Why didn't Jesus write his own book?

polygone · Jan 13, 2006

evange said:
But that's exactly it, How could so many people in different locations and at different times conspire to create a story and have it never contradict itself and fit so perfectly well together. It coulden't be done. Which is why I believe that the Bible is nothing other than truth and is the inspired word of God.

The bible has lots of contradictions. Some of my fellow honest "Christians" could point it out. Besides, you think it's not easy to mislead a couple of unknowledgeable shepherds and fishermen?

peaceful soul · Jan 13, 2006

polygone said:
The bible has lots of contradictions. Some of my fellow honest "Christians" could point it out. Besides, you think it's not easy to mislead a couple of unknowledgeable shepherds and fishermen?

Have you personally read the Bible with an intent to understand to make this claim?

polygone · Jan 13, 2006

Yup, I read the first three pages, till Adam and Eve were created. The whole thing seemed a bunch of mojo (no offense) so I closed it...

evange · Jan 13, 2006

polygone said:
The bible has lots of contradictions. Some of my fellow honest "Christians" could point it out. Besides, you think it's not easy to mislead a couple of unknowledgeable shepherds and fishermen?

Well, if they could read and write then I'd assume they weren't "unknowledgeable"

And even if they couldent write (but obviously they could if they wrote the Bible. or perhaps they were illiterate and God bestowed upon them the ability to read and write just for the purpose of being his scribe....) Even if they couldent write, what's to say they are stupid and gullible? You know, people 2000 years ago were capable of using logic too.

And anyway, if they were tricked then why is the Bible so consistant? Especially considering that the different books by their different authors were not written at the same time in the same place. I mean look, mohamed was one man, and he could barely keep his story strait. How could the many men who wrote the Bible possibly keep their story strait without divine guidence?

polygone · Jan 13, 2006

evange said:
Well, if they could read and write then I'd assume they weren't "unknowledgeable"?

So why haven't we both put forth our own versions of the Quantum Theory or written books about philosophy since we both know how to read and write?

evange · Jan 13, 2006

polygone said:
Yup, I read the first three pages, till Adam and Eve were created. The whole thing seemed a bunch of mojo (no offense) so I closed it...

Three pages does not equal the Bible. I challenge you to read the entire Bible, cover to cover (but not necicarity in order, what I mean is just read all of it, every word) so you'll be able to see the greater picture.

polygone · Jan 13, 2006

evange said:
Three pages does not equal the Bible. I challenge you to read the entire Bible, cover to cover (but not necicarity in order, what I mean is just read all of it, every word) so you'll be able to see the greater picture.

A greater picture full of contradictions? No thanks. If anything matters to me in the Bible, it's Jesus' ideals, which almost parallel Gandhi's. And they don't matter to you because they're just "clever things written by some guy 2000 years ago", as you said...

peaceful soul · Jan 13, 2006

polygone said:
A greater picture full of contradictions? No thanks. If anything matters to me in the Bible, it's Jesus' ideals, which almost parallel Gandhi's. And they don't matter to you because they're just "clever things written by some guy 2000 years ago", as you said...

Your main problem is that you can not know the context of Jesus without understanding the Bible. You are picking and choosing material without a full context. That can only lead you to error in your evaluation.

How would you like if I just read a few pages of your beliefs and then said that it is silly and false? Would you appreciate that? I would personally have to label myself as dishonest and should not be listened to as a source of credibility. Would you want to trust what I say in those circumstances?

arunma · Jan 13, 2006

Balbatish said:
Second, the text from Luke 4 raises the brow (fore-shadowing of my thrid point!). When Jesus quotes from Isaiah, he does so from a text unknown to the era. A side by side comparison of what Jesus reads from the torah scroll, with the Masoretic and the Great Isaiah Scroll from Quamron (1QIsa ), Jesus was clearly ( to me ) quoting a source that didn't exist in the area;
http://www.messiahtruth.com/luke.html

Interesting that you mention this. I'm not sure what the Masoretic text and Dead Sea Scrolls say, but I do have a copy of the Septuagint, and I know that St. Luke 4:18-19 is contained here. Now, we know that the Dead Sea Scrolls and Masoretic text tend to agree with each other in most areas, so we can conclude that the LXX and Dead Sea Scrolls stem from two different sets of manuscripts. We know that the LXX existed in Christ's day, and that it was available to all the Jews in Galilee, so it seems plausible to me that Christ would read this text. What do you think?

polygone · Jan 13, 2006

peaceful soul said:
Your main problem is that you can not know the context of Jesus without understanding the Bible. You are picking and choosing material without a full context. That can only lead you to error in your evaluation.

