Religion
Related: About this forumFlash! Fox’s Megyn Kelly now admits Jesus may not be 'white'
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/DC-Decoder/Decoder-Wire/2013/1214/Flash!-Fox-s-Megyn-Kelly-now-admits-Jesus-may-not-be-white-videoFox News host Megyn Kelly caused a mini-media storm when she asserted that Santa Claus and Jesus were both white. She backed off a bit on Jesus, but accuses her critics of race-baiting.
By Brad Knickerbocker, Staff writer / December 14, 2013
Megyn Kelly, host of Fox News Channel's "The Kelly Files," raised a mini-media storm when she claimed that Santa Claus and Jesus were "white men."
Richard Drew/AP
For TV personalities, the most important thing is exposure, even often especially if it means controversy. Toss out some outrageous political or cultural tidbit and watch the fur fly as your audience numbers bounce up.
Sometimes the tidbit goes too far, even for cable TV. Martin Bashir got bounced from MSNBC recently for what he admitted had been his shameful comments about Sarah Palin. (Americas resident dunce, the British broadcaster had called her.)
But anybody who thinks that Fox News host Megyn Kelly was actually shocked shocked! that people would react to her comments this week about Santa Claus and Jesus doesnt understand the way such things work.
The point was to keep her in the news, and her assertion that Santa and Jesus one a historical figure, the other (dont tell the kids) a made-up character were both white, and that "just because it makes you feel uncomfortable it doesn't mean it has to change certainly did just that.
more at link
Schema Thing
(10,283 posts)rug
(82,333 posts)Schema Thing
(10,283 posts)being tutored by Aristotle and conquering the world and shit.
I guess while he was sitting for some of those similar looking bust and artworks depicting him, he could have at least dictated a few chapters?
rug
(82,333 posts)Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)Your claim here is that the historical evidence for Jesus is equivalent to the historical evidence for Alexander?
Seriously?
rug
(82,333 posts)I made no "claim".
The response was to a comment that Jesus wrote nothing. BFD. There are dozens of historical figures who have written nothing.
If you want to discuss historiography, that's one thing. If you want to push an agenda, go back to GD and continue to rant against guns.
Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)Or is this instead your usual descent into personal attacks?
rug
(82,333 posts)Nice try.
Not to be personal, but is this instead your usual attempt to turn a topic into your predetermined agenda?
Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)cbayer
(146,218 posts)Warren Stupidity
(48,181 posts)cbayer
(146,218 posts)rug
(82,333 posts)Here, amuse yourself with Atwill.
http://caesarsmessiah.com/blog/
I'm sure you two can keep yourselves busy for hours.
stopbush
(24,395 posts)We miss out on the power of myth when we feel the need to morph mythical figures into historic figures. This is especially true of the ham-fisted attempts in the Gospels based on Mark to turn Mark's entirely allegorical figure of Jesus into a flesh-and-blood historical personage.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)If not, what would you call him?
Schema Thing
(10,283 posts)His presence during the time he was supposedly walking the earth (which is not an agreed upon or attested to data set) is sort of like the time GW Bush was supposedly showing up for duty in the Alabama national guard, except with even less supporting evidence. But at least Bush will leave behind paintings and pain.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)Whether he was an individual, a compilation or even primarily a myth, the impact has has been enormous.
Since the issue will probably never be fully resolved, does it really matter?
At any rate, whatever he is, I feel certain that he is a historical figure.
Bush will leave behind paintings and pain, but he will never, ever have the historical impact that the Jesus character has had.
Schema Thing
(10,283 posts)However, now that I think the lack of historical testament shows there was no single historical "Jesus" figure, or if there was he was a rather unremarkable person compared to the worshipful mythology that followed, I don't really care so much. And, I think that if everyone felt this way, it does seem like there would be much less strife in this world.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)individual (or group of individuals).
Hardly unremarkable, at any rate.
Whether there would be more or less strife if everyone felt the way you do is debatable.
Most of us feel that if everyone saw things like we do, the world would be a much better place.
Perhaps it is true, but it would be oh so dull.
Schema Thing
(10,283 posts)about: everyone seeing things like I do. Not gonna happen.
I think the worshipful mythology, especially as it exist by now, is a sort of "reverse engineering": all these billions of people believe, these giant institutions exist, every human's existence has been touched, and history has been incontrovertibly altered - See, Jesus not only existed, but HAD to be an incredibly special, remarkable person/god for all that to be so.
I just don't think that's true. Christians shouldn't take it personal though - I know that Mohammed existed, but I don't think he had any real connection to a supreme being, although it would not surprise me if he sincerely believed that he did. And he's got just about as many followers (more?) and has touched the world just about as powerfully.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)Geez, I can't even get my husband to think like me, lol!
I guess whether people actually existed or whether the things attributed to them actually occurred makes little difference.
I can see the good messages that have come out from all the religions that I am familiar with and also see how some of the messages have led to evil and been corrupted.
Cherry picking is ok by me, as long as the cherries picked lead to betterment and not destruction.
trotsky
(49,533 posts)Who decides if a cherry leads to "betterment," cbayer? You don't have any right at all to tell others what to think. Their opinions are just as valid as yours. Maybe someday you'll understand.
dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)SaltyBro
(198 posts)stopbush
(24,395 posts)cbayer
(146,218 posts)trotsky
(49,533 posts)Have you ever seen a picture of Jesus?
