Clarifications on Christianity

viole said:

Why do Muslims believe a black stone has been sent by God? As opposed to a garden variety meteorite falling on the desert, which is what most people would normally assume?

Your answer will be in the same category of their answer.

Ciao

- viole

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Who do you think sends meteorites?

The Qur'an also says God sent Iron to earth (everything we have is from God, obviously) as the Qur'an 57:25 says:

"We have already sent Our messengers with clear evidences and sent down with them the Scripture and the balance that the people may maintain [their affairs] in justice. And We sent down iron, wherein is great military might and benefits for the people, and so that Allah may make evident those who support Him and His messengers unseen. Indeed, Allah is Powerful and Exalted in Might."

Redemptionsong said:

God does not stop being one God by coming to earth, or by dwelling in the hearts of men

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It does according to Christians because He says according to the Bible that He cannot be seen. So they say, well he wasn't in the form of God. What is the form of God? What does He really look like? Jesus either was God or he wasn't. It doesn't make sense to claim he was in human form fully God, because then you couldn't see him. They saw him so he wasn't God.

sherifgg said:

1) Why did people believe Mary was a virgin and gave birth to Jesus through a miracle? As opposed to people saying she committed adultery which is what most people would normally assume.

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According to story an angel of the Lord explained it to Joseph.

sherifgg said:

2) Since Christianity is considered an Abrahamic Monotheistic religion, and since all the prophets in Abrahamic religions prior to Christianity and after (i.e. Islam) always preached that god is one, without mention of any trinity (to my knowledge), wouldn't that prove against it?

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Trinity is regarded as a monotheistic concept. It says God is one.

Shakeel said:

Who do you think sends meteorites?

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Who do you think causes virgin births?

Ciao

- viole

sherifgg said:

Not panicking at all, I did get the purpose of your counter question but it is not what I am asking. My question is not simply why people believe in anything that has other natural explanations, it is quite more specific to the story of Mary. We as Muslims actually believe in the miracle birth of Jesus the same way Christians do, so I am not saying it is not true, nor am I asking why would anyone believe in that when there is a natural explanation, but rather more specifically when Mary claimed that she gave birth miraculously, I'm sure the majority of people at the time wouldn't of believed it normally, what made them believe such a huge claim, which was a first of its kind? Obviously there must have been something to convince people into believing her story.

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Same with your black stone. Who would do such a claim, which was the first go its kind? Incidentally, virgin birth myths predate Christianity. The founders of Rome, for instance, are supposed to be born from a virgin. There are many such examples.

And the sky is the limit of what people can believe. Probably you believe in winged horses.

sherifgg said:

When you give the example of the black stone, we believe it is from heaven because it is narrated through hadith (traditional sayings of the prophet), and since we believe Prophet Muhammed PBUH is a true messenger of God, so if he did say it then it is true to us. Now you could question the authenticity of the hadeeth, since not all hadith are accurate and authenticated but this specific hadith has been authenticated. You could also question whether prophet Muhammed is a true messenger, and to me that comes from reading and understanding the Quran, but that would be an entire different debate from what I am asking.

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Well, it happens Christians believe in extraordinary claims also if they do not come from a certified prophet. At the end of the day, you have to hit a bottom and believe, by pure faith, in the truth of that initial claim, that bootstraps the rest. Call it hadith, Gospel, or whatever.

Shakeel said:

... He says according to the Bible that He cannot be seen...

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According to the Bible He is invisible yes. But already before Jesus he is said several times to assumed a physical appearance. Divine itself is formless but it can appear in form ("theophany") to man.

See Numbers 12:6-8 for example.

Shakeel said:

It does according to Christians because He says according to the Bible that He cannot be seen. So they say, well he wasn't in the form of God. What is the form of God? What does He really look like? Jesus either was God or he wasn't. It doesn't make sense to claim he was in human form fully God, because then you couldn't see him. They saw him so he wasn't God.

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God is Spirit, this is true. But we know from the conception of Mary that God created the vessel upon which the full measure of His own Holy Spirit would rest. The baptism of Jesus, lMO, was the point at which Jesus received the fulness of the Godhead bodily.

