How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
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John T
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

Post by John T »

Secret Alias wrote: Sun Jun 10, 2018 8:19 am
So you [John T] think that if don't provide Jesus recorded as saying "I am a god who has come down from heaven to be crucified" my point is disproved! The point is that the gospel of John and the Pauline epistles contain clear evidence that the narrative was taken to be about this. But you have such a facile understanding of Christianity that you suppose that Jesus 'is really speaking' in the gospel rather than an author determining what he will reveal about this character to his audience. ...
So, the short answer is no. That is, you don't have any scripture that supports your claim that God came down to earth to be crucified.

Let's flip the coin over and see if you can understand how arrogant and offensive to others that your pseudo-knowledge about Christianity comes across in your o.p.

Now, if I was to start an o.p. that made a wild false assumption that the basic tenant of Isam is founded on Allah committing suicide, you would be in the perfect right to say :wtf: and then demand I cite scripture from the Koran to support such a foul claim.

Yet, I'm the bad guy for asking you (anyone for that matter) to cite an example? :facepalm:

John T
"It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into."...Jonathan Swift
Secret Alias
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

Post by Secret Alias »

A person of limited intellect such as yourself can feel good that by plugging your ears and refusing to consider evidence you 'win' every debate at the forum. Congratulations!
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Secret Alias
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

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You are right with the point that we are looking at a story that is mostly about Jews and featuring Jews.
But my starting point is a bit different. The idea came from Celsus who wrote:
Again, if God, like Jupiter in the comedy, should, on awaking from a lengthened slumber, desire to rescue the human race from evil, why did He send this Spirit of which you speak into one corner (γωνίαν)? He ought to have breathed it alike into many bodies, and have sent them out into all the world (κατὰ πᾶσαν ἀποστεῖλαι τὴν οἰκουμένην). Now the comic poet, to cause laughter in the theatre, wrote that Jupiter, after awakening, despatched Mercury to the Athenians and Lacedaemonians; but do not you think that you have made the Son of God more ridiculous in sending Him to the Jews?" [6.78]
The citation is a paralleled by another statement about 'the corner' in question:
The Jews, then, leading a grovelling life in some corner of Palestine, and being a wholly uneducated people, who had not heard that these matters had been committed to verse long ago by Hesiod and innumerable other inspired men, wove together some most incredible and insipid stories, viz., that a certain man was formed by the hands of God, and had breathed into him the breath of life, and that a woman was taken from his side, and that God issued certain commands, and that a serpent opposed these, and gained a victory over the commandments of God; thus relating certain old wives' fables, and most impiously representing God as weak at the very beginning (of things), and unable to convince even a single human being whom He Himself had formed.[4.36]
Once we see that Jesus wants to be 'seen' by an audience, the place he chooses to be seen helps determine who his audience is. Celsus is another witness for the understanding of the gospel as Jesus 'descending' to Judea with a plan in mind.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
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John T
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

Post by John T »

andrewcriddle wrote: Sat Jun 09, 2018 1:57 am
Formally speaking the idea that God the Father comes down to Earth to get sacrificed is the heresy of Patripassianism

Andrew Criddle
Yes, quite right.

It is also known as monarchianism or sabellianism, an early Christian heresy taught by Noetus and Praxeas.

The verse that causes the most confusion is John 1:1.
However, John is using the Greek word "theos" in two different meanings.

Sincerely,

John T
"It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into."...Jonathan Swift
John2
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

Post by John2 »

John T wrote (re: Stephan's points):
So, if there is anyone left here that wants to have a serious conversation about Alias claim that the gospel is really founded on points 1. and 2., then let's have it.
I think both of those points are valid. Stephan already cited the Philippians Hymn. If you need to see something from Jesus (or something presented as being from Jesus), Jesus goes on and on about this in the gospels, starting with (in my view) the earliest gospel, Mark. It is the very thing the disciples are presented as not understanding, e.g., Mk. 8:31:
He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again.
And the Son of Man, which is based on Daniel, is a divine being, i.e. God (or at least invested with God-power), who, according to Jewish Christians, came down from heaven and entered into Jesus at some point during his life.
You know in spite of all you gained, you still have to stand out in the pouring rain.
Secret Alias
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

