What price religion?

Quote from spect8or:

If Christianity was the world's only religion, I might have a bit of trouble with this as it's not particularly fair of me to ask somebody to simply ignore their personal experiences. However, Christianity is far from the world's only religion. So, if we accept that Christians' religious experiences are the real deal according to their personal testimonies then it would only be fair to accept the testimonies of people who have non-Christian religious experiences, wouldn't it? But what about where these religions conflict with each other? They cannot ALL be true. Why should an evangelical christian's religious experience hold more water than a hindu's? Or why would we not assume worshippers of the ancient egyptian gods, or the greek gods or the roman gods each had confirmatory religious experiences?
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Again, I believe that there is very often a spiritual reality behind many of the world's religions. You brought up the example of a Hindu. I believe that there are often spiritual being behind the gods that they worship and that sometimes Hindus experience genuine supernatural experiences because of it.

I believe the same thing about UFO's for example. A few % of the citings are legitimate spiritual - and I emphasize spiritual - manifestations. Same thing with the occult/New Age. There's a spiritual reality behind their practices.

Now in the case of New Age, occult, eastern religion - I don't want their spiritual reality. Been there, done that!
 
Again, man has choice. For those in the world who are not materialists, they can worship or interact with whatever they want to. That's one of the reasons for the differences and, not entirely, as you assume because of manufactured emotional responses.
 
Quote from ShoeshineBoy:


Now in the case of New Age, occult, eastern religion - I don't want their spiritual reality. Been there, done that!
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Unfortunately when it comes to reality you dont get to pick and choose.

ps your still one shoe short of a pair . lol :-/
 
Quote from jem:

In response to spect8ors request.


Keep in mind that if all the documents we have from the first two centuries AD were collected and put on a bookshelf, they might take two feet of shelf space.

One of the best known references to Jesus is in Josephus's history titled Antiquities. (Flavius Josephus was born in AD 37 and died in AD 97).

Other ancient writers who mention Christ are Cornelius Tacitus (AD 55-120), Gaius Suetonius Tranquillas (secretary to Emperor Hadrian (AD 117-138), and Pliny the Younger who was a Roman author and administrator.

Writting in the year AD 221, Julius Africanus quotes from a history of the Eastern Mediterranean written in about AD 52 by Thallus. Julius Africanus writes concerning the time of Jesus' crucifixion::

"On the whole world there pressed a most fearful darkness; and the rocks were rent by an earthquake, and many places in Judea and other districts were thrown down. This darkness Thallus, in the third book of his History, calls, as appears to me without reason, an eclipse of the sun."*


This is copied from http://www.missiontoamerica.com/history.html but it is consistent with what I found when I researched it 5-8 years ago.

You also raised a question regarding the genologies that I will have to work on. But I cant right now-- I will do my research on it. Ih has been a while since I went through all my books, which are still in storage in San Diego. I will have to find it on the net.
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Jem, I'm aware of the Josephus claim, the so called Testimonium Flavium. I think it is pretty accurate is I say this widely regarded as a later Christian interpolation, even by Christian scholars themselves. I know there are some people that cling to it but I think the honest approach would be to say it is questionable at best.

Tacitus was writing more than 80 years after Jesus died. In my opinion he was just repeating what some Jew or Christian had told him. The fact that he mistakes Pilate for a procurator instead of a prefect makes it likely that he was using a non-roman source for his info.

Note that neither Tacitus nor Josephus mention Jesus in any other writings.

I'm not sure of what Suetonious or Pliny are supposed to have said. I'll look them up, noting that Suetonious was also writing more than 80 years after the events.

I'm not sure I see the significance of the Thallus quote, it doesn't mention Jesus and is simply reporting an eclipse. Is there some way he links the two?

Personally, I find it rather telling that these are the only independant mentions of Jesus, none of them by contemporaries.
 
Quote from stu:

I don't quite follow this shoeshine. Are you saying you don't believe in blind faith but you would believe in a religion where some supporting "supernatural, circumstantial or behavior modifying changes" have an effect on someone's life?

Surely..."Supernatural, circumstantial or behavior modifying changes" is not reason enough to say something is therefore true and meaningful is it ?

These things offer a standard which is sufficiently acceptable for you to consider believing them when they are part of a religious doctrine, and you would not require blind faith along with that, to convince you they are something more than what is widely recognised as human emotional reaction?? ...surely not ! ??
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I didn't understand your last paragraph, but basically I "tried Christianity" in college. The Bible said to believe so I just did it. I did not ask God for miracles, emotions, behavorial changes, etc. but these all happened naturally in my life and the life of many family and friends. (Yes, I know you're about to puke now.)

What I am saying is if I had felt, like Turok I guess, that I had received no confirmation of my faith, I would have given up. However, in my case I have had many confirming things happen - supernatural, circumstantial, behavioral, etc. - that have confirmed what I believe.

You're right - these don't prove Christianity. They just confirm it. It always comes down to faith in the end.

And, for the record, I believe faith comes first just like every other Christian. But I'm just saying that I am not "mindless" in the sense that I believe w/o any ensuing evidence.
 
Quote from ShoeshineBoy:

I didn't understand your last paragraph, but basically I "tried Christianity" in college. The Bible said to believe so I just did it.
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Thank god you didn't have the koran in your hands :-/
 
Quote from ShoeshineBoy:

Again, I believe that there is very often a spiritual reality behind many of the world's religions. You brought up the example of a Hindu. I believe that there are often spiritual being behind the gods that they worship and that sometimes Hindus experience genuine supernatural experiences because of it.

I believe the same thing about UFO's for example. A few % of the citings are legitimate spiritual - and I emphasize spiritual - manifestations. Same thing with the occult/New Age. There's a spiritual reality behind their practices.

Now in the case of New Age, occult, eastern religion - I don't want their spiritual reality. Been there, done that!
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Is this an admission that there is nothing particularly special about Christianity?

A "spiritual reality" could mean a thousand different things, couldn't it? None of which need necessarily have a god behind the curtains.
 
Quote from spect8or:

Is this an admission that there is nothing particularly special about Christianity?

A "spiritual reality" could mean a thousand different things, couldn't it? None of which need necessarily have a god behind the curtains.
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i am curious spect8or--- are you an ex theist or ex christian ?

surfer :)
 
Quote from spect8or:

Is this an admission that there is nothing particularly special about Christianity?

A "spiritual reality" could mean a thousand different things, couldn't it? None of which need necessarily have a god behind the curtains.
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very perceptive of you, nice pick up dude that is what is precisely suggested by her comment :-/
 
Quote from ShoeshineBoy:



You're right - these don't prove Christianity. They just confirm it. It always comes down to faith in the end.

And, for the record, I believe faith comes first just like every other Christian. But I'm just saying that I am not "mindless" in the sense that I believe w/o any ensuing evidence.
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But on what basis do you differentiate between your religious experiences and the religious experiences of other religions?

So far you've given me that you believe there's a "spiritual reality" to life. Which I can only read as there being no essential difference between a Christian religious experience and any other religious experience.

What you're accpeting "on faith", it seems, is that while there is no discernible difference between religious experiences, you just believe you're right and everyone else is wrong.

Can you understand why I then term that "irrational"?

And why I then claim that your decision to stick with Christianity is essentially an emotional one?

 
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