Mine is when the Israelites slaughtered entire cities and then they made kids sing about it at Bible Camp.
They still do it to this day
… and so does Islam and Christianity, it’s crazy!
what do they all share in common? It’s a pickle
(hint: it’s tax free)
(hint: it’s tax free)
Child support?
Instagram has some wonderful clips of Christopher Hitchens absolutely destroying religion.
“This happend to me the other day” and then someone wrote it down.
Well thats what happens when ur books gets updates faster than ur phone… ;-)
Religion is such a mindfuck. And life-fuck.
And society-fuck.
The new testament was written like a hundred years after Jesus died. Its entirely bullshit.
It’s an oral history whose earliest written accounts are dates between 60-150 years after the events in questions.
No more “bullshit” than any number of other 2000 year old transcribed histories.
Contemporary Roman records are less bullshit than Jesus walking on water in the New Testament because the writer cared whether or not it was true.
There was no such thing as academic tenure in those times and every historian depended on having a patron, usually a wealthy Senator. They probably cared more about keeping their patron happy than whether what they wrote was true or not.
I mean were you there? How do you know the intentions of the people writing things down back then?
Less bullshit, not perfectly credible. Records on taxes and grain production are much more plausible than magic powers.
LOL. Yeah the Romans were known for never being corrupt and they would never ever be skimming some tax revenue! Therefore those tax numbers were 100% accurate all of the time.
And Julius Caesar defeated one zillion Gauls at the Battle of Alesia. He would never exaggerate, because people cared a lot about whether the things they were writing were true.
I think I’ll go on thinking that primary sources are all inherently flawed. The Viking sagas talk about their colony in Vinland along with fighting sea serpents. They’re mostly bullshit, but it’s the only written record of Vinland which is supported by archaeological evidence. Do you discard everything in the sagas because there’s some mythological stuff in them? Do you inherently trust Roman records about taxes because they they’re dry and boring?
Or maybe historians are correct to consider the context of any work written (and that includes religious texts) alongside archaeological evidence? Also consider that for most of history most people couldn’t read or write. There’s always oral history that’s written down centuries later. Many things were never written down, and many things that were written down were destroyed. We have a limited amount of information from historical texts and given how uncommon literacy was in past, it’s usually written by either a wealthy person, someone employed by a wealthy person, or a priest. It’s always going to be an incomplete picture, and it all has a lot of bullshit in it.
Less bullshit, not perfectly credible
Therefore those tax numbers were 100% accurate all of the time.
I’m not sure we’re on the same page here
Contemporary Roman records are less bullshit
Didn’t Pliny the Elder include the Basilisk, the Manticore, and the Phoenix in his Natural History?
Meanwhile, Seneca described the feats of Hercules, the sorcery of Medea, and the plung into the underworld by Oedipus.
Ah OK I misunderstood and thought you meant anything written down at that time.
How often people do get plunged into the underworld out there? That’s Hercules, Oedipus, Heracles (Hercules’s nonunion Roman equivalent), persephone (rhymes with shone), Orpheus, who else? That’s like all the ancient geeks I know
*ancient nerds
It’s as bullshit as all the other oral histories that claim magic things
But it was collected and disseminated by a bunch of dudes in the 300s
Nicae canonized the subset of Gospels they considered legitimate and excised the Gospels they considered heretical.
But the earliest surviving written gospel is dated to AD 125, with speculation (based on adjacent writings) dating new testament documents back to AD 60.
I thought the Council of Nicaea was about addressing Arianism rather than settling the New Testament canon?
Ah, you’re right. I had to confused with the 382 Synod of Rome.
The Council of Nicaea addressed many things, including Christians making themselves eunuchs (as Jesus said to), which was very popular at the time.
I appreciate that link. I also like and recognize that you accept that “early Christians” is a misnomer and they were actually a sect of Judaism. They called themselves Jews as well.
you accept that “early Christians” is a misnomer and they were actually a sect of Judaism
I don’t think this internally contradictory. No more than asserting that “early Mormons” were a sect of Christianity, and therefore not real Mormons somehow.
