Knowing everything and allowing evil

[tackattack]

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@Abra- Jesus didn't spit in the face of the God of Abraham according to the Bible, he "spit in the face" of the Pharisitical teachings of the time. As far as the throne of David, check out Acts 2:25-36 if you're interested.

The book of Acts is not impressive tackattack. All the book of Acts amounts to is some of the earliest apologetics for the original gospels of Mark and John.

The author is just trying to justify the claims that Jesus was the messiah by pretending that his supposed rise from death and ascent into heaven represents him being handed the "Throne of David".

In short it's nothing other than totally absurd superstitious nonsense.

In fact, much of the New Testament is nothing more than early apologetic arguments for the original four rumor gospels of Mark, Matthew, Luke and John. And those four original Gospels are just repeats of the same rumors. In fact, most scholars believe that Matthew and Luke are just repeating Mark's tales.

So there's really only two gospels Mark, and John. The whole rest of the New Testament is basically just commentary on those original rumors. And then of course 75% is Paul's ramblings claiming to have seen Jesus in a vision. Personally I don't buy into anything that Paul wrote. He was just reacting to the whole rumor. (Not unlike a lot of modern day proselytizers)

I can't tell you how many Christian lunatics I've met live who claim to be in two-way contact with Jesus and even with God the Father.

Well, duh? If modern day humans are so easily deluded into thinking they are in direct contact with Jesus when it's pretty easy for me to believe that Paul could have been the same time of religious zealot in his day. Just another kook who is so desperate to believe in Jesus he went off the deep end proclaiming to have actually been contacted by the deity.

After all Paul (i.e. Saul) was a deeply troubled and desperate man. He had been the cause of persecution of many Christians. He had extreme reason to fear eternal damnation and a deep need for repentance. He probably just had a nervous breakdown is all. And then became a religious freak just like we see around us today.

Just look at how freaky these fables and rumors can make people. Jim Jones? David Koresh? Others? These freaky stories can easily cause people who are mentally unstable to go off the deep end and believe all sorts of things.

So no. The gibberish in Acts about Jesus being raised up to heaven to sit at the right-hand of God is nonsense. That was made up precisely as an apologetic argument to the Jews who instantly pointed out that these rumors are clearly false because of the fact that Jesus never became the king of the Jews and thus he could not have been the messiah.

That observation no doubt came up immediately. At the very moment that these rumors stared.

So the fact that these lame apologetic arguments became part of the "New Testament" early on, should not surprise anyone. In fact, there's a whole history of how these biblical tails unfolded. The stories and texts that ended up in the Christian Bible were created simultaneous alongside debates that the Christians were having with the Jews.

Here's a course on that very topic if you're interested:

Fall of the Pagans and the Origins of Medieval Christianity

This course describes how the New Testament cannon evolved over the centuries as the Christians and Jews slugged it out over whether or not it makes sense to believe that Jesus was the messiah.

The Jews kept objecting, and the Christians kept apologizing and that's how the New Testament evolved to become the collection of papers that it is today.

So no, I'm not impressed by what's written in acts.

Those arguments and apologetics started immediately as soon as the rumor that Jesus was the "messiah" were first made. The Jews objected instantly, and the Christians started making their excuses right at that time.

In fact, you can be certain that even Mark, Matthew, Luke and John were fully aware that even they had to justify their rumors to the Jews.

Look at the extremes they went to. They even had to stoop to proclaiming that God himself spoke from a cloud to verify the truth of their rumors.

They were extremely determined not to take no for an answer.

Not unlike religious zealots we meet today.

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I didn’t say acts would be impressive. You still haven’t established that Jesus in scripture spat in the face of God as you claimed earlier. You’re theories are fine and dandy, if you’re ok with picking and choosing which scriptures fit in with your belief and ignoring others. I find it surprising though that you can so blatantly hate on Christianity (you’ve obviously had some bad experiences and for that I’m truly sorry) yet skew it to fit your newest flavor. You don’t find it odd, that when you were a Christian Jesus was Christ, and now that you’re a Buddhist, Jesus is a Buddhist. I may not agree with everything considered by the majority to be standard Christian belief, but I don’t go around tearing off the stickers of rubics cubes, and solving things that way either. I'll get to reading the study when I have a free moment.
Do you think it odd to go ahead and throw in a falsifiable to those of the time genealogy of Jesus’ lineage if there wasn’t a point to them proving He was born of the line of David?

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Again, what makes sense to you vs what makes sense.

That sentence itself doesn't even make any sense.

What makes sense to me vs what makes sense to someone else.

Evidently you seem to think that whatever makes sense to you must represent 'absolute sense' somehow.

Hey, I'm not denying that these things "could possibly be" totally fictional rumors. But clearly they are rumors about the Torah. They rely on preexisting God-myths.

I just take it one step further and feel that its reasonable to assume that they may have also been sparked by some social event.

The idea that some guy spoke out against the immoral practices taught by the Torah is not an outrageous idea, IMHO.

The idea, that he instead sought to replace those immoral teaching with teachings that, appear to me, to be in perfect harmony with the teachings of Mahayana Buddhism which was at its peak at that very moment in history, is not an outrageous idea, IMHO.

The idea that he would risk being crucified for blaspheme for having spoken out against the Torah and against the Pharisees who oversee the Torah is again not an outrageous idea.

In fact, in Arab countries today you can be sentenced to death for blaspheme against the Koran. It's the same fundamental religion and hasn't changed much over the millennium.

So the idea that some guy spoke out against the immoral practices of the Torah, butted heads with the Pharisees, and was eventually excused on charges of blaspheme is not unreasonable at all.

And had such an event taken place it would have sparked rumors for sure.

It would be like seeing the Dalai Lama being crucified today by the Taliban. It would be cause of huge social controversy.

And that may have been precisely what it was like. This Jesus fellow who was a Mahayana Buddhist Bodhisattva (and perhaps you don't understand the concept of a Bodhisattva?). Would have naturally been going around preaching spiritual wisdom to anyone who is willing to listen.

He would have taken on disciples and trained them in his wisdom and even request that they too vow to become Bodhisattvas (i.e. to go out and teach spiritual wisdom to others). This was a huge thing in Mahayana Buddhism at that time. The concept of becoming a Bodhisattva was extremely important in Mahayana Buddhism.

So it makes perfect sense that Jesus as a Mahayana Buddhist Bodhisattva would have acted and behaved almost exactly like the rumors of Jesus. Although, he wouldn't have been claiming to be "The Christ". But if the New Testament is rumors trying to make out that this guy was "The Christ" then you can't expect to push those rumors onto the actual person of Jesus.

Somewhere along the way you've got to recognize that not everything that was written about this man was true. Most of it would be superstitious rumors. (i.e. the virgin birth, a God speaking from a cloud verifying the Jesus is his Son, the resurrection of not only Jesus but of a whole bunch of saints at the same time)

The stories are riddled with superstitious nonsense. But they still could have been sparked by a real person who was crucified.

That is a perfectly reasonable hypothesis.

It's a damn more reasonable hypothesis than the Christians are trying to sell.

Surely you've got to give me that much.

In my hypothesis Jesus is just another moral man like the rest of us.

But this theory explains where many of this rumors came from.

"I and the Father are one"
"Ye are also Gods"
"Don't be stoning people to death like that stupid Torah Teaches"
"Don't be seeking to get even with people like that stupid Torah Teaches"
"Don't be fooled by the Pharisees, they are hypocrites"

All of these things sound like what a Mahayana Buddhist might teach people. And these types of things are all being attributed to "Jesus".

So it's reasonable to believe that the "Jesus rumors" were sparked by a Mahayana Buddhist Bodhisattva.

For you to say this makes no sense is unreasonable.

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If Jesus was a Buddhist, he was a jewish practicing Buddhist. I don’t dfind it odd either that there wa someone to speak out against the immoral practices taught about the Torah. I think where you’re argument fails though is that He wasn’t replacing the Torah, He was giving a better understanding of it. blasphemers and idolaters were toned not hung on a Cross, btw. Jesus never taught that “Ye are also Gods”

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That was part of his plan Abra, washed us clean dontcha know. He's returning any day to set up his Kingdom. Maybe we should see if the romans you're referring to had anything to say about all of this.

You're essentially trotting out the "embarrassing details" apologist bullshit, if you hadn't realized that yet.

:asks the romans: -gets crickets-

I can see why you help wiccans smuggle christ in, you needed to smuggle him into buddhism. I asked you a bunch of questions about that once, about the effect your childhood faith may have had on your current beliefs.

I don't even have "beliefs" as you think of them.

In fact, 100% of the nonsense that you push onto me is created by your very own misconceptions.

I have no need to "save" Jesus. In fact, when I first left Christianity I didn't even give it a second thought. It really wasn't until much later in my life when I was studying the history of Buddhism that it became apparent to me that Jesus was most likely a Mahayana Buddhist Bodhisattva. Everything just fit together and that seemed to be the most likely explanation. I'm convinced not that this is indeed the most likely secular explanation for how those rumors got started.

It has nothing to do with my 'desire' to believe it. I couldn't care less.

In fact, even if Jesus was a Mahayana Buddhist, that doesn't automatically mean that he was necessarily sane. He might have started off as a Bodhisattva with good intentions, and as more and more people started thinking that he was claiming to be God and actually believing him that might have gone to his head, and he might have ended up falling into those delusions himself. Who knows?

