Religion III - Friday the 13th

[mardi gras skin]

I am curious though about something? You have no love for organized religion, but yet you attended New Orleans Baptist Theological School. Wasn't organized religion giving you your theological education? Explain the apparent fallout here, if its not too personal?

I was grounded in a very important aspect of the faith as Baptists see it. It is the concept of the "priesthood of all believers." This means that we all have the obligation to sacrifice and care for others spiritually and physically as the priesthood did, and that we are all able to read and understand the bible on our own. No one, not any pope, priest or pastor, has the right or the responsibility of interpriting the bible for me. It was always up to me to read and understand. I've disagreed with a large part of the sermons I've heard, but in the end it means squat. I love God and I love people just like the Old Testament said and just like Jesus said.

In that there were quite a few people at New Orealns Baptist Seminary who thought that way, i found a lot of common ground and we had no problems. It was organized, but it was kind of a bottom up organization for the most part. Pretty cool. Glad I went and i learned a lot.

BTW I know that you had a VERY different experience. That bites. All I can tell you is that there are a load of crappy churches out there. More churches I wouldn't attend than ones I would attend.

[mardi gras skin]

14-5 - By your own admission Mardi, you acknowledge now that the Bible is full of errors, mistakes and omissions, etc. And I don’t think I would be putting words in your mouth now, if we also included falsehoods and contradictory statements are also in the Bible. For as I recently pointed out in Religion II, number 29, you admitted that [Ezekiel 26: 1-21] contains what amounts to a number of false prophesies and statements made by God through Ezekiel.

I know I'm all over the place now, but there was so much thrown out here and responded to before I can get finished with the first thread that I really just trying to play catch up. This point stood out at me. First, there were definitely copy errors. Just as there will be a load of errors in the spelling and syntax of our letters, there were copy errors that occupy .5 percent of the entire Bible. That is well documented fact. Scribal errors exist. Some of them are major (verses that should be omited) and most of them minor spelling issues.

About the Ezekiel passage...uh...I think we may have enountered one of those flaws with the internet. I was trying to be sarcastic. If you read it again, I said something like, "boy, the writer must have been stupid to mistake the city of Tyre for a boat that was going under water...or maybe its just poetic liscence." Meaning, the writer obviously knew that the city was NOT a boat. If that part was an analogy, then the part about the city going under water was probably an analogy as well. NOT a lie. NOT a false statement. A poetic descritption of the bad mojo that was going to be all over the city.

I do completely believe that the bible was written by people with a perspective. They had access to different witnesses and different information. I do not believe that any of it has proven to be contradictory. In the next post I'll give more than the cursary nod to the problem you have with the witness on the cross.

[mardi gras skin]

Regarding the theives. Personally, I don't know what happened. There was a lot of mocking going on. The croud, the soldiers, the priests and the scribes. They were all feeding on each other. Mark makes it pretty clear that it was hard to hear what was going on. Its possible that Luke uncovered a witness who had more to add.

This from Mark 15:34-36-

At three o'clock, Jesus cried out wit a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?" which means, "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?" When some of the bystanders heard it, they said, "Listen, he is calling for Elijah." And someone ran, filled up a sponge with sour wine, put it on a stick, and gave it to him to drink, saying, "Wait, let us see whether Eiljah will come to take him down."

So there was definitely differing testimony about what was said in the crouded noisy turmoil. Within the book of Mark alone, we find two separate accounts of what people thought Jesus said. Is there any wonder, then, that someone may have heard one of the theives take up for Jesus, and another witness would not have heard it? Maybe both of the theives mocked Jesus at first and one of them had a change of heart later. Who knows? Neither of us do, Inmate.

[mardi gras skin]

Mardi is that rarest of breeds; a devout believer with the ability (willingness?) to open his soul to inspection and discuss his faith in intellectual terms. I have known many truly religious people in my life (as well as many self-styled ones), and treasure the precious few among them I have found with whom a Skeptic can truly "dialog."

Om, that is a tremendous compliment. Thank you.

And I'd also like to take this time to thank the administrators who have allowed the tailgate posts to count toward the accumulated total of my Redskins posts. I am HUNGRY for the Samuels icon!

[mardi gras skin]

No one expects honest testimony to be in agreement in every detail. But when the testimony of one witness [Luke] is contradicted by three other gospel writers, Luke's testimony becomes suspect. Have you ever testified in court Mardi? I don't think that you have, otherwise it would not be necessary to explain this to you twice. If you had ever been cross-examined by attorneys on discrepancies or contradictions in testimony you want know what I mean.

