The Mystery of Jesus Christ. (Page 10)

ghostgeek: Should one try to eliminate evil? It is like trying to remove one half of your body and still expecting to live.

chayi: No, every part of the body, has good or evil, so eliminating evil only takes away the evil aspect of it

ghostgeek: You are proposing to remove one half of what makes us human. If good exists in us so must evil. You cannot remove the one without destroying the other.

chayi: Evil is not a must, it's mortal

ghostgeek: It is the sum of good and evil that makes us what we are, human. The one cannot exist without the other because, in reality, they are one and the same thing. They are the exercise of free will. To do good is to mean that you haven't done evil and vice versa.

chayi: But evil is not a must to exist

ghostgeek: Good and evil are just mental constructs. They do not walk the earth.

chayi: False, evil evolves into emotion and facts and feelings

ghostgeek: It is all in the mind Chayiii. Just concepts. There is no twitchy tailed monster called Evil waiting to enter you. Good and evil is how you see the would, that is all.

chayi: Right, but it evolves into your whole existence, the thing is, that the demons and the devil club has that influance

ghostgeek: I think demons will have to wait for another night. It's supper time and no imp is going to get in the way of it.

ghostgeek: Talk of a virgin birth for Jesu was a misunderstanding resulting from a poor translation of the Old Testament into Greek. The author of the Gospel of Matthew used the Septuagint's translation of the Hebrew "almah" by the Greek "parthenos", a word that usually implies virginity. Scholars agree that almah has nothing to do with virginity "per se" but refers to a young woman, a neutral term that doesn't necessarily connote virginity. So, when Matthew states that the virgin birth of Jesus fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah 7:14 he's incorrect.

Matthew 1:22-23

"All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 'The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel' ( which means 'God with us' )."

The prophecy quoted by Matthew should instead read:

"Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign: a maiden is with child and she will bear a son, and will call his name Immanuel."

The Greek Matthew claims that the virginal conception is demonstrated by the Isaiah citation. He wishes his readers to understand that the conception of Jesus by Mary happened because, according to Isaiah, it was predestined by God. The opposite is the truth. The idea of the conceiving "parthenos", supplied by the prophecy in Greek, motivated the story.

lori100: this is interesting....-------------ancient-origins.net------The ancient text that describes Jesus as a shape-shifter------------------

It was in March last year when reports flooded the headlines about a newly deciphered Egyptian text, dating back almost 1,200 years, which controversially described Jesus as having the ability to change shape. But just as quickly as the story made its way through major news sites around the world, it disappeared and has hardly been mentioned since. Why has the study and research surrounding this text faded into oblivion? Why has there been virtually no scholarly debate on the subject?

Written in the Coptic language, the ancient text written in the name of St. Cyril of Jerusalem, a distinguished theologian who lived during the fourth century, tells part of the crucifixion story of Jesus with apocryphal plot twists, some of which have never been seen before. They have been revealed thanks to a translation carried out by Roelof Van den Broek of Ultrecht University in the Netherlands, and published in the book ‘Pseudo-Cyril of Jerusalem On the Life and the Passion of Christ: A Coptic Apocryphon’.

The ancient text explains why Judas used a kiss, specifically, to betray Jesus. According to the canonical bible, the apostle Judas betrays Jesus in exchange for money by using a kiss to identify him leading to Jesus' arrest. This apocryphal tale explains that the reason Judas used a kiss, specifically, is because Jesus had the ability to change shape.


Then the Jews said to Judas: How shall we arrest him [Jesus], for he does not have a single shape but his appearance changes. Sometimes he is ruddy, sometimes he is white, sometimes he is red, sometimes he is wheat coloured, sometimes he is pallid like ascetics, sometimes he is a youth, sometimes an old man ...

This leads Judas to suggest using a kiss as a means to identify him. If Judas had given the arresters a description of Jesus he could have changed shape. By kissing Jesus Judas tells the people exactly who he is.

This understanding of Judas' kiss goes way back. According to Van den Broek, the explanation of Judas’ kiss is first found in Origen, a theologian who lived 185-254 AD. In his work, Contra Celsum, the ancient writer, stated that "to those who saw him [Jesus] he did not appear alike to all."

Van den Broek is careful to note that he is not suggesting that Jesus was in fact shape changing but only that some people in early Christian times may have thought he was.

