Religion Discussion for High School Social Studies class

[AsburySkinsFan]

    To be fair I also equated him with a confectioner... If I hear the origins or motivations of secular religious studies dismissed as an exersise of antisemitism as Paster Ben did,  Paster Ben has no credibility with me...  

His title is Doctor, and the correct spelling is pastor.

BTW, I'll let him know that he has no credibility with you at his next book signing. I'd write him a facebook message but we don't discuss things on there that don't matter.

Your credibility in this discussion is based on.......?

And please warn me if you're gonna say wikipedia because I would rather not spit tea on my iPad.

[JMS]

I will absolutely affirm the following;

We believe in one God,

the Father, the Almighty,

maker of heaven and earth,

of all that is, seen and unseen.

We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,

the only Son of God,

eternally begotten of the Father,

God from God, Light from Light,

true God from true God,

begotten, not made,

of one Being with the Father.

Through him all things were made.

For us and for our salvation

he came down from heaven:

by the power of the Holy Spirit

he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,

and was made man.

For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;

he suffered death and was buried.

On the third day he rose again

in accordance with the Scriptures;

he ascended into heaven

and is seated at the right hand of the Father.

He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,

and his kingdom will have no end.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,

who proceeds from the Father and the Son.

With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified.

He has spoken through the Prophets.

We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.

We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.

We look for the resurrection of the dead,

and the life of the world to come. Amen.

So Yes, Methodists do subscribe to the Nicene Creed.

 

Not because by the conspiratorial mind says that Constantine wrote it, but because I have studied the scriptures Old and New Testaments, I have spent 10 years in training at institutions of academic training to learn how to read and research and interpret both from the Greek and the Hebrew, and the reason that I can affirm the Nicene Creed is because it is an accurate reflection of the teachings of the scriptures.

Well as the representative for folks with "conspiratorial minds", nobody on this thread has suggested Constantine wrote it. He mandated it, he called the church council which wrote it, he sponsored said council, he hosted said council, he addressed said council, he attended said council, he told them he wanted a unifying creed, He even debated the merits of different positions with the bishops involved. But nobody said he wrote it or even voted on it that I know of..

 

You want to throw it out because somewhere along the line you became convinced that because Constantine called together the church leaders he did not force them to adopt any theology, but instead to gather them together so they might form the affirmations of the Christian faith. He was not a dictator to the church, but was simply the catalyst for the council.

I do not want to throw it out.. I do not have any objection to any piece of the Nicene Creed. It is the profession of my faith. However Constantine literally was a dictator, and he literally was a dictator of all the bishops who attended the Councel of Nicia. And he literally did try to make poeple adopt the creed after it was authored, banishing even friends of his who would not addopt it or who spoke out against it. Including Eusebius of Nicomedia who eventually would baptize Constantine.

And even these coersive powers did not nulify the schism between the Nicean and Arian brach of christianity which the creed was in part supposed to address.

And yes I agree with you Constantine was a catalyst. Without him there is no creed. There is no unifying statement of beliefs for Christendom... That would be a bad thing. But there also would not have been the marrage between church and state which the Nicene Creed enabled; and that's a more nuanced and hypothetical discussion. Because I think you and I might agree that that marriage was not entirely a good thing...

[AsburySkinsFan]

So Yes, Methodists do subscribe to the Nicene Creed.Well as the representative for folks with "conspiratorial minds", nobody on this thread has suggested Constantine wrote it. He mandated it, he called the church council which wrote it, he addressed said council, he attended said council, he told them he wanted a unifying creed, He even debated the merits of different positions with the bishops involved. But nobody said he wrote it that I know of..I do not want to throw it out.. I do not have any objection to any piece of the Nicene Creed. It is the profession of my faith. However Constantine literally was a dictator, and he literally was a dictator of all the bishops who attended the Councel of Nicia. And he literally did try to make poeple adopt the creed, banishing even friends of his who would not addopt it.And yes I agree with you he was a catalyst.

The Council of Nicea lasted for 2 months, you think he presided over those Bishops for two months?

The ONLY thing he called the Bishops together for was to form a unifying creed. So what if he debated the merits, the Bishops were the experts. And if you think that those 300 Bishops were afraid of the Emperor of Rome and were going to buckle to his demands then I strenuously suggest you review the first 300 years of church history, I'd pay particular attention to Domitian and Nero and about 130 years worth of persecution by the pretenders who sat on that throne.

Constantine may well have been a dink after the creeds and canon were formed, but him being a jackhole has zero bearing on the accuracy of the Nicene creed.

[JMS]

The Council of Nicea lasted for 2 months, you think he presided over those Bishops for two months?

Yeah I think Nicea is a suburb of Constantinople the capital of Rome at the time, and that wasn't an accident. Constantine called the bishops of the church to him. I think Constantine was very keen to unify Christondom for his own purposes and put a high value on it. As for presideing over every meeting probable not.. I do think he was aware of the issues, aware of the problems, and was highly motivated to solve them. His ambition was that unifying creed and he set that goal for the bishops. He called the council. He paid for their meals. He paid for their loging and travel. It was his show... and when he got his Creed, he sent it out across his empire and had everybody endorse it, and whow to the people who wouldn't endorse it.

 

The ONLY thing he called the Bishops together for was to form a unifying creed. So what if he debated the merits, the Bishops were the experts. And if you think that those 300 Bishops were afraid of the Emperor of Rome and were going to buckle to his demands then I strenuously suggest you review the first 300 years of church history, I'd pay particular attention to Domitian and Nero and about 130 years worth of persecution by the pretenders who sat on that throne.

Only it wasn't during the period of Domitian or Nero was it... Clearly there were Bishops who weren't going to be pursuaded both in favor of the creed and against the creed. Clearly there were bishops who were pursuaded by Constantine... As you say Constantine wanted a unified Church coming out of Nicea.. he didn't get it; so you are right. There were bishops who were not pursuaded by Constantine, and Constantine was a pretty pursuasive guy.

 

Constantine may well have been a dink after the creeds and canon were formed, but him being a jackhole has zero bearing on the accuracy of the Nicene creed.

Never said Constantine was a jackhole, or a confectioner, just a dictator. Nor that his actions detracted from the validity of the Nicene Creed. Rather I agreed with you that he was a catylist. He was a coersive force which helped forge and gain the acceptence for the unifying creed of Christian beliefs.

[techboy]

You are a very sophisticated editorialist... When you fail to make a valid point, just repost and increase the font.

There's a reason I did this. It is that...