Inmate, you may have to explain it a third time. I'm just having a tremendously hard time trying to figure out how you make the jump from 21st century American legalistic standards for testimony to the content of an ancient manuscript.

I've never testified in an American court and neither has Luke. Neither of us has had a reason to. But I think that we are entitled to representation by a lawyer so that we don't get handled by more of your legal double-speak. :laugh:

[mardi gras skin]

If the Gospel of John was a first-hand observation, then explain to me why most Biblical scholars think it was the last gospel written and was written 50 to 100 years after the crucifixion? Talk about waiting a little while before committing something to writing!

He was called one of the "sons of thunder." He was a doer, not a thinker. He was one of the first and loudest to preach and testify. Leave the mundane stuff to the scribes!

Problem was, he got old and found time on his hands thanks, in part, to imprisonment. He became more of a teacher to guys like Polycarp who carried on the faith. He began to write. A lot. 1, 2, 3 John, Revelation, and the book of John. Only Paul, a former Pharissee who already had the discipline of writing, pened more books.

As for the date, 70-90 CE is quoted and it sound about right. He was several years younger than Jesus so he would have been 55 to 75 years old. Maybe he wrote it even later.

[inmate running the asylum]

Originally posted by Mardi

But I think that we are entitled to representation by a lawyer so that we don't get handled by more of your legal double-speak.

Double-speak? Rats. The pastor has also read George Orwell's 1984. :laugh:

Let me know when you have caught up, and I'll put some new stuff out here.

[mardi gras skin]

Not everyone is a nice guy like you Mardi. Very naive of you to say where do deceptions and lies come in about the Bible. You tell me then how cult leaders like David Koresh, Heaven's Gate and Jim Jones, fool, manipulate and murder naive Christians all the time?

Without going hellfire and brimstone, I'm convinced those people, and the many people who have lied to others to get personal gain from the Bible, will answer for what they've done. It hacks me off. I just called a pastor on some stuff yesterday. I don't think he realized what he was doing, but it amounted to manipulation to "win souls." Shiver.

At the same time, the information age is out there. In a big way. I'm looking forward to learning more about the Hittite cylinder thing that Terry was talking about. I'm confident that, with a little info., I can get it on the web. In the same way, most of what you've talked about and what I've talked about is out there as well. Better yet, anyone could just read the Bible for themselves like you and I have. Anything as big as what we're talking about can't come down to, "Shucks, whatever you say."

[mardi gras skin]

No they wouldn't have Mardi. You are too naive when it comes to the criminal or devious mind. I showed you in a post where some of the Early Church Fathers were destroying the manuscripts of Gnostics and other heretics, which did not conform to their orthodox interpretation. Once the Early Church Fathers determined what this was, every heretical manuscript which did not conform was torched. No wonder all the surviving Christian Bibles closely match today. Nothing surprising about that. I am sure all copies of the Communist Manifesto matched too in Russia. But when the Gnostic Gospels were found at Nag Hammadi, we discovered that their Christian Bible and beliefs were quite different from what has been passed down to today's Christians. The Gnostic Christians were persecuted to no end, by the Early Church Fathers.

It is also very naive of you to think that Paul and not a single NT writer, ever had anything derogatory to say about the hated Romans. Obviously when Constantine orders and pays for the first 50 Christian Bibles in existence, I am sure he didn't want to read in his copies what ba$tards the Romans were. The NT had obviously been "doctored" long before this, to toe the Roman party line.

I see my naiveté has come into play pretty regularly here. Coming from a conspiracy theorist like you or Tommy-the-Greek, I’ll consider that an affirmation of normalcy.

As to the Gnostic faith. Gnosticism never was a Christian faith or branch of the Christian faith. Gnosticism pre-dates Christianity. How can a faith that pre-dates Jesus be a branch of Christianity?

It was a mystery religion that claimed to have secret knowledge about God, humanity and everything else in the universe. Of course, the rest of the world was unaware of it. It was a peculiar faith. It could latch onto just about any faith that existed and either swallow it or alter it. There were Asian, Babylonian, Egyptian, Greek and Syrian aspects that Gnosticism latched on to as well as Judaism.

