Facing the Morally Bad Future

[FallentoReason]

My faith is base on the reality of the fulfillment of all the scriptures, God said He would send His Son to atone for my sin and I believe with all my heart He did just that. We could go around and around with these verses, the way I see things here is that you want to pick pieces out of verses and use them to make your own puzzle. I on the other hand, take all of scripture and find how it fits together, and am able to see the picture of love God drew before creation. When I put those verse up I looked at them as I knew you would, so your reply is of no surprise. The whole thing boils down to this, you are creating your own picture and I'm looking at God's picture that's intended for all of man kind.

If you think it all comes down to perspective then I can't honestly say how you got your interpretation. Actually I can only guess from my experience. The church says things and no one questions it. A good example is the supposed authors of the Gospels... '...and this is the Word, according to the Gospel of St. Mark'.

The 'traditional' view of the Bible has more questions than answers if one sees it historically. The amount of mental backflips that one has to perform to vaguely see a historical Jesus is astounding. Now that I don't have any agenda but am merely guided by evidence and reason I think the interpretation that resolves everything is allegorical Gospels and Paul preaching anything but a supposed historical Jesus that miraculously was never seen by someone literate, despite his celebrity status wherever he went.

What is Christianity? How can you be so sure you're not a heretic?

[Godscreated]

My faith is base on the reality of the fulfillment of all the scriptures, God said He would send His Son to atone for my sin and I believe with all my heart He did just that. We could go around and around with these verses, the way I see things here is that you want to pick pieces out of verses and use them to make your own puzzle. I on the other hand, take all of scripture and find how it fits together, and am able to see the picture of love God drew before creation. When I put those verse up I looked at them as I knew you would, so your reply is of no surprise. The whole thing boils down to this, you are creating your own picture and I'm looking at God's picture that's intended for all of man kind.

If you think it all comes down to perspective then I can't honestly say how you got your interpretation. Actually I can only guess from my experience. The church says things and no one questions it. A good example is the supposed authors of the Gospels... '...and this is the Word, according to the Gospel of St. Mark'.

The 'traditional' view of the Bible has more questions than answers if one sees it historically. The amount of mental backflips that one has to perform to vaguely see a historical Jesus is astounding. Now that I don't have any agenda but am merely guided by evidence and reason I think the interpretation that resolves everything is allegorical Gospels and Paul preaching anything but a supposed historical Jesus that miraculously was never seen by someone literate, despite his celebrity status wherever he went.

What is Christianity? How can you be so sure you're not a heretic?

Revelation through scripture, a revelation that comes from the Holy Spirit, asking for answers to things I do not understand and receiving them, very distinct and clear. I do not know who taught you while you were in church, but Christians know far more about the history of scriptures than you think we do, and we are encouraged to ask questions.

[Epimethean]

Just so long as you accept the standard line item answers.

[FallentoReason]

If you think it all comes down to perspective then I can't honestly say how you got your interpretation. Actually I can only guess from my experience. The church says things and no one questions it. A good example is the supposed authors of the Gospels... '...and this is the Word, according to the Gospel of St. Mark'.

The 'traditional' view of the Bible has more questions than answers if one sees it historically. The amount of mental backflips that one has to perform to vaguely see a historical Jesus is astounding. Now that I don't have any agenda but am merely guided by evidence and reason I think the interpretation that resolves everything is allegorical Gospels and Paul preaching anything but a supposed historical Jesus that miraculously was never seen by someone literate, despite his celebrity status wherever he went.

What is Christianity? How can you be so sure you're not a heretic?

Revelation through scripture, a revelation that comes from the Holy Spirit, asking for answers to things I do not understand and receiving them, very distinct and clear. I do not know who taught you while you were in church, but Christians know far more about the history of scriptures than you think we do, and we are encouraged to ask questions.

I decided to see what happened if I asked our ex youth pastor a serious question. I asked him how we knew for sure that Matthew, Mark, Luke & John wrote their Gospels. After 10 minutes of discussing in a very laid back manner he concluded with "I really don't think it matters what the Apostles' names were'. He changed the question from 'what was the identity of the authors' to 'what were the names of the Apostles who wrote the Gospels'. Of course, after much discussion on here I've trained myself up to be able to think very critically and I was able to see what he was doing during the conversation from a mile away. But I just pretended that we came to a 'satisfactory' conclusion and said 'yeah better not to worry about. Thanks for that!'

