response to Simon_Says.

Well.. religious participation is correlated with the social welfare state...and per the research done in this area..that is not changing much in the world..

The ACA is a start in the US..but as long as people cannot rely on the state for fuller social security in time of need..

Religions more than anything fill this space..for culture...

http://rss.sagepub.com/content/16/4/399.abstract

As linked and quoted earlier..believers have remained relatively stable since the 1940's in the US..at 90% but actual church doors closing is on the rise..at the start of the 2000's likely in part as a result of competing..sources of potential dopamine stimulation ..that the information technology highway brings..as well as alternative avenues of worship...

But belief remains strong..in the US..there is no reason to see for any change in that..even the fundamentalist folks that look toward pop stars like Katy Perry as some type of devil worshipper..for her full freedom in creative expressions..herself admits she has a personal belief in GOD..

GOD is alive and well..in the US..dying in some European countries..but with the immigration of Muslims in many of those..earlier homogenous only societies..the social welfare state..may potentially go on the decline instead of rise there..with the average tribal animosity among human beings who view each other as different....leading to separation of full human cooperation..as a tribe of one...instead of separation....

And to be clear..much about organized religion disgusts..me..it's amazing really i could find one in my local area i could tolerate...

I abhor oppression of all kinds..including the oppression of alternate beliefs..whether it is atheism..or whatever makes a person happy...

But i'm a maverick..not really a member of any herd..here or anywhere..other than the human one....

Well, non faith has made some significant inroads in the past few decades. I really don't need a link to establish it at this late date. And it's further advanced in Europe than the US.

As far as religiosity and birth rates, look at Spain and Italy. At one time they might have represented the gold standard for European religiosity. Now they have low birth rates even by EU standards. And falling birth rates have happened all over the world as nations develop. Things change.

Well..seriously while organized religion in churches in on the decline in the US..the research simply does not show that for overall belief in a higher power in the US..again it's relatively stable since the 1940's..perhaps you may be confusing the two..if ya can provide research that refutes the link i provided..i will certainly entertain..a different result...

It's impossible to determine this strictly by anecdote alone..

it's just not something many people wanna talk about around the water cooler...

Falling birth rates..are more associated with birth control and abortion in developing countries that any other single variable..

They are a long long way..from reaching a secure social welfare state...if ever..and the birth rate alone is not what the correlation is..it is the social welfare state..in research that is the correlation....

And yes i do agree that faith has been on the decline in Europe for decades now..but the difference is Universal health care and other measures of the social welfare state for human beings..in these countries..

But Europe is a relative drop in the bucket for the population of the entire world..and again..the Muslim world is moving in...slowly but surely....

We have the Mexican immigrant religious folks to replenish the minions of christians..in the US and they have the Muslim religious folks to replenish the minions of muslims..that are just starting their existence on a rise..in those European countries...if it wasn't for these immigrants..the statistics in the US..very possibly could show a significant overall general population loss of faith in the US..since the 1940's...

Religion sells...as long as the need is there...it's gonna exist..in needed proportion..as long as it's legal....

Gallup has a number of them. People identifying as "none" under religion is up from 8% in 2000 to 15% in 2013. Not all will be atheists and agnostics but it's something that Christian writers have openly worried about it. I didn't just make this up tonight.

A Gallup-Win international poll has atheism up 4 points internationally since 2005 and religious faith down. China having the largest pool of confirmed atheists.
http://www.jagranjosh.com/current-affai ... 69644886-1

And Europe is running thin on faith. Non faith in Spain: 19%, 25% UK. 40% France. 29% Norway. Even our neighbors in Canada have 23% with no faith.

It's also quite natural that you'll see more people willing to openly identify as non-believers in this era than 20 or 50 years ago when almost no one said none. Traditional society has lost much it's power to shame non-traditional beliefs. Your neighbor or boss usually doesn't care what you think any more. And where people are allowed to speak their minds ideas will naturally be passed on. To assume that the distribution of religious conversation in 1950 Mayberry is due to the natural order of things and biological mandates is likely missing a few factors.

When you look at the meta number you have to account for growth in certain regions. Since China has become more permissive there are Christian conversions going on. Same for Eastern Europe post communism. But that doesn't change the fact that regionally you do have developed regions that are slowly leaving gods behind. Europe, the source of all of that screaming and shouting over a parade of gods, is losing interest in the subject.



Which is associated with wealth and family planning, as I said:
http://www.gapminder.org/videos/what-st ... on-growth/

Thanks for providing the links..and it does seem like there is some movement in America..toward the non believers..significant yes..but substantial no..and yes definitely concern for traditional religion...like
Christianity...

But i do not see the overall idea of a higher power..as dying in the US..it's ingrained in the way of life..ironically as a cultural materialistic one too..with
almost one third of the year focused on the Christmas buying season...

But anything goes in Europe..it's been that way for sometime...and i do not have anything against that at all..

it would be better in my opinion..if people's needs were taken care of..properly when they fall in life..

as opposed to any specific ABSTRACT LANGUAGE 'VESSELED' OR 'VEHICLED' belief in any deity at all....INCLUDING
POTENTIAL MYTHS TO HOUSE THOSE VESSELS AND VEHICLES...of abstract language for however one may describe
the total force of 'GOD'...

But in my opinion GOD IS ALL ABOUT SURVIVAL..AND will and THOSE WHO CONNECT AND HELP OTHERS..
REAP THE NATURAL BENEFITS..OF WHAT IS THE NATURAL REWARD OF NATURE..
FOR BEING A SOCIAL ANIMAL...WHICH IN MY OPINON..IS JUST ANOTHER PROCESS AND POSITIVE
FORCE..THAT CAN reasonably BE identified as THE ABSTRACT CONCEPT GOD...