The text is one of fifty-five Coptic manuscripts that were found in 1910 by villagers digging for fertilizer at the site of the destroyed Monastery of Archangel Michael of the Desert near Al Hamuli in Egypt. Apparently, during the tenth century, monks had buried the monastery's manuscripts in a stone vat for safekeeping. The monastery ceased operations around the early 10th century, and the text was rediscovered in the spring of 1910. In December 1911, it was purchased, along with other texts, by American financier J.P. Morgan. His collections, and the text described, are now housed in the Morgan Library and Museum in New York City.

While headlines at the time of the announcement were quite sensationalist and described the text as containing Christianity-shattering information, the publishing scholar never claimed anything of the sort. It is also clear that the text is not a hoax but a genuine item published by a respected scholar by a notable academic press (E. J. Brill). So why hasn’t such a fascinating text led to further research, interpretations, or discussion among scholars
- See more at: http://www.ancient-origins.net/unexplained-phenomena/ancient-text-describes-jesus-shape-shifter-001361#sthash.7YNXyZba.dpuf

ghostgeek: Interesting Lori. I have to admit this is news to me. As your post above says, Van den Broek isn't actually claiming Jesus was a shapeshifter, only that the manuscript, written in the eighth or ninth century in the name of St. Cyril of Jerusalem says He was. Near the beginning of the text, Cyril, or the person writing in his name, claims that a book has been found in Jerusalem showing the writings of the apostles on the life and crucifixion of Jesus. I see one of the claims is that Jesus was arrested on Tuesday evening, and that His Last Supper was with Pontius Pilate who offered his only son as a stand-in for Jesus. The offer was declined, it is to be noted.

ghostgeek:

chronology: Lori. There is nothing in the Gospels to suggest Judas had any out of the ordinary abilities other than theft and lying and embezzlement. Other close friends of Jesus could not recognise Him at times, Jesus also vanished into thin air while stood among friends and strangers alike on a number of occasions.

The point of understanding the arrest of Jesus is that He deliberately allowed Himself to be taken into custody. There was not a thing Judas could do to outwit Jesus and trick Him into being arrested.

One creepy legend from Jerusalem today says that every drop of blood Christ shed on the ground during His arrest and execution was licked up at night by people seeking power, others say that was how Vampires first began their life cycle on Earth. There is nothing biblical about such legends, so who knows how true they are?

lori100: yes, just interesting...

Zanjan: Another 14 year old hits and runs through.

shadowline: The Testamentum Flavianum, if I may return to that for a moment, is usually considered a corrupt but genuine passage, and the most valuable and impressive historical reference to Jesus dating from his own century. That the passage contains references which would not have come from Josephus is probably due to tampering on the part of Medieval copyists, but most scholars are agreed that the interpolations can be identified and edited out, leaving a genuine core which was almost certainly written by Josephus himself. That makes the passage a testimonial to Jesus' historical existence by a non-Christian writer, from Jesus' own country, who was in a position to know, and who is considered a solid source in general.

Zanjan: I doubt very much the people of the same generation as Jesus had any clue at all what a great figure He would become; they had no way of seeing the full impact of His teachings. Aside from that, why would they pick Him out of a crowd of religious claimants, a Person with a ministry of only 3 years?

PequenaTha: Reza-se diariamente durante a novena:
Santíssima Trindade, Pai, Filho e espírito× Santo, eu Vos agradeço todos os favores e todas as graças com que enriquecestes a alma de vossa serva× Teresinha do Menino Jesus, durante os 24 anos que passou na terra.
E pelos méritos de tão querida Santinha, concedei-me a graça que ardentemente× Vos peço (... faça aqui o pedido ...) se for conforme a vossa santíssima vontade e para a salvação de minha alma.

Rezam-se em seguida:
24 vezes "Glória ao× Pai, ao Filho e ao× Santo, assim como era no princípio, agora e sempre, por todos os séculos dos séculos. Amém!"
Pode-se acrescentar a cada "Glória ao Pai", a jaculatória:
"Santa Teresinha do× Jesus, rogai por nós!"

E para finalizar:
1 Pai-Nosso
1 Ave Maria

lori100: ^^^fourth time she posted it....now it's 14 times posted....on dating, religion threads

ghostgeek: I might be able to answer in twenty years time, when I've learnt Portuguese. Till then, I haven't a clue what she said. Something about Jesus I think.