After that, I realised questions are encouraged at my church, but not the type that deal with objective evidence as opposed to theology where half the time you're talking about warm fuzzy feelings.

[Godscreated]

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Revelation through scripture, a revelation that comes from the Holy Spirit, asking for answers to things I do not understand and receiving them, very distinct and clear. I do not know who taught you while you were in church, but Christians know far more about the history of scriptures than you think we do, and we are encouraged to ask questions.

---

I decided to see what happened if I asked our ex youth pastor a serious question. I asked him how we knew for sure that Matthew, Mark, Luke & John wrote their Gospels. After 10 minutes of discussing in a very laid back manner he concluded with "I really don't think it matters what the Apostles' names were'. He changed the question from 'what was the identity of the authors' to 'what were the names of the Apostles who wrote the Gospels'. Of course, after much discussion on here I've trained myself up to be able to think very critically and I was able to see what he was doing during the conversation from a mile away. But I just pretended that we came to a 'satisfactory' conclusion and said 'yeah better not to worry about. Thanks for that!'

After that, I realised questions are encouraged at my church, but not the type that deal with objective evidence as opposed to theology where half the time you're talking about warm fuzzy feelings.

We're encouraged to ask all kinds of questions, even to question things the pastors say, we are all about the truth. As far as the four Gospels go, without the originals no one can say that the names given are not the real authors.

[Epimethean]

" ... we are all about the truth."

I think the "truth" you refer to here comes as a namebrand (cf., "Kool-Aid"). Perhaps it should even be respelled to represent its uniqueness: Trooth, or maybe, to give it a bit more biblicality, T-Ruth?

[FallentoReason]

We're encouraged to ask all kinds of questions, even to question things the pastors say, we are all about the truth. As far as the four Gospels go, without the originals no one can say that the names given are not the real authors.

I would have thought that without the originals no one could even suggest who wrote them. The exception of course is the early church. Where did they get the evidence for the authorship? They didn't... It's just 'tradition', which my ex youth pastor kept reassuring me is 'very reliable'.

[Epimethean]

If this weren't such a massive bone of contention, the Nicene Creed and other such rot would never have come into being.

[Godscreated]

We're encouraged to ask all kinds of questions, even to question things the pastors say, we are all about the truth. As far as the four Gospels go, without the originals no one can say that the names given are not the real authors.

I would have thought that without the originals no one could even suggest who wrote them. The exception of course is the early church. Where did they get the evidence for the authorship? They didn't... It's just 'tradition', which my ex youth pastor kept reassuring me is 'very reliable'.

How do you know they didn't know, they would of had these books and used them, the originals could not be used at all the churches, thus the copies without the authors name, they would have pass on the name of the authors, deceit was not part of the early church, they had an example, Ananias and Sapphira. These were important books to them, however they never knew they would be a part of the scriptures, if they had they might have placed the authors name on the copies. These people and writers did not have a desire to be standouts in their time, it was against the teachings of these very books.

[FallentoReason]

I would have thought that without the originals no one could even suggest who wrote them. The exception of course is the early church. Where did they get the evidence for the authorship? They didn't... It's just 'tradition', which my ex youth pastor kept reassuring me is 'very reliable'.

How do you know they didn't know, they would of had these books and used them, the originals could not be used at all the churches, thus the copies without the authors name, they would have pass on the name of the authors, deceit was not part of the early church, they had an example, Ananias and Sapphira.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and agree they weren't trying to deceive. That could only mean they didn't know who wrote them and simply assumed. The evidence for this lies within the Gospels themselves, which I have pointed out several times:

Matthew & John: 3rd person. An Apostle didn't write them.
Luke: most likely Lucius Plutarch, a historian who lived exactly during the time of Jesus.
Mark: I don't know who exactly, but so far the evidence tells me it was written by some Hellenistic Jewish philosopher.

These were important books to them, however they never knew they would be a part of the scriptures, if they had they might have placed the authors name on the copies. These people and writers did not have a desire to be standouts in their time, it was against the teachings of these very books.

Wait, were they teachings or history that they were writing? You can't have your cake and eat it.

Teachings I think would be the right answer for two reasons:

1) None of the Gospels are written in the way a historian would write them. Have a look yourself by reading some of Josephus' works and comparing.

2) Following on from #1, they have distinct story-telling techniques that the authors used to convey their message.

The genre for these writings is assumed to be historical on a whim, but how can one actually come to that conclusion upon closer inspection of them?