The context of Jesus doesn't hold any value to me. Why should I care about some dead guy or the way he died? It's his teachings that I'd rather appreciate.

peaceful soul said:
How would you like if I just read a few pages of your beliefs and then said that it is silly and false? Would you appreciate that? I would personally have to label myself as dishonest and should not be listened to as a source of credibility. Would you want to trust what I say in those circumstances?

Ahem... sadly, there are no "pages" in my belief! It's a set of rules that I follow and come to my own conclusions instead of being led around by the finger. Besides, I'm not saying your beliefs (the ideals of Jesus, I mean) are silly and false, instead I'm saying that all the other things that totally cover up the core are worthless.

arunma · Jan 13, 2006

polygone said:
The context of Jesus doesn't hold any value to me.

Do you know how dangerous it is to read any written material out of context? I don't think you know what you are saying.

polygone · Jan 13, 2006

arunma said:
Do you know how dangerous it is to read any written material out of context? I don't think you know what you are saying.

I completely know what I'm saying. Let's take an example...

I tell you "Don't kill people, for killing someone is bad" and then I die due to some reason. Now what matters to you? My statement or why I died? Simple analogy, but it still works!

arunma · Jan 13, 2006

polygone said:
I completely know what I'm saying. Let's take an example...

I tell you "Don't kill people, for killing someone is bad" and then I die due to some reason. Now what matters to you? My statement or why I died? Simple analogy, but it still works!

From the unrelated analogy you've given, I don't think you know what you are saying. Christ's teachings were made in a specific cultural and historical context. Not only do you want to discard that context, but you also wish to discard the rest of the Bible. You cannot cut and paste specific words that you happen to like. When you take a few words out of context, the meaning can be entirely altered.

polygone · Jan 13, 2006

You're not getting it, and you probably won't. That's the end of it.

peaceful soul · Jan 13, 2006

polygone said:
The context of Jesus doesn't hold any value to me. Why should I care about some dead guy or the way he died? It's his teachings that I'd rather appreciate.

You are the same person that said that you have not read more than a few pages of the Bible and I am to believe what you are saying now?? Get you head on straight please. Decide if you have enough knowledge and understanding of the Bible to make your assertions hold up under scrutiny.

Ahem... sadly, there are no "pages" in my belief! It's a set of rules that I follow and come to my own conclusions instead of being led around by the finger. Besides, I'm not saying your beliefs (the ideals of Jesus, I mean) are silly and false, instead I'm saying that all the other things that totally cover up the core are worthless.

Your beliefs consist of a set of rules that can be easily written down on paper or presented in a scriptural form. I was being very general in my speech; so, you want to take liberty and pretend that you didn't not know what I am referring to.

Your method of derriving beliefs is not in some way superior to mine just because you think that you are more free than I am in your choices. You still put your faith in something that you do not fully know; so, you are in the same predicament that every other human is in. Don't get too high-minded in your egocentrism.

polygone · Jan 13, 2006

peaceful soul said:
You are the same person that said that you have not read more than a few pages of the Bible and I am to believe what you are saying now?? Get you head on straight please. Decide if you have enough knowledge and understanding of the Bible to make your assertions hold up under scrutiny.

You Christians will never understand anything beyond the bible. I give up trying to put my point across.

peaceful soul said:
Your method of derriving beliefs is not in some way superior to mine just because you think that you are more free than I am in your choices. You still put your faith in something that you do not fully know; so, you are in the same predicament that every other human is in. Don't get too high-minded in your egocentrism.

Who's the one acting touchy and hurt here? And when exactly did I say my religion is superior? Even if I sounded like I implied it, so what? You think it's OK for a Christian to denounce others, but when the table gets turned, you can't take it. So you tell me who's the egocentric one here? Besides, I fully understand my beliefs, unlike some people who blindly follow what they've been taught.

JoeSixpack · Jan 13, 2006

evange said:
Well, if they could read and write then I'd assume they weren't "unknowledgeable"

And even if they couldent write (but obviously they could if they wrote the Bible. or perhaps they were illiterate and God bestowed upon them the ability to read and write just for the purpose of being his scribe....) Even if they couldent write, what's to say they are stupid and gullible? You know, people 2000 years ago were capable of using logic too.

Although I have to point out some people of today are stupid and gullible.

