Many people claim to believe in the God of Abraham and In Jesus, as many claim to believe in Mohammed. While that seems perfectly average, consider that those people believe while disclaiming the scriptures which teach of them.

Word of mouth will suffice if written documentation is forbidden however, today we are so far removed from the word of mouth scenario that I have to wonder; where do individuals who believe in holy ‘beings’ get their beliefs if not from the scriptures?

Example: if you believe in Jesus, how do you think you came by the beliefs you hold if not from the bible?

As a child, you hear your parents and other adults talk.

Hmmmmmm, well, I keep being told what I believe in the General Religion forum.


So apparently I get my beliefs from the Mingle2 Forums...

hmm, I exist, rather someone ever reads about me or not

so I suppose the answer to the thread title is.....'yes'



as to where I get my knowledge of Jesus life, yes its from the bible


just like I learned of thousands of other historical figures through some sort of accepted literature,,,,

certainly noone in my private life personally shared stories or knowledge about them as was done through 'word of mouth'

I suppose that could be. But why would simply hearing adults talk about God give a child enough of an understanding to not only believe in God but believe that the what the bible or the Quran says about God is incorrect?

I hope you're not making notes because it all changes too quickly.

Seriously though. Several times in the religious forums we hear believers making claims that are very different from each other and it seems to me that some are simply saying that not all of scripture is correct.

In effect those people believe in god, Jesus, or Muhommad but don't believe the scriptures that teach about them are correct.

Hense my question is, if scripture is claimed to be the directed word of god then shouldn't it be accurate and shouldn't scripture 'teach' how to be obedient without having to interpret using one's own brand of logic?

I'm not trying to start anything, just asking because I really don't understand.

That all makes sense becuase you have often shared parts of your history that includes your families beiefs. You actually learned about who Jesus is (to you) and what god expects of you through the bible.

But what if someone says they believe in God and that Jesus is the messiah but they discredit almost everything else in the bible. So I'm trying to figure out how a person can belive in God and Jesus with no other beliefs (morals & sense of duty, etc)about them.

Why would someone accept only God & Jesus and nothing else?

I dont know how one can develop a belief in God or jesus without any other beliefs,,,,because I think beliefs are developed through experience and environment and that they are either strengthened or dissolved with every new experience we have

so that we cant truly have beliefs based in 'only' one thing , unless we have absolutely no experiences of our own,,,

I met both Jesus and Mohammed more than once without the bible being involved so yepper.

Other kids. Example, my daughter told me this evening "Daddy, angels watch over me." I replied, "no they don't, who told you that?" Her cousin mentioned it the night before during a sleepover (my sister is fairly religious, not a fundamentalist like my aunt, luckily).

With no desire to tell her that her little cousin and my sister were crazy (I actually get along well with my sister, since she's not one to preach) and I hesitated ... I ended up just saying that sometimes people believe in silly things because they don't know how things really work.

These scriptures are at the beginning of recorded history. Just
because the stories may not be historically accurate does not mean
that Jesus or Mohammed or Buddha never existed.



People may accept that the individuals described actually existed but
that the stories are not historically accurate. There is no logical
inconsistency in that.

Of course there is a large body of literature discussing the
significance of the stories and the individuals described also.

Take for example Alexander the Great's great-great-grandmother.

She existed and there isn't even any scripture at all written about
her as far as I know!!

Even if I read some stories about her it would not erase her from existence!



How about Socrates? Stories concerning Socrates might not be historically accurate.

I don't know about Mohammed. But the biblical Jesus most certainly could not exist without scripture, because that's the only place these rumors come from.

Some people might argue that there possibly exists historical information of some guy being crucified for some vague reasons and they could argue that this give a "historical perspective" for Jesus.

But those claims would have nothing at all to do with the "biblical Jesus" because there is nothing in those claim that would suggest that Jesus was born of a virgin, or that he was the only begotten son of any God, or that he even rose from the dead after the crucifixion.

So, for all intents and purposes, the answer must necessarily be no.

There can be no Jesus without scriptures.

As far those who say, "Well, we hear about it via word of mouth". But those rumors ultimately came from the scriptures as well. So there is no "word of mouth" rumors going around today that actually stem directly from the period when these events supposedly took place.

So truly all that exists of these rumors is indeed what is contained in the scriptures or has been generated by them.

So the answer has to be no. Do away with the very few rumors that we call "The Bible" and there would be no such thing as a "Jesus" in terms of the mythological demigod that they describe.

is not knowing of something the same as something not existing?

just asking

Well there is always Josephus etc.

http://www.rationalchristianity.net/jesus_extrabib.html

People already overlook a million good reasons why not to believe in the Bible, i think if you took the bible out of existence people would still believe in it. It must just be a human trait to believe in something rather than nothing, even if that something basically amounts to nothing.