Equating non secular religious studies with anti Semitism is absurd. A lot of Christians seek an honest discussion of the history of their beliefs. They don't need to bend the events of history to some predetermined angle to avoid exploring their faith. That you do is your business, but don't go calling those of us who don't anti Semites or having roots in anti-Semitism.. It's a new low even for you.

... you clearly aren't reading what I am writing, so I thought I'd highlight the key point, which you will notice, is that the vast majority of scholars, of all faith backgrounds, even those of no faith have abandoned the approach you are espousing.

If you had bothered to actually read what Dr. Witherington had to say before you flew off on your silly assault on his (and my) character, you would know that the school of thought he is discussing was in vogue DECADES AGO. It de-emphasized Judaism at a time and place (Germany) where anti-semitism encouraged this.

He's not saying current adherents to the theory are anti-semites, and I certainly didn't say that either.

You are making it very difficult to continue to take your arguments seriously for the following reasons:

1. You are a plagiarist. As an educator and a respecter of intellectual property, I am not inclined to let this point go, and you have not addressed it beyond attempting to deflect. And no, this is not a matter of "common knowledge". You have, multiple times, lifted entire paragraphs word for word from other sources, without giving credit.

2. You do not bother to read carefully what anyone who disagrees with you has to say.

3. When you cannot refute the arguments presented to you, you engage in the genetic fallacy, or simply ignore them.

I'd suggest you correct these behaviors if you want to be taken seriously. You might have noticed that there are a variety of people making critical comments about your argument style in this thread. Maybe a little self-reflection is in order.

Or, I suppose you can respond to this with your usual mixture of personal insults, the genetic fallacy, and declarations of your own genius and devastating argumentation.

No skin off my nose either way, really.

[AsburySkinsFan]

Yeah I think Nicea is a suburb of Constantinople the capital of Rome at the time, and that wasn't an accident.

Bearing in mind that Constantinople was not made the capital of the Empire until five years later.....

Constantine called the bishops of the church to him. I think Constantine was very keen to unify Christondom for his own purposes and put a high value on it. As for presideing over every meeting probable not.. I do think he was aware of the issues, aware of the problems, and was highly motivated to solve them. His ambition was that unifying creed and he set that goal for the bishops. He called the council. He paid for their meals. He paid for their loging and travel. It was his show... and when he got his Creed, he sent it out across his empire and had everybody endorse it, and whow to the people who wouldn't endorse it.

Your bias on this is totally laughable and reads exactly like the History channel. He didn't get "his" creed, and it wasn't like the Arians were strong movement anyways, they were just a continual thorn for the church that until the First Council of Nicea had to be dealt with individually.

Only it wasn't during the period of Domitian or Nero was it...

Right, and these bishops some of whom would have likely lived through periods of persecution by Rome, abandoned the church's history and heritage of persecution by Rome for a free meal and a stay at the Motel 6. Seriously, this is a joke right?

Clearly there were Bishops who weren't going to be pursuaded both in favor of the creed and against the creed. Clearly there were bishops who were pursuaded by Constantine... As you say Constantine wanted a unified Church coming out of Nicea.. he didn't get it; so you are right. There were bishops who were not pursuaded by Constantine, and Constantine was a pretty pursuasive guy.

"Incidentally, only Arius and two of the council's bishops out of the 200 that attended dissented. Therefore... calling it "a relatively close vote at that" is simply wrong."

http://www.newmediaministries.org/DaVinciCode/Assertions%20About%20Nicea_S.html

Never said Constantine was a jackhole, or a confectioner, just a dictator. Nor that his actions detracted from the validity of the Nicene Creed. Rather I agreed with you that he was a catylist. He was a coersive force which helped forge and gain the acceptence for the unifying creed of Christian beliefs.

You also paint this in wholly negative terms, give it up, the "vote" wasn't even close, only Arius and two others dissented out if more than 200.

Seriously, this is a joke...I'm on candid camera right?

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

I've really enjoyed this version of "JMS knows more than the experts." We can add religious scholar to his many honorariums.

[techboy]

Right, and these bishops some of whom would have likely lived through periods of persecution by Rome, abandoned the church's history and heritage of persecution by Rome for a free meal and a stay at the Motel 6. Seriously, this is a joke right?

This, and the council's actual makeup and vote, has been pointed out to him many many many many times.

The ancient writer Theodoret of Cyrus, for example, records in his The Ecclesiastical History of Theodoret:

Paul, bishop of Neo-Cæsarea, a fortress situated on the banks of the Euphrates, had suffered from the frantic rage of Licinius. He had been deprived of the use of both hands by the application of a red-hot iron, by which the nerves which give motion to the muscles had been contracted and rendered dead. Some had had the right eye dug out, others had lost the right arm. Among these was Paphnutius of Egypt. In short, the Council looked like an assembled army of martyrs.

Paphnutius of Thebes is probably the most famous example mentioned in that passage.

Paphnutius of Thebes, also known as Paphnutius the Confessor, was bishop of a city in the Upper Thebaid in the early fourth century, and one of the most interesting possible members of the First Council of Nicaea in 325. He was a disciple of Saint Anthony the Great.

Paphnutius had been persecuted for his Christian beliefs, and had suffered mutilation of the left knee and the loss of his right eye for the Faith under the Emperor Maximinus, and was subsequently condemned to the mines. According to some reports, at the First Council of Nicaea, he was greatly honoured by Constantine the Great.

[Riggo-toni]

I'm not wanting to step to firmly into this derailment of what started as a good thread and suddenly devolved into mush.

I would like to point out that there was a divide amongst the Arians themselves, and that possibly the largest faction were moderate Arians, who believed Jesus was God, but not co-substantial or "one essence/substance." Hosius, who directed the council spoke first and passionately in favor of Athanasius. I can't remember the name offhand, but there was another church council some months later where this "moderate Arianism" won the majority vote, and Constantine was reportedly furious.

Constantine's son/successor Constantius was a devout Arian thanks to his mother's influence. He exiled Athanasius and overturned Nicea. This might have been only a blip on the radar, except that Goths and Vandals were converted to Christianity during his reign, and subsequently became the adversaries of Catholocism. As Gibbon noted, the western empire fell on the difference of one iota.(omo-ousias versus omoi-ousias)

Roman Emperor Julian the Apostate wanted to re-establish the old Roman religion, so he combatted Christianity by promoting tolerance! He figured letting arians and athanasians both exercise their religion freely would pit them against each other and a house divided wouldn't stand.

