Thomas Eshuis wrote:

theropod wrote:So, I am obligated to provide a defintion of a true Christian when all I have ever said that some things exclude one from being able to claim Christianity? Huh.

RS

You're not obligated to do anything.
I am just saying that, without a rigourous definition of what is Truely Christian, how could you objectively claim, what is not Truely Christian?

As soon as someone, indeed anyone, will address the question I raised earlier in this thread regarding whether Jim Jones' brand of insanity can be considered Christianity I might feel more inclinded to offer my opinions in this regard. I even asked again this morning, and it hangs there like a fart in a still room. Why would that be? Could it be that if one responds either way the whole point of this thread grinds to a halt? If his batshit crazy "faith" is Christianity then anything and everything can be considered Christianity and the word has no meaning whatsoever. If his real world death cult is not Christianity I rest my case, and have demonstrated that there are exclusions to what can be reasonably considered Christianity.

RS

theropod wrote:

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

theropod wrote:So, I am obligated to provide a defintion of a true Christian when all I have ever said that some things exclude one from being able to claim Christianity? Huh.

RS

You're not obligated to do anything.
I am just saying that, without a rigourous definition of what is Truely Christian, how could you objectively claim, what is not Truely Christian?

As soon as someone, indeed anyone, will address the question I raised earlier in this thread regarding whether Jim Jones' brand of insanity can be considered Christianity I might feel more inclinded to offer my opinions in this regard.

I can't say I am familiar wiht Jim Jones, let alone his brand of Christianty, never mind what he bases it on.

theropod wrote: I even asked again this morning, and it hangs there like a fart in a still room.

It's seems a rather anecdotal question to ask.

theropod wrote: Why would that be?

As I said, in my case, I don't really know who Jim Jones is.

theropod wrote:Could it be that if one responds either way the whole point of this thread grinds to a halt? If his batshit crazy "faith" is Christianity then anything and everything can be considered Christianity and the word has no meaning whatsoever. If his real world death cult is not Christianity I rest my case, and have demonstrated that there are exclusions to what can be reasonably considered Christianity.

RS

Again, I agree in essence with your point. I am just saying it's hard to give a rigourous line between True and Non True Christianity.

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

PensivePenny wrote:In the US, I'm not so sure about elsewhere, we have this epidemic of universities who are now required, mostly by students, to provide "safe spaces" from "microagression" and other "perceived threats." It is a sign that people have become overly sensitive to criticism or disagreement, "micro-agression". Now THAT is something that SHOULD make us ALL sad. I hope it never rises to that here.

If anything it's been going the other way with trolls getting more and more leeway in flaming or outright attacking their interlocutors.

Be that as it may...I haven't attacked you.

Telling you I think you were rude to me isn't a personal attack. Telling you I don't wish to engage you isn't a personal attack. Calling you a man or dutch or 27 years old, isn't an "attack." If any of those things offend you, you need to deal with that yourself. I'm going solely on the information at my disposal... your avatar info. And that could all be wrong for all I know. But, it makes no real difference to me one way or the other.

Name calling is an attack, which I've not done.... "brow beating" might be considered an attack... harassment, at the very least. The latter having been done to ME. You don't see me curling up in a ball and sucking my thumb over it. I'll take the browbeating for a while... when I've had enough and the negatives of participating here exceed the positives, I'll simply find something more interesting to do.

Am I allowed to say there might be something more interesting? Or, is that considered another attack? The bar seems pretty low.

John Platko wrote:

theropod wrote:

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

theropod wrote:

Why not ask me directly? Why snip out the arguments I made in support of my claim? Again, is a radical departure from the central tenets of Christianity not enough to disqualify such as actually being Christian? As I stated in an unquoted post words have meanings, and if one dismisses the central tenets and dogma of Christianity the claim that such people as Jim Jones are also Christian is wrong. If anything one wants to believe is allowed to be called Christianity then the word has no meaning and the entire point is moot. It would be the same as if I claimed to be a Republican that supported a woman's right to control her reproductive choices, universal single payer healthcare, decreased military spending, greater environmental regluation and splitting up Wall Street banks. No matter if I claimed to be a Republican or not I could not reasonably enconsidered one. It is exactly the same as when North Korea claims to be a free and open society.

