Rational Agnostic
Well-Known Member
Both religions are false so makes no difference.
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Could Christianity and Islam ever reach a consensus?
- Thread starter Lucian Hodoboc
- Start date
Both religions are false so makes no difference.
Lucian Hodoboc
Member
And you believe that because a person who lived 600 years after Jesus said so, despite the fact that (the Bible aside) the Roman historian Tacitus confirmed Jesus' crucifixion in his Annals less than a century after it happened? Why would a Roman historian, who was not supporting Christianity in any way, lie about it?
Was Tacitus at the Crucifixion site? Why does he mention a 'vast multitude' of Christians being in Rome around 68 A.D. when there was so few in Palestine? Tacitus was an imperial writer, and no imperial document would ever refer to Jesus as "Christ." Also, Pilate was not a "procurator" but a prefect, which Tacitus would have known. Nevertheless, not willing to throw out the entire passage, some researchers have concluded that Tacitus "was merely repeating a story told to him by contemporary Christians."
What happened when people fled following the Earthquake and Eclipse that the the whole area into darkness? Why did at least 6 Disciples claim Jesus pbuh was not the man on the cross? Some claimed it was Judas, others said it was Simon of Cyrene. Why does John give the wrong date for the crucifixion, and why are none of the NT writers eyewitnesses?
Muhammad pbuh coming 600 years later has nothing to do with it, rather the only reliable witness to the Crucifiction was God, the author of the Qur'an.
Magus
Active Member
Do you have any evidence that Mr Christ didn't or did eat pork?
It makes plenty of difference in practical terms. Both doctrines, troubled as they are, still motivate quite a lot of people to a noteworthy degree.
He was a Torah observant Jew.
Question # 1 No
Question # 2 Christianity will never disappear
Question # 3 No compromise: Jesus will involve himself into mankind affairs according to Isaiah 11:3-4; Revelation 19:14-16
Question # 4 Christians already accept Jesus as a divine prophet besides being Son of God (No trinity - Rev. 3:14 B)
Question # 5 No, Muslims will never adopt the trinity concept because Jesus taught he is Son at John 10:36.
Question # 6 Basically beliefs can't be incorporated.
Because he is a Muslim creation, custom-made in order to support the Muslim claim that Christianity is misrepresenting and in effect betraying its own revelation.
And we all would be considerably better off for that!
Magus
Active Member
Although the New Testament suggests he was a Septuagint observant Roman,
Rather, to me it is Not Christianity that has a great falling away but Christendom (so-called Christian but mostly in name only). Jesus stressed ' few ' at Matthew chapter 7. MANY would prove false according to Matthew 7:21-23.
None of which makes the 1st-century teachings of Jesus as wrong, but makes the fake 'weed/tares' Christians as wrong.
According to Holy Scripture Jesus was Not an imperfect man but a perfectly sinless man as per Hebrews 4:15; 7:26.
Jesus was a corresponding ransom to undo the damage Adam brought upon us according to Matthew 20:28.
God did Not become a perfect or an imperfect man, rather perfect God sent the perfect pre-human created heavenly Jesus to Earth for us. Pre-human Jesus, according to Revelation 3:14 B, was the beginning of the creation by God.
I don't know about ' layers ' of meaning because to me John 14:19 is very clear: the world would see Jesus No more.
So, Not a physical seeing but seeing the action taken by Christ as described at Isaiah 11:3-4; Revelation 19:14-16.
How can everyone be 'filled with wisdom' when at the coming ' time of separation ' on Earth according to Matthew 25:31-33,37 it is only the righteous figurative ' sheep'-like people who are saved (delivered/rescued) through the coming great tribulation of Revelation 7:14. Only those humble 'sheep' can remain alive on Earth, and continue to live on Earth right into the start of calendar Day One of Jesus' coming 1,000-year governmental rule over Earth begins.
Lucian Hodoboc
Member
No. Was Muhammad?
He doesn't give out numbers, and the phrase 'vast multitude' is not in the text. It's just 'multitude', which could very well mean a few hundred. Show me actual numbers from historical sources to disprove that statement.
Why not?
How do you know that Pilate didn't have both functions either alternatively or simultaneously during his lifetime?
http://www.richardcarrier.info/TheProvincialProcurator.pdf?x23333
Contemporary Christians who were persecuted by the Roman empire for their religious views would have willingly gone to an imperial historian and risk their lives to tell him a doctrine that they knew was made up? Does that sound logical to you?
What do you mean what happened? There was an earthquake ( Jesus 'died on Friday, April 3, 33AD', claim researchers, who tie earthquake data with the gospels to find the date | Daily Mail Online ) and people reacted accordingly.
What?
Where are you getting your facts from? Apocrypha from the middle ages?