Even more absurd was was the Chalcedonian debate over whether as God incarnate, Christ had one or two natures. The Bishop or Rome, Leo, used the controversy over monophysitism to establish supremacy over the Egyptian (Coptic) church by excommunicating Dioscorus. Egypt had been the focal point for Christian dogma for centuries - creeds, monastic movements, and even the title of Pope as head of the church all originated from Egypt. Leo used a philosophical, non-biblical disagreement as grounds for heresy. Persecution even under the Byzantine emperors was so bad the Egyptians opened their cities to Muslim conquerors a few centuries later after obtaining promises of religious tolerance.

[JMS]

Of course you could sub in either creed to either service form but chances are that if the church doesn't do communion each week then you aren't going to be saying the Nicene Creed nearly as often as the Apostles Creed which will, once again, reduce the familiarity and the ease of reciting it in unison with a group.

 

Just my $.02.

Thank you for your input.

[JMS]

Your bias on this is totally laughable and reads exactly like the History channel. He didn't get "his" creed, and it wasn't like the Arians were strong movement anyways, they were just a continual thorn for the church that until the First Council of Nicea had to be dealt with individually.

Constantine didn't get a unifying creed for Christianity out of the first church council at Nicea?

And the arians were strong enough to take control of the empire after Constantines death, puting the Nicean bishops on the defensive. The council of Nicea did not settle the issue.. It remained a problem for the next five decades within the empire, so the Arians support certainly extended beyond a handful of bishops. Then the Arians outside the empire among the Goths and Vandals weren't put down for five hundred more years.... And then Arianism made a comeback during the Protestant Reformation more than 1000 years latter... So yeah Arianism was a pretty big deal before the Reformation and East and West Schisms taught Christianity what a really big deal was.

 

You also paint this in wholly negative terms, give it up, the "vote" wasn't even close, only Arius and two others dissented out if more than 200 bishops.

I'm not painting it in any terms. It's history. Yes only a handful of the 220 bishops who attended Nicea dessented... but Constantine had invited 1800 bishops to the first church council didn't he... so that's quite a lot who didn't attend. And just a few years after Nicea the Arians controled the empire, and then they called another Church Council which passed an Arian creed at the Council of Rimini. The Nicean Bishops struggled with Aryanism for decades and the Empire struggled with it for hundreds of years.. Christianity wouls struggle with it for more than 100o years...

So all in all claiming only 3 biships supported it at Nicea, is a little misleading...

[JMS]

I can't remember the name offhand, but there was another church council some months later where this "moderate Arianism" won the majority vote, and Constantine was reportedly furious.

Constantine's son/successor Constantius was a devout Arian thanks to his mother's influence. He exiled Athanasius and overturned Nicea. This might have been only a blip on the radar, except that Goths and Vandals were converted to Christianity during his reign, and subsequently became the adversaries of Catholocism.

Are you thinking of the Council of Rimini, in 359? That was decades after Constantine's death in 337, but it was an achievement for the Arians who saw 3-400 biships from east and western church, more than who attended Nicea support a pro Arian creed... But even when Constantine was alive the Arians were pretty strong... One of the bishops from Nicea who had supported Arius was Eusebius of Nicomedia.. He had been banished by Constantine after Nicea.. but by 337 this Arian bishop had made a comeback with Constantine and Constatine choose him to baptize him on his deathbed.

[drtdrums]

A complete aside here, but I've never been able to figure out the logic chain of Arianism. It simply does not mesh well with the version of Logos theory presented in John 1. It leans heavily on arguing from John 14 using an interpretation that simply cannot be reconciled with John 1.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

That Constantine was a real dick, huh?

[AsburySkinsFan]

That Constantine was a real dick, huh?

Yeah he kinda was, and because of his later strong armed tactics to try and force Christianity upon the empire we has Christendom and the unification of church and state which resulted in a bunch of long term nearly catastrophic results. I am no fan of Constantine, but what I like even less is the proliferation of the mythology that Constantine gathered the bishops of the Christian church together and they were either bribed with food and lodging, or were bullied by a dictator into doing what he wanted them to do. Men who had endured serious persecution because of their faith by Constantine's predecessors.

As for JMS's contention that Arians got larger and spread, that's wholly irrelevant as well in that there are lots of wrong teachings that gain wide acceptance, and that acceptance does not legitimize an errant interpretation of the texts, e.g. Dispensationalism, Rapture theology, Liberation theology, racist theologies like what we saw in our nation's South. The fact that these theologies at varying points in time became the dominant theologies in various regions in no way makes them legitimate interpretations of the Christian scriptures, because the number of adherents does not excuse the fact that there are serious flaws with those theologies according to the texts, experience, and reason. Arianism in each of its forms is errant, not because Constantine says so, not even because the Council at Nicaea says so, but because the texts themselves witness against the interpretation.

So unless JMS is going to argue from the texts for the various forms of Arianism, I'd suggest that it's time to move on.

[JMS]

As for JMS's contention that Arians got larger and spread, that's wholly irrelevant as well in that there are lots of wrong teachings that gain wide acceptance, and that acceptance does not legitimize an errant interpretation of the texts,

its not "my contention", its. Historic fact that the Arian controversy wasn't settled at Nivea.

It continued to plague the empire for five more decades internally and 5 centuries externally.

And Christianity for another 500 years. It was one of the early. Catastrophes of the church.

You seem to be suggesting it was no big deal or worse that the Arians never really threatened

To eclipse the nicean bishops . And that's just wrong. As I said before the arians actually were

in control of the empire calling there own church councils voting in there own creeds just a few

short years after Nicea.

As for

[AsburySkinsFan]

The Arian controversy was and is settled, in the same way that evolution and climate change are settled, the fact that the Arians refused to accept it is irrelevant.

[grego]

A complete aside here, but I've never been able to figure out the logic chain of Arianism. It simply does not mesh well with the version of Logos theory presented in John 1. It leans heavily on arguing from John 14 using an interpretation that simply cannot be reconciled with John 1.

 

 

john 1 would seem to put it to rest. not sure why it was a belief. but then, i dont get why alot of things are believed. 

[The Sisko]

Well, one reason it's not on the standardized test is probably that the idea that you can explain Christianity's beliefs by comparing it to earlier religions, as popularized by the Religionsgeschichtliche Schule, has been out of favor in academia for decades. It just doesn't fly. This is also covered in depth in the Theological thread I covered earlier.

Ben Witherington puts it well:

 

sic

I'm admittedly not a huge scholar of this stuff in part because I'm not particularly good at it but more importantly because I just don't find it very interesting. Even so, I think I am capable of forming some conclusions which should still stand up to basic reason.

 

First, if I'm understanding the Religionsge... Religionsgesch... my fellow German dudes correctly, their argument was that much of the similarities between Christianity and paganism was the result of Greek influence. As I understand it, where this line of reasoning goes off the tracks has to do with the Jews reputation for resisting syncretism and Paul's constant exhortations against the same regardless of his background as a "Greek" Jew/Christian.