That's totally unimportant to me. I have no need to defend someone who lived 2000 years ago.

Just the same, these stories make for a good psychic archetype. Psychic archetypes have psychological value even in a purely secular world. It's always good to have your heroes and legends to look up to. Whether they are real people or fictitious characters are totally irrelevant.

So yes, I totally approve of and support anyone who can make a positive spiritual archetypes out of anyone including Jesus. So if an ex-Christian wants to bring Jesus into "Wicca" more power to them! But of course, it wouldn't make any sense to try to maintain his status as "The Christ", if a person is going to do that they may as well stick with Christianity because that's the whole thesis of Christianity. What's the point in leaving Christianity at all if you're going to continue to hold up that Jesus is the sacrificial lamb of a jealous God?

But yes, I support any positive use of Jesus as a psychic or spiritual archetype. And that can be done from a purely secular perspective though you may not be able to understand that.

I support anything that positive and constructive.

Of course, Christianity is not positive nor is it constructive. Christianity holds Jesus up as "The Christ" and uses him to exclude people from spirituality. They use him for destructive purposes to renounce people as 'non-believers' etc.


Christianity is not a positive religion at all for anyone who isn't a member and supporter of the cult. It's an extremely divisive religion that uses Jesus as an excuse to exclude people from divine love, if they refuse to join and support the cult.

So it's just a hateful exclusionary religion that uses Jesus as a hate hammer. I have absolutely no respect for the religion whatsoever and the sooner it dies, the better off humanity will be.

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It might be able to be done from a secular archetype, but I must confess that seems as odd to me as I think it does to Rhythm. It can however also be done from a Christian perspective as well though. As far as your big glass of haterade (yes I said it)
1- Christianity nor does the Bible use Jesus or God to exclude people from Spirituality. Spirituality is a fundamental cornerstone in the belief. The fact you deny this speaks more to your exclusion from Christianity, than Christianities exclusion of you.
2- Calling a spade a spade is not destructive. Rhythm doesn’t believe in God.. know what that makes him.. and unbeliever.. we call them atheists. I don’t think he or I are offended by that label in the slightest. Now I know that some Christians have a lot of fear and hatred for things they don’t understand, like atheism. There’s a difference between bigotry and identification though. Identification with segregation is bigotry, identification for clarification is constructive.
3- Christianity is a positive for all the unbelievers getting outreach from the Christian community. Some are also getting preached to, but not all. Even if they are though, it doesn’t detract from fixing someone’s car for free or paying some of their bills, or feeding/clothing them.
4- It is an extremely divisive religion, not because of the nature of the religion, but because of the nature of herding cats.
5- The Bible has lots of stories of people who never knew Jesus that received “divine love”, some people only choose to see the bad things though.
If you’d like to PM or email me all your traumatic experiences with religion I’d be glad to listen if you’re up for it. Your hatred though is only harming yourself and doing nothing to further your hateful cause or heal any wounds you have.

[Abracadabra]

I didn’t say acts would be impressive.

Well, you offered it like as if it should convince me of something.

You still haven’t established that Jesus in scripture spat in the face of God as you claimed earlier. You’re theories are fine and dandy, if you’re ok with picking and choosing which scriptures fit in with your belief and ignoring others.

I don't need to make a case for it. It's right in the scriptures and cannot be denied.

• The Torah teaches that God directed us to judge others and to stone sinners and heathens to death.
  
• The Gospels have Jesus teaching that people should not judge others and that they should not stone sinners to death.
  

Why do you think the Jews were stoning sinners to death in the first place? Where do you think they got that idea from?

Jesus was clearly rejecting the teachings of the Torah (i.e. The commandments of the God of Abraham)

It's right there in the gospels.

• The Torah teaches that God directed people to seek revenge as in an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
  
• The Gospels have Jesus teaching that people should not seek revenge but should instead forgive others and turn the other cheek.
  

This are complete polar opposites.

There's no question that this man Jesus was rejecting the teachings of the Torah and the God of Abraham as being immoral and unhealthy. And the moral values that Jesus taught were clearly in harmony with the teachings of Mahayana Buddhism.

Why should anyone think that the "son" of the God of Abraham would disagree with his commandments?

I find it surprising though that you can so blatantly hate on Christianity (you’ve obviously had some bad experiences and for that I’m truly sorry) yet skew it to fit your newest flavor.

This isn't a personal hatred. Christianity has been used to hate on people for centuries. Christianity has been used to persecute and belittle anyone who refused to agree with the religion. Christianity was used to destroy and renounce Pagan spirituality, and burn pagan holy sites to the ground. Christianity. Christianity is responsible for the torture of tens of thousands of innocent women and even had them burned alive at the stake. The thought is horrific. Christianity has been (and still is being used) to impede the intellectual achievements man humanity. Christianity interfered with scientific progress all throughout history and continues to do so to this very day by renouncing evolution and the true age of the universe and Earth.

It's teaches ignorance and fear. Fear of God even. It uses the notion of a supposedly all-loving God to instill shame and guilt into same-gender lovers.

In short, Christianity uses Jesus as a weapon of hatred in the name of a supposedly all-mighty God.

Christianity creates hate in the name of Jesus and the God of Abraham. The hate is on their shoulders not mine.

You don’t find it odd, that when you were a Christian Jesus was Christ, and now that you’re a Buddhist, Jesus is a Buddhist.

First off, you're making huge assumptions.

I was born into Christianity, I did not chose to believe in the religion. Moreover, it would be a lie to say that I believed that Jesus was the "Christ" at any point. What happened is that my parents, extended family and society, and the clergy of our church all told me that Jesus was the "Christ".

When I finally decided to look into the matter myself and read the Bible I quickly discovered that the claims are utter nonsense.

So I can't say that there was ever a time when I actually "believed" that Jesus was "The Christ". All I did was accept what my parents were telling me and presumed that they wouldn't lie about something like that. What I realized later is that, in truth, they had no clue. They were just going along with the crowd and doing what their parents had taught them, etc.

I don't think any of them seriously looked into the matter. They were probably content with just believing in the religoin and weren't truly interested in questioning it. In fact, they were probably taught that to question it would be to question God, and that's frowned on as being 'arrogant'. Question the Bible too much and you'll quickly get that utterly stupid saying, "Who are you to question God?"

I may not agree with everything considered by the majority to be standard Christian belief, but I don’t go around tearing off the stickers of rubics cubes, and solving things that way either. I'll get to reading the study when I have a free moment.

I have absolutely no respect for a religion that has a history of ruthless and relentless proselyting and "in-your-face" evangelizing. If the religion were truly as meek as Jesus taught people to be then it wouldn't be a problem. But face it, it's not meek at all. It's constantly in the face of others accusing them of "rejecting God", or "refusing to believe", or whatever.

It's disgusting and I make absolutely no apology at all for my strong stance against it. I would even personally vote to have Christianity taken off the list of "valid religions" and instead have it listed as a hate cult.

I my personally opinion there is nothing more despicable than using a historical character like Jesus in the pretense that the religion stands for what he taught all the while using him a hate weapon to support their religious bigotry.

Just like Jesus called the Pharisees hypocrites, I call the Christians hypocrites. And as long as they use Jesus as weapon of hatred I will continue to condemn them as hypocrites.

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Having said that I'm fully aware that there are a lot of sheeple who view themselves as "Christians" yet they do not hate anyone, nor do they use Jesus as an excuse to hate others. In fact, thank God, (not the God of Abraham obviously), that the vast majority of "Christians" are indeed sheeple. They are just trying to get through life the best they can. They have accepted Jesus as "The Christ" because they were taught that this is what they should do and they want to do the right thing. Bless their souls.

It's not the "followers" of this religion that I have beef with. Those sheeple "Christians" are just victims of the cult. I was born into a family of sheeple and basically became one until I decided to look into the doctrine more thoroughly myself.

My entire family of extremely devoted Free Methodist Christians were the nicest people you can imagine. They were friendly, they'd give you the shirt off their back if they thought it would help you. They would be the last people on Earth to buck science, or harass same-gender partners, or to even evangelize or proselytize their religion to other people. If all Christians were like the Christians I grew up among no one would have a problem with the religion. But let's face it, that's not the case.

In fact, even when I was a Christian and I was trying to make sense of the Bible every time I would try to interpret things in a "good" way, hardcore fundamentalists would argue for a more hateful interpretation. Hardcore Christian Fundamentalists became the greatest obstacle in even trying to salvage anything "good" from the religion.

And that's still the case today.

Just like my sig line indicates, clearly the Bible has Jesus forgiving people "for they know not what they do". And these are people were were denying his divinity, mocking him, physically beating him to a pulp, and nailing him to a pole.

I point to that and show this as evidence that Jesus does not require anyone to worship him or ask him for forgiveness. Yet the hardcore hateful Christian fundamentalists won't stand for a truly forgiving Jesus who offers unconditional grace and love.

They demand that Jesus will hate you if you don't kneel down and worship him and repent your sins in the name of the "Christ Almighty". And then after you're done doing that you had better get up and start supporting the entire Christian religious bigotry scheme proclaiming that the entire Old Testament is the "Word of God" and that God hates homosexuality, etc. etc. etc.

These people are just using Jesus as a patsy to support their religious bigotry and hatred.

Show anywhere in the Bible where Jesus might forgive someone without them supporting Christian bigotry and the Christian fundies will be quick to renounce it with a vengeance. They will not tolerate a loving Jesus who offers unconditional love and Grace, because that would defeat their use of him as a weapon of hatred.

