Quote:Early Christians may have centered on the vertical pole with a crossbeam because it echoed the Egyptian ankh, a symbol of life, or the Sumerian symbol for Tammuz, or because it simply was more artistically and symbolically distinctive than the alternatives. Imagine millions of people wearing a golden pole on a chain around their necks.
That is interesting.
The Jesus of the bible said that he wouldn't know those who didn't help feed or clothe the poor. If Paul hadn't existed, Protestants would not believe in faith alone because that is not what Jesus taught.
Quote:We can be confident that at least some of the wise and timeless words and catchy proverbs attributed to Jesus are actually from earlier or later thinkers. For example, the Golden Rule was articulated before the time of Christ by the Rabbi Hillel the Elder, who similarly said it was the “whole Torah.” By contrast, the much-loved story of the woman caught in adultery doesn’t appear in manuscripts until the fourth century.
Glad to see that someone else has noticed a similarity between Hillel and Jesus.