 

However though it makes good sense I think there's a limit to the reasoning of this dismissal. Unless I'm misunderstanding the nature of the Jewish diaspora and the early church, Greeks wouldn't have been the only influence. The Roman empire was known for being a melting pot for different religions and no matter how much one might try to prevent it, cross pollination happens regardless because well, people are people and what the laity did in everyday life most likely didn't always jibe with what the priests/scholars were working out doctrinally. I think a good example of this is the church sanctioning the adapting of pagan holidays to help grease the skids for pagan converts. 

 

My thinking is that in the first few hundred years prior to the Nicene creed (especially while the traditions were still maintained orally) there was a lot of back and forth about the dogma and meaning of the new religion, whether it was a sect of Judaism or it's own entity, whether gentiles should be accepted etc. Clearly somewhere in the process, something changed. Something pushed the Jews over the line to reject Christians as being part of their faith and vice versa. Otherwise, Christianity would have remained an accepted sect of Judaism like the rest rather than becoming an entirely separate faith. I think this change and other instances described in the Bible/Torah/history where the Jews go astray, e.g. the golden calf incident, Gnosticism, etc. means there was some degree of change in the doctrine and hence Jewish syncretism cannot be completely ruled out. 

 

Going back to your prior refutation of my comment about Christianity being largely a Pauline creation, at the very least I think we can agree that he was highly influential in the formation of the new church. He wrote a bunch of the NT himself. What I honestly don't remember is whether he knew or how much he interacted with the disciples who actually knew Jesus. Either way, without the writings of the disciples themselves, much of what we have in the NT is Paul's view. I don't think he was intentionally misrepresenting anything in his writings, he just genuinely believed his positions were true.

 

An additional issue to syncretism is the basic lack of trustworthiness of the OT that as a Jew, Jesus himself believed in. To be blunt, much of it is nonsense and clearly smacks of syncretism or just being made up by the Jewish writers. The story of Noah and the flood is clearly borrowed from earlier myths and all the stuff about people living to 500 or 900 years is simply foolishness. Please correct me if I'm wrong but there's no archeological evidence for that stuff.

 

In addition to that Jesus emphasized how kind, loving and forgiving God is. And yet this is the same God who ordered genocide, that destroyed the whole world, and royally screwed Job over on a bet among other things. So either God got a good therapist after carving Jesus off himself, the OT can't be believed yet again, or he's not as unchanging as the Bible says. Therefore, if Jesus was really divine, I'd think he would have used his miracles as a platform to tell the Jews for whom he said he was sent, God's chosen people, that they'd royally screwed things up and that a full on reset was in order, i.e. throw out the Torah and just listen to what he had to say. If he was worried about being killed too soon for such a heresy, as the miracle working son of God himself he could have prevented that from happening until he wanted it to. Besides, if the average person sees a guy turn water into wine, raise the dead and then come back from the dead himself, you can bet he'd be pretty damn willing to take Jesus' word about the Torah being bogus and get on board. Instead Jesus does a lot of dissembling and basically says he's not here to upset the existing Jewish order.

 

I'm sorry but I think Jesus was a reformer who taught the importance of love, kindness etc. over blind adherence to the law but I'm not buying the miracles and such. In line with many of the other religions of the era, I think the miracles and divinity came after his death, before church dogma solidified and that's the reason for the similarities between Christian lore and previous myths.

[Jumbo]

First, my thanks to Riggo-toni and Yusuf for their posts. Refreshing and appreciated to see your views in such threads.And I have long wished we had more diversity in religious believers in here (i.e. non-Christian), but we don't. Even dedicated members of various dominant Muslim and Jewish sects are sadly under-represented and these conversations suffer. We even have had more, say grad-level philosophy folks here over the years than Buddhists. Oh well.

 

Given some of the discourse in the thread from several disparate participants, it won when looking for somewhere to put this link that came up on a page this a.m. while I was checking in here, as it happens. I think it's a great class topic in general, but don't know if it fits for your purposes, Code.

 

The dynamics of "belief"  in human cognition has become part of a primary lens for me to view such discussions after the philosophical/historical-cultural/anthropological/religious/classical logic arguments where I spent the most of my earlier decades. I see it all from more of a "human behavioral sciences" perspective these days, and in forms far more intricate than the simple human staple of anthropomorphous tendencies (mainly mortality/self-identity<"ego">/fear-insecurity drivers).

 

I think that following the forms almost any strong belief (or entire belief system) can take, and discussions of the "forces" (internal and external, if you will) connected to developing and driving such, can be some real red meat for students. I send much time on it.   

 

http://tv.yahoo.com/news/natgeo-snake-salvation-star-dead-snake-bite-175410245.html

 

UPDATE, 11:15 AM: With the first season fully filmed National Geographic had no plans for a second season of Snake Salvation, says a network rep. Now in the wake of Jamie Coots‘ death NatGeo is working up a special tribute episode “so people can understand Pastor Jamie and his method of worship and see that he died doing what he believed was his calling.” Here’s NatGeo on Coots’ passing:

 

National Geographic joins his family, friends and community in mourning the loss of Pastor Jamie Coots. In following Pastor Coots for our series Snake Salvation, we were constantly struck by his devout religious convictions despite the health and legal peril he often faced. Those risks were always worth it to him and his congregants as a means to demonstrate their unwavering faith. We were honored to be allowed such unique access to Pastor Jamie and his congregation during the course of our show, and give context to his method of worship. Our thoughts are with his family at this difficult time.

 

more at link 

[techboy]

I'm admittedly not a huge scholar of this stuff in part because I'm not particularly good at it but more importantly because I just don't find it very interesting. Even so, I think I am capable of forming some conclusions which should still stand up to basic reason.

In this post you have constructed a narrative which is coherent, plausible, and according to the best scholarship, totally wrong.

I have to admit I'm puzzled as to why you feel comfortable admitting that you neither care much nor know much about the topic, yet are willing to "reason" your way to a different conclusion than the vast majority of actual scholars.

To be fair, this approach is hardly unique to yourself. If a poster tried to insert a "reasoned opinion", no matter how plausible on the surface, on one of a variety of other topics such as trickle down economics, climate change, or (perhaps most appropriate given the thread on the first page) the age of the Earth, he or she would receive immediate push back from just about everybody.

Somehow, when the topic is history of religion, that standard is relaxed. You'll probably even get likes and/or posts in agreement.

I addressed this in some detail in the thread I linked earlier, but I'll give you a sketch of why your argument doesn't fly.