Some groups of Jews in Jesus’ time, such as the Essenes, celebrated the Passover on a slightly different date–just as some Eastern Christians today celebrate Christmas on January 6 while Western Christians observe the feast on December 25. Thus all Jews in Jerusalem would not have been eating their Passover meal on exactly the same evening.,
Peter and John were eyewitnesses.
It does, actually. Why would God send Jesus to Earth, let Him preach the Gospel for 3 years, then rise Him up to Heaven and then, for 600 years, allow the teachings of His highest prophet be corrupted by His own followers, until Muhammad came to correct everything?
That makes absolutely zero sense. Jesus didn't leave any writings behind, so there was no way for the people whom, having never met Jesus, believed the alleged corruptions created by the writers of The New Testament, to know that they were following false doctrine. What Islam claims is that God allowed His people to be led astray by the followers of His highest prophet for 600 years.
True, I find there was No need for Jesus to be on a T-shaped cross because that would have meant a lot more work to add a cross-beam to a pole or tree trunk. Jesus was hung (nailed to a tree) as per Acts of the Apostles 5:30; 10:39; 13:29.
Romans often did mass executions at one time, so to add a cross beam without modern tools would be un-necessary.
The pagans wore a Tau, or T-shaped crosses, and by lowering the top bar 'Christendom' placed Jesus on a cross.
Agree, since Jesus was under the Constitution of the Mosaic Law he did Not eat pork.
That pork restriction was lifted for Christians according to gospel writer Luke at Acts of the Apostles 10:12-15.
Not want to be picky, but I googled Jewish calendar of 33 CE (common era) and Nisan 14 fell on Friday April 1st.
So, to me the Jewish lunar calendar would be in harmony with the Jewish month of Nisan the 14th day.
Thus, the modern Jewish Passover would often be in harmony with the Jewish Lunar Calendar starting in Jerusalem and Not here.
In Scripture there is No Christmas nor birthday celebration for Jesus. They did Not celebrate birthdays.
Since Jesus was 33 1/2 when he died in the Spring of the year 33 CE, then Jesus would have turned 34 in the fall or autumn of the year (No way winter) .
I told you God was witness.
All the references I'm finding mention the word 'vast', a site I just looked at added more damaging information:
There was no "vast multitude" of Christians at Rome by this time, as there were not even a multitude of them in Judea. Oddly, this brief mention of Christians is all there is in the voluminous works of Tacitus regarding this extraordinary movement, which allegedly possessed such power as to be able to burn Rome. Also, the Neronian persecution of Christians is unrecorded by any other historian of the day and supposedly took place at the very time when Paul was purportedly freely preaching at Rome (Acts 28:30-31), facts that cast strong doubt on whether or not it actually happened.
Nor did Clement of Alexandria notice this passage in any of Tacitus's works, even though one of this Church father's main missions was to scour the works of Pagan writers in order to find validity for Christianity. As noted, the Church historian Eusebius, who likely forged the Testimonium Flavianum, does not relate this Tacitus passage in his abundant writings. Indeed, no mention is made of this passage in any known text prior to the 15th century. Also there is the tone and style of the writing is unlike the writing of Tacitus, and the absence in any of Tacitus's other writings of the least mention of Christ or Christians. In his well-known Histories, for example, Tacitus never refers to Christ, Christianity or Christians. Furthermore, even the Annals themselves have come under suspicion, as they themselves had never been mentioned by any ancient author. Even if the passage in Tacitus were genuine, it would be too late and is not from an eyewitness, and it is valueless in establishing a historical Jesus, it is simply a recital of very old Christian tales.
Because the Romans were persecuting the Christians, and you think they would refer to their leader as the Messiah?
Yes perhaps he was both, but given the additional evidence the reference is either fabricated or Tacitus just passing on Hearsay.
There no evidence to suggest anyone gave him personal testimony.
My point was the eclipse and Earthquake would have caused panic and people would have been panicked, hence no one knowing what happened on the cross.
Middle ages? Early Christian Writings: New Testament, Apocrypha, Gnostics, Church Fathers
Jesus pbuh himself prayed all night to be saved:
luke 22:44 And having been in agony, He was praying more earnestly. And His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down upon the ground.
John 11:41-42 shows his prayers were ALWAYS heard. No wonder of course, as his name Yeshua means, 'God Saves'.
6 disciples outside of the NT write to say another whose name was Simon was crucified in error by the enemies of Jesus pbuh.
"Come therefore, let us go on with the completion of the will of the incorruptible Father. For behold, those who will bring them judgment are coming, and they will put them to shame. But me they cannot touch. And you, O Peter, shall stand in their midst. Do not be afraid because of your cowardice. Their minds shall be closed, for the invisible one has opposed them."
When he had said those things, I saw him seemingly being seized by them. And I said "What do I see, O Lord? That it is you yourself whom they take, and that you are grasping me? Or who is this one, glad and laughing on the tree? And is it another one whose feet and hands they are striking?"