You've only got to look at the followers of David Koresh to see that, or that ufo ponce Rael. Or the moonies or whatever they're called, along with various other cults.

Throughout history it is always shown that some people will believe anything, especially if they want to believe it.

Most of the time the people are conned by being tricked into thinking they are someone significant in the grand scheme of things. This can be very alluring, especially if you live in a world where you are at the bottom of the barrel.

Balbatish · Jan 13, 2006

arunma said:
Interesting that you mention this. I'm not sure what the Masoretic text and Dead Sea Scrolls say

It's really cool, actually. Here is the Masoretic rendering of Isaiah 61: 1-2

Masoret Text said:
1. The spirit of the Lord God was upon me, since the Lord anointed me to bring tidings to the humble, He sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to declare freedom for the captives, and for the prisoners to free from captivity.

2. To declare a year of acceptance for the Lord and a day of vengeance for our God, to console all mourners.

Now, there were a sundry of Isaiah scrolls found at Quamran. I cited "Scroll B" which is almost identical to the Masoret tradition, but it renders the opening passage as " The spirit of the Lord was upon me, " However, scroll B was is rather fragmentary, so Chapters 10-66 are all that are available.

"Scroll A" was almost completely preserved and was different from the B scroll. Here is a quote Schiffman (Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls, page 173-174)

Lawrence H. Schiffman said:
Looking at the two texts, we immediately recognize the coexistence of different versions. Isaiah B represents a proto-Masoretic text, with only minor variations from the traditional Hebrew text as we now know it. On the other hand, Isaiah A represents the sectarian type, for it uses Qumran linguistic forms and, therefore, was most probably copied by members of the group.
In addition to these unique forms, this text also has many linguistic "modernizations" forms and words common when it was copied (rather than when it was composed) as well as simplifications. Some scholars have concluded, therefore, that the Isaiah A Scroll was intended for study and not for worship and that it represents a sort of common text, often termed "vulgar." The Book of Isaiah was so popular that eighteen fragmentary manuscripts of this book have been identified in the collection from cave 4.

Kinda off track, but I just find these things cool

arunma said:
but I do have a copy of the Septuagint, and I know that St. Luke 4:18-19 is contained here.

Could you reproduce Septugaint's Isaiah 61: 1-2 for me? I don't have a translation of the Septugaint and I am not aware of any trust worthy ones on the internet.

Now, we know that the Dead Sea Scrolls and Masoretic text tend to agree with each other in most areas, so we can conclude that the LXX and Dead Sea Scrolls stem from two different sets of manuscripts.

Well, we know King Ptolemy issued an edict to have a translation of the Jewish Torah done in Greek, so he had 72 elders brought togther to do the translation.

The Jewish Talmud Megilla 9a mentions this event and goes on to list the changes the Rabbis made from the Hebrew to the Greek translation. Josephus in the Preface to the Antiquities of the Jews, affirms the same account.

However, Jewish treatment of the Septugaint, ends there, in my opinion. There are no other records of Jews maintaining it in any circle, that I am aware of. Let me quote from the book, " The Books and Parchments " page 150;

Dr. F.F Bruce said:
The Jews might have gone on at a later time to authorize a standard text of the rest of the Septuagint, but . . . lost interest in the Septuagint altogether. With but few exceptions, every manuscript of the Septuagint which has come down to our day was copied and preserved in Christian, not Jewish, circles.

The Late Professor of[size=-1] Biblical Criticism and Exegesis, is one of my favriots.[/size]

Arunma said:
We know that the LXX existed in Christ's day, and that it was available to all the Jews in Galilee, so it seems plausible to me that Christ would read this text. What do you think?

I was not aware that the Greek Translation of Isaiah was available in Galilee at this time period, I also was not aware that enough people of Galilee knew Greek enough to understand the words of the Prophets.

Also, why do you think they were reading Isaiah 61 in this synagauge? From what I understand, Jews do not read from the Prophets, unless it's the Haftorah, and Isaiah 61 isn't part of the 22 line Haftorah.

Again, It was a pleasure speaking with you

graysparrow · Jan 13, 2006

vedickings said:
Most all the yogis before and after his time wrote their own teachings.

So why didn't jesus do so? I think that if Jesus would have wrote his own teachings, he would have be understood better IMHO.

Jesus favored oral transmission... ie Apostolic Tradition

Enjoying Catholicism

polygone · Jan 13, 2006

graysparrow said:
Jesus favored oral transmission...

So did the ancient Hindus...

Why didn't Jesus write his own book?

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