 

First, if I'm understanding the Religionsge... Religionsgesch... my fellow German dudes correctly, their argument was that much of the similarities between Christianity and paganism was the result of Greek influence.

The parallel religions approach also attempted to incorporate Egyptian and other beliefs, actually, but as already noted, the big problem with this is that scholars now recognize nearly universally that, as Witherington writes, the New Testament is Jewish "from stem to stern".

Jesus was Jewish. All of Jesus' early followers were Jewish. Paul wasn't just a Jew, he was a Pharisee.

Generally, the idea that a bunch of devout Jews would build in beliefs from other cultures and religions is ridiculous.

When the Roman Empire assimilated a new region, those people would get to keep their beliefs and pantheon. The Romans just asked that the Emperor be considered a god. They saw this as a way to integrate cultures, and it largely worked.

The Jews, though, wouldn't have any part of it and it caused such strife that Rome ended up sacking Jerusalem and destroying the Temple in 70 CE. They literally preferred death over syncretism.

In the area of positive evidence, analysis of the New Testament shows that it is steeped in the ideas of Second Temple Judaism. I'm not going to go into detail here, but Witherington touches on it in his piece.

 

My thinking is that in the first few hundred years prior to the Nicene creed (especially while the traditions were still maintained orally) there was a lot of back and forth about the dogma and meaning of the new religion, whether it was a sect of Judaism or it's own entity, whether gentiles should be accepted etc. Clearly somewhere in the process, something changed. Something pushed the Jews over the line to reject Christians as being part of their faith and vice versa.

Let's start with the easy one. Nothing "changed". There were tensions and a split between Jesus and his followers and the Jewish authorities of the day from the very beginning for two reasons.

1. Jesus claimed to be the Messiah. Second Temple Judaism expected the Messiah to be a military leader that would cast off the oppressors of Israel and lead it to glory. Jesus clearly didn't do that.

2. More importantly, Jesus claimed to be God. As Edwin Yamauchi writes in Jesus, Zoroaster, Buddha, Socrates & Muhammad:

 

Unlike the other spiritual leaders we are examining, Jesus came out of a monotheistic culture. The concept of "gods" in polytheistic religions is quite anthropomorphic; there is no sharp difference in kind between men and such gods.25 In Jewish monotheism the distinction between God as transcendent and infinite and man as finite is almost absolute.

It is therefore altogether remarkable that Jesus claimed to be one with the Father (John 10:30), a blasphemy for which the Jews wished to stone him (John 10:31, 33: John 5:17-18). This claim to be one with God was expressed in Jesus' claims to be free from sin (John 8:46), to be the only way to the Father (John 14:6), to have authority to forgive sins (Matthew 9:5-6) and to have the right to demand complete loyalty (Luke 14:26). He accepted worship (John 20:28; Matthew 28:9; Luke 24:52; contrast the refusal to accept any adoration by Peter, Acts 3:12; 10:25-26; and by Barnabas and Paul, Acts 14:14-15) and believed he deserved equal honor with God the Father (John 5:23). Jesus dared to address God as Abba, an intimate Aramaic term for "father," which none of the rabbis used. As Joachim Jeremias has noted, "…this Abba implies the claim of a unique revelation and a unique authority."26

It is sometimes suggested that the deity of Jesus is a late doctrine, imported into Christianity by pagan converts.27 This thesis cannot be maintained in light of the declarations of the apostle Paul, a converted Pharisaic Jew.28

In claiming to be Messiah, Jesus made himself a threat to the Roman state. In claiming to be God, Jesus was seen as a blasphemer and also a threat to the Jewish religious authorities. This is why he was killed.

This is also why there was a split and tension between early Christians and Jews from the very beginning. These tensions are visible in the narratives of the various texts of the New Testament.

I'll come back to the "deity and miracles developed later" angle in a bit.

 

Going back to your prior refutation of my comment about Christianity being largely a Pauline creation, at the very least I think we can agree that he was highly influential in the formation of the new church.

Yes, but we also know from the historical record that Paul met with early church leaders like James and Peter very early. It's silly to think (and there's certainly no evidence to believe) that the early Christians would just let a Pharisee hijack Jesus' teachings and life and run his own direction with them.

Moreover, most of what we know about the earliest Christian beliefs comes from Paul's letters, because many of them predate the Gospels, which is usually what people try to compare to when they claim that Paul took over and changed things. If he had, it seems to me that the later documents (the Gospels) would reflect that change.

There's just no reason to believe this, and usually the people that do have some sort of theological bias that leads them to want to ignore what Paul taught.

 

In line with many of the other religions of the era, I think the miracles and divinity came after his death, before church dogma solidified and that's the reason for the similarities between Christian lore and previous myths.

Now back to your other main point. This view is simply not supported by the historical record. One of the most clearly attested to and agreed upon facts about Jesus is that he was seen as a miracle worker. That doesn't mean that historians necessarily believe that the miracles actually occured, but it is well outside the mainstream to argue that the miracles were added to the story later.

The "biggie", of course, is the Resurrection, so let's look at that as a specific example.

In Resurrection Research from 1975 to the Present: What are Critical Scholars Saying?, Gary Habermas writes:

 

Bart Ehrman explains that, “Historians, of course, have no difficulty whatsoever speaking about the belief in Jesus’ resurrection, since this is a matter of public record. For it is a historical fact that some of Jesus’ followers came to believe that he had been raised from the dead soon after his execution.” This early belief in the resurrection is the historical origination of Christianity.[91]

As we have mentioned throughout, there are certainly disagreements about the nature of the experiences. But it is still crucial that the nearly unanimous consent[92] of critical scholars is that, in some sense, the early followers of Jesus thought that they had seen the risen Jesus.

This conclusion does not rest on the critical consensus itself, but on the reasons for the consensus, such as those pointed out above. A variety of paths converge here, including Paul's eyewitness comments regarding his own experience (1 Cor. 9:1; 15:8), the pre-Pauline appearance report in 1 Corinthians 15:3-7, probably dating from the 30s, Paul's second Jerusalem meeting with the major apostles to ascertain the nature of the Gospel (Gal. 2:1-10), and Paul's knowledge of the other apostles' teachings about Jesus' appearances (1 Cor. 15:9-15, especially 15:11). Further, the early Acts confessions, the conversion of James, the brother of Jesus, the transformed lives that centered on the resurrection, the later Gospel accounts, and, most scholars would agree, the empty tomb. This case is built entirely on critically-ascertained texts, and confirmed by many critical principles such as eyewitness testimony, early reports, multiple attestation, discontinuity, embarrassment, enemy declarations, and coherence.[93]

If you know Bart Ehrman, you know that he is an agnostic who has been in debates about the historicity of the Ressurection, arguing against, so it's not like this is an issue of theological bias.