But they take the texts and they change them. Make them their own. For instance, we can both agree that Judaism owes nothing to Gnosticism. The account of Adam and Eve, whether you believe it or not, is of Jewish origin. Yet the Gnostic gospels view the serpent and Eve as heroic figures who oppose the dull deity in "The Reality of the Rulers" and in "On the Origin of the World," both Gnostic writings. I doubt any Jewish ExtreemSkin out there would accept that twisting of their scripture any better than Christians did the twisting of theirs.

Believe what you want, write whatever you want, but don't call it Christianity, Judaism or whatever it isn't when you're done with it.

As to Constantine's editing out what he didn't like, it still makes no sense that we are digging up copies and fragments of the Bible that pre-date him by over a hundred years, yet none of them say anything harsh about Rome either. How did he edit those to say what he wanted them to say? He didn't. And it makes no sense that Christians would edit the texts to the Romans benefit during the time before. If anything, the fragments we've found that date to the time of Christians being killed in droves would have called for an edit AGAINST the Roman establishment.

Believe me, I don't think Constantine was a saint. I think the period of "Christianity" that the Romans ushered in was a hoax. Image people all over the Roman empire going to bed one night a part of whatever faith they had and waking up "Christian" the next morning just because some Emperor issued a decree. What a joke. Worse, the church in the West developed a stranglehold on Christianity by tying it to Latin/high Roman culture and keeping it from the masses. Nothing Jesus says or does lends itself to that.

But the fact remains. The biblical texts have proven to be highly reliable both before the centralization under Rome and during.

[mardi gras skin]

Alas, I guess we will never agree on this Mardi. The Romans and subsequent Vatican had over a 1,000 year monopoly on the Biblical manuscripts within their empire. More than enough time to burn all heretical manuscripts and see that all theirs were in conformity. Mardi you are too trusting and therefore I believe too naive about the criminal mindset. I guess it comes with the territory. Again very naive to believe that popes, antipopes, and cardinals involved even in murder, would not tamper with the Biblical text.

I'll leave it to a catholic to defend their leadership, but as to the evidence that pre-dates them, I have to accept what is physical and real. There are parchments that could not have been altered by the popes, antipopes, and cardinals because those manuscripts pre-date them.

:gus:

Yep, its definitely become one of those. Where you see naiveté on my part, I see a dogged determination to defend a conspiracy theory on your part. The facts are pretty black and white for both of us it seems. As Om said; good to debate, not going to find common ground here.

Maybe we should stick to bashing "organized religion." At least untill we figure out that we can't agree on what "organized religion" is. :laugh:

[mardi gras skin]

Double-speak? Rats. The pastor has also read George Orwell's 1984.

"1984" (like all Mac users) and "Catch 22" rank as all time favorites. Along the same lines, I really dig Dr. Strangelove.

OK, inmate, I'm all caught up. Bleary eyed, calluses on the ends of my fingers...but caught up. Now I'm going to go apologize to my wife for the time spent on this thread. You've probably cost me some big bucks and (worse) time at the mall.

You're turn.

[dchogs]

Mardi, a quick question...

you said: The account of Adam and Eve, whether you believe it or not, is of Jewish origin.

since the story (myth) of adam and eve was in genesis, doesn't that mean that the story actually predated the jewish faith? to be considered jewish, people have to have believe in the torah, and since adam and eve is one of the first stories in the torah, the story would have had to have existed before judiasm, right?

i guess this could be like the chicken/egg question...

[mardi gras skin]

Good point. It does definitely pre-date Judiasm.

[dchogs]

Daniel Quinn, in his novel Ishmael, offers up an interesting take on the adam and eve story, as well as the cain and abel story.

his main point in the book is that there are two kinds of culture in general in the world: takers and leavers. leavers are the "uncivilized" cultures of the world that live in accordance with the laws of nature. they have lived as their ancestors have lived, mainly a mix of farming and hunting/gathering. they don't take more than they need and leave the rest alone, hence their name "leavers." takers on the other hand are the "civilized" cultures that live above the laws of nature and take more than their share, hence the name "takers." the birth of taker civilization, in Quinn's opinion, was the agricultural revolution in mesopotamia about 10,000 years ago. takers are unique in that they desire to convert leavers to their culture or exterminate those that do not conform to their ways.

