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Originally Posted by mytmouse57  Exept for a few who aren't taken very seriously, most serious scholars conclude that Jesus did, in fact, exist.
You seem to be seeing only a one-way pattern. That being -- Man makes God(s) to suit his percived needs.. and God(s) are reinvented as man changes.
I think it's more dynamic and complicated than that. I would say it goes -- God created man and wished man to know him and to educate man. God sends Messengers to educate and quicken the spirits of man. Over time, the origional message is lost or corrupted. It begins to flow the other way, and man re-invents God(s) in his own image or to suit his own desires. Blind tradition becomes dogma. Dogma becomes "truth." Religion because an empty routine of mechanics and rules. Religion becomes a tool of worldly power and a way to dominate othes.
God sends a new Messenger, the errors are corrected, new knowlege and inspiration is passed on.. the cycle begins again. Meanwhile the teacher Himself is usually feared, despised -- and perhaps even imprisoned, tourtured or killed -- by those in power. Becasue they hold temporal power, they foolishly think they can "stop" the Messenger by temporal means. Thus, they attack and persecute him and his earliest followers. Such was the case with Christ Jesus. But by killing his physical body, He was only made stronger -- as a true spiritual force. Consider today that Christ still holds sway over the hearts of billions. Those who opposed him during his Earthly life saw him as a temporal threat. Yet it was through his spirit that Christ eventually conqured entire nations. Those who opposed him could not see or grasp this, because their materialistic thinking had blinded them. To them, again, religion was a source of Earthly pride and power.
As for the Mormons, I believe Joseph Smith was truely inspired by some sort of vision or insight. Many people throughout history have been.
Past that, I reserve no judgement or criticism of the Mormon religion. It is not my place to do so.
I've peronally known some Mormons who seemed to have a true, abiding love for God. |
Joseph Smith was an illierate man who 18 months prior to fining the golden plates that no-one but himself has ever seen and now resides in heaven was arrested and convicted of fraud. He was trying to pass himself off and defrauded peope of lots of money. He is a snake oil salesmen pure and simple. here is why:
After he found the Golden plates and contended the 12 tribe of Isreal followed an Angel called Moroni here to the US thousands of years prior to actual European settlement (or invasion if you like), they had a war with the local inhabitants and because the local inhabitants (who in his 'vision are black) were the wrong color (yes its that racist) they won. So Native Americans are actually the descendents of the 12 tribe of Isreal. After he found out about Moroni (if they follow Moroni why aren't they called morons???) via divine inspiration which seems to have actually happened when he was in jail for fraud he found the plates no-one else ever saw and the stones, stones only he could use, and wrote the book of mormon. As he couldn't write he enlisted the help of a neighbour. The neighbours wife stole the first 180 pages of what they had divined from God (on suspicion Smith was full of it) saying that if its written on these stomnes then you should be able to write the exact same ting word for word, of course he couldn't.
Tell me again why you think he was divinely inspired???
Saying you are not going to pass judgement on someones religious beliefs but you will pass judegment on mine because they aren't religious which just go to prove my contention that things that are not OK are OK when its religion. Why??
God sends a new messegener and the prior messeges are corrected, how convienient..btw that would mean we should all be mormons after all he was the last 'big' religion to have been divinely inspired by God, which means everyone but them is wrong. I think you should call the Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury and inform them.
What you are saying is based on conjecture and is completely unprovable, its faith. Which by its nature is of course devoid of reason. When you attach actual evidence and reason to it it cannot stand up to what it is we now kow to be true about the world around us. Jesus was Jewish and everything he said was within the realms of Judaism, he was in fact what we would call today a Fundamentalist Jew. He wanted a return to strict judaism and everything he suposedly said points to this.
The bible itself was written many years after the supposed existence of Jesus. We know this because there are words and concepts that didn't exist until centuries after Jesus was suppose to have existed. The story of Mary M is prime example. Where was the man?? In jewish tradition both the man and woman she was caught committing adultry with should of been there to be stoned. But here is no man. The first texts we have of the Bible have been studied by many religious scholars most of whom have concluded this story was added hundreds of yearsafter the death of Chirst.
Another reason its all crap is Mary the Mother of Jesus who seems consitantly surprised her son is doing any of this . Did she forget the Angel Gabriel?? And the virgin birth?? In Catholic mythology the concept of the immaculate conception remained hidden until an edict by the Pope in the 1850's and theconcept of the assumption didn't appear until the 1950's. Tell me again why you think that Jesus the messenger (which is actuallly Gabriel in Christain mythology) came to fix what had been written.
Simple fact is there is evidence which I would say is pretty conclusive to suggest we created God to explain what we couldn't explain. That we hang on to the concept through vainity (we don't want to appear silly for believeing) and the need to think there is more then this. Its also a handy system of authoritarian control and although we have freedom of speech that speech seems never to be as important as the freedom of and from religion. Got to ask yourself why don't youself why?? Why can we question my belief but its not up to anyone to question peoples religious belief. Why not?? The belief is amaking the world really screwed up and always has.
Even the writers of the Bible new the world came before we did they just didnt now how it worked but now we do ergo no need for God to explain these things.
Many people refuse to accept the evidence because they need to the thought of an afterlife or something bigger then they are to make life seem worthwhile or because they just don't want to look like morons for believing that whoich isn't true. To say there is no God completely disrupts our sense of who we are. It would make us listless and so forth. The same reason we invented God still exists, it is a way of controlling the masses.