Post by Secret Alias »

or alternatively just came down from heaven in his original form - so the Marcionites and the dominant form of Christianity attacked by Celsus throughout his True Word (probably Marcionism).
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
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John T
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

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John2 wrote: Sun Jun 10, 2018 11:31 am And the Son of Man, which is based on Daniel, is a divine being, i.e. God (or at least invested with God-power), who, according to Jewish Christians, came down from heaven and entered into Jesus at some point during his life.
Actually, the Son of Man that Jesus speaks of is based on The Similitudes of Enoch (1 Enoch 46-48). The Son of Man is not God but a faithful servant that does his will.

At best, Jesus may have referred to himself as the Son of Man but not God himself.

Oh, and yeah, I realize that the Similitudes have not been attested in the Qumran literature, not as far as I know.

Sincerely,

John T
"It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into."...Jonathan Swift
Secret Alias
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

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Actually, the Son of Man that Jesus speaks of is based on The Similitudes of Enoch (1 Enoch 46-48). The Son of Man is not God but a faithful servant that does his will.
But is Jesus really saying anything? It's the author of the gospel who puts the words in Jesus's mouth. We don't know if Jesus said anything of the sort. This speaks to the basic problem which is Paul is the same as the gospel with respect to information about Jesus. There's no compelling reason to suggest that Paul is a worse source than the gospel writers and the Marcionites knew that Paul wrote the original gospel, so he was definitely on equal footing.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
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John T
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

Post by John T »

Secret Alias wrote: Sun Jun 10, 2018 1:12 pm
Actually, the Son of Man that Jesus speaks of is based on The Similitudes of Enoch (1 Enoch 46-48). The Son of Man is not God but a faithful servant that does his will.
But is Jesus really saying anything? It's the author of the gospel who puts the words in Jesus's mouth. We don't know if Jesus said anything of the sort. This speaks to the basic problem which is Paul is the same as the gospel with respect to information about Jesus. There's no compelling reason to suggest that Paul is a worse source than the gospel writers and the Marcionites knew that Paul wrote the original gospel, so he was definitely on equal footing.
Julius Caesar upon crossing the Rubicon said-"Alea iacta est.", the dice is thrown.

Did Julius Caesar really say anything? Or did the author put words in Julius mouth?

We don't know anything of the sort, therefore Julius Caesar never existed, let alone crossed the Rubicon.

Now do you see how silly your so-called logic sounds?

That will be all.
"It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into."...Jonathan Swift
Secret Alias
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Re: How Did God Crucified Establish Civic Idealism?

Post by Secret Alias »

So the solution is to assume that everything in the gospel was said by Jesus? The point here is that Paul is the same value in terms of understanding early Christianity as the gospels - if not better. I think your difficulty with this thread is that you have this inherited notion that 'Jesus is speaking to us' throughout the verses and that 'whatever Jesus doesn't say' in the gospel is of a lower level of truthfulness. The facts are that there is no compelling reason to suppose that the gospel writer has any better of an idea what Jesus said or did than Paul. The fact that the gospel writer(s) wrote in 'storybook' format doesn't mean that they are providing for us 'real testimony.' It was just an aesthetic preference.

With Paul or the gospel we're already dealing with a packaged story. There is no 'authentic bits' of historiography. It's all seen through the lens of an overarching literary purpose with means that when we ask 'what did Jesus think? what did Jesus do? who was Jesus?' the answer is insoluble. All that we know has been compressed into an artificial story line which originally (so Celsus, Marcion and various others) has a god come down to earth to speak (presumably) to his own people and - I argued in the beginning - get himself crucified.

To argue that a real live human being named Jesus 'cited' or alluded to the Books of Enoch on a particular day in his ministry is hopelessly stupid. People tend to talk with made up stuff that came to them spontaneously. It's better to figure a writer added 'literary bits' and allusions from scripture.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
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