The Savior said to me, "He whom you saw on the tree, glad and laughing, this is the living Jesus. But this one into whose hands and feet they drive the nails is his fleshly part, which is the substitute being put to shame, the one who came into being in his likeness. But look at him and me."
But I, when I had looked, said "Lord, no one is looking at you. Let us flee this place."
But he said to me, "I have told you, 'Leave the blind alone!'. And you, see how they do not know what they are saying. For the son of their glory instead of my servant, they have put to shame."
And I saw someone about to approach us resembling him, even him who was laughing on the tree. And he was <filled> with a Holy Spirit, and he is the Savior. And there was a great, ineffable light around them, and the multitude of ineffable and invisible angels blessing them. And when I looked at him, the one who gives praise was revealed.
The Apocalypse of Peter -- The Nag Hammadi Library 80-100 AD
Early Christian Writings: New Testament, Apocrypha, Gnostics, Church Fathers
Many early Christian sects did not believe Jesus was crucified. Jesus laughed with joy:
Wherefore he did not himself suffer death, but Simon, a certain man of Cyrene, being compelled, bore the cross in his stead; so that this latter being transfigured by him, that he might be thought to be Jesus, was crucified, through ignorance and error, while Jesus himself received the form of Simon, and, standing by, laughed at them. For since he was an incorporeal power, and the Nous (mind) of the unborn father, he transfigured himself as he pleased, and thus ascended to him who had sent him, deriding them, inasmuch as he could not be laid hold of, and was invisible to all. Those, then, who know these things have been freed from the principalities who formed the world; so that it is not incumbent on us to confess him who was crucified, but him who came in the form of a man, and was thought to be crucified, and was called Jesus, and was sent by the Father.
(The Church Father Iranaeus, Against Heresies, Chapter XXIV.-Doctrines of Saturninus and Basilides) <<< Basilides was an early Gnostic religious teacher in Alexandria, Egypt who taught from 117 to 138 AD, and claimed to have inherited his teachings from Matthew.
Notice how Iranaeus says “through ignorance and error” the Jews misapprehended, and crucified the wrong person. Amazingly, the Holy Qur'an harmonises this account, stating that they follow error, conjecture, and ignorance:
That they said (in boast), "We killed Christ Jesus the son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah";- but they killed him not, nor crucified him, but so it was made to appear to them, and those who differ therein are full of doubts, with no (certain) knowledge, but only conjecture to follow, for of a surety they killed him not: (Al-Quran 4:157)
The 1945 discovery of Gnostic texts at Nag Hammadi, Egypt unearthed a book called The Second Treatise of the Great Seth, 55-56 AD where Jesus states:
I did not succumb to them as they had planned. But I was not afflicted at all. Those who were there punished me. And I did not die in reality but in appearance, lest I be put to shame by them because these are my kinsfolk. I removed the shame from me and I did not become fainthearted in the face of what happened to me at their hands. I was about to succumb to fear, and I suffered according to their sight and thought, in order that they may never find any word to speak about them. For my death, which they think happened, (happened) to them in their error and blindness, since they nailed their man unto their death. For their Ennoias did not see me, for they were deaf and blind. But in doing these things, they condemn themselves. Yes, they saw me; they punished me. It was another, their father, who drank the gall and the vinegar; it was not I. They struck me with the reed; it was another, Simon, who bore the cross on his shoulder. It was another upon Whom they placed the crown of thorns. But I was rejoicing in the height over all the wealth of the archons and the offspring of their error, of their empty glory. And I was laughing at their ignorance. (The Treatise of the Great Seth)
“There are also several historical sources other than the Bible and the Qur'an which confirm that many of the early Christians did not believe that Jesus died on the cross...The Cerinthians and later the Basilidians, for example, who were among the first of the early Christian communities, denied that Jesus was crucified...The Carpocratians, another early Christian sect, believed that it was not Jesus who was crucified, but another in his place”.
(Jesus Prophet of Islam, Muhammad Ataur-Raheem, Ahmed Thompson, 1996 (revised edition. p47)
“… Plotinus, who lived in the fourth century, tells us that he had read a book called The Journies of the Apostles which related the acts of Peter, John, Andrew, Barnabas, Thomas and Paul. Among other things, it stated that Jesus was not crucified, but another in his place, and therefore, he laughed at those who believed that they had crucified him”.
(ibid, Jesus Prophet of Islam, 1991 edition. P. 37) acts of john 97-101 AD
Throw into the mix the facts, you don't have the originals, widespread editing from Scribes and Church Fathers, fabricated letters and epistles, disagreement between John and the Synoptics about what was said at the trial, where the trial was, the day and time of the crucifixion, and events surrounding the empty tomb, and it is plain to see you can not be sure of anything.
