Did Jesus decompose?

[The Grand Nudger]

It's difficult for me to fathom why you would repeatedly insist that the central mystery of christology is comparable to a neurological disorder.

( an eddie izzard bit is cropping up in memory, lol "lipstick colors this fall are in the frosted pink area with nails to match, and this reminds me rather of our lord jesus")

[tackattack]

Guess I'm just begging someone to take the shot. Scientific theory can't usually stand two competing theories to describe one phenomenon. I'm assuming that's your basis for assuming they're incompatible. Science isn't really good at describing non-objects, but I'll try a different example. Similarly, light has a wave theory and a particle theory two competing theories about the same object but both true. I was just using DID as an example where competing identities within one body can be present and cooperative, because I thought was an example closer to the subject. I also re-watched split last week and it was fresh on my mind, so I was being lazy.

[The Grand Nudger]

Guess I'm just begging someone to take the shot. Scientific theory can't usually stand two competing theories to describe one phenomenon. I'm assuming that's your basis for assuming they're incompatible.  Science isn't really good at describing non-objects, but I'll try a different example. Similarly, light has a wave theory and a particle theory two competing theories about the same object but both true. I was just using DID as an example where competing identities within one body can be present and cooperative, because I thought was an example closer to the subject. I also re-watched split last week and it was fresh on my mind, so I was being lazy.

I'm not sure if you're referring to the did/christology comparison or the fully human fully god thing..but in either case your assumption would be wrong.  

The fully human fully god thing was incompatible on the basis of the religious tenets of those proto-christians that aligned with the abrahamic elements of the development of the movement set in contrast with the hellenistic elements.   Two of the three overarching abrahamics continue to regard the notion of god made a man as flatly heretical.  Christians, on the other hand, went all in on hellenization as a consequence of having embedded themselves in roman authority.    

That's the only phenomena we're discussing, in truth, though I appreciate that you believe otherwise.  

As to the other, without going too far into the weeds, it's not strictly true that did is an issue of two competing identities, nor, if it were, would this make it a competent analogy to a god and a man sharing body space.  The entirety of the conscious stream involved in did is produced by a single individual, constructed from them, fully human and not in the relevant quality even remotely of a "different nature"...let alone the alleged difference in nature between men and gods.  

Back to christianity and how we come to find ourselves here.  It's often the case that the ideas you see expressed in new magic book were the body of work of a sect that is now defunct, having found themselves incapable (for a variety of reasons) of competing in the religious economy of the jesus movement during it's formation.  At a time when the movement was trying to create an intellectual framework for itself the existence of those works and ideas couldn't be ignored nor could they be disposed of as conveniently as the people who had created them.  Marcion is probably the most well known example.   There were other theological or practical issues that an antithetical corpus addressed to the satisfaction of the victors and for this reason the paradoxical articles would be piggybacked in on that other thing.  The camps representing both visions of christ were very much distinct from each other, but they ended up getting grafted together in the fullness of time due to these compelling interests.  

It is deliciously wild that the central contention of marcionism, profoundly hellenistic, that the demi-god (and not a man at all, at that) of new magic book was not the same god as that of old magic book was declared to be heresy even as the hellenistic current it represented eventually became the authoritative voice of christianity through the use of a gospel pioneered by the very same man. The thing you now hold is full of contradictory this and that's because it was the product of human interaction and organization, not the product of some supernatural event or divine being (regardless of whether or not there were either). You find yourself trying to understand a "phenomena" without realizing that you are trying to understand the wrong phenomena in the first place. The question is not how christ could be both god and man, there is no resolution to that because there was no christ...the question is why and how people came to believe as much.

[Godscreated]

  What I see is someone crying about things he doesn't understand so he parrots what others have said for many generations. Doctors have been completely confounded by instant healing of people who they have said would die from there condition. They have said they have no idea short of a miracle as to what happened.

GC

I have heard of spontaneous remission**, but have never  of a case of an instant healing. Of course you can prove that claim?.

What doctors have allegedly said in such cases is opinion based on speculation, not proof.