without getting into the nitty gritty details, quinn says that the story of adam and eve is really a leaver story that was used to explain the appearance of this mysterious taker culture that was trying to wipe out the takers in the middle east. as quinn interprets it, when adam ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, he imagined that he now knew what was good and what was evil; he thought he had this knowledge, but in reality he did not. so, now man could justify anything that he did as good and everything that opposed him as evil, which would explain (to the leavers) why the takers were exterminating the "evil" leavers at all costs.

a couple of interesting points are raised in support of this theory. first of all, why would god not allow human beings (the pinnacle of evolution, or the focal point of the creation of the universe depending upon your views on creationism/evolution) to have the most essential knowledge so that they could rule the world. secondly, why would the story list as a punishment "tilling the soil and living by the sweat of his brow," when that was the defining feature of the taker culture (farming)? surely that would not be considered a punishment to the taker culture, but would be a huge punishment for the leavers (hunter gatherers). lastly, adam was tempted by eve, whose name meand "life." adam was tempted by the prospect of extending the human population over the entire world by throwing off the burden of following the law of nature (population limitation). he was not tempted by "love" or "woman" or "lust." it was the temptation of life. mind you this is all from the leaver point of view.

they story of cain and abel can also be looked at in these terms. this is basically a story of the leavers, in quinn's opinion, that was used as propaganda showing that the gods were on the leavers side. the takers (farmers) were invading the territories of the leavers and killing off the people and the culture. quinn says this story is semetic in origin, and semites were herders ( a variation of hunting/gathering). so we have god accepting the offering of abel (a shepherd) and rejecting the offering of cain (a farmer). because of this rejection, cain murdered abel just as the takers were murdering the leaver semites.

this obviously has holes, and i'm not holding this up as my own belief. i just thought it was an interesting interpretation of some early biblical stories that i could share...

[inmate running the asylum]

Posted by Mardi

As to the Gnostic faith. Gnosticism never was a Christian faith or branch of the Christian faith. Gnosticism pre-dates Christianity. How can a faith that pre-dates Jesus be a branch of Christianity?

15-1 - The statements you made above are false. Its a good thing you don't take cases and assignments from attorneys like I do, otherwise they would eat you alive on your carelessness. The Gnostic sects believed in many things, but some of their sects were Christian, believing in Christ, and some did not. Some of the sects believed Christ rose physically from the dead, some believed he only rose spiritually. All Gnostic sects did not predate Christianity either.

*The Gnostic gospels found at Nag Hammadi are dated at 350-400 A.D., with the originals estimated at 120-150 A.D. - pg xvi

*"The Gnostic Gospels" by Elaine Pagels [Noted scholar who studied their texts in Cairo]

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-form/103-6154424-6407812

15-2 - Admittedly some of their texts were a hodgepodge of beliefs, but nevertheless they still contain many stories found in the Christian Bibles, like the Garden of Eden and stories about Jesus. So to say they were not Christians is false, just because they made changes and alterations to orthodox Christian views. Protestant religions today generally don't believe in purgatory or limbo either, as Catholics do. Does that mean Protestant religions are not Christian, because the Reformation altered the prevailing Christian Catholic belief at the time?

15-3 - Now I know neither one of us are Gnostic experts, but at least I try to give the professional people reading my posts, some reference sources if they want to check something out. But I hardly ever see anything in that regard from you. I don't claim to be a pastor, but how do we know you are a pastor? You could be some guy who just read a few hundred pages of the Bible and is shooting from the hip.

[inmate running the asylum]

Posted by Mardi

As to Constantine's editing out what he didn't like, ....

You are always trying to put words in my mouth, Mardi. :gus:

16-1 - If you reread what I said, you will see I never said Constantine HIMSELF edited or changed anything. Who knows when or who did this. The early church fathers were destroying and burning every heretical document they could get their hands on. And they left alone every manuscript which spouted their orthodox view or the party line. So between the early church and the later Vatican, I am not surprised at all that the Biblical manuscripts REMAINING today, closely match the party line. [read below]

:read: 16-2 - “The Nag Hammadi texts and others like them, which circulated at the beginning of the Christian era, were denounced as heresy by orthodox Christians in the middle of the 2nd century. We have long known that many early followers of Christ were condemned by other Christians as heretics, but nearly all we knew about them came from what their opponents wrote attacking them. Bishop Irenaeus, who supervised the church in Lyons, c. 180, wrote five volumes, entitled "The Destruction and Overthrow of Falsely So-called Knowledge." [Note the word “destruction” in his title. He is writing in 180 A.D., or almost 150 years before Constantine convenes the Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D.] By the time of the Emperor Constantine’s conversion, when Christianity became an officially approved religion in the 4th century, Christian bishops, previously victimized by the police, now commanded them. Possession of books denounced as heretical was made a criminal offense." - page xviii

