Almost every book in the Hebrew and Christian Bibles are from different authors, addressing different audiences with very specific issues.

I've gotten into some debates on this board here before, so my intention is not to start another endlessly looping quarrell over semantics, but here are some points that you should keep in mind.

Christianity, like all mythologies, rejects and adopts various ideas from circulating stories at the time. It has inherited notions from Hellenetic philosophers, ancient Egypt, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Paganism, and too many more to mention.

Every notion that people dismiss as "Christian" usually has a basis in some other school of thought.

There are very few new ideas out there.

The texts themselves, when examined individualy, portray multiple Christianities, each with their take of the story of this dude Jesus, each with a particular interpretation usually directly corresponding to the circumstances of that particular group. (Imagine that! How uncanny!)

As for Jesus the Jew, who knew what his original thoughts were, although it is highly likely that he did exist. Historians have tried, but most academic works on the historical Jesus end up portraying him as a mirror to a popular archetype of the time it was written (in the seventies, Jesus came out looking very much like a hippy, today, he might even rap).

It is also highly likely that whatever he actually thought and did will never be known, and no one really cares. Time and time again, people have proven that they will believe what they want to believe. Any exercise to change this is an exercise in futility.

A good place to start is looking up misstranslations of the Bible as well as the evolution of the bible. The bible often mixes up plural and singular nouns for example.
Here is a good article

Apparently the bible is a collection of stories from many different cultures collected over a long period of time.

The story of the tower of Babel is found in Sumerian Mythology. Moses is shares similarities to Sargon, etc.

I'm not ashamed nor embarrassed to mention the book. It is, yes, simply that, a book.

I know a lot about it, and again, like in many books you can find a few grains of wisdom.

Lex: How did I know you'd show up here?

Well, there's the Kanye West "Jesus Walks" rap track, for sure, and I've noticed many of the rappers are insistent that Jesus was a black man, and supposedly his time spent in Egypt proves this. (Which is funny since all the Egyptians I've ever seen were Arabs...)

So I think you're right.

How long til we see a debate on whether or not Mary Magdalene was Jesus' ho? Or did it already happen and I wasn't paying attention.

More than several years after the fact. I recall seeing a documentary (on A&E a few Decembers ago) on this matter and even the born again Christian scholars admit that the earliest known version of the earliest of the gospels dates from around 100 AD, or 70 odd years after this is all supposed to have taken place.

But of course this is a special case wherein absolutely NONE of the details were forgotten, changed, or exaggerated in those 70 years of oral tradition.

I haven't been ass-deep in academic Jesus movement analysis not to spread my knowledge occasionally.



Take the customary emotional response out of the equation, and the bible's a fascinating book, for diverse reasons.

Maybe you should just read them. You can find both in any good book store.

The texts of the Hebrew Bible were redacted a hundred years before Plato was born, and would not be translated into Greek until after he was dead. Plato never travelled to Judea. He may have spent time in Egypt, and it's conceivable he might have encountered Jews there, but there's no evidence he ever knew anything about it, let alone studied it or could have been influenced by it.

During the Hellenistic age, Jewish culture was influenced a great deal by Greek customs and traditions, including philosophy. The Talmud mentions "philosophers" often, but almost always disparagingly. "Philosopher" was a stereotype for an obnoxious know-it-all who always tried to stump the Rabbis with stupid and ignorant questions. Nevertheless, some Greek metaphysical ideas may have influenced some esoteric traditions of Judaism.

Christianity emerged from a Hellenized Jewish culture, and the New Testament is written in Greek, but the NT authors don't really demonstrate any knowledge of Greek philosophy, or refer to it at all. There's no particular idea or concept or claim that you could point to and say, "There's Plato". The values, attitude, approach, and intent are all very different.

Rather, what you do have is, hundreds of years later, theologians who have a commitment to Christianity but an interest in Plato, trying to reconcile the two. This often came at the cost of distorting both. (You also have the odd situation of pagans who are committed to Plato but interested in Christianity: they became the "Neo-Platonists", but their views were not exactly the same as Plato's.)

Modern Egyptians are Arabs, but there's evidence to show that migratory and military patterns over the last several millenia have altered the phenotypical makeup of egypt. One point to note is that the ancient border of Egypt would've been well-within the sudan today.

I've found that the Old Testament in particular has some great nuggets of wisdom. The literary figure of Jesus makes some dramatic speeches, but ultimately I don't find what he has to say very interesting. Ecclesiastes on the other hand has some rather pessimistic screeds within it, though the authors' solution to the wickedness of the world is to trust God. They lost me there, but its still some fine literature. It is this Satanist's favorite book of the Bible!

I knew I asked my question in the right place. Thanks for all your replies. I now have more sources to follow than my level of curiosity!

I think I'll just go back to rereading my Satanic Bible

I also agree with you Eve, doing battle with a Xitan is like trying to receive a Heavy Rock FM station on an AM radio. Better to leave them with their heads filled with that static they feel so comfortable with.

IRI

Now that's the best suggestion I 've heard all night.

Wait a minute...okay. That is the SECOND best suggestion I have heard tonight.

This book of fairy tales written about a god, created by men who have condoned and enforced every heinous crime known to man throughout the ages has but one small element I can appreciate - The part when Satan fights to overthrow the evil son of a bitch.


Hail Satan!

Yes, thank you. I was about to add this very thing.

Platonic thought predominantly through Plotinus didn't get infused into Christian until Church Fathers like Augustine attempted to reconcile their mish-mash theology with one aspect of 'classical' philosophy. Later in the Scholastic period, it was an attempt to integrate Aristotle by such Fathers as Aquinas.

Gypsy, I don't believe the archetype Satan actually exists in the bible, let alone tries to overthrow god. There's the Snake, one figure called Satan who torments Job so god can observe how pious he is(strange thing for an omnipotent and clairvoyent being to need to do), the devil that offered Jesus the earth before he became a preacher, the antichrist and the beast. These are often grouped together to form the basis of the archetype of Satan, minus the fact the only one actually named satan torments in the name of God.

Personally, I favor the Islamic version of Satan. The Jinn named Iblis, refused to bow down to Adam at God's biding.

Ishkur, I believe it was St. Augustine that was known for the best christian prayer ever: "Lord, grant me the give of chastity, just not right now."

I knew I should have kept out of this.

Eh phooey Satan/Lucifer/The Devil however you name him - He fought to overthrow god's kingdom.

Isn't it exactly why he was banned from 'heaven' and thrown down to earth?

And hence why he has been the scapegoat for every goddamn 'sin' of man since now he supposedly is the 'ruler' of the earth, and is here to tempt and gather as many to his side before the 'end' when the bearded wonder returns to take back god’s kingdom and throw Satan into the pit for a thousand years...and so on and so on....and everyone lived happily ever after. THE END was that a run-on sentence?

Excuse me if I’m not some scripture spouting nutcase. I really couldn't care less but that is the story as far as I know.

OK I'm done with this nonsense here...If you think the book is interesting, and contains anything worthy of discussion then by all means knock yourself out.