How does that explain Jewish eyewitnesses giving the wrong day for the alleged crucifixion?
Yes and as the material left out of the Bible shows, it wasn't Jesus pbuh on the cross.
1 year according to the Synoptics and early Church Fathers.
His family and followers in Jerusalem did not believe in any crucifixion, they kept Torah as he had commanded them and remained faithful to his teachings.
The Pagan Church hijacked the message of Jesus pbuh and made it their new religion.
Sorry but men led them astray. Ignatius the Bishop of Antioch was taught the faith by Saul the Pharisee, and as you will read was discussing key points with a group of Jewish followers of Jesus pbuh:
Ignatius (35 – 107) was the bishop of Antioch. In the year 107 (or 108) he was arrested by the Romans and subsequently taken away to Rome. In between his incarceration and his death in around 107 (or 108), Ignatius wrote a series of letters in which he attacked other Christian groups as a result of them holding on to beliefs which were contrary to his own. In Ignatius’s letters, there is often verbal battles against other Judaic-Christian and Christian groups which held contrary beliefs to his own, as mentioned. One letter which caught my eye was the following:
“7 Some there may be who wanted in a human way to mislead me, but the Spirit is not misled, seeing it comes from God. For “it knows whence it comes and whither it goes,”250 110 and exposes what is secret.251 When I was with you I cried out, raising my voice—it was God’s voice252—”pay heed to the Bishop, the Presbytery, and the deacons.” 2 Some, it is true, suspected that I spoke thus because I had been told in advance that some of you were schismatics. But I swear by Him for whose cause I am a prisoner, that from no human channels did I learn this. It was the Spirit that kept on preaching in these words: “Do nothing apart from the bishop; keep your bodies as if they were God’s temple; value unity; flee schism; imitate Jesus Christ as he imitated his Father.”
8 I, then, was doing all I could, as a man utterly devoted to unity. Where there is schism and bad feeling, God has no place. The Lord forgives all who repent—if, that is, their repentance brings them into God’s unity and to the bishop’s council. I put my confidence in the grace of Jesus Christ. He will release you from all your chains.253
2 I urge you, do not do things in cliques, but act as Christ’s disciples. When I heard some people saying, “IF I DON’T FIND IT IN THE ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS, I DON’T BELIEVE IT IN THE GOSPEL,” I answered them, “But it is written there.” They retorted, “That’s just the question.”254 To my mind it is Jesus Christ who is the original documents. The inviolable archives are his CROSS AND DEATH AND HIS RESURRECTION AND THE FAITH THAT CAME BY HIM. It is by these things and through your prayers that I want to be justified. (Early Christian Fathers [Grand Rapids, MI: Christian Classics Ethereal Library] by Richardson, Cyril C. (1909-1976), page 96)
Early Christian Fathers - Christian Classics Ethereal Library
This group is arguing that if what Ignatius believes in is not found in the “original documents”, they will not believe the gospel which Ignatius basis his faith on. Ignatius responds by saying that it is there in the document(s), and they respond by stating that,
“it is not written there”.
So what exactly was this group in disagreement with in this instance? Few lines down Ignatius tells us the reason and this is Jesus’s,
“Cross and death, and his resurrection…”
This was the debate. The point of contention here is the reality of Jesus’s crucifixion and resurrection not being mentioned in their original, and authentic document(s). Here the text suggests to us that what Ignatius had in his possession or believed in was the corrupted gospel, whereas what they had were the originals. The above discussion reveals that this group and Ignatius stood right at the opposite of the Christian theological spectrum. The group Ignatius is countering in this instance are of Judaic-Christian or fully Christian. The language used by Ignatius against this group suggests very likely that they were Christian, but they only rejected the crucifixion as a result of it not being in their own present manuscript (“documents”). The sayings,
“pay heed to the Bishop, the Presbytery, and the Deacons”,
And:
“Do nothing apart from the bishop; keep your bodies as if they were God’s temple; value unity; flee schism; imitate Jesus Christ as he imitated his Father”
And:
“act as Christ’s disciples”
These are not words used for heretics or fully Judaic group(s). This is a language employed only to his own Christian brothers, a group who were Christian but disagreed with him massively on the evidence of Jesus’s crucifixion.
Clearly there were early First Century followers of Jesus pbuh who did not accept crucifixion as actually happening. How big a group were they?
Big enough for Paul, the twister of scripture to write:
1 cor 15
12 Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?
13 But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen:
14 And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.
If you read the whole of 1 cor 15, Paul is clearly promoting his own Gospel, and is worried by what people are hearing. It's likely these other Christians were aware the family of Jesus pbuh and his earliest followers knew people were trying to turn the Jewish son of God into Greco-Roman Son of God.
I don't want to derail the conversation, and I'm not interested in fighting about it.
Its a common enough point of view that its worth mentioning. There's no need to go into it.