It spelled T H E R O P O D.

RS

Well, the central tenets of Christianity have changed several times over the century, from marriage, female priests, to the way one get's into heaven.
It's also a bit of stretch to compare Republicans to Christians. There aren't 6000 different Republican denominations after all.

So Christianity is whatever one wants it to be? This is the entire point that somehow seems to escape everyone. There comes a point where abandonment of of these central tenets disqualifies said factions from being able to claim, or be considered, Christianity.

And exactly who is the referee that makes the call of disqualification?

Thomas Jefferson considered himself a Christian. He seemed to have put a lot of time and effort into working out what he thought it actually means to be a Christian. Was he wrong?

So, is what Jim Jones did and taught also Christianity? Nobody seems to want to address this question. He called his insanity Christianity, but wasn't it simply insanity?

No it isn't a stretch to use the Republican example because words, and positions, have meaning.

RS

One could be a Christian and insane - they are not mutually exclusive.

Some people might even say that latter is requisite for the former!

Jim Jones was the nutbucket that lead a mass suicide/murder cult in Gana a long time ago. He considered himself a true Christian.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Jones

RS

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

proudfootz wrote:

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

proudfootz wrote:

I quite agree the No True Christian fallacy is being employed there, to what end I can't say.

What do you think the point is?

Like I said, that it's incongruous to deny something that is a fundamental part of the origin of your religion.

I don't necessarily buy the notion that Original Sin was part of the origin of christianity.

It's present both in the bible and in texts written by the early Christian communities.

As I pointed out earlier, the OT texts themselves don't explicitly contain a doctrine of Original Sin requiring a Savior and that is not apparently what Jews held.

Some early texts by christians may include the idea. They also contain evidence that there was quite a bit of controversy among christian communities regarding various doctrines.

proudfootz wrote:So it would appear we are viewing things from different perspectives.

What do you base your perspective on?

The myths about the origins of christianity are not trustworthy, and should be treated with some circumspection. This seems to be evident in the competing versions of the narratives purporting to be biographies of an earthly Jesus. The Acts of the Apostles seems to be contradictory to material found in the Epistles, which seems to me to indicate some effort to paper over doctrinal disputes.

If, as it seems, you are accepting christianity's own version of its history we are holding different perspectives on the matter.

proudfootz wrote:

It would be the equivalent of Jews who believe Moses didn't lead the Jews out of Israel because they were enslaved but because they wanted to live in Israel.

The Jewish texts speak of the Exodus as the freeing of the Jewish slaves from Egypt.

Despite the complete absence of mass enslavement of Jews in ancient Egypt, this is still a central tenet of Judaism.

There's no significant Jewish denomination that believes this did not happen, with the exception of those who dismiss the entire Jewish texts as being pure allegory.

That's all well and good, but a bit off point as to what early christians may have believed.

proudfootz wrote:

proudfootz wrote:I personally view myths about christian origins to be dubious. That christian cults can exist today without the notion of Original Sin would seem to me an indication that the doctrine was not a necessary condition at an earlier time.

That does not follow.

At best it indicates that later Christians found little or no objection to changing the original dogma.

I disagree. At the very least it demonstrates doctrines and dogmas could have changed.

That's not a disagreement of my position.

My mistake - I thought 'at best' and 'at least' would be terms indicating of disparity of views.

proudfootz wrote:At best it would indicate that Original Sin is not a necessary dogma for one to be a christian.

From a modern day perspective.

That says nothing about the early days of Christianity.

That's like arguing that marriage was always a central Chrisitan tenet, eventhough the Chruch did not officiate it until well into the Medieval period.