They were Jewish until they called themselves something different. We know they called themselves Jews until at least the trashing of the temple, so around 70 ad or so. After that, I think the historians say they start to change their names. Not sure if it was always Christians as the name they chose. It’s interesting, I’ll start looking it up.
No, they’re not real mormons now because they’re dead. It’s been like 200 years
Yes the other stories are also 100% bullshit
No shortage of contemporary accounts.
My favorite part is how well it can be used to light a fireplace. Just tear out some pages, put some wood over it and light it. Secundair use is rolling paper when you’ve run out.
I smoked a bible joint once, it’s still a lot of paper hahs
It does not work well as toilet paper. But in a a pinch give it a try. Consider your ass warned, though.
No no no, cleaning your ass is what holy water is for. At the entrance of every church they have a bidet for that.
At hotels, rip out a random page in the middle. If anyone ever reads it they’ll be super annoyed.
Or draw a pentagram on the first page and the text heil Satan
My father once threw my mother’s bible to the fireplace and because it was closed it didn’t burn, my mother took that as a holy sign, I’ve never had the heart to explain her why it didn’t burn.
Physics explanations usually aren’t welcome anyway.
I’m still annoyed that it has never been printed in two-ply
Hey now don’t oversimplify it!
We all know about Joseph Smith and the stones in a hat.
Wait, what?
Dum dum dum dum duuum
In case you are unaware of the story of the origins of the Mormon faith that Mormons actually believe, go look up the South Park episode titled All About Mormons. It gives a pretty brief overview of everything, including the stones in the hat.
It’s quite a funny episode, tbh.
I’ll never forget watching that episode with my (non-mormon) friend, his (fresh-convert) brother, and said brother’s (raised mormon) girlfriend. After the episode ended we naturally wanted their opinions on it, and girl straight up said -and this is verbatim- “It was pretty close. Joseph Smith didn’t read from under a hat, it was more of a shawl, but otherwise it was good”
Speechless.
Smrt smrt smrt smrt smrrrrrt
The origin of the Mormon religion is practically a parody of itself. It’s also a sterling example of why education is so important in developing people’s critical thinking skills so they aren’t all credulous morons.
There’s this great video of the previous head mormon sticking his head in Joe Smith’s hat.
My favourite thing about the Bible is that every time it’s been translated the people doing the translations include they’re own nonsense.
you mean poopiecoin isn’t cannon??
And the Lord sayeth, “Vote for Trump, for the Haitians are eating dogs”. Amen.
As David Cross said, “They didn’t have science back then so everyone was even stupider…” or something approximating it.
My favorite thing about the Bible is that the gospels were written by followers of the disciples, who themselves didn’t know how to read or write, in Aramaic, then translated to Greek, then to Latin, then censored by the council of Nicea, then finally translated into English with the Geneva, then quickly edited by the commission of King James, because the J-Sauce was very socialist and anti-government.
And the atheists who want to quote terrible things mentioned in the bible are pulling from the Old Testament, specifically a book of law written by the King Joshua, 800 years before Jesus, and proclaim that people proclaim it to be the word of God.
So, ok: we have so many translations, literally a mass obliteration of Cathars, as well as other Inquisitions… now, you wanna tell me you know jack shit about the bible and tell me things didn’t happen?
Ok. Cool, bro.
Apologies, I’m going to do something that I think is kind of a jerk move and paste my standard argument for a very specific point. It’s a jerk move because I see that you wrote a genuine reply and I appreciate that. I don’t know enough about the specific points that you raised to discuss them directly, so I’m falling back on my broader thinking. To that end, I’m truly trying to contribute to the discussion (even though I’m pasting a repeated(-by-me) blurb; see my sibling post; I’m pretty into this topic). I respect your views even if we disagree, so long as you don’t try to impose them on others, which I’m not saying you do / did.
Jesus is an ahistorical figure who was originally crucified in the firmament above the earth. Notice no mention of an earthly ministry in the Pauline epistles; Paul is arguing for salvation from a heavenly figure. In his letters, Jesus is still to be revealed, rather than returning. Only decades later did the stories about a human man get written.
The Didache was most likely part of the letter written by the “pillars in Jerusalem” (James the Just, Peter, and John) after their meeting with Paul. This was the meeting to discuss the matter of preaching to gentiles and whether circumcision ought to be required for christian converts. It contains many of the tenets later ascribed to Jesus, but doesn’t associate him with teaching them.