Do you think it odd to go ahead and throw in a falsifiable to those of the time genealogy of Jesus’ lineage if there wasn’t a point to them proving He was born of the line of David?

They didn't "prove" anything. All they did was write down a bunch of gibberish claiming that they could prove it.

Moreover, why would linage to King David be important for a demigod who was supposedly born of a mortal woman who had been impregnated by God?

Obviously Jesus wouldn't be a descendent of King David anyway. He would be a demigod. These superstitious fables are utterly absurd.

You don’t find it odd, that when you were a Christian Jesus was Christ, and now that you’re a Buddhist, Jesus is a Buddhist.

By the way I forgot to mention, I was never a Buddhist. I studied Buddhism. I don't claim to have ever become a Buddhist or to have taken on Buddhism as my own personal religion.

I did meditate and practice many of the things that Buddhism teaches, but I can't say that I did those things as a 'religion'. In fact, from my perspective they were simply wise things to do even if a person is a totally convinced secular atheist. Buddhism contains a lot of wisdom even if a person isn't interested in spiritual beliefs. Far more than the Hebrew mythologies for sure.

It was during my studies of Buddhism that I learned about Mahayana Buddhism and realized that Jesus was most likely a Mahayana Buddhist. The fact that Mahayana Buddhism was at it's peak and precisely the same that Jesus would have lived seals the deal for me.

If Jesus was a Buddhist, he was a jewish practicing Buddhist.

Yes, of course. I imagine that Jesus probably was a Jew. However, that does not imply a modern view of Judaism. Many "Jews" in those days had a very mystical view of "God". In fact, I even hear modern day Jews expressing this kind of view. Just because he was a Jewish practicing Buddhist doesn't mean anything. He could have his own views concerning how he interpreted the Torah. In fact, even the Gospels have Jesus referring to the Torah as "your law" when speaking with the Scribes and Pharisees not as "God's Law". He also was quick to point out that the Scribes and Pharisees are hypocrites.

So there's really no reason at all to believe that Jesus worshiped the Torah as the absolute verbatim "Word of God". On the contrary, he may have disagreed with much it. And apparently he obviously did since he taught against those teachings.

I don’t dfind it odd either that there wa someone to speak out against the immoral practices taught about the Torah. I think where you’re argument fails though is that He wasn’t replacing the Torah, He was giving a better understanding of it.

How could you possible support such an obviously nonsensical statement?

He was not giving a better understanding of it. The Torah clearly has the God of Abraham commanding people to stone sinners and heathens to death in no uncertain terms. Jesus renounced those commandments.

That is not giving a better understanding of it. It's a flat out about-face.

Jesus was blatantly renouncing those directives.

blasphemers and idolaters were toned not hung on a Cross, btw. Jesus never taught that “Ye are also Gods”

We don't know the details of Jesus' death. All we have is the rumors of the Old Testament that could be extreme exaggerations, or even blatant outright lies.

IMHO, these authors already showed their desperation to exaggerate things. They claim that God spoke from a cloud verifying that Jesus was his son. Well, damn if you're going to believe that one, then why bother proving a linage? Wouldn't God's Word be proof enough?

They also claim that when Jesus rose from the dead so did a multitude of saints who were also jostled from their graves due to a trembling Earth. And they went into the Holy City and showed themselves to the people there.

The baloney you need to believe in order to support these fables is truly amazing.

And yes, Jesus most certainly did teach, "Ye are Gods".

When he was accused of blaspheme for having said that he and the father are one, he pointed to the Torah and said, "Is it not written in your law, I said ye are Gods".

By pointing to that verse in the Torah he was loaning his support to that notion. Moreover, what kind of a feeble thing would that be for a real demigod to do?

I mean, if Jesus was truly divine and he was attempting to proclaim his unique divinity by saying that he and the father are one, then when asked what he meant by that why would he point to the Torah and show people where it says, "Ye are Gods"?

That makes absolutely no sense at all. If Jesus was attempting to proclaim unique divinity he's not going to be pointing to the Torah where is says "Ye are Gods".

So this event actually supports the idea that he was indeed thinking pantheistically like a Mahayana Buddhist. He was proclaiming that we are all children of God equally. And that he is no different from anyone else.

For me, this is very strong evidence that Jesus was a Mahayana Buddhist. '

Yet you seem to be in denial that Jesus even taught this. But it's right there in the gospels.

John.10:34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?

1- Christianity nor does the Bible use Jesus or God to exclude people from Spirituality. Spirituality is a fundamental cornerstone in the belief. The fact you deny this speaks more to your exclusion from Christianity, than Christianities exclusion of you.

They most certainly absolutely do. They exude people from spirituality if those people are not Christian. That's the very basis of the religion. There is no other way to God but through "The Christ".

That is the exclusion of everyone who does not worship Jesus as "The Christ".

Moreover, what that truly means is that the person has converted to supporting the entirety of the religion including all of it's bigotries and judgements against all others who are not Christian.

The only way it is deemed "acceptable" to receive "Christ" is to swallow and support the the entire dogmatic cannon of the cult.

Anything less that this is deemed unacceptable. After all, it makes no sense to accept Jesus as "The Christ" whilst denying the God of Abraham and the Old Testament. If you're going to accept that Jesus is the sacrificial lamb of the God of Abraham you've got to support that fairy tale first.

Therefore you must support a jealous male-chauvinistic pig who has cursed women with sorrowful conception and childbirth for the fall from grace of Eve, blah, blah, blah.

Christianity isn't about Jesus at all. It's about accepting the whole shebang in Jesus' name.

It's a scam.

2- Calling a spade a spade is not destructive. Rhythm doesn’t believe in God.. know what that makes him.. and unbeliever.. we call them atheists. I don’t think he or I are offended by that label in the slightest. Now I know that some Christians have a lot of fear and hatred for things they don’t understand, like atheism. There’s a difference between bigotry and identification though. Identification with segregation is bigotry, identification for clarification is constructive.

I'm personally not concerned about atheists. Christians renounce all other religions and spiritual faiths as being false, and they accuse those people of refusing to accept Christ as their savior.

In fact, if I tell Christian that I believe in Jesus as Mahayana Buddhist, that's nowhere near good enough.

If I don't accept the whole God of Abraham thing and the demand that we have all fallen from Grace and God had to send his only begotten son to be butchered on a pole to pay for my sins, then I am 'excluded' from God's love.

And to make matters far worse, "It's all my fault because I'm the one who's refusing to love this bastardy God"

That assertion and demand of people right there is extreme emotional terrorism. It basically accusing people of supposedly turning against a supposedly loving God and being either stupid or evil for doing so.

When the truth is that I reject it because it's a hateful religion. Period.

3- Christianity is a positive for all the unbelievers getting outreach from the Christian community. Some are also getting preached to, but not all. Even if they are though, it doesn’t detract from fixing someone’s car for free or paying some of their bills, or feeding/clothing them.

When I here this kind of nonsense it just makes me what to say "Fuck you and your arrogance".

Christianity is not responsible for the good will of people in general. There are also many atheists who make great efforts to save humanity, the planet, and all the animal life on the planet.

Christianity does not hold the copyright on charity. Moreover, as I mentioned before there are many good sheeple who do good things in the name of Christianity. And in the name of Jesus. Clearly all the followers of the religion on are not hateful people.

That doesn't change the fact that the religion itself (i.e. the underlying brainwashing doctrine is hateful and bigoted).

I speak to the religion. Not to the sheeple who might follow it. Those same people would most likely become very charitable Buddhist, Taoists, Wiccans, or even Atheists, if Christianity were to suddenly disappear from history.

Loving people will do loving things no matter what religion they believe in.

I think Steven Weinberg said it best, "There are good people and there are bad people, but it take religion to get good people to do bad things"

It's easy to get good people to do good things. You don't need religion for that.

But you do need religion to get good people to support bad and hateful things in the name of a God.

So we don't need religion for philanthropy. Philanthropy will take care of itself.

4- It is an extremely divisive religion, not because of the nature of the religion, but because of the nature of herding cats.

No it's the demand that no one gets to God but through "The Christ" is what makes the religion devise.

It's basically saying, "Either join and support this religion or you are excluded from the club, and this club OWNS GOD!"

5- The Bible has lots of stories of people who never knew Jesus that received “divine love”, some people only choose to see the bad things though.

Well don't look at me. Read my signature file. Jesus forgives people for merely not knowing what they do. For the Bible tells us so.

It's only the hardcore Christian fundamentalists and evangelists who demand that people receive Jesus are their terms.

They have taken charge of Jesus. He's a marionette that they operate from their lap. They decide who Jesus will accept or not. Jesus has no say in the matter.

If you’d like to PM or email me all your traumatic experiences with religion I’d be glad to listen if you’re up for it. Your hatred though is only harming yourself and doing nothing to further your hateful cause or heal any wounds you have.

It's not the kind of hatred that you imagine. I hate Christianity in the same way that I hate cancer. Cancer is a deadly disease of the body. Christianity is a deadly disease of the human spirit. I don't care it around with me on an emotional level. In fact when I finish typing this I'm going to go back to jamming on the guitar and I carry no emotional baggage with me from having tried to explain these things to you.

I have no "personal trauma" associated with the religion. My concern is for humanity.

My childhood days as a Christian in a Christian family were quite pleasant. I had no problem with the religion. On the contrary I was planning on becoming a minister. Naively of course. That was before I actually read the bible for myself.