Or, Michael Grant was an eminent classical historian, and in Jesus: An Historian's Review of the Gospels, he writes on page 176:

 

The Ressurection is the subject of some of the greatest pictures ever painted, but there is no actual description of it, and nobody claimed to have seen it happen. Yet those who believed that Jesus had appeared to them on the earth after his death have their alleged experiences recorded in a number of passages of the New Testament. Their testimonies cannot prove them to be right in supposing that Jesus had risen from the dead. However, these accounts do prove that certain people were utterly convinced that that is what he had done.

This was not a later addition, as you theorize. It was something Jesus' followers really believed happened.

Probably the most definitive work on this, though, can be found in TND Mettinger'sThe Riddle of Resurrection: Dying and Rising Gods in the Ancient Near East.

First, Mettinger's assessment of the current state of scholarship, from Chapter 1.2.1: Where Do We Stand? The Task of the Present Work (This quote is from page 40):

 

As a result of the many decades of research since de Vaux (1933), "it has become commonplace to assume that the category of Mediterranean 'dying and rising' gods has been exploded... (I)t is now held that the majority of the gods so denoted appear to have died but not returned; there is death but no rebirth or ressurection." These words of J.Z. Smith aptly summarise the present state of research. (56)

Mettinger spends a lot of time in this chapter discussing this: the current consensus of scholars is that there are no "dying and rising" gods that predate Christ, and that, in fact, many of the references came after Christ, and are in fact more likely either cases of pagans borrowing from Christians, and not the other way around, or, as in the case of the Church moving Jesus' birthday to Dec. 25, an attempt by early Christians to attract followers of various pagan beliefs.

Now, I want to be totally fair here: although Mettinger shows the current state of scholarship, he then goes on to say that he is one of the few that disagree, and the book is an attempt to make his case that there are in fact a few "dying and rising" gods that pre-date Christianity. He makes a fairly good argument, too, for the gods Melqart, Adonis, Osiris, and Dumuzi. Most scholars disagree with him, but it's a fair argument.

Consider, though, that along with the fact that he is in the extreme minority on this issue, there is also this quote from page 221, in the Epilogue (the bold emphasis is mine, the italics are his):

 

(1)The figures we have studied are deities. In the case of Jesus, we are confronted with a human (for whom divinity was claimed by himself and by his followers). For the disciples and for Paul, the resurrection of Jesus was a one-time, historical event that took place at one specific point in the earth's topography. The empty tomb was seen as a historical datum. (4)

(2) The dying and rising gods were closely related to the seasonal cycle. Their death and return were seen as reflected in the changes of plant life. The death and ressurection of Jesus is a one-time event, not repeated, and unrelated to seasonal changes.

(3) The death of Jesus is presented in the sources as vicarious suffering, as an act of atonement for sins. The myth of Dumuzi has an arrangement with bilocation and substitution, but there is no evidence for the death of the dying and rising gods as vicarious suffering for sins.

There is, as far as I am aware, no prima facie evidence that the death and resurrection of Jesus is a mythological construct, drawing on the myths and rites of the dying and rising gods of the surrounding world. While studied with profit against the background of Jewish resurrection belief, the faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus retains its unique character in the history of religions. The riddle remains.

Your chain of reasoning just doesn't hold up to the scholarship.

[JMS]

I'm admittedly not a huge scholar of this stuff in part because I'm not particularly good at it but more importantly because I just don't find it very interesting. Even so, I think I am capable of forming some conclusions which should still stand up to basic reason.

First, if I'm understanding the Religionsge... Religionsgesch... my fellow German dudes correctly, their argument was that much of the similarities between Christianity and paganism was the result of Greek influence. As I understand it, where this line of reasoning goes off the tracks has to do with the Jews reputation for resisting syncretism and Paul's constant exhortations against the same regardless of his background as a "Greek" Jew/Christian.[/color][/font][/size]

Pagan influences on Judaism and by extension Christianity aren't even controversial topics. As I've brought up Cyrus the Great of Persia, is referred in the bible (Old Testament) as being a Messiah / Christ / anointed one; figure to Diaspora Jews. He's represented as speaking to God, and doing God's work on earth in the bible. His dynasty ended the first jewish Diaspora, rebuilt the Temple in Jerusalem after Israel fell, and even was responsible for entire books in the old testiment. The Zoroastrian / Pagan / earliest Monotheists appointed prophets to teach at the temple, and those prophets wrote Old Testament books in the Jewish Torah and Christian Bible..... So Influence... it's hard for anybody with an open mind to claim the surrounding religions had no influence on Judaism. Judaism and by extension Christianity owes its very existence to alternate religions. Hell there is evidence Jewish dietary laws, the Jewish monotheistic belief, and the supernaturfal duality of a good and evil also fell out of their association / dependence with the ancient Persians / Zoroastrians.

As for Pagan influences on Christianity... again it's not even a controversial topic. How exactly does a bunny get into the Christian Easter tradition? How about a pine tree, a ewl log, a December date for Christ's birth, kneeling in mass, Christ on the cross behind our alters, various other Christian totems/medals , incense in church, the robes a Catholic priest wears, hell this entire obsession with correctness of one belief over another? Christianity is repeat with pagan influences... Arguable more so the western brands of Christianity, but even the Orthodox Church which escaped many of the invasions from the east that plagued the west for centuries. Comparing the traditions of eastern and western Christendom, as well as the religious texts which predate Christianity it's possible to track influences.

Specific influences and their importance are interesting to discuss, but the fact that there were waves of different influences across centuries is not debatable.

As for the Greeks being a primary source of these "contaminations", that's a topic for debate and discussion. In order to have a meaningful qualitative discussion on that narrow a topic you would have to agree on metrics. There is no doubt as you brought up the Christian faith spread beyond its early Jewish practitioners through Greek texts. These texts though don't seem to be a rich source of Greek influence though because they were written by Paul, a jewish Christian, a person well versed in the Jewish wing of the early Christian Church, and his writings, teachings and ministry were vetted by the early church leaders in Jerusalem at the council of Jerusalem. So to then claim Paul as an outliar would be a hard get.

