The Mystery of Jesus Christ. (Page 7)

The13th: Sigh. Looks like even this slaying of baby is a bit far fetched. No gag order will ever prevent things like that from being written down and pass on. May be Herod is a bad guy, may be he can order 100s to be crucified in those lawless land. But ordering baby to be terminated is far fetched. I guess other than bibilical tales, no one ever claimed that.

The13th: More sigh. Even Wikipedia doubt the massacre of innocent ever took place. The courage of christian to record fictitious even would embarras the most sensationalistic journalism. Normally when we fabricate. We try at least to make a bubble that is not so easy to burst.

ghostgeek: It's quite possible that the author of the Gospel of Matthew made up the story about the Star of Bethlehem so as to present the birth of Jesus as a fulfillment of the prophecy of Micah 5:2

"But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times."

It seems there was a visit to Rome of a delegation of magi at the time of a spectacular appearance of Halley's Comet in AD 66, led by King Tiridates of Armenia, who came seeking confirmation of his title from Emperor Nero. The possibility exists that this event formed the basis for that wandering star we hear so much about. Remember, Matthew's Gospel is thought to have composed around 70 - 90 A.D. If this idea is correct it would suggest that the killing of the children is probably also false.

The13th: yes. Killing of babies in a raging war can happen, but plotting the termination of 2 years old babies life never ever happened in the history of mankind. Dont ever underestimate the EQ of those tyrants and bad guys. They just dont do that.

Zanjan: Boyz, there are people TODAY who kill children. Hitler thought nothing of it, neither did the Africans in the recent tribal wars. History attests to the practice of killing children as a sacrifice to God to assuage His wrath.

That still happens. In Peru, after recent devastating earthquakes, some people took out a bunch of children and sacrificed them to their God. This is the 21st century! Did YOU know about that? Well, it was on the news.

Outside of war, assassinations kill children along with the target, parents kill their children. Psychos go into schools and shoot children, pedophiles stalk, capture and kill children of certain ages in serial killings. You have only to look around you today to know what's plausible. It's all over the media, but who will remember each case 50 years hence, other than the survivors?

Don't you think the times are the same as in the time of the Christ? Doesn't that signal something to you?

Of course, Herod was the first anti-Christ of that generation.

The13th: Examples that you are given are just sicko or people consumed by hatred. For sicko, they would chop anything. Last Friday a drug addict sicko lured a 2 years old gal from a shopping complex where I normally have lunch, and chop her head off. The sicko later get cornered by police and drown in the river. Things like that happen and I dont necessary regard that as "modern day supporting evidence" of Herod slashed 2 years old babies. I also don't draw parallel between now and then. Herod arent sicko. He is a ruler. If he felt threatened, he can banish a lot of people, not just the babies. But above all, those people who wrote the wikipedia, which probably draw from many other sources, believe the killing of infant did not happen. I am not saying that kids are safe on the street. A lot of heart wrenching bad things can happen to kids if you leave them alone on the street, but no reasonably sane man who plot against a bunch of 2 years old. Bad guys like Herod simply wont felt threaten by 2 years old.

Zanjan: Herod was a sicko because he was corrupt, consumed by lust of power. An organic illness would have prevented him from functioning on a daily basis, which was not the case. He had a spiritual illness which made him capable of many unconscionable doings.

Why would you think someone who held a high rank would be immune to that?

When God sends a Prophet, He sends Him to absolutely the worst place on earth, the most corrupt, where the people can't help themselves anymore. God sends the Prophet for the healing of the Nations.

The13th: Zan, you have been analytical when it comes to analyse movement of stars, but when it come to biblical tales you just accept it as that must be the case, and heap piles of adjectives on herod that he probably don't deserve.
Now a place became the worst place on earth normally not because of one person or one organization, but mostly because everyone is trying to be an ass of a man. You can't run a place like this without some heavy hand method. Herod probably did and thus earn himself a bad name. And I probably cannot expect the "book" to provide an accurate and fair assessment of its enemies. But in all fairness, if herod and his boys do not exist, are the people all suddenly going to live happily after? Very unlikely. Its probably still he worst place on earth.

Zanjan: From what history says of Herod's acts, I can most certainly and accurately determine what was wrong with him. He falls into a classic pattern of behaviour, which most people should be able to recognize.

Israel is far from the worst place on earth, though it was in that country that I saw, for the first time in my life, pure hatred on someones face. We were strangers and I was just walking by. I continued walking, thinking how absolutely miserable that man must have been. But it was nothing to pity.

There's a time and place for force, Boyz, but justice should always be. Those who know and love God have every reason to be happy forever.

ghostgeek: Whatever Herod's faults, he has been judged by history to have been a competent ruler. He may have been the head of a disfunctional family but he managed to placate both the Romans and his own citizens, thus ensuring both peace and a measure of prosperity for his kingdom. It is noticeable that only in Matthew do we hear about the killing of children. Luke, the other gospel that mentions the birth of Jesus, has an entirely different story to tell. To my mind the author of Matthew could have been using a tale from the Old Testament, the birth of Moses where the Pharaoh ordered all newborn Hebrew boys to be killed, to embellish his own narrative.

Zanjan: Herod didn't give his people peace - he gave them order and obligation, by his own standard. His kingdom didn't prosper because he was the most 'influential' person in it. From where do you think the money came to build the temple? Political moves don't happen without negotiation; a bargain struck. He was an effective ruler, not a competent one.

Had he been competent, he'd have made provision for the long term future of his kingdom. As you know, it collapsed and the Monarchy dissolved, never to be seen again.