So I have no personal trauma associated with the religion. Even when I realized that it could not possibly be true I didn't even feel 'betrayed'. I just realized that my parents accepted it on pure faith and never even bothered to question it. That was good enough for them. So I didn't even really blame them. They were just trying to do what they believe to be the right thing.

~~~~~

I personally wouldn't have a problem with the religion at all if it wasn't constantly being proselytized and used to belittle people who don't accept it. As well as being used to support ignorance over knowledge. Just as teaching people to not believe in evolution, etc.

The fact that we are directly related to everything on this planet is important for people to realize. Yet this religion has people thinking that they are special and animals are just lesser creatures created by a God for us to exploit.

I have a lot of problems with what this religion teaches our society in general. The very nature of this "God" is to solve all his problems via harsh punishments and threats of punishments. And don't try to tell me that this idea doesn't cause people to think that such solution are WISE. Its does. People get it in their heads that if violence and punishment are God's divine way of dealing with problems, then it makes sense that we should do that to.

That's "Divine Justice"

I just disagree with the whole Hebrew mentality. Male-chauvinism in particular. We basically have a religion that is nothing more than the myths of a sick demented culture and we hold that up as being the "Word of God".

That's sick if you stop and think about it.

It's not about me. It's about humanity.

This religion is detrimental to humanity in general.

And the tension between Islam and Christianity (both products of these same stupid myths) is going to come to a head and could indeed be the cause of some horrific war.

So these are legitimate concerns.

Don't try to reduce it to something so petty as my "personal problem".

No, these Abrahamic religions are a cancer on humanity.

It's not "my" problem, it's "our" problem.

Everyone needs to wake up and take a very close look at this Abrahamic nonsense.

"Save" Jesus as a Mahayana Buddhist if you like.

Dismiss him entirely as nothing but pure fiction.

But let's get over these utterly insane rumors that he was the demigod son of the God of Abraham.

A jealous hateful God who will cast mere non-believers into a hell fire for merely not believing in him.

Get over it.

[tackattack]

---

I didn’t say acts would be impressive.

Well, you offered it like as if it should convince me of something.

You still haven’t established that Jesus in scripture spat in the face of God as you claimed earlier. You’re theories are fine and dandy, if you’re ok with picking and choosing which scriptures fit in with your belief and ignoring others.

I don't need to make a case for it. It's right in the scriptures and cannot be denied.

• The Torah teaches that God directed us to judge others and to stone sinners and heathens to death.
  
• The Gospels have Jesus teaching that people should not judge others and that they should not stone sinners to death.
  

Why do you think the Jews were stoning sinners to death in the first place? Where do you think they got that idea from?

Jesus was clearly rejecting the teachings of the Torah (i.e. The commandments of the God of Abraham)

It's right there in the gospels.

• The Torah teaches that God directed people to seek revenge as in an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
  
• The Gospels have Jesus teaching that people should not seek revenge but should instead forgive others and turn the other cheek.
  

This are complete polar opposites.

There's no question that this man Jesus was rejecting the teachings of the Torah and the God of Abraham as being immoral and unhealthy. And the moral values that Jesus taught were clearly in harmony with the teachings of Mahayana Buddhism.

Why should anyone think that the "son" of the God of Abraham would disagree with his commandments?

I find it surprising though that you can so blatantly hate on Christianity (you’ve obviously had some bad experiences and for that I’m truly sorry) yet skew it to fit your newest flavor.

This isn't a personal hatred. Christianity has been used to hate on people for centuries. Christianity has been used to persecute and belittle anyone who refused to agree with the religion. Christianity was used to destroy and renounce Pagan spirituality, and burn pagan holy sites to the ground. Christianity. Christianity is responsible for the torture of tens of thousands of innocent women and even had them burned alive at the stake. The thought is horrific. Christianity has been (and still is being used) to impede the intellectual achievements man humanity. Christianity interfered with scientific progress all throughout history and continues to do so to this very day by renouncing evolution and the true age of the universe and Earth.

It's teaches ignorance and fear. Fear of God even. It uses the notion of a supposedly all-loving God to instill shame and guilt into same-gender lovers.

In short, Christianity uses Jesus as a weapon of hatred in the name of a supposedly all-mighty God.

Christianity creates hate in the name of Jesus and the God of Abraham. The hate is on their shoulders not mine.

You don’t find it odd, that when you were a Christian Jesus was Christ, and now that you’re a Buddhist, Jesus is a Buddhist.

First off, you're making huge assumptions.

I was born into Christianity, I did not chose to believe in the religion. Moreover, it would be a lie to say that I believed that Jesus was the "Christ" at any point. What happened is that my parents, extended family and society, and the clergy of our church all told me that Jesus was the "Christ".

When I finally decided to look into the matter myself and read the Bible I quickly discovered that the claims are utter nonsense.

So I can't say that there was ever a time when I actually "believed" that Jesus was "The Christ". All I did was accept what my parents were telling me and presumed that they wouldn't lie about something like that. What I realized later is that, in truth, they had no clue. They were just going along with the crowd and doing what their parents had taught them, etc.

I don't think any of them seriously looked into the matter. They were probably content with just believing in the religoin and weren't truly interested in questioning it. In fact, they were probably taught that to question it would be to question God, and that's frowned on as being 'arrogant'. Question the Bible too much and you'll quickly get that utterly stupid saying, "Who are you to question God?"

I may not agree with everything considered by the majority to be standard Christian belief, but I don’t go around tearing off the stickers of rubics cubes, and solving things that way either. I'll get to reading the study when I have a free moment.

I have absolutely no respect for a religion that has a history of ruthless and relentless proselyting and "in-your-face" evangelizing. If the religion were truly as meek as Jesus taught people to be then it wouldn't be a problem. But face it, it's not meek at all. It's constantly in the face of others accusing them of "rejecting God", or "refusing to believe", or whatever.

It's disgusting and I make absolutely no apology at all for my strong stance against it. I would even personally vote to have Christianity taken off the list of "valid religions" and instead have it listed as a hate cult.

I my personally opinion there is nothing more despicable than using a historical character like Jesus in the pretense that the religion stands for what he taught all the while using him a hate weapon to support their religious bigotry.

Just like Jesus called the Pharisees hypocrites, I call the Christians hypocrites. And as long as they use Jesus as weapon of hatred I will continue to condemn them as hypocrites.

~~~~

Having said that I'm fully aware that there are a lot of sheeple who view themselves as "Christians" yet they do not hate anyone, nor do they use Jesus as an excuse to hate others. In fact, thank God, (not the God of Abraham obviously), that the vast majority of "Christians" are indeed sheeple. They are just trying to get through life the best they can. They have accepted Jesus as "The Christ" because they were taught that this is what they should do and they want to do the right thing. Bless their souls.

It's not the "followers" of this religion that I have beef with. Those sheeple "Christians" are just victims of the cult. I was born into a family of sheeple and basically became one until I decided to look into the doctrine more thoroughly myself.

My entire family of extremely devoted Free Methodist Christians were the nicest people you can imagine. They were friendly, they'd give you the shirt off their back if they thought it would help you. They would be the last people on Earth to buck science, or harass same-gender partners, or to even evangelize or proselytize their religion to other people. If all Christians were like the Christians I grew up among no one would have a problem with the religion. But let's face it, that's not the case.

In fact, even when I was a Christian and I was trying to make sense of the Bible every time I would try to interpret things in a "good" way, hardcore fundamentalists would argue for a more hateful interpretation. Hardcore Christian Fundamentalists became the greatest obstacle in even trying to salvage anything "good" from the religion.

And that's still the case today.

Just like my sig line indicates, clearly the Bible has Jesus forgiving people "for they know not what they do". And these are people were were denying his divinity, mocking him, physically beating him to a pulp, and nailing him to a pole.

I point to that and show this as evidence that Jesus does not require anyone to worship him or ask him for forgiveness. Yet the hardcore hateful Christian fundamentalists won't stand for a truly forgiving Jesus who offers unconditional grace and love.

They demand that Jesus will hate you if you don't kneel down and worship him and repent your sins in the name of the "Christ Almighty". And then after you're done doing that you had better get up and start supporting the entire Christian religious bigotry scheme proclaiming that the entire Old Testament is the "Word of God" and that God hates homosexuality, etc. etc. etc.

These people are just using Jesus as a patsy to support their religious bigotry and hatred.

Show anywhere in the Bible where Jesus might forgive someone without them supporting Christian bigotry and the Christian fundies will be quick to renounce it with a vengeance. They will not tolerate a loving Jesus who offers unconditional love and Grace, because that would defeat their use of him as a weapon of hatred.

Do you think it odd to go ahead and throw in a falsifiable to those of the time genealogy of Jesus’ lineage if there wasn’t a point to them proving He was born of the line of David?

They didn't "prove" anything. All they did was write down a bunch of gibberish claiming that they could prove it.

Moreover, why would linage to King David be important for a demigod who was supposedly born of a mortal woman who had been impregnated by God?

Obviously Jesus wouldn't be a descendent of King David anyway. He would be a demigod. These superstitious fables are utterly absurd.

You don’t find it odd, that when you were a Christian Jesus was Christ, and now that you’re a Buddhist, Jesus is a Buddhist.

By the way I forgot to mention, I was never a Buddhist. I studied Buddhism. I don't claim to have ever become a Buddhist or to have taken on Buddhism as my own personal religion.