The reason the earthly story was embraced by the church was to stop people like Paul from having visions of Christ that the church couldn’t control. By pointing to a real guy on earth, they could control the message. Otherwise, any yokel on the street could teach that Jesus revealed new teachings and the church risked being undermined.
Marcion was probably the first to create a collection of writings associated with christianity: he collected some of Paul’s letters and had his own gospel. It was thought that he had a shortened version of Luke (as testified by Eusebius and Tertullian). Marcion, however, claimed that his gospel had been “judaized”; this suggests that his shorter version was the original gospel before others modified it.
Acts was written as a direct response to Marcion’s scripture. It was written to harmonize Paul’s high-jacking of the religion by making he and Peter appear to be in alignment when actually he was at odds with the leaders in Jerusalem.
The Jerusalem pillars (James, Peter, John), were strict adherents of Judaism, whereas Paul taught that Jesus made the Law / Torah unnecessary. They were almost certainly Essenes, one of the three flavors of Judaism at the time (the other two were the Pharisees and Sadducees mentioned in the new testament). John the Baptist was clearly also an Essene. He’s said to wear camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and honey. His practice of baptism also aligns with daily ritual water immersion believed to be a core practice of the Essenes.
This is a very long way of saying that Jesus first appeared in visions and spoke to the early leaders without walking on earth. It’s a fringe belief about which I was quite skeptical, but damn if the evidence doesn’t line up. See Robert Price, Earl Doherty, and Elbe Spurling for more info. Elbe’s online book is free and contains a huge amount of historical information about the region at the.
You are claiming Jesus is ahistorical, using the term to basically mean fictional. Those aren’t the same.
Jesus was crucified here on Earth, and his crime was pissing off Pontius Pilate. He would help people without going through the proper channels.
The religious leaders were getting kick backs from the Roman Empire, as they were taxing the people for religious reassurance. Jesus was doing it for free.
His disciples didn’t understand what he was doing, because Simon wanted a cult. The other Simon and Judas were picking up what he was throwing down.
He then told Judas to identify him to lead by example and show the harsh brutality of their governance.
And Jesus didn’t “live without sin”. He stole a donkey just to ride it into town, just for a performance act which he was tried for, because he was claiming himself King of the Jews.
I don’t see him as being fictional. Ahistorical I can concede, as he wasn’t literally born during Yule. And that is another fun topic I can delve into.
However, he reminds me of Abbie Hoffman.
Anyhow, while his records are muffed, he was a living human who said a lot of things you can catch in the Vulgate, which includes proof that the Jews didn’t free a murderer and condemn Jesus. Barabbas means son of God, while Christos is King of the Jews.
In the Vulgate, it makes it clear. Jesus went before two judges. “Are you the son of God?” and “Are you the king of the Jews?”
“If you say so.” The vulgate also reveals that Barrabas had a first name: Jesus.
So to appeal to the Jewish populace, as they could see that their tyranny was causing insurrection, certainly amplified by Jesus, they gave a tricky deal:
We will free a prisoner. This man who claims he is your messiah! Or this man who claims he is the son of God.
“Free the Son of God.”
Well, you said it. Don’t blame us. It is your fault.
And that’s why Jesus was put on display with the sign that says, “Here lies the King of the Jews.”
Now, I realize you are saying his existence is fictional. I don’t care. I love the story. Some people really get into Warhammer lore. And the same with Star Wars: just because it got retconned all to shit doesn’t mean Episode 4 didn’t kick ass.
It’s all horseshit.
Thank you for attending my lecture.
Succinct. Informative. Accurate. No notes.
So you are MAGA?
Maybe your knowledge of the topic is just horseshit.
Bro I didn’t even read your comment because it was discussing the legitimacy of different interpretations of thousand year old fanfics. It’s meaningless. The book makes some good points about being nice to each other, but it’s not real. It’s literal hallucinations and grifts by people over hundreds of years.
I don’t need to get a PhD on theology to determine that it’s all fucking lies.