The only point of contention is how pervasive influences were on Christianity and whether they reach into Christian doctrine. Which brings us back to the Nicean Creed as it is the closest things Christians have to a unified statement of beliefs. There is debatable evidence of Pagan influence on the early Christian leaders who wrote the Nicean Creed. The fact they were assembled, lobbied, hosted, and their entire goal of writing a unifying creed was dictated by a Pagan Roman Emperor is just the tip of the iceberg... The fact the early Christians struggled amongst themselves for decades after this creed against heresies who's entire motivation for labeling them heresies were Pagan is again another point of influence... And then you have the doctrinal similarities which came out of Nicaea with other religions in Rome at the time.. There are lots of areas for discussion, which may or may not challenge people of faith.

 

My thinking is that in the first few hundred years prior to the Nicene creed (especially while the traditions were still maintained orally) there was a lot of back and forth about the dogma and meaning of the new religion, whether it was a sect of Judaism or its own entity, whether gentiles should be accepted etc. Clearly somewhere in the process, something changed. Something pushed the Jews over the line to reject Christians as being part of their faith and vice versa.

I would argue there was some discussion in the first few hundred years of Christianity... Paul and Peter's discussions for example representing the Jewish centric early dominant Christian church, and paul the outward facing movment of that same church... However I would argue the real discussions started to occur only after Christianity was legalized and adopted by the empire 300 years after Christ. This step, marrage between the church and state was itself a huge pagan influence which would dramatically affect christianity for thousands of years. When this marriage occured the doctrinal discussions ceased to be come the purview of men of faith and became tenants of state security. expediant concensus became a mandate of the empire. So that's when the debate became it's most intense / coersive... It's also when various princes of the church rose in relevence based upon their proximity to the secular state leadership... The Pope in rome, The Patriach in Constaninopolis. And all the controversy and trouble that relationship between state and church would cause can be traced back to pagan influences.

Also there is still a lot of back and forth going on about Christian tradition and dogma even today so I think you are on exceptionally safe ground wiht your assertion. But whether the religious message changed when being taught to the early Jewish (Peter) vs. early Greek Christians (Paul)... You are again not discussing debatable topics. It did. Early Jewish Christians considered themselves Jews. The gentile Christians being ministered by Paul did not. or eventually would not. Whether this difference is a meaningful difference from a Christian doctrinal perspective is a less clear topic for discussion. Modern Christians are less affected by Jewish aspects of early Christianity like dietary laws, circumcision, dress, and various other Jewish traditions might argue the core Christian principles did not change, and from their perspective they might have a strong point. But did Christian conduct / worship/ doctrine change from Peter to Paul. It can't be argued it did not by anyone with knowledge of the topic and looking at it from a purely secular perspective. The significance of the changes is all that is open to discussion. And from a religious perspective the secular perspective isn't all that determinitive.

 

Going back to your prior refutation of my comment about Christianity being largely a Pauline creation, at the very least I think we can agree that he was highly influential in the formation of the new church. He wrote a bunch of the NT himself. What I honestly don't remember is whether he knew or how much he interacted with the disciples who actually knew Jesus. Either way, without the writings of the disciples themselves, much of what we have in the NT is Paul's view. I don't think he was intentionally misrepresenting anything in his writings, he just genuinely believed his positions were true.

I think you are pretty much correct. Modern Christianity owes a huge debt to St. Paul. The history is Paul was a very important leader in the early Christian Church. He translated the religious texts into a language where most of the empire could use them; and was the first to spread the religion widely beyond its Jewish origins... If you will he rebranded Christianity from an extension of the Jewish faith into one which could be consumed by people all over the empire and beyond. He also founded around 100 churches outside of Jerusalem and the early Jewish Christian boarders / influences... He was not a one man show however, as his message and ministry were approved by the leaders of the Jewish Christians at the council of Jerusalem. So it is argued Paul’s work was merely an extension to that which came before him. Even while doctrinally, Paul did make changes... Among the faithful though these doctrinal changes were conveyed to Paul by God... So again, doctrinally Paul bases are covered. Paul's bases are probable also covered from a historical stand point.

 

 

I would argue presenting the Old Testament as "something Jesus himself believed in" and then knocking them down as historically unsupportable isn't all that condemning. (1) Jesus taught a new interpretation of these texts. So clearly believed in it is both true and an active subject for discussion... (2) As for a literal interpretation of anything in the bible that's a separate discussion to the validity of the texts. The bible is made up of stories, poems, songs, parables, and history... Claiming Noah as history vs parable is not an indictement upon Christianity, but rather a discussion ongoing inside of Christianity... For most of Christianity doctrinally, it's irrelevant. It's as irrelevant as whether the earth is the center of the universe or in orbit around a minor star, which at times in Christianity were also core tenants of belief.

 

An additional issue to syncretism is the basic lack of trustworthiness of the OT that as a Jew, Jesus himself believed in. To be blunt, much of it is nonsense and clearly smacks of syncretism or just being made up by the Jewish writers. The story of Noah and the flood is clearly borrowed from earlier myths and all the stuff about people living to 500 or 900 years is simply foolishness. Please correct me if I'm wrong but there's no archeological

But that is the point of Christianity... Christians believe God did change. The New Testament and Jesus and then Paul brought a new covenant from God. You are right the God described in the New Testament through Jesus’ teachings does seem different. The Old Testament God is a jealous, angry, and authoritative God. Many Christians believe the New Testament God as you say, is more of a loving kindly father figure... although there are some Christians who would differ... You can read Jonathan Edwards sermon "sinners in the hand of an angry god", or various sermons by George Whitefield... John Brown and some of the American abolition movement or prohibition movements come out of the fire and brimstone wing of Christianity. I believe the Protestant Calvin taught of an angry christian God.

So you are touching on doctrinal differences between christian groups now.

 

In addition to that Jesus emphasized how kind, loving and forgiving God is. And yet this is the same God who ordered genocide, that destroyed the whole world, and royally screwed Job over on a bet among other things. So either God got a good therapist after carving Jesus off himself, the OT can't be believed yet again, or he's not as unchanging as the Bible says.

I'm sorry but I think Jesus was a reformer who taught the importance of love, kindness etc. over blind adherence to the law but I'm not buying the miracles and such. In line with many of the other religions of the era, I think the miracles and divinity came after his death, before church dogma solidified and that's the reason for the similarities between Christian lore and previous myths.

I believe most would agree with you Jesus was a reformer.

I think you would find yourself in good company in your beliefs about the miracles too... Thomas Jefferson for instance, rewrote the bible and took out all super natural references pertaining to Jesus... Then again a lot of Christians would not agree with you... which is also not all that unusual modern day Christians disagreeing about fundamental tenants of Christianity too.

You name it, folks who call themselves Chrisitans disagree on it...

[techboy]

So Influence... it's hard for anybody with an open mind to claim the surrounding religions had no influence on Judaism.