I did meditate and practice many of the things that Buddhism teaches, but I can't say that I did those things as a 'religion'. In fact, from my perspective they were simply wise things to do even if a person is a totally convinced secular atheist. Buddhism contains a lot of wisdom even if a person isn't interested in spiritual beliefs. Far more than the Hebrew mythologies for sure.

It was during my studies of Buddhism that I learned about Mahayana Buddhism and realized that Jesus was most likely a Mahayana Buddhist. The fact that Mahayana Buddhism was at it's peak and precisely the same that Jesus would have lived seals the deal for me.

If Jesus was a Buddhist, he was a jewish practicing Buddhist.

Yes, of course. I imagine that Jesus probably was a Jew. However, that does not imply a modern view of Judaism. Many "Jews" in those days had a very mystical view of "God". In fact, I even hear modern day Jews expressing this kind of view. Just because he was a Jewish practicing Buddhist doesn't mean anything. He could have his own views concerning how he interpreted the Torah. In fact, even the Gospels have Jesus referring to the Torah as "your law" when speaking with the Scribes and Pharisees not as "God's Law". He also was quick to point out that the Scribes and Pharisees are hypocrites.

So there's really no reason at all to believe that Jesus worshiped the Torah as the absolute verbatim "Word of God". On the contrary, he may have disagreed with much it. And apparently he obviously did since he taught against those teachings.

I don’t dfind it odd either that there wa someone to speak out against the immoral practices taught about the Torah. I think where you’re argument fails though is that He wasn’t replacing the Torah, He was giving a better understanding of it.

How could you possible support such an obviously nonsensical statement?

He was not giving a better understanding of it. The Torah clearly has the God of Abraham commanding people to stone sinners and heathens to death in no uncertain terms. Jesus renounced those commandments.

That is not giving a better understanding of it. It's a flat out about-face.

Jesus was blatantly renouncing those directives.

blasphemers and idolaters were toned not hung on a Cross, btw. Jesus never taught that “Ye are also Gods”

We don't know the details of Jesus' death. All we have is the rumors of the Old Testament that could be extreme exaggerations, or even blatant outright lies.

IMHO, these authors already showed their desperation to exaggerate things. They claim that God spoke from a cloud verifying that Jesus was his son. Well, damn if you're going to believe that one, then why bother proving a linage? Wouldn't God's Word be proof enough?

They also claim that when Jesus rose from the dead so did a multitude of saints who were also jostled from their graves due to a trembling Earth. And they went into the Holy City and showed themselves to the people there.

The baloney you need to believe in order to support these fables is truly amazing.

And yes, Jesus most certainly did teach, "Ye are Gods".

When he was accused of blaspheme for having said that he and the father are one, he pointed to the Torah and said, "Is it not written in your law, I said ye are Gods".

By pointing to that verse in the Torah he was loaning his support to that notion. Moreover, what kind of a feeble thing would that be for a real demigod to do?

I mean, if Jesus was truly divine and he was attempting to proclaim his unique divinity by saying that he and the father are one, then when asked what he meant by that why would he point to the Torah and show people where it says, "Ye are Gods"?

That makes absolutely no sense at all. If Jesus was attempting to proclaim unique divinity he's not going to be pointing to the Torah where is says "Ye are Gods".

So this event actually supports the idea that he was indeed thinking pantheistically like a Mahayana Buddhist. He was proclaiming that we are all children of God equally. And that he is no different from anyone else.

For me, this is very strong evidence that Jesus was a Mahayana Buddhist. '

Yet you seem to be in denial that Jesus even taught this. But it's right there in the gospels.

John.10:34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?

1- Christianity nor does the Bible use Jesus or God to exclude people from Spirituality. Spirituality is a fundamental cornerstone in the belief. The fact you deny this speaks more to your exclusion from Christianity, than Christianities exclusion of you.

They most certainly absolutely do. They exude people from spirituality if those people are not Christian. That's the very basis of the religion. There is no other way to God but through "The Christ".

That is the exclusion of everyone who does not worship Jesus as "The Christ".

Moreover, what that truly means is that the person has converted to supporting the entirety of the religion including all of it's bigotries and judgements against all others who are not Christian.

The only way it is deemed "acceptable" to receive "Christ" is to swallow and support the the entire dogmatic cannon of the cult.

Anything less that this is deemed unacceptable. After all, it makes no sense to accept Jesus as "The Christ" whilst denying the God of Abraham and the Old Testament. If you're going to accept that Jesus is the sacrificial lamb of the God of Abraham you've got to support that fairy tale first.

Therefore you must support a jealous male-chauvinistic pig who has cursed women with sorrowful conception and childbirth for the fall from grace of Eve, blah, blah, blah.

Christianity isn't about Jesus at all. It's about accepting the whole shebang in Jesus' name.

It's a scam.

2- Calling a spade a spade is not destructive. Rhythm doesn’t believe in God.. know what that makes him.. and unbeliever.. we call them atheists. I don’t think he or I are offended by that label in the slightest. Now I know that some Christians have a lot of fear and hatred for things they don’t understand, like atheism. There’s a difference between bigotry and identification though. Identification with segregation is bigotry, identification for clarification is constructive.

I'm personally not concerned about atheists. Christians renounce all other religions and spiritual faiths as being false, and they accuse those people of refusing to accept Christ as their savior.

In fact, if I tell Christian that I believe in Jesus as Mahayana Buddhist, that's nowhere near good enough.

If I don't accept the whole God of Abraham thing and the demand that we have all fallen from Grace and God had to send his only begotten son to be butchered on a pole to pay for my sins, then I am 'excluded' from God's love.

And to make matters far worse, "It's all my fault because I'm the one who's refusing to love this bastardy God"

That assertion and demand of people right there is extreme emotional terrorism. It basically accusing people of supposedly turning against a supposedly loving God and being either stupid or evil for doing so.

When the truth is that I reject it because it's a hateful religion. Period.

3- Christianity is a positive for all the unbelievers getting outreach from the Christian community. Some are also getting preached to, but not all. Even if they are though, it doesn’t detract from fixing someone’s car for free or paying some of their bills, or feeding/clothing them.

When I here this kind of nonsense it just makes me what to say "Fuck you and your arrogance".

Christianity is not responsible for the good will of people in general. There are also many atheists who make great efforts to save humanity, the planet, and all the animal life on the planet.

Christianity does not hold the copyright on charity. Moreover, as I mentioned before there are many good sheeple who do good things in the name of Christianity. And in the name of Jesus. Clearly all the followers of the religion on are not hateful people.

That doesn't change the fact that the religion itself (i.e. the underlying brainwashing doctrine is hateful and bigoted).

I speak to the religion. Not to the sheeple who might follow it. Those same people would most likely become very charitable Buddhist, Taoists, Wiccans, or even Atheists, if Christianity were to suddenly disappear from history.

Loving people will do loving things no matter what religion they believe in.

I think Steven Weinberg said it best, "There are good people and there are bad people, but it take religion to get good people to do bad things"

It's easy to get good people to do good things. You don't need religion for that.

But you do need religion to get good people to support bad and hateful things in the name of a God.

So we don't need religion for philanthropy. Philanthropy will take care of itself.

4- It is an extremely divisive religion, not because of the nature of the religion, but because of the nature of herding cats.

No it's the demand that no one gets to God but through "The Christ" is what makes the religion devise.

It's basically saying, "Either join and support this religion or you are excluded from the club, and this club OWNS GOD!"

5- The Bible has lots of stories of people who never knew Jesus that received “divine love”, some people only choose to see the bad things though.

Well don't look at me. Read my signature file. Jesus forgives people for merely not knowing what they do. For the Bible tells us so.

It's only the hardcore Christian fundamentalists and evangelists who demand that people receive Jesus are their terms.

They have taken charge of Jesus. He's a marionette that they operate from their lap. They decide who Jesus will accept or not. Jesus has no say in the matter.

If you’d like to PM or email me all your traumatic experiences with religion I’d be glad to listen if you’re up for it. Your hatred though is only harming yourself and doing nothing to further your hateful cause or heal any wounds you have.

It's not the kind of hatred that you imagine. I hate Christianity in the same way that I hate cancer. Cancer is a deadly disease of the body. Christianity is a deadly disease of the human spirit. I don't care it around with me on an emotional level. In fact when I finish typing this I'm going to go back to jamming on the guitar and I carry no emotional baggage with me from having tried to explain these things to you.

I have no "personal trauma" associated with the religion. My concern is for humanity.

My childhood days as a Christian in a Christian family were quite pleasant. I had no problem with the religion. On the contrary I was planning on becoming a minister. Naively of course. That was before I actually read the bible for myself.

