An anon posted his thoughts the other day,
>> No.8917348
and I'd like to say thank you. His thoughts:
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My case for Christ, Anon-Style.
First I'm going to argue the case for Jesus The Christ as a historical man that was born as a bastard of Mary of Arimathea, a woman from a wealthy tin mining family, and King Herod Antipater II. This man existed and would have been born right around what we refer to as year 0, then in 30AD he returns to Judea and sought his rightful place as King, however the Jews hated him as he was not a Jew and would have been the first Roman king of Judea. They had him hanged, but not before he won the hearts and minds of many Judean citizens by, among many other things, treating them as equals. After all, he had been raised as a common citizen due to his mother not wanting the king to have him killed so he wouldn't be heir to the throne.
From a logical standpoint, this historical figure who's lineage can be traced and factual accounts of which exist, is most likely the real Jesus The Christ.
Next, a case for the historical figure Jesus who raised the dead and fed 5,000 people with 5 loaves of bread. He walked on water and sacrificed himself so that those around him to witness his existence would have been absolutely certain he was the son of God. He even went as far as to bring himself back to life and ascend into heaven after moving a 10 ton rock out of the way with no blood left in his body and the first signs of decay setting in. It's a big argument to make and one that I've never, for whatever reason, been able to swallow hole, especially when considering his doctrine was "Whoever believes this story shall find his way to Heaven and if you don't, you don't [find your way to heaven]." This hardly seems fair to the, oh, 15 billion people who didn't get to witness his miracles.
Finally, the case for Christ, the Jesus of Christianity. An aura of good will, do unto others as you would have done unto yourself. Lend a hand to a man in need. It's better to love than hate because your hatred ends up owning you. When I put my faith in this Jesus, my life improves. I love this Jesus and you will have a hard time convincing me this Jesus isn't alive and well because he lives in my heart.
[We Americans are a Christian nation.]
So, there you have it, Anons. That's my personal case for Christ. Perhaps you have your own? Am I a Christian? You bet! Do I believe what a Jewish prisoner of war [one of the Gospel writers] wrote of him 40 years after he may or may not have existed, word for word? I wish I could, but I can't abandon reason to that degree, especially when that same POW not only avoided being murdered for his "historical accounts" but went on to be given the name of Caesar for his writings [?]. It takes an awful lot of money to write a book in those days (relatively speaking) someone has to fund that venture and it's most likely the funding party will have an interest in the utility of that thing they paid for.
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I'm not a church goer or much of a bible student, so I did a bit of digging after reading that. I found this notable:
The Gospels were written by highly literate, Greek-speaking Christians living 40-65 years after the death of Jesus. … These authors were not eyewitnesses. They lived in different countries from Jesus. The disciples of Jesus were lower-class, illiterate, Aramaic-speaking peasants from Galilee. They could not read, let alone write. None of them wrote down what Jesus said. …
Not trying to start a slide here. Just my way of thanking the anon who shared his thoughts only to have them buried in the usual clutter. Apologies for the minor edits and emphasis.