Uumm, exactly how many recorded cases of amputees regrowing limbs? (in round figures will be fine)

Spontaneous remission occurs 1:30,000  cases. A lot more than putative miracles. ,


PS it's 'their"

 You've made this easy. First of all you must have your head stuck in a hole because not all illnesses or accidents are remissive, they either heal or not. The claim is valid and if you are not very lazy you can find examples. Here's the easy part, How is it that a doctor can have anything but an opinion about something he/she doesn't understand and a miracle is not understandable to humans. The doctors have studied and practiced for many years and understand that what they witnessed is something they have not seen, heard of or recognize.
 How many of those amputees lived because they were healed and would have otherwise died. Just go back to the Civil War and you might just find your answer. Why should God regrow a amputated limb, God wants people to lean on Him because He loves them enough to be there for them in a time of need. That amputee thing is an old tired subject that just doesn't fly and why, because no one has ever proven that it is necessary for God to regrow a limb and He certainly isn't because you want Him to. 
 The definition of spontaneous remission is sudden regression or cure, yes I looked it up to be sure maybe you should have, also. You are using on type of illness to question miracles and I have used the broader spectrum of all illnesses and accidents, you want to limit a limitless God and that is not possible. Could be that the 1: 30,000 was God's miraculous work. Whatever people are healed everyday by God, if you choose not to believe that then that's what you will have to do, but there is one thing for sure you want have an answer for the miraculous healing, but I do.

GC

[tackattack]

@Gae Bolga I agree the camps representing both visions of Christ were very much distinct from each other, but they ended up getting grafted together in the fullness of time due to compelling interests. I just disagree with your interests. Marcionites, Gnostics and even Ebionites are all still pretty heretical today. Can't we take good from the bad? We do this every day. A lot of the best lies contain truth, and those groups methodology was to reject certain scripture. I believe there are differing denominations by design. Each part preserving some truth but none grasping the whole. It's the denominations that reject scriptures and focus on what divides us that give a poor name to the word Christian.

I wasn't trying to understand the wrong phenomena. I was attempting to explain a presumed paradox you establised

---

If jesus were incapable of sinning then the temptation of christ, a narrative that the authors saw important enough to include in matthew, mark, and luke, would be reduced to contrived drama. In a similar vein, if jesus were not fully human his sacrificial value would be diminished. He had to suffer.

OFC any paradox can be conceptually resolved by simply affirming one side or the other..but in the case of christology the issue becomes the theological equivalent of a hydra. You chop off one head, two more appear. This intractability is why the proto-christian authorities punted on the issue and decided to include two contradictory camps, declaring it a "mystery".

You're not supposed to be able to resolve it, and any attempt -to- resolve it erodes some other christological concept.

---

The fact that your moving the goalposts now to say it's not that they are paradoxical but because "there is no resolution to that because there was no christ" and then moving on to why and how the belief solidified in a newly formed body of believers is a minor point (and a bit disingenuous, IMO) but it was my main one. I wouldn't deny that people fuddled with understanding the Creator's nature during the foundation of what we now call Christianity. I also won't claim that we all have it all right 2000 years later. My only point, and the only reason I stepped into another's conversation, was to say that the 2 natures aren't paradoxical.

[The Grand Nudger]

Don't be a dunce Tack. That's not why the issue is paradoxical, it's simply why you'll never understand it. You're looking for the answer to a question faithfully believing that there -is- an answer to the question, even though the question is fundamentally malformed as a consequence of history and as an issue of faith, positively intended not to be subject to resolution.

The nature of christ is paradox by design. If you think that you've resolved it, in addition to the weirdness above...you're getting christianity wrong...and it's massively ironic, though not entirely unpredictable, that it takes an antitheist to inform you of this fact. Honestly, I think that your own private faith can only be improved by acceptance, in this regard, rather than argument. It's just a sideline benefit that acceptance would provide you with the means to defang criticism on that count going forward. I'm tossing a drowning man a rope...and he's angrily rejecting it, like a common doubter sinking under the waves in the sea of galilee.....imputing the motivations and means of the person extending that help. More than anything else, that's what disappoints me about contemporary jesusism.