I'm not a huge fan of argument by analogy, but it appears to me that you are arguing because Original Sin is a major tenet of doctrine for some christian churches today it must have been a central tenet for all christian cults in the early days.

proudfootz wrote:

proudfootz wrote:
Supposing that Jesus and his first followers were Jewish, and as I pointed out in an earlier post Original Sin requiring a Savior doesn't seem to be a part of that religion, this notion would seem to have evolved at a later date.

Jesus and his followers were Jewish in almost the same sense that they are Muslims according to Islam.

They were ethnically Jews and thought of themselves the natural continuation of the Jewish faith.

They interpeted the Jewish text as predicting the arrival of Jesus and that Jesus would absolve/save them from the original sin/curse inflicted upon A&E.

Was Jesus one of these interpreters?

How would we know? We have no direct writing of him.

Indeed.

What we do know, both from the bible and other early Christian texts, is that this is the origin myth: that god had to sent Jesus to (paraphrasing) create a loophole out of the eternal, inheretable sin of A&E.

Yes, I am aware this is *a* myth about the theological necessity to accept Jesus as a Savior.

And we know this was apparently a controversial theological dogma even into the 5th century BC - when Augustine was trying to hammer out the details of this supposedly 'founding myth'.

proudfootz wrote:
Anyplace I can do some more reading on these Muslim followers of Jesus who came up with the notion of Jesus as a Savior from reading the Torah?

Read my post again, that's not what I said.

Jesus and his followers were Jewish in almost the same sense that they are Muslims according to Islam.

They interpeted the Jewish text as predicting the arrival of Jesus and that Jesus would absolve/save them from the original sin/curse inflicted upon A&E.

PensivePenny wrote:

John Platko wrote:

theropod wrote:

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

Well, the central tenets of Christianity have changed several times over the century, from marriage, female priests, to the way one get's into heaven.
It's also a bit of stretch to compare Republicans to Christians. There aren't 6000 different Republican denominations after all.

So Christianity is whatever one wants it to be? This is the entire point that somehow seems to escape everyone. There comes a point where abandonment of of these central tenets disqualifies said factions from being able to claim, or be considered, Christianity.

And exactly who is the referee that makes the call of disqualification?

Thomas Jefferson considered himself a Christian. He seemed to have put a lot of time and effort into working out what he thought it actually means to be a Christian. Was he wrong?

So, is what Jim Jones did and taught also Christianity? Nobody seems to want to address this question. He called his insanity Christianity, but wasn't it simply insanity?

No it isn't a stretch to use the Republican example because words, and positions, have meaning.

RS

One could be a Christian and insane - they are not mutually exclusive.

Some people might even say that latter is requisite for the former!

Well it was kind of dialed in from the get-go.

Mark 3 - NIH

Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. 21When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”

theropod wrote:

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

theropod wrote:So, I am obligated to provide a defintion of a true Christian when all I have ever said that some things exclude one from being able to claim Christianity? Huh.

RS

You're not obligated to do anything.
I am just saying that, without a rigourous definition of what is Truely Christian, how could you objectively claim, what is not Truely Christian?

As soon as someone, indeed anyone, will address the question I raised earlier in this thread regarding whether Jim Jones' brand of insanity can be considered Christianity I might feel more inclinded to offer my opinions in this regard. I even asked again this morning, and it hangs there like a fart in a still room. Why would that be? Could it be that if one responds either way the whole point of this thread grinds to a halt? If his batshit crazy "faith" is Christianity then anything and everything can be considered Christianity and the word has no meaning whatsoever. If his real world death cult is not Christianity I rest my case, and have demonstrated that there are exclusions to what can be reasonably considered Christianity.

RS

Did Jones and his followers believe in Jesus as some kind of messiah?

That would seem to me to be an essential dogma.

Here's an article about Jones and his career - looks like things started out pretty much mainstream christian:

The Peoples Temple was for the last 15 years of its existence a part of the Christian church (Disciples of Christ), a large mainstream Christian denomination. In the 1960s it was hailed by liberal Protestants for its social activism. Within the loose structure of the Christian church, however, it developed a unique internal life.