So I have no personal trauma associated with the religion. Even when I realized that it could not possibly be true I didn't even feel 'betrayed'. I just realized that my parents accepted it on pure faith and never even bothered to question it. That was good enough for them. So I didn't even really blame them. They were just trying to do what they believe to be the right thing.

~~~~~

I personally wouldn't have a problem with the religion at all if it wasn't constantly being proselytized and used to belittle people who don't accept it. As well as being used to support ignorance over knowledge. Just as teaching people to not believe in evolution, etc.

The fact that we are directly related to everything on this planet is important for people to realize. Yet this religion has people thinking that they are special and animals are just lesser creatures created by a God for us to exploit.

I have a lot of problems with what this religion teaches our society in general. The very nature of this "God" is to solve all his problems via harsh punishments and threats of punishments. And don't try to tell me that this idea doesn't cause people to think that such solution are WISE. Its does. People get it in their heads that if violence and punishment are God's divine way of dealing with problems, then it makes sense that we should do that to.

That's "Divine Justice"

I just disagree with the whole Hebrew mentality. Male-chauvinism in particular. We basically have a religion that is nothing more than the myths of a sick demented culture and we hold that up as being the "Word of God".

That's sick if you stop and think about it.

It's not about me. It's about humanity.

This religion is detrimental to humanity in general.

And the tension between Islam and Christianity (both products of these same stupid myths) is going to come to a head and could indeed be the cause of some horrific war.

So these are legitimate concerns.

Don't try to reduce it to something so petty as my "personal problem".

No, these Abrahamic religions are a cancer on humanity.

It's not "my" problem, it's "our" problem.

Everyone needs to wake up and take a very close look at this Abrahamic nonsense.

"Save" Jesus as a Mahayana Buddhist if you like.

Dismiss him entirely as nothing but pure fiction.

But let's get over these utterly insane rumors that he was the demigod son of the God of Abraham.

A jealous hateful God who will cast mere non-believers into a hell fire for merely not believing in him.

Get over it.

---

Re numbering for brevity
1- I agree with you that “Jesus was clearly rejecting the teachings of the Torah” which is different than “Jesus is spitting in the face of God”. He wasn’t rejecting the Torah at all though because he’s quoted as saying not one line of the law is to become invalid. And he also professed to following those same laws, as they could find no fault with him, other than He claimed to be the son of God. He professed many time to loving God so He wasn’t rejecting God. Perhaps, he was showing how authoritative manipulation misuses laws for their own self-righteous gain, missing the initial meaning of the words of that law.
2- Christianity has been used as an excuse to hate on people for centuries. Christians have persecuted and belittled anyone who refused to agree with their religion. Christianity was used as an excuse to destroy and renounce Pagan spirituality, and burn pagan holy sites to the ground. Christianity has been used as an excuse to impede the intellectual achievements man humanity. Christians are responsible for the torture of tens of thousands of innocent women and even had them burned alive at the stake. So were a lot of other people. However I believe it’s more to do with human nature an less on dogmatic teachings. While it’s true the Christian reformation kicked the witch hunt into overdrive exponentially, it wasn’t just Christians doing the persecuting. In fact by the time of the reformation people like King James of Scotland, judge Pierre de Lancre, and legal professor Jean Bodin were writing the most popular witch hunting manuals. Don’t forget that town mobs and even other witches also contributed to the killings. I don’t deny that religious intolerance and instability instigated and proliferated the segregation of society, condemnation and fear. But I believe the Christian Church as a whole also handed out far more penance and imprisonment sentences than death sentences. But we can play the blame game all day, I don’t deny Christian participation. Now I guess it’s up to you to establish that it’s Christian doctrine to kill people because you don’t like or understand them.
3- If you want to claim that what Jesus taught was in harmony with the teachings of Mahayana Buddhism, that’s fine. He was Jewish though and lived and spoke about the Laws of Moses though, which clearly make him not a Buddhist, but a Jew.
4- Christianity doesn’t “use” anything, it’s a belief. Christians however have used and misused Jesus for centuries.
5- Christianity doesn’t teach ignorance and fear. It teaches reverence of God and love of your fellow man. It doesn’t instill shame and guilt into same-gender lovers, it defines what Godly is and what it isn’t. If people feel shame over their own nature that is not because of some outward teaching, but far more likely from some inward insecurity. Christianity doesn’t create hate, in fact that’s the opposite of its over-reaching teachings. Christians however do create hate, or love based on their use of their own beliefs.
6- You’re entitled to your opinion that all Christians are hypocrites. Feel free to elaborate by using me as an example. How am I a hypocrite or using Jesus or God as a tool of hatred? I find it odd (and a bit intellectually dishonest) though that you admit that majority are “sheeple” that don’t use Jesus as a hate tool or hate people and still hold that Christianity as a whole is about hate. Care to revise your statements? At the very least I think we can agree that fundamentalist Christians are just using Jesus as a patsy to support their personal bigotry and hatred. Could it be that by showing that same bigotry and hatred of Christians that you’re exacerbating the issue or helping solve it?
7- To answer your question why would linage to King David be important for a demigod who was supposedly born of a mortal woman who had been impregnated by God? It wouldn’t for a demigod. It would be important though for someone who was establishing their mortal authority and the fulfillment of a prophesy.
8- Jesus didn’t say don’t stone people, he said if you’re not qualified to judge someone don’t (or more precisely, you without sin cast the first stone).
9- Psalms 82 as you’re referring to isn’t about each of us being god-like with mystical powers and immortality. Elohim is also used to denote angels and mortal judges and prefects. It’s about power and authority, not ability and nature. He was quoting the Psalm in John 10 to show them that he was given authority as the son of God. It’s not a pantheistic belief, but Trinitarian to acknowledge that He and the Father are one. He was stating that we are all chidren of God, but that He had an authority they didn’t have, as the messiah. But I’m sure you’ll read it as you like [url= http://www.onenesspentecostal.com/yegods.htm] here’s a little study if you’re interested[/url].
10- There is no other way to God but through "The Christ" is the exclusion of everyone who does not worship Jesus as "The Christ" from salvation, but not from spirituality. There are even some spiritual atheists I’ve met. Christianity is not a prerequisite for spirituality nor does it limit it, at best you can say it helps define it. A definition you apparently are in disagreement with, which is fine.
11- So Christianity is not responsible for the good will of people in general but it is responsible for their general ill will…. Double standard much?
12- If those Christian fundamentalists have taken charge of Jesus, why not just just spread your outrage to them instead of all of Christianity, since you already admitted that the majority of Christians are sheeple anyways.
13- I’m glad you hold “no emotional baggage” or personal trauma from your religious experience. You have to be able to see though, that coming from someone with such lengthy(word translated to 16 pages) posts where almost every other sentence speaks to how much you hate this or that. Why not better focus your outrage to the YEC and fundamentalists you obviously do have issues with. I wasn’t attempting to minimalize your argument by making it personal, it just seems like more your personal bias than a substantiated argument.
14- Even without Islam and Christianity, etc. groups of stupid people would gather, get more stupid, and do stupid things. I’m all for less ignorance. More hatred though I think doesn’t help that cause, but retards it and galvanizes the idiocies.
15- God solves all his problems via just punishments, while I’m aware some still preach unjust torture, I believe it’s becoming a minority view.

[Abracadabra]

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1- I agree with you that “Jesus was clearly rejecting the teachings of the Torah” which is different than “Jesus is spitting in the face of God”. He wasn’t rejecting the Torah at all though because he’s quoted as saying not one line of the law is to become invalid. And he also professed to following those same laws, as they could find no fault with him, other than He claimed to be the son of God. He professed many time to loving God so He wasn’t rejecting God. Perhaps, he was showing how authoritative manipulation misuses laws for their own self-righteous gain, missing the initial meaning of the words of that law.

---

I agree, saying that Jesus was "spitting in the face of God", gives a very wrong impression. That's not what he was doing at all.

What he was doing was rejecting the Torah as the "Word of God".

There's not doubt that Jesus believed in "God", but he clearly didn't believe in the Torah as the verbatim word of God.

As a Mahayana Buddhist he would definitely believe in "God". The Mahayana Buddhist were quite spiritual. Not at all like today's modern Zen Buddhists who are almost glorified atheists.

So Jesus as a Jewish Mahayana Buddhist would definitely believe in God.

In fact, I see Jesus being very much like myself. I too believe in God. I just don't believe in the Torah. So I have no problem with Jesus' view of things. He probably felt about God much the same that that I do.

---

2- Christianity has been used as an excuse to hate on people for centuries. Christians have persecuted and belittled anyone who refused to agree with their religion. Christianity was used as an excuse to destroy and renounce Pagan spirituality, and burn pagan holy sites to the ground. Christianity has been used as an excuse to impede the intellectual achievements man humanity. Christians are responsible for the torture of tens of thousands of innocent women and even had them burned alive at the stake. So were a lot of other people. However I believe it’s more to do with human nature an less on dogmatic teachings. While it’s true the Christian reformation kicked the witch hunt into overdrive exponentially, it wasn’t just Christians doing the persecuting. In fact by the time of the reformation people like King James of Scotland, judge Pierre de Lancre, and legal professor Jean Bodin were writing the most popular witch hunting manuals. Don’t forget that town mobs and even other witches also contributed to the killings. I don’t deny that religious intolerance and instability instigated and proliferated the segregation of society, condemnation and fear. But I believe the Christian Church as a whole also handed out far more penance and imprisonment sentences than death sentences. But we can play the blame game all day, I don’t deny Christian participation. Now I guess it’s up to you to establish that it’s Christian doctrine to kill people because you don’t like or understand them.

---

I agree with what you're saying here. The blame for theses things cannot be placed solely on the Hebrew Scriptures for sure.

However, from my perspective that's totally irrelevant. The Hebrew scriptures loaned themselves for supporting these kinds of horrendous atrocities and superstitions. It's states right in these scriptures "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live".

That's arms people with ammunition to use these scriptures for these kind of horrors in the "Name of God".

In these scriptures Jesus supposedly made himself known to Saul (a Christian Persecutor) and converted him into Paul (a saintly believer).

Well, if Jesus truly is a magical being who can intervene like this, then IMHO there would be absolutely no excuse for Jesus to not have appeared before the two Christian Monks who wrote the Malleus Maleficarum and stop them dead in their tracks at the moment they started writing it. He could have turned them into saints like Paul as well.

Why should Jesus just sit back and allow people to create books and movements that would use his name to torture and burn women to death for the next 300 years?

You can make excuses for this all you want. But in my humble opinion any divine being who is capable of intervening in human affairs (and is claimed to have done so many times in a religious doctrine) yet fails to stop atrocities being done "In His Name", would be totally untrustworthy, and quite frankly despicable, IMHO.

Jesus as a Mahayana Buddhist would have been a mortal man. He could not stop such future atrocities being done in his name. That's understandable.

But Jesus as an all-powerful God who can easily intervene in the lives of men to change their course (as he clearly did in the case of Paul), that would be utterly despicable.

You're basically asking me to believe that a supposedly divine being would just sit back and allow horrible atrocities to be carried out under the authority of his name, for hundreds of years without setting people straight that he does not approve of this?

That is inexcusable, IMHO. I could never worship, love, or even respect such an ignorant deity.

The only sane conclusion for me, is that no such intervening God exists.

It's really that simple.

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3- If you want to claim that what Jesus taught was in harmony with the teachings of Mahayana Buddhism, that’s fine. He was Jewish though and lived and spoke about the Laws of Moses though, which clearly make him not a Buddhist, but a Jew.

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I personally have no problem with that. If Jesus was a mortal man like I suspect then he would have had normal human views of things. I can easily see Jesus as a Jew valuing some of the things in the Torah as being valid accounts of spiritual messages from the divine, whilst simultaneously rejecting other parts of the text as being the contamination of mortal men.

Many religious people view their sacred scriptures in this way.

Did Jesus tell anyone that they must accept the entire Torah as the verbatim word of God?

No he did not!

Moreover, if you point to the verse were he supposedly says that not one jot nor one tittle of the law shall pass from law to mean that we should accept everything in the entire Torah, then this would fly in the very face of the things that he changed.

So it can't be made to work without extreme contradictions.

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4- Christianity doesn’t “use” anything, it’s a belief. Christians however have used and misused Jesus for centuries.

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The authors of the New Testament were the original "Christians". They are the people who desperately try to make a case that Jesus was "The Christ".

There are no "Christians" alive today. All that exist today are followers and believes in the original "Christians". Yes, they too call themselves "Christians" but they are writing the religion. They have no say in what the religion says at all.

Christianity (i.e. the doctrine created by the original Christians), used all sorts of claims to try to convince people that Jesus was "The Christ" and that anyone who refuses to accept this as Fact with be condemned to hell.

