At Messiah Truth, someone remarked:
I think the whole issue of race is downright silly.
My response:
I think it’s a question of what feelings and judgments get attached to it.
Tag Archives: Messiah Truth
* Why Christians believe
A new thread at Messiah Truth.
This is most emphatically not Jewish teaching. I expect it correctly to be condemned as not-Jewish. I also expect it to be condemned, correctly or not, as just plain wrong.
The point is to facilitate understanding of what motivates belief in the Christian myth.
Sunday was Palm Sunday. The appointed “Gospel” text this year was Luke 22:14-23:56, which covers from the beginning of the Last Supper up to Jesus’ burial.
The pastor normally reads the “Gospel” lesson. Pastor’s voice quavered throughout this reading, which I found hard to figure since his beliefs are similar enough to mine. We waded through all the problems in the text, e.g. the impossible trial at the High Priest’s house on Pesach. But I also got re-acquainted with why Christians believe so fervently in this text.
* Transference, BLM and anti-Semitism
When I hang out at Dunkin’ Donuts in the morning, I have a prescribed spot, in a corner, by the door.
This morning this woman came in scowling. She was deeply resentful about something. Once she got her order and began to head out, it became clear that the something had changed. Whatever she’d been resentful about before was no matter; what she resented now was my skin color.
Transference is the removal of emotions, normally negative, from connection with one idea or situation, and attaching the same to a different idea or situation. This incident this morning was an epiphany for me of how easily it happens, and how evil it can be.
* Kimberly Leto verdict
* Is This Stone the Clue to Why Jesus Was Killed?
Is This Stone the Clue to Why Jesus Was Killed?
Here is the latest in a flurry of rather silly articles extolling the supposed archaeological significance of the First Century synagogue at Magdala; which just happens to be located wholly within the confines of a privately-owned Christian tourist resort (hint, hint).
Conspiracies occur. In my past work as a legal secretary, I had direct contact with secret campaigns to promote certain large corporations and political movements. These included “news” articles and ghostwritten op-ed pieces planted in various major news outlets.
Some years ago, there was a tremendous scare over avian flu, which was portrayed as threatening a real plague over North America. I came to conclude that the whole thing was a PR ploy to ennoble public impressions of the pharmaceuticals industry.
The present article sets forth a fanciful notion of what the Sanhedrin may have been thinking during Jesus’ trial.
As to many New Testament stories, my position in the past has been, “This specific thing may not have happened, but something like it probably did.” There are so many problems with and discrepancies among the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ trial, however, that as a Christian I now doubt he was ever tried by the Sanhedrin at all.
By the time of his arrest, Jesus had become such an irritant to the Jewish leaders that the New Testament easily portrays them as having wanted him dead. A conspiracy of the chief priests and Pharisees (John 11:57) to that end would have been singular, as these two parties were otherwise bitter enemies. The Sanhedrin, however, was without power at the time to condemn anyone to death, for blasphemy or any other reason; so the New Testament portrays “the Jews” as having taken Jesus to Pilate to portray him as an insurrectionist, on which basis Pilate might well put him to death.
My own current belief is that Judas may never have betrayed Jesus into the hands of “the Jews” at all; he may instead have betrayed him directly to Pilate, who I believe had his own, wholly personal, reasons to want Jesus dead.
Related: The Son of the Blessed
Reblogged 2022-12-15.
* Bible contradictions #08: Is God love and light?
1 John 1:5:
This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all.
1 John 4:8:
Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.
The author of John appears not to have been aware of Isaiah 45:5-7:
Continue reading * Bible contradictions #08: Is God love and light?
* Bible contradictions #05: Jesus’ genealogies
The New Testament provides two genealogies of Jesus, one in Matthew and one in Luke. Matthew’s genealogy begins with Abraham and moves forward in time: “A was the father of B, B the father of C,” and so on. Luke’s genealogy begins with Jesus and moves backwards in time all the way to Adam: “C the son of B, the son of A.”
Let’s compare only the portions from Abraham forward.
Continue reading * Bible contradictions #05: Jesus’ genealogies
o The church in the Old Testament?
Folah, a sometimes participant at Messiah Truth, visited here on July 27, and posted a comment summarizing her beliefs:
The counter-missionaries and most Jews (especially Judaism adherents) define Hebrew, Jacob, Israel, land of Israel, Judah, house of Judah, Joseph, Ephraim, David, house of David, city of David, Zion, mount Zion, daughter of Zion e.t.c as all referring to a particular race and a particular parcel of land in the middle-east both in historic and eschatological contexts. Quite a lot of Christians (trying to avoid replacement theology label) have accepted these definitions without question and research. These definitions have caused majority to build eschatological edifices with extremely weak foundations. Continue reading o The church in the Old Testament?
* Did Biblical changes occur?
There is a widespread belief among Jews, that Chrstian translators routinely falsify their translations of the Hebrew Bible to create “proof texts” that indicate the Hebrew Bible predicts or substantiates Christianity.
At Messiah Truth, where I am known as “Proteus,” I recently made some remarks on that question; that the participant Ezekah wound up quoting, and questioning himself. I have chosen to respond here.
Please comment!
========================================================================= Continue reading * Did Biblical changes occur?
* Dogmatism vs. pragmatism
A post from a thread at Messiah Truth where we were discussing “Embracing what is.”
This morning as I waited outside for library to open, that remark about what they give us in chapel was still on my mind.
This is a tangent, and a stretch of the forum rules, so if this post isn’t released, I’ll understand.
“The Five Old Guys” present to us two, sometimes three times a month: the third Monday, fourth Wednesday, and fifth Wednesday, if there is one. Some months ago, for the Scripture lesson, Bro. Wayne gave us a highly redacted version of Matthew 25:31ff. I don’t believe this text comes from J., but it’s still one of the focal passages of the GT.
The Homeless Blogger 