Copies of such books were burned and destroyed. - page xix

16-3 - One of the earliest writings we have from the church of Rome -- a letter attributed to Clement, called Bishop of Rome [c 90-100] -- was written to the Corinthian church in a time of crises. Clement argues that whoever refused to “bow the neck” and obey the church leaders is guilty of insubordination against the divine master himself, who delegates His authority of reign to rulers and leaders on earth. Clement warns that whoever disobeys the divinely ordained authorities “receives the death penalty.” - page 34 Source: The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels

16-4 - So here we have a church father in Rome, Clement in 90 A.D., advocating killing OTHER CHRISTIANS and heretics, at the time the last gospel is being written and only 20 years after the destruction of the Jewish Temple in 66-70 A.D. Clement and other church fathers are destroying anything they considered heretical -- or encouraging other Christians to destroy heretical manuscripts -- and advocating killing Gnostic Christians, over 200 years before Constantine and the publication of the first Christian Bible in 325 A.D.!

16-5 - With the Jews having been slaughtered in Jerusalem and their temple destroyed in 66-70 A.D., is it really hard to figure out why there is nothing in the entire Bible, that is derogatory against the evil, hated Romans? If anyone had written anything derogatory against the Romans in the Bible, they would have been tortured and have signed their own death warrant. And then the Romans would simply have destroyed their derogatory manuscripts. The Romans were not going to allow anything to circulate PUBLICLY that was derogatory against them. Religion was not totally banned by the Romans, as long as it stayed out of what they considered the political arena, and did not advocate or encourage the overthow of their government. That is why the New Testament writers SLANTED the Bible verses and blamed the Jews for DEICIDE or killing Jesus, when in actual fact it was the Romans who executed and killed Jesus.

16-6 - Mardi is such a trusting, nice guy. He has never had to deal with criminals or the criminal mind. No wonder Paul condones slavery in the NT and says for slaves to obey their masters, and says for everyone else to obey authority. Now I realize that Paul was believed to have been executed later in Rome by Nero or other Roman authorities. So what! All they had to do was make sure nothing he said was in the Biblical manuscripts available to the public, which encouraged the overthrow of the emperor or their government. Understand the situation then was not like it is today. People did not have individual Bibles. So we are not talking about controlling millions upon millions of Bibles. The Biblical manuscripts were tediously hand-copied on large, heavy, cumbersome, papyrus scrolls. Only the major cities within the empire had these Biblical manuscripts, such as Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, etc. And the Romans had informers in the cities and all over the empire.

16-7 - So after the murder of Julius Casaer, most of the Roman emperors who followed were dictators, and we find everyone in the empire living under their heel. So just as when Stalin was in power in Russia, you sure as hell didn't find anything derogatory publicly written against him or the communists either. Otherwise, you would have disappeared in the middle of the night. Then the general public in later Christiandom was forbidden to read the Bible privately -- under the penalty of death -- up until approximately the 11th century A.D. And the first printed Bible does not appear on the scene until 1454. So how would the public know if anything had been changed in the manuscripts in previous centuries, anyway? These ancient and medieval dictatorships and theocracies were not democracies. :laugh: And Mardi wonders why all the surviving Biblical manuscripts closely match. :laugh:

[mardi gras skin]

As to the Gnostic faith. Gnosticism never was a Christian faith or branch of the Christian faith. Gnosticism pre-dates Christianity. How can a faith that pre-dates Jesus be a branch of Christianity?

False statment? This from a christian heresy site

The Gnostics were a sect older than Christianity itself. They had already used Jewish faith as a basis with which they mixed many eastern myths as well as Greek philosophy (gnosis = knowledge).

Due to the multitude of influences, gnosticism varied largely in its forms. With the emergence of Christianity bits and pieces of Christian faith were integrated into gnosticism.

Gnosticism pre-dates Christianity exactly as I said. Gnosticism could not be a branch of Christian faith because it predates Christianity. Gnosticism became the first major heresy to invade Christianity. It can not be a branch of something it pre-dates! Does that not make sense to you? That is like the branch of a tree pre-dating the trunk. Not possible. Now, a faith that already existed before Christianity can borrow from it, like kudzu or a parasite, but it can not be considered a branch. Can you not see that? Really?!