And you think this makes me MAGA…? Fuck that’s sad. What a worthless worldview you have.
Funny he mentions MAGA in the context of christ, as they tend to be Christian nationalists.
Who aren’t Christian, btw. I am criticizing logic through facetious statements.
Jokes are funnier when they don’t have to be explained. But hey, breathe through the mouth: it is a valid channel.
Jokes are funnier when they don’t have to be explained.
Not commenting on anything for the chain, just this thing. Agree, but personally that’s more on the teller than the listener.
However, I really enjoy explaining my jokes when people ask or people explaining their jokes. At that point it isn’t about laughing but about learning things I missed or alternative viewpoints.
Jokes are funnier when they don’t have to be explained
Have you thought that nothing you’ve said is funny?
Damn, I need to attend your lecture. You know so much that I don’t.
Ask away, my man. Look at the rest of the thread because some of us are having some deep dives into the topic.
In regards to the 12 year old boy, the people were complaining about hunger. Jesus gave a sermon saying we should share food.
The 12 year old offered 2 fish and 5 loaves of bread, which was his paycheck, to a disciple. The disciple asked Jesus, “Wtf am I supposed to do with this?”
“Disperse it.”
5000 men, meaning 5000 families as children and women were being counted, ran to their pantries, inspired by the boy, to grab what they could find. Shit that was just sitting on the shelves that they didn’t have the rest of the ingredients to actually use it.
It is a story of an impromptu potluck. The magic was only the words of Jesus and the generosity of that 12 year old boy.
And everyone was fucking fed. That’s properly administrated socialism. Love your neighbor. Government doesn’t even need to be involved.
Hold up, how do I get ahold of scriptures that support this interpretation of the story?
Very interesting, thankyou
*weren’t counted. 5000 families held an impromptu potluck.
What do you think about the resurrection of Lazarus?
What do you think about CPR?
I’d think survival would be inconsistent with the amount of time Lazarus was “dead”/needed cpr.
I lean more towards Lazarus being misdiagnosed as dead and Jesus giving Lazarus the ol’ sternum tap to wake him up.
I can agree with that.
Look, I am saying that I agree with what Jesus taught, no question. But I don’t think he was a magic zombie man.
And I do believe in God/Godhead, and I am not a hard physicalist.
The miracle of Jesus is mostly that he helped people without asking for money, which the pharisees and sadducees were doing by order of the Roman empire, while additionally refusing to assist gentiles.
And the J-Sauce was like, “fuck this stupid shit. And fuck the Romans and their self-perceived authority to deny the basic commandment: Love thy neighbor.”
Jesus was punk as fuck. He refused to stand down, the Romans tried to twist the narrative so that his own supporters would be blamed, and made an example of.
But that holy spirit should die. Hence, fuck ICE. I will happily die to defend my neighbor, without using any force. Just an example.
But if you strike me first, well, I will take action to stop you from doing it again. Pacifism is not submission.
What is your preferred translation of the Bible? Are there any other books you’d recommend on this topic?
Biblegateway.com is an AWESOME tool. I don’t have a preference towards any translation. Sometimes, I will dig down to the Vulgate or Greek. I sure as shit have to admit I can’t read Aramaic.
But you can put in the verse and flip between translations on the fly and look for commonalities.
That’s how I eventually discovered the Barabbas was Jesus, and that required me to get down to the Vulgate.
So Christians don’t know jack shit either since every historical fact is lost in translation or just corrupted and misconstrued for a personal agenda.
The “Christians” who didn’t study the Bible don’t follow the teachings of Jesus.
Jesus was punk rock and worthy of study. Buddhism fell in the same hole.
You are buying into and, sure, trying your best to reject the propaganda. But you are buying into the “official story” just the same as the “Christians” you disdain.
Study the Bible, and then when some evangelical asshole wants to tell them that you will burn in eternity in Hell, you can correct them: Hell is simply destruction, literally what atheists consider death to be.
But Jesus was way cool, and not as magical as the GOVERNMENTS that killed him for insurrection want us to believe.
So how can one study the true Bible where to find a faithful translation
Study it and cross reference the translations, and you will find the point being made.
I know, it takes time, and this thread makes me want to just write a book that summarizes the Bible, like it is Harry Potter, but of course citing sources.