There actually is a brand of christer belief that leans into the shit I say. WTF is wrong with the rest of you? Any christian faith that depends on my being a craven liar and wrong in in every particular is dead before arrival. My ultimate aim is not to compelling argue against your beliefs, but to whittle your beliefs into something I can't argue against. I think....that christians would have something relevant to say about human nature if they could contain themselves...it's only because they can't that they don't.

It may be true or it may be false, but, ultimately, I'm a better friend to the idea of christ than christians are, lol.

: shrugs :

[tackattack]

I'm not mad Gae, not even in the slightest, I enjoy our repartee. I believe there is an answer because I believe there was a man and that would reduce to something knowable and measurable. I think I understand and can appreciate your motivators, in this aspect at least. I don't think I've resolved much of anything, personally. In the case of Jesus Christ though, I'm unfortunately more of a doubting thomas than a faither. I believe, for the very fact we're discussing, that while I may not understand the 100% God motivations of Jesus or be able to fully emulate Him and His will, I believe I can come to know the 100% man personality personally.

The fact you don't see it a possible that He exists informs your biases that it's not necessary or possible to be solve-able. It may be true or it may be false, but I'd take a friend any day over an enemy.

[The Grand Nudger]

I didnt say you were mad, I suggested that you were being a dunce.  Obviously, the notion that this is a suggestion is very generous.  I enjoy our discussions as well.  It's the closest I've ever been in a decade on these boards to an intellectual discussion with a sane believer (as sad as that is)....the whole reason I joined.  I appreciate (and hope) that you can move past my unwillingness to address your beliefs as even remotely credible.  

Yes, you believe that there's a satisfactory answer to your malformed question because the articles of your belief prevent you from realizing that the question is malformed.  That's exactly what I commented on.  You believe that because you've been hobbled by dead people whose agendas are not...necessarily, your own, and because of your inability to separate those dead people's agendas -from- you own.     


The fact that I'm an antitheist who won't humor you has absolutely -nothing- to do with why or how I explain to you that your beliefs are paradoxical and contradictory.  As my posts go to lengths to describe...that relies on the acceptance of things, for conversational convenience, that I don't believe.  To make a long story short, I know more about your silly cult than you do...and certainly much more than you're willing to accept as true because to do so would be to reduce your specific beliefs to pointless absurdity.

And yet, throughout all of this, and honestly, I see nothing but benefit for you, as a christian, to accept mere reality....even though you'e powerfully inclined to argue against it and suggest that I propose mere reality for no reason other than our differences of belief. Ultimately, I think that this demonstrates that you're a nut..but I think that you're so close to the line of sanity as to be salvageable. I'm familiar with believers like that in my life and relationships with those people are kindof my wheelhouse. In a magic book contest, you're gonna lose...I'm A Southern Person™ of the highest order. In some squaring of the circle between christer belief and reality I'm just standing here waiting for you to make that choice. After that event you'll still be a christer, but I wont have any leverage to bitch about you. Always been your call,nutter.

[tackattack]

@Gae Bolga I was referencing post 66 where you implied I was angrily rejecting your help. anywho,

Please help me reform the question in a way that's not malformed

Given:
a. God exists
b. Jesus existed
c. The Bible can be believed

1. Can Christ be both 100% God and 100% man?
2. If 1 is true did He die
3. If 1 and 2 are true did His body decompose?

[The Grand Nudger]

Given:
a. God exists
b. Jesus existed
c. The Bible can be believed

1. Can Christ be both 100% God and 100% man?
2. If 1 is true did He die
3. If 1 and 2 are true did His body decompose?

1.  No.
2.  Magic book says he died, it doesn't matter whether or not 1 is true. 
3.  Magic book says it didn't, it doesn't matter whether or not 1 or 2 are true.

It's your given c that allows me to flatly reject 1, as it has been since the beginning of our convo.