NO LANGUAGE OR logical STRUCTURE..IS NECESSARY TO BE
part of that..

It flows..in the way..
most animals enjoy a oneness with the force of what i describe as GOD...

I NEVER FULLY experienced that until this year..when i returned to nature..and escaped..the prison..
and illusions of cultural delusions..like hate..illusory fear..and a desire for anything but
the joy of now....

But it is a practice..my way is a similar way..that people have entered into a oneness with the ALL that is..
since 70 thousand years ago..
a natural form of TAI CHI dancing..walking in reverse..and belly dancing..
that flowed from me..
and was never lessoned from another human being...

The folks that come to this type of enlightenment have to escape logic..
it is the only way to do it..
in my opinion..and the more intelligent a person is per standard intelligence measures..
the more difficult it is..
but i veer from no challenge in life..or death.

And seriously it
s not that different than a hawk spiraling around the Sun..
it requires no thought at all....

But the experience of it is better than many human orgasms..at the same time..
continuously...
There are no words to even describe the experience..
of TRUE ONENESS WITH ALLITIS...

YEAH..SERIOUSLY I GOT A CASE OF ALLITIS..

BUT YEAH SERIOUSLY..IT'S NOT A BAD THING TO CATCH..
IF YA find a way TO FISH FOR IT....;)

I'm sure there are many other paths..
but the one i found
works for me..and yes
many folks find it in a similar way through history..
mostly Yogis and folks in the Buddhist tradition..of the way
to Bliss...and escape from human suffering...
My meditation is movement..
some folks do it sitting still...
but hell no i ain't ever sitting still again.. like i did when i was a shut in for over 60 months with 19 documented medical disorders...
as long as i can move...toward.. and stay in an enlightened state of being...
that is the way i'm moving...

Well, of course you should do what works for you. I don't claim to know what is going on. I know it's very strange and that's about it..

i cannot agree more with you ..everyone should do whatever works for them...
follow one's own will is my basic philosophy for me and anyone else..who chooses that...

and no i do not even want to know what's going on..as far as GOD may go...
i flow WITH IT..AND DON'T EVEN need to understand it
in what most folks describe as human reason..and or logic...

i seriously doubt that most Christians in our modern society..ever connect WITH IT..
they are simply too repressed...it's like a giant cluster f** of human experience...and mind illusions...

A human being has to be as free as an animal in the wild to truly experience IT..
in only my opinion...i go to church for the human connection...

i go to nature..without human cultural artifacts for my dance with GOD...

But i can also transcend all of that now..in an extremely busy shopping mall..

That is what makes me like a Zen Master..

And hell no most people do not meditate in loud crowded malls..specifically 23 miles
in a TAI CHI dance walk..;)

That is a hell of an accomplishment all by itself..by whatever means necessary.....particularly
for someone like me..who couldn't even stand the stimulus of a friggin 15 minute visit to Whataburger..
just last June...and part of why my therapist called my recovery a real life human miracle...

That is the way ..once again..i found what i describe as GOD...but it is an active process without logic and or reason..
once again...it needs no name...:)

I think that Jesus existed. The story is full of awkward details that nobody would put into a story if they were making it up.

Here is an example: you know that "census" that explains why Mary and Joseph went to Bethlehem? Well, that census never happened. It's totally made up. Why is that census made up? Well, obviously it's because the real Jesus really was born in Nazareth, but the Messiah was supposed to be born in Bethlehem. So they had to make up an excuse.

Religion is not a place for any type of thinking. It's a place for faith.

Oh, so you pick and choose which parts of the bible you want to believe?

BS is BS. Either the book has credibility or it doesn't.

Essentially. And if Revelations has any relevancy, it's the history of the 1st century church, but told in the Apocryphal language of Persia, so that the Roman government wouldn't know they were being bad mouthed. But till the separation of the goats from the sheep, it's not the story of times yet to come. You don't seriously think anyone should interpret Revelations as a literal forecast of the future, do you? So yes, you gotta pick and choose what's relevant and what's not.

Yes..the thing about rigid thinking.. is an issue..here...it appears....

Hang on, so what do you believe, most christians believe in Christ. They Believe in Christ of the bible, they believe that christ is the messiah, sent by god, and that whilst he brought a new covenant, the old one still stands.

However according to you, the bible is very much open to interpretation and nothing is to be taken at face value. So then what is the point of the bible, surely, taken to the logical. contemporary conclusion wikipedia supersedes the bible. If you can cherry pick the bible, taking from it what resonates with you and ignoring, or dismissing as falsehoods the bits you don't like, then surely the bible is nothing more than a collection of philosophical treatises. By extrapolation of your perspective the existence of Jesus as either a man or the son of god is also open to interpretation and dismissal even from believers in the Book.

To be honest I find your perspective far more objectionable than I do the perspective of the likes of Moviefan. The latter takes the whole story and accepts it warts and all, yet you think its ok to decide which bits fit your own personal prejudice and reject the rest. The bible is either the word of god or it is not. God, Jesus, The Satan and the other Arch Angels either exist or they do not.

Revelations is not meant to be taken literally, as the language is purposely deceptive, and misinterpretation is rampant among denominations less interested in scholarship. That's how bad doctrines like millennialism came about. As far as interpretation is concerned - what denomination is in total agreement with any other? I admit I was perhaps a bit too flippant concerning what is and isn't acceptable, and the freedom of interpretation. But I stand by the doctrine of gradual revelation - that is, the people of OT times not having a full picture or understanding of what would eventually emerge as Christian theology.
If that's objectionable to you, well, you're more than welcome to your opinion.