Why do you think a Christian identifies with sin? What is the purpose of it? per the Bible?
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Why do you think a Christian identifies with sin? What is the purpose of it? per the Bible?I don't really identify with the feeling of "sin". I don't have some heavy guilt hanging over me as some sort of burden which needs to be lifted.
I've never identified with this line of thinking when seeking converts.
Which parts of the New Testament do you see as an ununified message?The point is though, there was no original church. Even the early Christians were made up of dozens of fractured and conflicting sects. There never was a fully unified Christian message.
Which parts of the New Testament do you see as an ununified message?
Are you seeking one church in a certain location that everyone converted to Christianity around the world attended? How would you plausibly think an original church would have existed?
True but surely you must acknowledge the possibility that the very first Christians had, via word of mouth, absorbed the basic contents of what later turned out to be the four gospelsWhat does the gospel have to do with "original" Christianity? The four gospels we have now weren't written until 40-100 years after Jesus was said to have been killed. The very first Christians did not have them to go off of.
Indeed, but why does this surprise you. Are you inclined to reject the content of the four gospels simply because other documents were not canonized. I would agree that the presence of these other "gospels" raises interesting questions and perhaps doubts about the canonized four, but this alone does not seem to undermine the possibility that the four canonized ones represent the basic "true picture" of Jesus and His life. Let me be clear: I am not suggesting the four gospels are free of bias - they obviously are not. But to say that a writer has an "agenda" and a bias is not by itself grounds for rejecting their writings. Everyone has an agenda.However, that's ignoring the fact that once the gospels started to be written, there were dozens of other gospels also written, used by other sects of Christianity that bore very little resemblance to the gospels we have now.
I know of one highly respected scholar (yes, he is a Christian but, again, that by itself does not disqualify his views) who argues that from the beginning there was surprising agreement amongst Christians regarding the matter of what happens to the believer after death (i.e. the belief that all believers will be bodily resurrected).There never was one unified Christian church.
I am not sure why you have such an expectation. Perhaps Christians of a more fundamentalist leaning are largely responsible with their arguably overly simplistic thinking. I do not see the fact that it took a while for things to settle down as a particularly strong reason to doubt the basic truthfulness of the "gospel" message. Sure, it raises legitimate questions, but real life is messy and complex.One would presume if Jesus really existed as described that his message should have been pretty clear to all of the early Christians. There would have been one central church at the beginning of it all.
I have only now rejoined this thread. Have you given examples of this "disunity"? If so, can you point me to posts.... however it would have started as one unified body. That's not what we see from early Christianity though.
NO! Jesus is the Creator who existed from eternity. He did not become divine at His human conception or any other time.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men." (John 1:1-4) (Jesus is the Word... made clear by John 1:14 and Revelation 19:13.)
What does the gospel have to do with "original" Christianity? The four gospels we have now weren't written until 40-100 years after Jesus was said to have been killed. The very first Christians did not have them to go off of.
However, that's ignoring the fact that once the gospels started to be written, there were dozens of other gospels also written, used by other sects of Christianity that bore very little resemblance to the gospels we have now.
There were dozens, if not hundreds of competing sects for centuries, some with very different ideas of what Christianity was. The bible itself wasn't canonized until the 4th century, however the oldest bibles we have also do not match the current bible. Some parts are the same, some parts are very different.
Name any major sects that dispute the teaching of Love God and Love your neighbor as yourself, that we are all sinners and can only be saved by God's grace. The message of Christianity is very clear and is indisputable.So basically, my point is what the gospel says now doesn't really matter to the early Christians, as what you'd refer to as the gospel didn't come about for hundreds and hundreds of years after Christianity became a thing. There never was one unified Christian church.
True but surely you must acknowledge the possibility that the very first Christians had, via word of mouth, absorbed the basic contents of what later turned out to be the four gospels
Indeed, but why does this surprise you. Are you inclined to reject the content of the four gospels simply because other documents were not canonized. I would agree that the presence of these other "gospels" raises interesting questions and perhaps doubts about the canonized four, but this alone does not seem to undermine the possibility that the four canonized ones represent the basic "true picture" of Jesus and His life. Let me be clear: I am not suggesting the four gospels are free of bias - they obviously are not. But to say that a writer has an "agenda" and a bias is not by itself grounds for rejecting their writings. Everyone has an agenda.
I know of one highly respected scholar (yes, he is a Christian but, again, that by itself does not disqualify his views) who argues that from the beginning there was surprising agreement amongst Christians regarding the matter of what happens to the believer after death (i.e. the belief that all believers will be bodily resurrected).
I am not sure why you have such an expectation. Perhaps Christians of a more fundamentalist leaning are largely responsible with their arguably overly simplistic thinking. I do not see the fact that it took a while for things to settle down as a particularly strong reason to doubt the basic truthfulness of the "gospel" message. Sure, it raises legitimate questions, but real life is messy and complex.
I have only now rejoined this thread. Have you given examples of this "disunity"? If so, can you point me to posts.
What does the gospel have to do with "original" Christianity? The four gospels we have now weren't written until 40-100 years after Jesus was said to have been killed. The very first Christians did not have them to go off of.