Maybe you disagree with this site because it has a Christian perspective. (Believe me, the book you've been quoting has zero credibility with me, so I understand.) So, I'll give you another site. This one is dedicated to religious tolerance (thats code for "Christians are intolerant.") It is in no way a Christian site, so please check this one out. It states:

Gnosticism is a philosophical and religious movement which started in pre-Christian times…Gnostics claimed to have secret knowledge about God, humanity and the rest of the universe of which the general population was unaware.

I disagree with most of what this site says, but even this pro-Gnostic site says that it PRE-DATES Christianity! It is not a branch of Christianity. Gnosticism was a mystery religion like other mystery religions that were flourishing at the time. Gnosticism took elements of many faiths (including Jewish and Christian) and weaved their own faith. Christian elements? Absolutely, in various manifestations of the movement they borrowed from Christianity. Could Gnosticism be Christian? Impossible, because Christianity can not pre-date Chistianity. It is a very simple concept.

If you disagree with me, fine. Makes no sense, but go ahead. But the next time you feel the need to bash my credibility how about you exercise some restraint.

[mardi gras skin]

BTW. Here's a quote from one of the earth shattering Gnostic texts:

These are the secret words which the living Jesus spoke, and which the twin, Judas Thomas, wrote down.

The SECRET words from Jesus' twin brother. Consipracy theorisits, you have a long herritage. :laugh:

Oh yea, the source... its Inmate's favorite Gnostic book

[inmate running the asylum]

Here's a quote from the earth-shattering Biblical text too:

"And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not

surely die. " [Genesis 3:4]

The difference is I don't believe in the Gnostic text or talking animals, but you do believe the Biblical text. :laugh:

You are making a big deal out of Gnosticism not being a "branch" of Christianity. Who cares whether it was a "branch" or not. There were apparently many Gnostic sects and some believed in Christianity and some apparently did not. Some believed in Jesus and some did not. No one today can really say or prove whether ALL Gnostic sects pre-dated Christianity. The point is the early church fathers went after these other Christians as heretics, just like the later Catholics excommunicated and tried to go after Martin Luther as a heretic.

But what is the point of debating Gnosticism when neither one of us trust our sources, and obviously neither you nor I know squat about Gnosticism. At least Elaine Pagels is a recognized religious authority who studied the actual Gnostic texts in Cairo. I don't know what her religious affiliation is, or if she even believes in the Bible. If you don't accept what she says, fine, I could care less.

As far as bashing your credibility, you don't have any yet. :laugh: I think this is only about the third time that you have ever given any source for anything you said, that can be checked out. At least I provide sources for any professionals reading these posts, in case they do want to follow up on something. And I am not very impressed with computer links either. A 10 year-old can type any word into "search" and then go to the website and cut and paste the link to the board. What does that prove? The person may not have even read the link they posted. I am interested in what you have read... the Biblical verses or an authoritative source. If you learned something from watching a documentary film from a reliable source, I would say thats fine too. So if you are not going to provide Biblical verse numbers or other reference sources, you don't have any credibility with me and whats the point?

[mardi gras skin]

You are making a big deal out of Gnosticism not being a "branch" of Christianity. Who cares whether it was a "branch" or not.

Aparently you do. If not, why say it was a false statement? You go out of your way to call that statement a lie, mock me, and then fall back to "I didn't really care anyway" when I DO back it up?! Thats weak. Suck up your bottom lip and move on kid.

[mardi gras skin]

If you reread what I said, you will see I never said Constantine HIMSELF edited or changed anything.

Here's what you said:

The Romans and subsequent Vatican had over a 1,000 year monopoly on the Biblical manuscripts within their empire. More than enough time to burn all heretical manuscripts and see that all theirs were in conformity.

The Romans had no claim to the texts until Constantine. If the conspiracy you believe is true, then wouldn't Constantine have had something to do with it? No, I'm not saying he was standing over a trash can with a zippo lighter, I'm saying that "The Romans and subsequent Vatican" can only start with Constantine. Before that, you're talking about an underground movement like the Christian movement in China.

Do I need to footnote that, too?