~~~~

Having said that, the followers of these scriptures who also proclaim to be Christians do indeed "use" these scriptures to try to make Jesus into what they want him to be all the time.

You say that Christians (meaning believers in these fables) don't "use" anything, and that it's just a belief for them.

But that's not true at all. Not in the least.

Modern day Christians "use" these scriptures all the time in extreme efforts to back up their views and renounce the view of others.

Like I say, I can go through these scriptures and find a lot of verses where Jesus does not require that anyone believe in him, and places where he has forgiven people who did not believe in him nor asked him for any forgiveness.

Yet these "Christians" will argue with me tooth-and-nail to the death demanding that anyone who refuses to accept Jesus as Lord and Savior will surely be condemned.

Don't tell me that Christian proselytizers and evangelists don't "use" these scriptures in an attempt to belittle those who either refuse to believe in the scriptures, or even refuse to accept the interpretations of that particular proselytizer or evangelists.

Often times Christians can be quite obnoxious and relentless in their undying passion to make Jesus out to be a monster who hates non-believers.

It can truly make a non-Christian want to literally barf.

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5- Christianity doesn’t teach ignorance and fear. It teaches reverence of God and love of your fellow man. It doesn’t instill shame and guilt into same-gender lovers, it defines what Godly is and what it isn’t. If people feel shame over their own nature that is not because of some outward teaching, but far more likely from some inward insecurity. Christianity doesn’t create hate, in fact that’s the opposite of its over-reaching teachings. Christians however do create hate, or love based on their use of their own beliefs.

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This is the arrogance of Christianity and especially the arrogance of modern day followers of this cult.

You say that the only reason that homosexuals might feel 'guilty' is become they are somehow naturally feeling guilty about things. That's hogwash and absolutely arrogance on your part to even suggest such nonsense.

There are many homosexual couples who have absolutely no feelings of guilt associate with they LOVE for each other. They are just constantly being harassed by a society who keep proclaiming that they are doing something horrible. And that is going to make them feel horrible simply because they have to live among so many people who support their bigotry in the name of God.

And again, you had just proclaimed that Christians don't "use" anything. But here you are yourself attempting to "use" these scriptures to proclaim that homosexuality is wrong in the Eyes of God, and that if homosexuals feel guilty about anything it's only because they are doing something wrong.

That is precisely the kind of ignorance that Christians are infamous for.

If you want to proclaim that it's merely a 'belief'. Then by all means believe it for yourself. If you believe that homosexuality is wrong in the eyes of God than don't participate in homosexual activities. It's that simple.

However, if you are doing to go running around showing your holy book in the face of homosexuals proclaiming that God hates homosexuality and that homosexuality is a sin. Then you most certainly are "using" these scriptures to harass other people and belittle them in the name of "God".

There are actually Christian Churches that have been founded by homosexual couples, or a single homosexually individual. They have reasons and interpretations of their own that allow for same-gender love. And they argue that no loving God would frown upon love in any form.

So for you to argue with these people requires you to not only "use" these scriptures as a weapon against them, but to also argue that your interpretations of the scriptures should trump theirs!

It becomes nothing but personal arrogance. Not unlike the authors of the Malleus Maleficarum who argued that the scriptures support the burning of witches.

It's really not any different at all.

It's just yet another horror story in the long line of horror stories that these superstitious fables cause.

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6- You’re entitled to your opinion that all Christians are hypocrites. Feel free to elaborate by using me as an example. How am I a hypocrite or using Jesus or God as a tool of hatred? I find it odd (and a bit intellectually dishonest) though that you admit that majority are “sheeple” that don’t use Jesus as a hate tool or hate people and still hold that Christianity as a whole is about hate. Care to revise your statements? At the very least I think we can agree that fundamentalist Christians are just using Jesus as a patsy to support their personal bigotry and hatred. Could it be that by showing that same bigotry and hatred of Christians that you’re exacerbating the issue or helping solve it?

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You are a hypocrite clearly. Without a doubt.

Perhaps you can't see it, and you may even believe that you are doing this in a state of complete innocence and perhaps you are because you can't see what you are doing.

But as I had just pointed out, if you want to proclaim that you have a 'beleif' fine! If you believe that God frowns upon homosexuality then don't become a homosexual, and be glad that you weren't naturally born with those desires.

However, if you're going to point at other people and say, "Well they should be felling guilty, clearly they are sinning", then you have taken it beyond a personal belief and you are now using it to judge others.

And that is where the hypocrisy comes into play.

You proclaim that you aren't 'using' it, and that you merely believe in it.

Well if that's true, then when I tell you that it's clear to me that by these scriptures that Jesus forgives people who do not believe in him and even mock him and nail him to a pole.

Then who are you to argue with that?

After all, you have your 'beliefs' and I have mine.

This is why you are a hypocrite. You claim to merely have a personal belief, and that you don't "use" these scriptures to judge others, yet you do!

That's hypocritical.

I personally don't care what you believe. What I object to is when you try to push your beliefs onto me and proclaim that my beliefs have no merit.

Baloney.

If you want to believe that Jesus is a monster who hates homosexuals and will condemn everyone who refuses to worship him as Lord and Savior, fine.

I have no problem with that at all.

All I ask in return is that you accept that I believe that Jesus was far a mortal man who didn't even ask anyone to worship him as a "Lord".

Then we can finally live in peace.

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7- To answer your question why would linage to King David be important for a demigod who was supposedly born of a mortal woman who had been impregnated by God? It wouldn’t for a demigod. It would be important though for someone who was establishing their mortal authority and the fulfillment of a prophesy.

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IMHO Jesus never attempted to establish any such authority. The authors who wrote these rumors are the ones who tried to push that authority onto Jesus.

Besides, there was no fulfillment of prophecy. Jesus was never handed the throne of David to become the King of the Jews as prophecy demands.

The Christian nonsense is that Jesus rose from the dead, ascended to heaven, and not sits at the right-hand of God as the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

But that's not "fulfillment of prophesy". That's just an utterly asinine superstitious fable that pretends that some prophesy was "fulfilled".

There does not exist any evidence that any prophecy had ever been fulfilled. What Christians claim to be "fulfillment of prophesy" is nothing more than superstitious myths themselves.

Totally unimpressive.

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8- Jesus didn’t say don’t stone people, he said if you’re not qualified to judge someone don’t (or more precisely, you without sin cast the first stone).

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Jesus was clever I'll grant you that much. However your observation here doesn't help matter. According to the Bible all men are sinners. If God had only wanted people who are without sin to stone sinners to death, then that could never be possible even in the Old Testament.

So even if I accept your apologetics on this I would still be stuck with having to believe that at one God was ok with sinners stoning sinners to death and now he has CHANGED that law.

Moreover, why would Jesus even bother saying that it would be ok for a sinless person to cast the first stone if no such creatures exist?