The Peoples Temple was founded in Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1955 by a youthful Jim Jones as an independent congregation. He eventually brought the congregation into fellowship with the Disciples of Christ and he was ordained as a minister in that church in 1965.

http://www.encyclopedia.com/people/phil ... /jim-jones

Ok, how about this angle. Let's forget original sin. Jesus was supposed to be a direct descendant of David to fulfill Old Testament prophecy. This is mentioned twice in the New Testament.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genealogy_of_Jesus

RS

theropod wrote:So, I am obligated to provide a defintion of a true Christian when all I have ever said that some things exclude one from being able to claim Christianity? Huh.

RS

Defining christianity is likely to be as slippery as defining god.

But if we are going to give ourselves license to define who is in and who is out according to adherence to certain specific doctrines, it would be interesting to know what those doctrines might be.

Perhaps Papal infallibility? It's in the bible.

theropod wrote:Ok, how about this angle. Let's forget original sin. Jesus was supposed to be a direct descendant of David to fulfill Old Testament prophecy. This is mentioned twice in the New Testament.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genealogy_of_Jesus

RS

Indeed, lots of things are mentioned in the so-called new testament.

Should all of them be required to be rightfully a christian? Or only some?

proudfootz wrote:

theropod wrote:

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

theropod wrote:So, I am obligated to provide a defintion of a true Christian when all I have ever said that some things exclude one from being able to claim Christianity? Huh.

RS

You're not obligated to do anything.
I am just saying that, without a rigourous definition of what is Truely Christian, how could you objectively claim, what is not Truely Christian?

As soon as someone, indeed anyone, will address the question I raised earlier in this thread regarding whether Jim Jones' brand of insanity can be considered Christianity I might feel more inclinded to offer my opinions in this regard. I even asked again this morning, and it hangs there like a fart in a still room. Why would that be? Could it be that if one responds either way the whole point of this thread grinds to a halt? If his batshit crazy "faith" is Christianity then anything and everything can be considered Christianity and the word has no meaning whatsoever. If his real world death cult is not Christianity I rest my case, and have demonstrated that there are exclusions to what can be reasonably considered Christianity.

RS

Did Jones and his followers believe in Jesus as some kind of messiah?

That would seem to me to be an essential dogma.

Here's an article about Jones and his career - looks like things started out pretty much mainstream christian:

The Peoples Temple was for the last 15 years of its existence a part of the Christian church (Disciples of Christ), a large mainstream Christian denomination. In the 1960s it was hailed by liberal Protestants for its social activism. Within the loose structure of the Christian church, however, it developed a unique internal life.

The Peoples Temple was founded in Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1955 by a youthful Jim Jones as an independent congregation. He eventually brought the congregation into fellowship with the Disciples of Christ and he was ordained as a minister in that church in 1965.

http://www.encyclopedia.com/people/phil ... /jim-jones

:yes:

How many grains of sand does it take to make a beach? How many (recognizing some have more weight than others) criteria does a person need to accept in order to be a "true christian?" The whole "true scotsman" fallacy exists precisely as a result of this sort of debate.

I'm still inclined to go by dictionary definitions, which reflect the defacto standard and the evolutionary fluctuations leading to it. That is about as close as we can hope to get to "objectivity" and a definitive authority. Even that isn't perfect.

proudfootz wrote:

theropod wrote:Ok, how about this angle. Let's forget original sin. Jesus was supposed to be a direct descendant of David to fulfill Old Testament prophecy. This is mentioned twice in the New Testament.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genealogy_of_Jesus

RS

Indeed, lots of things are mentioned in the so-called new testament.

Should all of them be required to be rightfully a christian? Or only some?

Not my point, or what I thought was the point of the thread. If we are going to go down the road of referring to the segments of the Bible as so-called we are just whistling in the wind.