Zanjan: If Mathew was using the the Egyptian theme, why would you believe the Egyptians killed all Hebrew male babes but not that Herod killed them too?

Why would you ignore the later wrath of God against the Egyptians, tit for tat, on their own first born males? Then also, the wrath of God against the Jewish kingdom?

Zanjan: By the way, about the death of first born Egyptian males. I saw a documentary where science tried to explain that plague. They figure they were killed by poisonous swamp gas that rolled in at night through the city. The highest ranking males (first born) traditionally slept with their beds at a certain level due to pecking order - the gas only moved at a certain level from the ground.

ghostgeek: I have no idea whether the Egyptians killed even one baby. That is not the point. The fact that the story exists in the Old Testament means it could have been reused by the author of Matthew.

We all know Herod had his faults but he did spread some money around and, compared to the situation that existed before him, he did bring peace. Let us not forget why Palestine was part of the Roman Empire. Squabbling princes, fighting over who should run the country, asked Pompey and the Roman army to help in their dispute. The Romans gladly obliged. Herod was a client king who made sure the Romans didn't interfere in the internal running of the country by keeping the peace and paying tribute. That his methods were sometimes brutal was dictated by the situation he faced. Mostly, like Hitler much later on, he balanced opposing forces so that they neutralised each other. Where his political skills failed him was in his dealings with his family, hence the dead relatives. It was the failure of his son Archelaus to rule effectively in the territories of Judea, Samaria and Idumea that resulted in them being administered as an official province of Rome. That's how Pontius Pilate gets into the Bible.

I've seen it suggested that the plagues of Egypt were the result of the eruption of Thera. Just one more theory to contend with.

Zanjan: Any way you want to make it sound, Herod still had his ass backed into a corner. You're right on one thing - had there not been so many sycophants and ruthless power mongers, that kingdom might not have fallen. Rome fell right after it; they were all the same.

I don't think Pontius Pilate was a bad guy - just a no-nonsense person doing his job. He got sent to the "front" because he did something that didn't please Ceasar - probably something honest.

Well, nature does strike back - God has a handle on that. Pompeii & Herculanium - you only need to piss off ONE God. Those people didn't know Vesuvius was a live volcano - it hadn't errupted for 1,800 years. It's all in the timing, you know.

The Egyptian plague of frogs was because they jumped out of the water - there was a quake and fizzure where hot red mineral stuff oozed up into the river.

Moses's trek to the Red Sea was guided - in those days, it was called the Reed Sea because it was shallow- there was a land bridge there; all He had to do was wait for the signal for the waters to slide away on either side, as they do just before and after a Tsunami. Except in this case, the earth bridge sunk lower, as happened to the Island of Japan.

The13th: I am perplexed. It just doesn't feel right to analyze and offer plausible explanation for events that no one ever have a clue whether they took place at all. Perhaps if we can only establish that something did happen e.g. I saw a woman flying outside down. Its real. I would love to hear an explanation, but if thereis none then i m equally happy since it did happened.

ghostgeek: This is the problem, isn't it Boyzz, we know Christianity existed in the first century A,D. but it's not possible to state, with absolute certainty, that there was ever a living Jesus. If you reject the Gospel accounts as being historically accurate, and I do, then you are left to swim in a sea of speculation. All you can do is look at the available scraps of evidence and come to your own conclusion.

Zanjan: Since when was there ever a new religion without a Founder, whose name all its followers mention?

You can't reject history as not being historically accurate unless you were there. You'd need a massive amount of evidence to even think otherwise, and that entails NOT rejecting the first hand accounts of the writers.

ghostgeek: I haven't rejected first hand accounts because I'm still looking for some.

The13th: The "first hand account of the writer" called for some clarification. I just read somewhere that the book of Paul, Mark, Luke and James are all written by anonymous i.e. not Paul Mark James and Luke. So its definitely not first person. Average age of person in those days are shorter, so I do not know how many generations have passed before the account were written.

ghostgeek: It's not the average age that counts but the lifespan of those who wrote things down. Maybe they didn't all live to a ripe old age but some surely did. Most likely, the writers of the Gospels were born around the time Jesus is supposed to have died. This means it's possible they could have heard the testimony of people who claimed to have seen Jesus in life. That's not to say their evidence would be reliable, just that it might have been recorded.

ghostgeek:

Zanjan: You might notice the scriptures generally don't speak ill of anyone by name; they simply state events.

ghostgeek: OK Zanjan, duly noted. Maybe those Gospel writers wanted to keep the Romans on side. Butter them up a bit. Better than a Roman spear up the jacksie, at the very least.

chayim: jesus was born to his Jewish mother Mirriam, Mirriam is a Hebrew female name, מרים, Moses's sister was so called, shortly it's Marry, his mother commited adultery, and jesus what his Jewish name was Yehoishua, was born as a bastard, he had a bad sinned nature, he did black magic, demonic unholy spirits, the bible is not the real picture of jesus, the bible was written by paul and peter, both Jews, and they wrote Jewish wisdom and knowledge in the bible, the whole entire bible is built on Judaism, the so called OT in the bible, is the Jewish Torah and prophecy books, and the so called NT is built on Jewish knowledge about the true Messiah, they put it on jesus, jesus was not killed and crucified by the romans, the Jewish Sanhedrin congress killed him, and than he was hung for one day, the whole crucifiction is lies

The whole christianity written in the bible is pure Judaism, it's all written in the Jewish books