Why even have a God asking people to stone sinners to death at all if there is no one qualified to carry out this commandment?

You need to realize that the stoning of sinners to death was supposedly God's idea in the first place!

Does God want us to stone sinners to death or not? Can he make up his mind?

So your apologetic argument here is meaningless to me. It's totally empty and devoid of any rational sense.

Either this God wants us to stone sinners to death or he doesn't.

My view that Jesus was a Jewish Mahayana Buddhist is viable. Jesus was simply trying to find ways to get around these stupid immoral teachings of the Torah without appearing to be "changing the laws", and I'll grant you that Jesus was a very clever wise sage. He succeeded in doing this convincingly. He even convinced YOU!

But as the son of the God of Abraham it can't be made to make sense. Either God wants us to stone sinners to death or he doesn't. Saying that only those without sin should obey this command is itself a contradiction.

Moreover, it also implies that all of humanity should be stoned to death. Since all of humanity are sinners.

It's just an utterly stupid tale if taken literally. It's clearly nothing more than absurd fables to begin with.

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9- Psalms 82 as you’re referring to isn’t about each of us being god-like with mystical powers and immortality. Elohim is also used to denote angels and mortal judges and prefects. It’s about power and authority, not ability and nature. He was quoting the Psalm in John 10 to show them that he was given authority as the son of God. It’s not a pantheistic belief, but Trinitarian to acknowledge that He and the Father are one. He was stating that we are all chidren of God, but that He had an authority they didn’t have, as the messiah. But I’m sure you’ll read it as you like [url= http://www.onenesspentecostal.com/yegods.htm] here’s a little study if you’re interested[/url].

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That is the standard apologetic argument.

But that fails completely in this case.

Why does it fail. Well it should be blatantly obvious.

If fails because in this case Jesus was being accused of blaspheme for having proclaimed that he and the Father are one.

His defense to this charge was to point to the Psalms where it states that "Ye are Gods".

Well, if Jesus himself knew that this was just a reference to mortal judges and prefects, etc, then he would also know that it would not be a viable defense against charges of blaspheme.

The mere context in which Jesus was using this as a defense shows clearly that he was attempting to proclaim that anyone can claim divinity and that this should not be viewed as blaspheme.

The standard apologetic excuse that you gave doesn't address the true context of how Jesus was using this to defend against charges of blaspheme.

So, no, I don't buy into those apologetic arguments. They totally miss the point of why Jesus was pointing to the verse in the first place.

My hypothesis that Jesus was a pantheistic Buddhist holds.

The apologist's arguments flunk. They totally fail to recognize and acknowledge why Jesus was pointing to that verse in the first place.

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10- There is no other way to God but through "The Christ" is the exclusion of everyone who does not worship Jesus as "The Christ" from salvation, but not from spirituality. There are even some spiritual atheists I’ve met. Christianity is not a prerequisite for spirituality nor does it limit it, at best you can say it helps define it. A definition you apparently are in disagreement with, which is fine.

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Sure you can point to that verse and proclaim "I hold this to be an absolute truth that no other verse can trump!"

But I can do the same thing with "Forgive them father for they know not what they do!"

I can point to that verse and proclaim "I hold this to be an absolute truth that no other verse can trump!"

And so we're dead even! Shouting at each other using totally conflicting verses from a totally absurd myth.

In fact, I would argue that I should WIN this battle because I'm holding up Jesus "Last Words".

Therefore I have a stronger position that no other verses should trump Jesus "Last Words".

~~~~

Moreover, the verse you point to doesn't demand that a person recognize Jesus or appeal to him or anything like that. All it does is state that no one can get to the father but through him.

Well duh?

If he later than proclaims that he forgives people when they know not what they are doing, then clearly he will forgive them for this reason, and they can still get to the father "Through Him".

So my position does not violate yours anyway!

And your position does not require anything of anyone. All it states is that Jesus will be the one who decides in the end.

If Jesus wants to welcome atheists and homosexuals into heaven based on his legal loophole that they know not what they do, then who are you to demand that he doesn't?

You're arguments to try to force Jesus to become an unforgiving monster simply don't hold.

At the end of the story he proclaims that he will indeed forgive people if they merely don't realize that what they are doing is wrong. And clearly based on these scriptures they can be mocking him, beating him to a pulp, and even nailing him to a pole, and he'll STILL FORGIVE THEM!

That's what these fables ultimately proclaim about Jesus!

So even if they are true, Jesus can still give his grace totally unconditionally to atheists, non-believers, and even homosexuals if he so desires. Just like he gave his grace unconditionally to the Roman heathens who nailed him to the pole.

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11- So Christianity is not responsible for the good will of people in general but it is responsible for their general ill will…. Double standard much?

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I'm sticking with the words of Stephen Weinberg on this one.

"Good people will do good things, bad people will do bad things, but it takes religion to make good people do bad things."

No, Christianity is not responsible for good people.

On the contrary there are millions of good people who are not Christians.

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12- If those Christian fundamentalists have taken charge of Jesus, why not just just spread your outrage to them instead of all of Christianity, since you already admitted that the majority of Christians are sheeple anyways.

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I'm renouncing the claims of the New Testament as themselves being the product of very early "Christian fundamentalists".

I really don't care about the modern day followers. Other than the fact that the modern day followers continue to hold this bull shit up as "The Word of God".

No, it's not the word of any God. I've proven that this is the case time and time again. These are just fables made up be a sick male-chauvinistic society.

It's really not an 'attack' on anyone. I'm just trying to get people to wise up and quite using these sick fables to support religious bigotry in the name of a bigoted Jealous God.

It's a seriously world-wide problem. It's not just Christianity. I renounce all of the Abrahamic religions equally. They are all speading the same type of religious bigotry in the name of a Jealous God.

It's not just Christianity.

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13- I’m glad you hold “no emotional baggage” or personal trauma from your religious experience. You have to be able to see though, that coming from someone with such lengthy(word translated to 16 pages) posts where almost every other sentence speaks to how much you hate this or that. Why not better focus your outrage to the YEC and fundamentalists you obviously do have issues with. I wasn’t attempting to minimalize your argument by making it personal, it just seems like more your personal bias than a substantiated argument.

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Yes, I do hate to see hatred being spread in the pretense that it is supported by a supposedly all-loving all-benevolent God.

There is nothing all-loving, or all-benevolent about these Abrahamic religions. They create religious bigotries and hatred in the name of "God".

The Muslims hate the Christians in the name of this God.
The Christians hate the Muslims in the name of this God.
The Sunnis hate the Shias in the name of this God.
The Shias hate the Sunnis in the name of this God.
The Catholics hate the Protestants in the name of this God.
The Protestants hate the Catholics in the name of this God.
Everybody hates the Jews in the name of this God.
They all hate atheists in the name of this God.

It's just the epitome of hatred that is being passed off in the name of this God.

Join our version of the religion or you're turning against God!

It's the most hate-producing religion that ever plagued mankind.

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14- Even without Islam and Christianity, etc. groups of stupid people would gather, get more stupid, and do stupid things. I’m all for less ignorance. More hatred though I think doesn’t help that cause, but retards it and galvanizes the idiocies.

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Again, the words of Steven Weinberg:

"Good people will do good things, bad people will do bad things, but it takes religion to make good people do bad things."

Stupid people doing stupid things on their own is one thing. They can only gain so much support for that without appealing to the notion of a God being on their side.

Do you think there would be any massive movements on planet earth that have the size and power of things like Christianity or Islam if they were based on nothing other than someone's personal views?

No way! The only reason these things get so out of hand is because they are being held out in the name of GOD!

Would you be so passionate about supporting Christianity if it was just Joe Blow's personal opinions?

No, of course you wouldn't.

The only reason you support it is because you are convinced that it represents that "Word of God"

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15- God solves all his problems via just punishments, while I’m aware some still preach unjust torture, I believe it’s becoming a minority view.

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You can justify whatever you like about these fables.

It's crystal clear to me that the whole way through these fables this supposedly all-wise all-benevolent God attempts to solve all his problems using extremely crude and violent means.

In every case I can personally offer a far more intelligent way to deal with the problem. Why should I be so much wiser than a supposedly all-wise God.

Therefore these fable necessarily have to be false.

That's crystal clear to me.

Moreover, all I need to do is ask myself a very simple question:

"Am I the willful enemy of all that is good and righteous?"

No, that is absolutely false for certain.

Well, then it makes no sense for be to believe in a religion that proclaims that this is precisely what I must be!

No, sorry about that. I stand for everything that is good and righteous.

Yet this religion would have me condemned for this.

It's clearly a false fable.

There can be no doubt about it.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Augustine defined evil as the lack of the good that ought to be. Anything less than the highest good is by necessity evil to some degree. Evil not is really anything at all, only an absence of something good. That's the premise behind the phrase "even angels are unclean before the Lord." In a sense I agree with MysticKnight. Freewill is not tied to evil.

[The Grand Nudger]

I define evil as the lack of twinkies that ought to be.

[Neo-Scholastic]

I'm partial to Hostess cupcakes myself.

[The Grand Nudger]

Guess that makes it subjective. Damn, thought I'd solved a manufactured issue that had plagued us as long as we had considered it, guess I wont get any statues in my honor after all.

[Cyberman]

I've never tasted either article; is there to be no salvation for me?

[KichigaiNeko]

Oh sorry Stimbo. I read that as "Salivation" ....time for my meds I am thinking