RS

theropod wrote:

proudfootz wrote:

theropod wrote:Ok, how about this angle. Let's forget original sin. Jesus was supposed to be a direct descendant of David to fulfill Old Testament prophecy. This is mentioned twice in the New Testament.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genealogy_of_Jesus

RS

Indeed, lots of things are mentioned in the so-called new testament.

Should all of them be required to be rightfully a christian? Or only some?

Not my point, or what I thought was the point of the thread. If we are going to go down the road of referring to the segments of the Bible as so-called we are just whistling in the wind.

RS

Blame me for not getting your point.

So, what was the point of bringing up Jesus's family background?

With 40,000 + sects you can choose any flavour you want. Original sin exists for some and not for others. There are sects that dont believe that jesus existed and still call themselves xtians.

Pure madness.

proudfootz wrote:

theropod wrote:

proudfootz wrote:

theropod wrote:Ok, how about this angle. Let's forget original sin. Jesus was supposed to be a direct descendant of David to fulfill Old Testament prophecy. This is mentioned twice in the New Testament.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genealogy_of_Jesus

RS

Indeed, lots of things are mentioned in the so-called new testament.

Should all of them be required to be rightfully a christian? Or only some?

Not my point, or what I thought was the point of the thread. If we are going to go down the road of referring to the segments of the Bible as so-called we are just whistling in the wind.

RS

Blame me for not getting your point.

So, what was the point of bringing up Jesus's family background?

Blame you? Where did you come up with that?

From the onset of this thread it has been about tying the Old and New together, or so I thought.

OK, you win. I have no further interest in this silliness. Considering that I am most likely the only one of the participants in a thread specifically asking for input from those that studied the Bible beyond the layperson level I stupidly thought I might have been able to contribute in a meaningful manner. What was I thinking?

I can have meaningless arguments on Facebook where I am not bound by the FUA in place here.

RS

Hmm? I understood proudfootz was accepting the blame for the misunderstanding, theropod... Was that not an apology?

I'm thinking about taking up Mandarin, because it seems my native English I just don't understand anymore.

theropod wrote:

proudfootz wrote:

theropod wrote:

proudfootz wrote:

Indeed, lots of things are mentioned in the so-called new testament.

Should all of them be required to be rightfully a christian? Or only some?

Not my point, or what I thought was the point of the thread. If we are going to go down the road of referring to the segments of the Bible as so-called we are just whistling in the wind.

RS

Blame me for not getting your point.

So, what was the point of bringing up Jesus's family background?

Blame you? Where did you come up with that?

From the onset of this thread it has been about tying the Old and New together, or so I thought.

OK, you win. I have no further interest in this silliness. Considering that I am most likely the only one of the participants in a thread specifically asking for input from those that studied the Bible beyond the layperson level I stupidly thought I might have been able to contribute in a meaningful manner. What was I thinking?

I can have meaningless arguments on Facebook where I am not bound by the FUA in place here.

RS

Is this your way of saying that it is Jesus's lineage which ties the christian texts to the Jewish texts?

Or is it the claims by the christian writers that Jesus fulfilled some sorts of prophecies in the Jewish scriptures?

PensivePenny wrote:

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

PensivePenny wrote:In the US, I'm not so sure about elsewhere, we have this epidemic of universities who are now required, mostly by students, to provide "safe spaces" from "microagression" and other "perceived threats." It is a sign that people have become overly sensitive to criticism or disagreement, "micro-agression". Now THAT is something that SHOULD make us ALL sad. I hope it never rises to that here.

If anything it's been going the other way with trolls getting more and more leeway in flaming or outright attacking their interlocutors.

Be that as it may...I haven't attacked you.

You have. On multiple occasions you've insinuated or outright made accusations about my mental state and character.
That's what's called a personal attack.

PensivePenny wrote:Telling you I think you were rude to me isn't a personal attack. Telling you I don't wish to engage you isn't a personal attack. Calling you a man or dutch or 27 years old, isn't an "attack."