What a worthless world view you have. You just had to write all of that to justify holding onto your ego, when it is so easy to let go.
Are you intending to reply to OP? “Write all that”? It’s a sentence
You are missing what I just said. So it goes.
Sorry that the rest of us don’t blindly believe in your bronze age fantasy book, but some of you lot tend to make it our problem from time to time…
Believe? Idiot. I am irreligious. You are sanctimoniously being EXACTLY what you are attacking, MAGA.
Loll
Are you okay?
Btw… you apparently didn’t watch Monty Python.
Only the Holy Grail. Guess this one’s gone over my head.
Oh, dude, Life of Brian. Must see. Relevant to the discussion and hilarious.
Odd… this is what I might ask my leg.
objectively wrong in every case. Violence against oppressors does not violate the tolerance paradox.
Nope. How can we even be objective on a subjective topic?
You, dude, are objectively wrong on the use of objective.
Objects you can experience, usually you can touch them. Physics, where we derive the subjective concept of “physicality” hinges on its objective conclusions.
This is an abstract discussion over a SUBJECT, which holds no mass and only takes up time but not space.
So you think I am subjectively wrong but you wanted to not speak monosyllabically in hopes you would read more intelligent than me.
Dude, I don’t give a damn. Have a great day and enjoy the weather while we got it. Internet warrior.
It’s a meme you dip
Do what? Holy hell, so you not know what memetics are, you dip?
Just the fact that he needed to talk to him is a problem enough. I was raised with the understanding that they were the same person.
Being, not person. Maybe schizophrenics are actually the closest we got to gods image xD
What you don’t realize is the holy spirit was spying on them, recorded the conversation, and sold it to the local tabloid.
It was really the flock that watched them
Mine is the part where Moses went up the mountain, tripped balls for a while, write down some laws, came back down and threw a fit because the people had relapsed into their old religion, and smashed the law tablets like a dumbass.
I still think it’s wild that no one really talks about how the order of the books after the gospels is shortest to longest with Revalation (some truly crazy ass shit) tacked on at the end.
The best part, in my opinion, is the extra ending in Mark. This was the original ending, which is an absolute banger:
When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body. 2 Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they were on their way to the tomb 3 and they asked each other, “Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb?”
But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away. 5 As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed.
“Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. 7 But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.'”
Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid.
This is in later versions, likely because someone copying the text found the ending to be insufficient:
When Jesus rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had driven seven demons. She went and told those who had been with him and who were mourning and weeping. When they heard that Jesus was alive and that she had seen him, they did not believe it.
Afterward Jesus appeared in a different form to two of them while they were walking in the country. These returned and reported it to the rest; but they did not believe them either.
Later Jesus appeared to the Eleven as they were eating; he rebuked them for their lack of faith and their stubborn refusal to believe those who had seen him after he had risen.
He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”
After the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, he was taken up into heaven and he sat at the right hand of God. Then the disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it.
But remember, kids: the bible is all true and infallible and the word of god and whatever other crap they tell you.
Criticism aside, I’m a hardcore atheist and reading about the history of early christianity (first ~300 years) was absolutely fascinating and I’d recommend checking out the subject to others who oppose organized religion. Bart Ehrman would be a good starting point, though can you go down quite a rabbit hole beyond his writing. This might be a good jumping off point: How Jesus Became God
is there a story over why Jeusus’s body was entombed with a big rock? Was the big rock put there by people who loved Jesus or Zombie panicked haters of Jesus?
I think there were cases of grave robbery going on, and if I recall correctly, He was buried with some expensive perfume or something.
Yes, the book of Revealation is insane
written about 60-90AD, fyi
Wait no I changed mine it’s when they put Jesus in a hole, then put a giant wheel of cheese in front of the hole.
The reason Jesus ain’t come back is he needs our help to eat all that cheese and get out of the hole
[now that I think about it I might be able to start a cult around cheese. I told my wife no more cults, but I didn’t promise. Plus, cheese. Maybe she wants to join this one]
Can I be your wife? I’d join a cheese cult.
Hmmm suspicious username. Are you sure you’re not a pastafarian spy ?