Yes, I'm quoting wikipedia here, but only because it concurs with everything I've ever read about your proof there:



Point being, like the Bible, this document cannot pass any authenticity standards except on faith.

Well there are others from the time period too...I just don't think
it is so cut and dried...

=-=-=-=-=-= from the reference I linked...

Josephus (A.D. 37 - c. A.D. 100)

Josephus' Antiquities (early 2nd century A.D.) refers to Jesus in two separate passages. The common translation of the first passage, Book 18, Ch. 3, part 3, is disputed and is most likely from an altered source. F. F. Bruce has provided a more likely translation:

Now there arose at this time a source of further trouble in one Jesus, a wise man who performed surprising works, a teacher of men who gladly welcome strange things. He led away many Jews, and also many of the Gentiles. He was the so-called Christ. When Pilate, acting on information supplied by the chief men around us, condemned him to the cross, those who had attached themselves to him at first did not cease to cause trouble, and the tribe of Christians, which has taken this name from him is not extinct even today.

The translations of this passage are discussed in Josephus: Testimonium Flavianum from Jesus.com.au.

The second passage is from Book 20, Ch. 9, part 1:

...so he assembled the sanhedrim of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned...

(Note: The Antiquities can be found at several different sites, including the Christian Classics Ethereal Library, Perseus Digital Library and Crosswalk.com)


Tacitus (c. A.D. 55 - c. A.D. 117)
Annals, book XV:

Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular.


Suetonius (c. A.D. 69 - c. A.D. 140)

Lives of the Caesars - Claudius, sec. 25:

He banished from Rome all the Jews, who were continually making disturbances at the instigation of one Chrestus.

Lives of the Caesars - Nero, sec. 16

Punishment was inflicted on the Christians, a class of men given to a new and mischievous superstition.


Julius Africanus (c. 160 - c. 240)

Chronography, XVIII refers to writings by Thallus and Phlegon concerning the darkness during the Crucifixion:

On the whole world there pressed a most fearful darkness; and the rocks were rent by an earthquake, and many places in Judea and other districts were thrown down. This darkness Thallus, in the third book of his History, calls, as appears to me without reason, an eclipse of the sun...Phlegon records that, in the time of Tiberius Caesar, at full moon, there was a full eclipse of the sun from the sixth hour to the ninth - manifestly that one of which we speak.


Origen (c. 185 - c. 254)

In Against Celsus, Origen quotes Celsus, a second-century skeptic, on Jesus. Celsus' view of Christians and Christianity, an article from Bluffton College, contains relevant excerpts.


Pliny the Younger (c. 62 - c. 113)

Letters, 10.96-97 records Pliny's dealings with Christians

=-=-=-=-=

BTW, I just closed my Bible. Did the 10 Commandments cease to exist
yet? Or are they still there?!

I have no doubt that rumors of a "Christ" arose from some social events. That's truly irrelevant.

The questions that are paramount are the questions concerning the specific verbatim claims made in the biblical texts, specially those associated with a "virgin birth", claims of being the "only begotten son of God", and claims of a resurrections, etc.

Even the writings of the New Testament are not consistent in their rumors. At one point they have Jesus being accused of blaspheme when he claims to be a child or God. But in response to that he supposedly points out that in the religious texts of the culture it even claims that we are all children of the most high.

Not only does that fly in the very face of Jesus supposedly proclaiming to be the "only begotten" son of God, but it clearly implies that he was alluding to a pantheistic view of creation.

So these rumors are inconsistent at the very best in the very claims that they make.

It appears to me that the things you've mentioned concerning the writings of Josephus would be totally consistent with my conclusion that Jesus was most likely a Mahayana Buddhist Bodhisattva who probably became active in civil rights movement and was indeed ultimately crucified by his opposition.

I have no doubt that there were indeed rumors that tried to make out like Jesus was the "Christ" or "Messiah". Apparently there was as much, if not more, controversy about those rumors back in those days. The Jews didn't accept those rumors and rejected them as such.

But at the same time they recognized this man named Jesus or James, or whatever his name might have been to have been a spiritually motivated man, not unlike other spiritually enlightened men such as Buddha.

There probably was an uprising over the crucifixion of a man who was ultimately trying to stand up for what's good and just in the face of the political opposition that existed at the time. Clearly the Jews were living in an extremely oppressive time living under Roman rule. So they needed a "Savior"

thats scary

Id hate to think that if two thousand years from now noone happens to be able to PERSONALLY have a memory of my existence, and the documents (limited that they are) were no longer around,,,that it would mean I never existed,,,,,what a paradox

We've been through this list before: http://mingle2.com/topic/show/305204?page=13

And except for the possibly doctored translation on that website, none mentioned Jesus by name and even the self-proclaimed "honorable" Tacitus named the Christians as terrorists and instigators of violence.