God cannot dwell on earth amongst men (as the Christ) without dwelling in a human 'temple'. To be God, the question is not whether he 'appears' human but whether or not he is sinless and holy. Corruptible flesh is only a temporary covering. Jesus' flesh was crucified, and he died. Everything raised to life was spiritual, transformed through resurrection. Jesus would not have been able to ascend to heaven had he not been a spiritual being with a spiritual body.

The reason that believers call Jesus 'Lord' is because he has come from God (the Father) to be our Saviour. No man can go to the Father except through him. This is the word of God as found in the New Testament [John 14:6]

IMO.

sherifgg said:

1) Why did people believe Mary was a virgin and gave birth to Jesus through a miracle? As opposed to people saying she committed adultery which is what most people would normally assume.

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Christian interpretation of birth miracles of Hebrew Scripture.

sherifgg said:

2) Since Christianity is considered an Abrahamic Monotheistic religion, and since all the prophets in Abrahamic religions prior to Christianity and after (i.e. Islam) always preached that god is one, without mention of any trinity (to my knowledge), wouldn't that prove against it?

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The Trinity as understood by the Church does not contradict 'God is one'.

sherifgg said:

I guess you might have misunderstood my question as I might have not phrased it very clearly - it is more so, why did people back then believe Mary when she said Jesus was miraculously born, not why do Christians right now believe it, as the latter would be more fitting of your analogy.

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I don't think Mary spread the news around.
The gospels tell us Mary was betrothed to Joseph and he found she was pregnant and did not want to marry her but also did not want to get her into any trouble. We are told Joseph had a dream in which an angel told him that the pregnancy was of God. Joseph believed and the marriage continued and nobody was the wiser except for Joseph and Mary.
Mary was around when Jesus was crucified and rose again and she knew Jesus was special and had treasured and wondered about all the things that had happened when she became pregnant and as Jesus was growing up. I imagine that she would have told disciples of Jesus at that stage.
We are told in John's gospel that when Jesus died John took Mary into his house to live with him so he could care for her.

sherifgg said:

Interesting point, What religion do you follow if I may ask? Also that doesn't directly address the point as to why Christians would believe in it, if other Abrahamic religion followers do not believe/mention a trinity.

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Initially after the resurrection the trinity doctrine was not taught as a trinity doctrine. The Sonship of Jesus to His Father God was taught however.
Obvious heresies developed over time and eventually the clarification of who Jesus is was forced on the church by the heresies and developed into the formal trinity doctrine to explain what was said of Jesus in gospels and epistles etc and to open up the understanding of the Hebrew Scriptures in the light of what Jesus had done.
There are still many variations on the theme of who Jesus is these days of course so an orthodox view was needed imo even if it, on the surface does not seem to be in the Hebrew scriptures and other Abrahamic religions do not teach it.
The doctrine seems implied in the Old Testament and becomes more explicit in the New Testament. Revelation from and about God was not complete in the Old Testament period and the oneness of God is still taught in the New Testament in a different way.
Other Abrahamic religions (Islam) seems a bit confused about Jesus and teaches against the truth of the Gospel message as described in the Bible.

sherifgg said:

Why would you need a new nature of looking at the divine, which causes significant conflict with Judaism and other teachings of previous prophets? As well as conflict even within the same religion

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It's just what is taught in the Bible imo. It certainly causes conflict in Christianity and many with orthodox teachings say that others are not true Christians and visa versa.
I sometimes wonder if God sees it like that.

Brian2 said:

I don't think Mary spread the news around.

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I think you're quite right. Mt and Lk apparently accepted the virginal conception as historical, there is no certainty where they got their information from. The presence of the virginal conception in the infancy narratives of two Gospels carries no absolute guarantee of historicity. There can be no doubt that those who formulated the creedal affirmations believed in the bodily virginity of Mary.
For the mass of Christians it was an unexamined doctrine taken for granted. As Jerome explained "We believe that God was born of a virgin because we rad it." Now the virginal conception is being questioned by Christians who do not deny the divinity of Jesus- but who can no longer simply state with Jerome that they believe because they read it, since they now know the complexities of the scriptural accounts in which they read it.
Jane Schaberg, Raymond E. Brown, and the Problem of the Illegitimacy of Jesus on JSTOR

sherifgg said:

...1. While your answer would explain why people right now believe, it does not explain why people would believe her at the beginning. As it would have been an outrage for her to become pregnant outside of marital relationship...