JMS is skipping to the end here. The full time line is more like this:

1. JMS makes a very strong claim with no support, mixed with lots of opinion and outright factual error.

2. People push back, asking for citations, and correcting the mistakes.

3. JMS quotes a mixture of bad sources and good sources that don't say what he thinks, and ignores the mistakes that he can't deny.

4. People then point out the bad sources, and cite the good ones back to him, showing that his own sources disagree with his contentions.

5. JMS attempts to avoid the entire mess by "summarizing", allowing him to avoid all the points that have thus been made.

6. People point out that he still hasn't proven even a shred of his bold claims.

7. JMS declares that anyone who doesn't agree that he is a rhetorical genius simply does not have an open mind.

Having reached the end that JMS references in his post, we eventually get to 8...

8. JMS starts over with the same tired diatribe, as if none of 1-7 has ever even happened.

[Riggo-toni]

Lather, rinse, repeat....shampoo labels are a conspiracy designed to drown IT workers.

I won't get into the minefield of outside influences on Christian dogma, other than to note that things like Christmas, Easter, and such are adopted traditions that can be completely discarded just as easily as the old Viking gospel rewrites (which portrayed Jesus as a mighty warlord) without repudiating or contradicting in any way Christian canonical writings.

As for estimating Zoroastrian influence on Judaism, the degree to who influenced whom can never be definitively settled because the Zoroastrians thought it was blasphemous to write records of their beliefs. A few points seem quite clear, however:

The pre-Exilic Judahite religion did not believe in an afterlife, let alone a final judgment that would place one's soul in heaven or hell, nor did they believe in a devil. Zoroastrianism, on the other hand, believed in an eternal sturggle between the forces of light and darkness, with God (Ahura-Mazda) coming at the end of the world to pass judgment on men.

Israelite dietary laws, however, predate any Mesopatamian conquest - a fact that is borne out by the absence of pig bones in 12th century BCE Israelite settlements - roughly 6 centuries prior to Babylonian captivity. William Dever, a highly reputable and secular archaeologist, goes into somewhat mind-numbing detail as to various practices/writings which clearly predate any Babylonian and Persian influence in the book "What Did the Biblical Writers Know and When Did They Know It."

[JMS]

So Influence... it's hard for anybody with an open mind to claim the surrounding religions had no influence on Judaism

JMS is skipping to the end here. The full time line is more like this:

1. JMS makes a very strong claim with no support, mixed with lots of opinion and outright factual error.

techboy, I understand your position thus my disclaimer... "it's hard for anybody with an open mind to claim the surrounding religions had no influence on Judaism"...  I thought we were already in agreement you don't have an open mind. 

Not JMS's Opinion, Just facts, biblical quotes and reputable sources

 

Cyrus the Great is reffrenced 30 times in the bible,  as are others in his dynasty....   There is no more influencial epitaths in the bible than those given to Cyrus...  Cyrus is called the annointed one, along with David, Moses, Saul, Isaiah and Jesus (annoninted one is synonymous with Christ).... Doesn't get more influencial than that.

 

Cyrus is my anointed king.

I take hold of his right hand.

I give him the power

to bring nations under his control.

Here are a few other Biblical Quotes attributing great influence to Cyrus... rebuilding the great temple in Jerusalem, speaking for God, repatriating Jewish holly relics, or God speaking of Cyrus.....

 

who says of Cyrus, ‘He is my shepherd and will accomplish all that I please; he will say of Jerusalem, “Let it be rebuilt,” and of the temple, “Let its foundations be laid.”’

Isaiah 44:27-28

 

Ezra 1:6-8

Moreover, King Cyrus brought out the articles belonging to the temple of the Lord, which Nebuchadnezzar had carried away from Jerusalem and had placed in the temple of his god. Cyrus king of Persia had them brought by Mithredath the treasurer, who counted them out to Sheshbazzar the prince of Judah.

 

 

I am the God of Israel.

I am sending for you by name.

4 Cyrus, I am sending for you by name.

I am doing it for the good of the family of Jacob

 

“This is what Cyrus king of Persia says: “‘The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and he has appointed me to build a temple for him at Jerusalem in Judah. Any of his people among you may go up, and may the Lord their God be with them.’”

 

So the elders of the Jews continued to build and prosper under the preaching of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah, a descendant of Iddo. They finished building the temple according to the command of the God of Israel and the decrees of Cyrus, Darius and Artaxerxes, kings of Persia.Ezra 6:13-15

 

I made the earth.

I created man to live there.

My own hands spread out the heavens.

I put all of the stars in their places.

¹³ I will stir up Cyrus and help him win his battles.

I will make all of his roads straight.

He will rebuild Jerusalem.

Here are some reputable sources noting influences of outside religions on Judaism and or Christianity..

 

"The (Zoroastrian) dualism between good and evil was to have an impact upon ancient Israel, Judaism, Christianity and Islam."

http://www.sullivan-county.com/z/zor7.htm

p. 16

"The Persians had their own mythology, or rather their own conception of the natural and supernatural order, formulated by the religion of Zarathushtra. this cosmic philosophy, influenced by Babylonian astronomy, had an effect on late Jewish thought and Messianic expectations."

P. 127

"The development of the concept of Satan as the personal power of evil, who had his counterpart in the archangel Michael, the champion of cause of man in God's purpose of creation, was probably developed under the influence of Persian Zoroastrian belief in the two conflicting spirits of good and evil...."

http://www.sullivan-county.com/z/zor7.htm

P. 345

"There is plenty of evidence that the post-exilic religious development of the Hebrews was affected by the teachings of Zarathushtra, and that among the international influences to which the development of Hebrew morals was exposed, we must include also the teachings of the great Medo-Persian Prophet."

http://www.sullivan-county.com/z/zor7.htm

 

P. 54

"How did the idea of two opposing forces (Satan & God) originate? It too is the result of conditions during the Hellenistic age, a period when ideas were exchanged widely among various religions and nations. The principle of dualism came from Zoroastrianism, .... This idea spread through the wide open Hellenistic world; the controversy between God and Satan is its reflection in Judaism."

P. 55

"....The people have a heavenly representative, a guardian angel. This is a new concept of Zoroastrian origin. Previously the term `Malakh', angel, simply meant messenger of God."

7. JMS declares that anyone who doesn't agree that he is a rhetorical genius simply does not have an open mind

 I didn't agree with Yusuf06 on everything... I didn't say his mind wasn't open... Hell man you have even admitted in this thread you have a bias...As this is a question of faith for you... Don't go pretending to be impartial or suggesting there is any disagreement about your bias now because you think it might add weight to your renewed personal attacks....