The personal attacks I am referring to are your insinuations and accusations about my mental state and character.
I've clearly explained this several times already.
So you're either still not reading what I actuallly post, or dishonestly acting obtuse to erect yet more straw-men.

PensivePenny wrote: If any of those things offend you, you need to deal with that yourself.

I've made it perfectly clear which comments of yours are personal attacks. And they're not the straw-men you've just erected.

PensivePenny wrote: I'm going solely on the information at my disposal... your avatar info. And that could all be wrong for all I know. But, it makes no real difference to me one way or the other.

You either have a problem rememebering what you post, or your acting incredibly dishonest. The following things are personal attacks that have no basis in my avatar info. Nor do you have any other sound basis to make these remarks. Not to mention that they're FUA violations either way.

Implying that I'm overly sensitive and need special considerations:

PensivePenny wrote:Whatever soothes your sensibilities Thomas

Baseless accusation about my character:

PensivePenny wrote:
Now who's making use of straw men? I think you just like to fight.

Another baseless accusation about my character and motivations:

PensivePenny wrote:

Thomas Eshuis wrote:
You still haven't answeed the question: why is it not a lot? In other words why would you expect more?

IMO, I did. If you spent more time looking for common ground than something to be contrarian about, you might have caught it. I leave it to you to (re)interpret my meaning.

More baseless accusations about my character:

PensivePenny wrote:For whatever reason, through your desire to be intentionally obtuse or adversarial or maybe just you and I don't gel... whatever the reason, I see trying to engage you as pointless.

Insinuating I am mentally handicapped and asserting I need to see a therapist:
[quote=PensivePenny"]

Thomas Eshuis wrote:
I'm not worried, only disappointed that you refuse to engage with what I actually post and have now chosen to dismiss me out of hand, based on several characteristics you've projected onto me that have no basis in reality.

If I were "disappointed" because some anonymous person on a forum wouldn't talk to me, I would evaluate that with my therapist, not share it in a public forum. That's just me. If "baiting" me is your goal, you'll have to do better.

False accusations of bullying and verbal abuse:

PensivePenny wrote:
I don't sulk when verbally abused or bullied. I always hold my ground. So, if you try any of those things, don't expect me to submit like a sad puppy with my tail between my legs. I got over my daddy issues a long time ago.

Baselessly accusing Fallible of trying to manipulate you:

PensivePenny wrote:
To me, and this is just my opinion, mind you... What I hear is manipulation for me to like who she likes, dislike who she doesn't and fall into line. Well, it isn't my experience.

And these are just the most obvious examples in this thread.

PensivePenny wrote:
Name calling is an attack, which I've not done....

Name-calling is one form of personal attack. Others include (baselessly) questioning your interlocturs sanity, motivations and character.
All of which you have done and repeatedly so, in this thread)

PensivePenny wrote: "brow beating" might be considered an attack... harassment, at the very least.

The latter having been done to ME.[/quote]
Pure fantasy.
The only reason I kept responding to your post is because you kept misrepresenting me and projecting all manner of things onto me.
If you'd just kept your word and ignored me, I wouldn't have made those posts.

PensivePenny wrote: You don't see me curling up in a ball and sucking my thumb over it.

There you go again. This is inflammatory posting Penny. Even if it were an accurate description of the situation, which it isn't by lightyears, it would still be inflammatory and a violation of the FUA.

PensivePenny wrote: I'll take the browbeating for a while...

I'm not interested in what fantasies you decide to engage in.

PensivePenny wrote: when I've had enough and the negatives of participating here exceed the positives, I'll simply find something more interesting to do.

Again, you're not the innocent party here by a long shot.

PensivePenny wrote:
Am I allowed to say there might be something more interesting? Or, is that considered another attack? The bar seems pretty low.

When you make stuff up, like you do, there is no bar.
You keep pretending I haven't long since pointed out how we could get back to a more interesting and reasonable discussion on the topic of this thread. It won't fly.

Test