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I believe people begun to believe it, when they began to see the miracles. Before that, it is possible that Joseph and Mary didn’t speak about the matter.

sherifgg said:

...2. Interesting point, What religion do you follow if I may ask? Also that doesn't directly address the point as to why Christians would believe in it, if other Abrahamic religion followers do not believe/mention a trinity...

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I think I am just a disciple of Jesus. I don’t call it a religion. I think it is more like a fellowship and kingdom of God.

I think the main reasons why many Christians believe it is because someone misunderstood the Bible, or intentionally twisted it to mean something else than what is actually said in the Bible. And because many people don’t read what was actually said, they can be misled for benefit of the people who for example can get lot of money from the organization.

PearlSeeker said:

Trinity is regarded as a monotheistic concept. It says God is one.

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In three.

viole said:

Who do you think causes virgin births?

Ciao

- viole

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God. He causes all births.

Shakeel said:

God. He causes all births.

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So, please relay that to your co-believer who started this thread.

Ciao

- viole

PearlSeeker said:

According to the Bible He is invisible

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And according to the Bible He's been seen many times (no, not Jesus).

Exodus 33:11 "Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses returned to the camp, his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, would not depart from the tent."

Numbers 14:14 "then they will tell it to the inhabitants of this land. They have heard that you, Lord, are among this people, that you, Lord, are seen face to face, that your cloud stands over them, and that you go before them by day in a pillar of cloud and in a pillar of fire by night."

Exodus 24:9-11 "Then Moses went up with Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel, and they saw the God of Israel; and under His feet there appeared to be a pavement of sapphire, as clear as the sky itself. Yet He did not stretch out His hand against the nobles of the sons of Israel; and they beheld God, and they ate and drank."

Saying, according to the Bible He is invisible, is misleading though. It gives the impression He cannot be seen while, for example, Exodus 33:20 [But he added, “You cannot see my face, for no one can see me and live".], implies He can be seen, but that one would not survive seeing Him - which the Bible contradicts elsewhere.

PearlSeeker said:

Trinity is regarded as a monotheistic concept. It says God is one.

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It says more than God is one. It says God is three in one. That's monotheism, but a very muddy version of monotheism.

sherifgg said:

2) Since Christianity is considered an Abrahamic Monotheistic religion, and since all the prophets in Abrahamic religions prior to Christianity and after (i.e. Islam) always preached that god is one, without mention of any trinity (to my knowledge), wouldn't that prove against it?

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Where do Christians teach that God is not one?

alypius said:

Where do Christians teach that God is not one?

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Christians teach that God is one but also three, which may be monotheism, but its a very muddy form of monotheism.

Brickjectivity said:

Not understanding it and not wishing to learn it is not proof against it. Just because not everyone needs to understand it and not everyone needs to know it, this is not proof against it.


The reason is a secret, however if you claim she was raped (being raped is not adultery in Judaism) or else that she committed adultery you can do so without being punished. She cannot be harmed by cast aspersions since her death. I'm not suggesting that its Ok to accuse young women of things, but when it comes to discussing Mary and this theological question there is freedom. Also the gospels say slander against Jesus is forgivable, too. Here are three partial quotations with references about forgiveness of slander and other things:

• [Mat 12:32 NIV] 32 Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven,...
  
• [Mar 3:28 NIV] 28 Truly I tell you, people can be forgiven all their sins and every slander they utter,...
• [Luk 6:37 NIV] 37 "Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven.

So the real reason is a secret, however it is part of the creed that catholics must recite as well as many anglicans, episcopals and other liturgical protestants.

I suspect the real reason is that she symbolizes the church, but I don't know for sure. It is not official dogma.

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1. So are you implying that Judaism, from which Christianity is based, did not understand God?

2. I am not claiming she was raped, as I mentioned in another post, we as muslims believe in Mary's miracle birth and I am not slandering her, I am trying to corroborate the explanation of Jesus's birth in Christianity with what our version of her birth in Islam tells us, which I could so far not find a similar explanation in Christianity. In Quran, chapter 19 verse 27 to verse 37 (the chapter is called maryam/mary), it mentions that people did accuse her of an atrocious act when she first appeared carrying Jesus, but Jesus PBUH came to her defense as an infant to exonerate her.

Shakeel said:

In three.

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No, the definition is not: one God in three. It's "One God in three persons". There are not three gods. All three are one God.