[inmate running the asylum]

Posted by Mardi

As to the Gnostic faith. Gnosticism never was a Christian faith

Thats what you said above and its false. I only said the Gnostics were Christians. I never said anything about Gnostics being a branch of Christianity. Elaine Pagels says some Gnostic sects were Christians and some apparently were not. Your sources say they were not Christians. So be it. But how could they not be a Christian faith, when some of them believed in Jesus? It makes no difference here, whether the chicken came before the egg, or vice versa.

Catholicism preceded Protestantism. So what! They are both Christian faiths. Catholicsim preceded the Mormons. So what! They are both Christian faiths.

I will agree with you that the Gnostics mixed together many beliefs, if that makes you happy. :laugh:

[mardi gras skin]

GNOSTIC UNDERDOGS?

Although Pagels and others have provoked sympathy, if not enthusiasm, for the Gnostics as the underdogs who just happened to lose out to orthodoxy, the Gnostics' historical credentials concerning Jesus are less than compelling. It may be romantic to "root for the underdog," but the Gnostic underdogs show every sign of being heretical hangers-on who tried to harness Christian language for conceptions antithetical to early Christian teaching.

Many sympathetic with Gnosticism make much of the notion that the Gnostic writings were suppressed by the early Christian church. But this assertion does not, in itself, provide support one way or the other for the truth or falsity of Gnostic doctrine. If truth is not a matter of majority vote, neither is it a matter of minority dissent. It may be true, as Pagels says, that "the winners write history," but that doesn't necessarily make them bad or dishonest historians. If so, we should hunt down Nazi historians to give us the real picture of Hitler's Germany and relegate all opposing views to that of dogmatic apologists who just happened to be on the winning side.

In Against Heresies, Irenaeus went to great lengths to present the theologies of the various Gnostic schools in order to refute them biblically and logically. If suppression had been his concern, the book never would have been written as it was. Further, to argue cogently against the Gnostics, Irenaeus and the other anti-Gnostic apologists would presumably have had to be diligent to correctly represent their foes in order to avoid ridicule for misunderstanding them. Patrick Henry highlights this in reference to Nag Hammadi: "While the Nag Hammadi materials have made some corrections to the portrayal of Gnosticism in the anti-Gnostic writings of the church fathers, it is increasingly evident that the fathers did not fabricate their opponents' views; what distortion there is comes from selection, not from invention. It is still legitimate to use materials from the writings of the fathers to characterize Gnosticism."

From the Christian Research Institute Journal . Just a little input from one of those experts.

[mardi gras skin]

Catholicism preceded Protestantism. So what! They are both Christian faiths. Catholicsim preceded the Mormons. So what! They are both Christian faiths.

And which of then predated Jesus? Right.

[inmate running the asylum]

Posted by Mardi

The Romans had no claim to the texts until Constantine. If the conspiracy you believe is true, then wouldn't Constantine have had something to do with it?

No, I'm not saying he was standing over a trash can with a zippo lighter, [Hey, I like that..... at least you are developing a sense of humor. :laugh:]

I'm saying that "The Romans and subsequent Vatican" can only start with Constantine.

Nope, I doubt that Constantine had anything to do with changing the text. I think it was done centuries before. Mardi, "How can you say the Romans had no claim to the texts until Constantine?" I'll give you an example: When the Roman legions marched in and slaughtered the Jews and destroyed their Temple in 66-70 A.D., I suppose you are going to try and say: "the Romans had no claim to the Jewish texts!" You can be damn sure the Romans destroyed every Jewish text they could get their hands on, besides killing Jews.

When a succession of Roman emperors who were dictators followed -- such as Nero and many others -- you can be damn sure they burned any texts of ALL RELIGIONS anywhere, that criticized them or tended to incite the people in rebellion. Jesus was probably executed by the Romans because they feared his political power and increasing following, rather than for his religious views.

The Bible text ultimately survived because the NT writers and bishops SLANTED the text to blame the Jews for deicide -- killing Jesus -- instead of blaming the Romans. The Jews did not execute people by crucifixion, the Romans did. That is why there is nothing in the Bible critical of the Romans. If someone had written some criticism, he would have been tortured and executed and the Biblical text destroyed or changed.

By the time Constantine comes along, the Christian orthodox viewpoint of blaming the Jews for deicide is already in vogue, and the NT text is in compliance. So when Constantine and succeeding emperors convert to Christianity, it is mainly all downhill now for Christianity.