However, that's ignoring the fact that once the gospels started to be written, there were dozens of other gospels also written, used by other sects of Christianity that bore very little resemblance to the gospels we have now.
There were dozens, if not hundreds of competing sects for centuries, some with very different ideas of what Christianity was. The bible itself wasn't canonized until the 4th century, however the oldest bibles we have also do not match the current bible. Some parts are the same, some parts are very different.
Name any major sects that dispute the teaching of Love God and Love your neighbor as yourself, that we are all sinners and can only be saved by God's grace. The message of Christianity is very clear and is indisputable.So basically, my point is what the gospel says now doesn't really matter to the early Christians, as what you'd refer to as the gospel didn't come about for hundreds and hundreds of years after Christianity became a thing. There never was one unified Christian church.
The first Christians uses Torah, and the most well know teachers of Torah summarizes the Torah as "don't do to others what you don't want others do to you" or something the like. Compare to Jesus' teaching of "Love your neighbor as yourself", see how similar those are? The message is the most central thing of Christianity, it doesn not matter what book is used or when it is written.
List the Gospels that is written in the same period of the 4 Gospels, which one bore very little resemblance and used by other major sects of Christianity? Even the book by Thomas has a lot of resemblance. Please back up your claims.
Again, please back your claims with facts.
Name any major sects that dispute the teaching of Love God and Love your neighbor as yourself, that we are all sinners and can only be saved by God's grace. The message of Christianity is very clear and is indisputable.
Well, the Word (Logos) is indeed the Creator who existed from eternity, but the man Jesus has only existed from his conception.
Yes, Jesus is the Word, but prior to the Incarnation, the Word was obviously not incarnate as Jesus.
Jesus is the Word, who always existed, but took on flesh for good about two thousand years ago. When you say the man Jesus has only existed from His conception, it seems like you're trying to divide His divinity from His humanity.
Besides, He appeared in the flesh other times before--for example, to Adam (walking with him in the garden), Abraham, Sarah, and Jacob.
For example, in the Codex Sinaiaticus, one of the two earliest complete or near complete versions of the bible (along with Codex Vaticanus), there is no resurrection story for Jesus. He's never described as the son of god, there's nothing about Mary, a virgin birth, Joseph of Arimathea, the star of Bethlehem, or anything of that sort. A lot of the tales which tie him to old testament prophecies also do not appear
There is also no resurrection story in virtually all of the other early surviving bibles, the Codex Vaticanus, Codex Alexandrinus, Codex Bezae, etc.
The Gnostic Christians, which were a major collection of early sects believed nothing like that.
Thanks to modern technology, this sort of thing is easily checkable, and you are completely wrong. The Codex Sinaticus, online at codexsinaiticus.org, says exactly what modern translations of the New Testament do:
John 1: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him came into being not one thing that is in being... And the Word became flesh, and tabernacled among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." -- see http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/manuscript.aspx?book=36
Luke 1: "And in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee, named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man, whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the name of the virgin was Mary... And behold, thou shalt conceive in the womb and bear a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and Son of the Highest shall he be called; and the Lord God shall give him the throne of David his father, and he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there shall be no end. But Mary said to the angel: How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?" -- see http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/manuscript.aspx?book=35&chapter=1&verse=26
For the star of Bethlehem, see http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/manuscript.aspx?book=33&chapter=2
Joseph of Arimathea: http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/manuscript.aspx?book=34&chapter=15&verse=43
Resurrection: http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/manuscript.aspx?book=33&chapter=28
Also false.
The Gnostics were not Christians. They were a different, hybrid, religion. Their so-called "gospels" were written later than the Christian gospels.
I meant to specify the earliest writings contained in these bibles, for example the Gospel of Mark in Sinaiaticus. This was the first gospel written, and the one all of the others were based upon (Matthew and Luke in particular).
For example, the resurrection story is not present, it ends at Mark 16 verse 8, as does all other early bibles that I'm aware of. The resurrection story was added to the gospel later on.
Which basically points to the fact that the gospels had undergone numerous edits, which is the commonly accepted view of biblical scholars. Things by this point hadn't quite settled into a fully agreed upon storyline, but it was getting close.
As for something that might give you a bit of a laugh, Arimathea is actually a joke name.
Matthew and Luke seem to rely partly on Mark, John not at all.
Well, as I said, the Resurrection appears elsewhere in the gospels as well, including in the "short ending" of Mark (see http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/manuscript.aspx?book=34&chapter=16&verse=6). So your statement is false again.
Also, the so-called "long ending" of Mark coexisted with the "short ending" from early on. Second-century Christian writers quote it as Scripture. Some manuscripts have the "long ending," many don't. It's far from clear which ending came first.
Nonsense. There's not really much variation between manuscripts at all. There is no manuscript support for an "editing over time" theory.
Yes, that ludicrous theory does make me laugh. Where do you get all this nonsense?
"Arimathea" is more likely a Hellenization of a Hebrew definite article + name, such as Ha-Ramathaim.
The point is that it conflicts but you have no specific verses? Umm... Ok, moving on. Just your opinion and you've probably never read it.Virtually all of it. Every gospel conflicts with each other, and they conflict again with the epistles.
That's not to mention the dozens of other gospels and other writings that didn't make it in the bible, but were held as sacred by various early Christian sects.
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