Skittles
(153,141 posts)cbayer
(146,218 posts)Squinch
(50,935 posts)would nod their heads and agree with her.
edhopper
(33,556 posts)I'm not saying they were better people or Gods or whatever, just more important to a lot of the kids out there.
cbayer
(146,218 posts)Very white.
amerxp
(6 posts)Theres an elegant, albeit scrupulously self-serving reason why an awful lot (82%) of the canonical writings pertaining to Jesus were left on the cutting-room floor in the Christian bibles 300+ year editing process. While charlatans, liars and counterfeiters of the highest order, the nameless proof readers and editors ultimately in-charge of fashioning the orthodox Christian product werent entirely insane. From the creepily coercive homosexual Jesus who surfaces in James 2nd Apocalypse and the Secret Gospel of Mark (Jesus told him what to do and in the evening the youth came to him, wearing a linen cloth over his naked body. And he remained with him that night, for Jesus taught him the mystery of the kingdom of God) to the gnostic gospel of Thomas (which miraculously forgets to mention the crucifixion) there are in fact over seventy so-named Apocryphal books that were evidently considered either too outlandish or simply too contradictory by early Christian publicists to make the final grade. Alone, this is
a remarkable statement as it means Mathews post-crucifixion Zombie Apocalypse (which, extraordinarily, no one in all of Judea seemed to have noticed) was deemed at some point by these same men to be perfectly credible. Credible, that is to say, when perhaps compared to the mob of hideous, fire breathing, winged dragons a two-year-old, nappy wearing Jesus battles (and bests) on his way to Egypt.
That particular story is found in the 18th Chapter of the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew; one of the nine so-called Infancy Gospels which detail the early life of a thoroughly odd, utterly ghastly little boy named, Jesus; a boy you seriously, absolutely, positively wouldnt want as a neighbour.
Three years after the dragon incident, now aged five and back in Nazareth (which incidentally wouldnt actually exist as a town until at least five generations later), Jesus was playing on the muddy banks of a creek with some other kids. Being Jesus he fashions some birds out of clay, whispers life into the statues, and they happily fly away (Infancy Gospel of Thomas 3:2-3). Another boy saw this and for reasons hed soon regret meandered up to Jesus pool of miracle-mud and started poking at it with a stick. Puddles, evidently, meant a lot to Jesus because he goes balls-in-the-air ballistic and murders the kid right there on the spot. O evil, ungodly, and foolish one, what hurt did the pools and the waters do thee? Behold, now also thou shalt be withered like a tree, and shalt not bear leaves, neither root, nor fruit. And straightway that lad withered up wholly. (Pseudo-Matthew 27-28)
A little later on that same day Jesus is walking through the streets of Nazareth (streets which, of course, wouldnt be laid until at least the middle of the 2nd century) whereupon a happy-go-lucky boy carelessly, but accidently, bumps up against him. Without rhyme or reason Jesus goes berserk and in a frenzied fit of rage promptly murders that kid as well. Jesus was provoked and said unto him, Thou shalt not finish thy course. And immediately he fell down and died. (Infancy Gospel of Thomas 4:1)
With the homicidal butchering of two kids under his belt before even lunchtime the
five-year-old then goes completely off the rails and in an eruption of egomaniacal hellfire orders that the terrified children of Nazareth (which didnt exist) worship him as a king. Panic-stricken they obey and mobilise into Jesus personal sycophant army who proceed to terrorise the town, forcing all passers-by to pay their respects to him like Kurtz enthroned in the middle of the deepest, darkest jungle. Soon after some men dash through town carrying a child and when confronted by Jesus thugs they refuse to divert from their path and pay homage. When he gets wind of this Jesus tracks the men down and demands an explanation. The child has been bitten by a snake and we desperately need a cure, they tell him. Jesus calls the snake out from the woods, commands it to suck the poison back out from the boy, and then for no reason whatsoever blows the poor reptile to smithereens. So the serpent crept to the boy, and took away all its poison again. Then the Lord Jesus cursed the serpent so that it immediately burst asunder, and died. (First Gospel of Infancy 18:13-16)
After this incident the townsfolk of Nazareth (a town as yet settled by anyone) confront Jesus father, Joseph, and insist he rein the boy in. Under threat of expulsion (from a place not yet founded) Joseph delivers his cease and desist ultimatum to the boy. Jesus hears the words, ponders his fathers insolence, momentarily thinks about killing him, but then chooses instead to just blind all the adults in town. They shall bear their punishment. And straightway they that accused him were smitten with blindness (Infancy Gospel of Thomas 5:1).
At this Joseph goes nuts, but Jesus simply dismisses him. He mocks and threatens everyone, says he knows the day of their death, makes a teacher named Zacchaeus cry, then bursts into deranged maniacal laughter and restores everyones sight. After that, nobody dared to make him angry because they did not want to be cursed or crippled. (Infancy Gospel of Thomas 8:4).
A few days later though Jesus is playing on the roof of a house with another boy and when the lads parents return they, predictably, find their son dead on the ground (Infancy Gospel of Thomas 9:1-3). When asked Jesus says he didnt do it, rather the kid just spontaneously threw himself off the roof. To make amends Jesus resurrects the boy whos clearly so petrified of this egotistical little psychopath that he parrots the story and tells everyone that he, in fact, hurled himself off the roof, voluntarily
. Not Jesus, oh no, never.
Now, this is just one snippet (a few days copied across three canonical documents) in
the life of what is essentially fifty entirely different (albeit mostly incomplete) Jesus; a 1st Century Judean gnostic character who in even the church sanctioned editions exhibits different personality traits doing completely different things at entirely different times depending on which account you read. It is a character to whom not a single physical description is given and who floats in a suggested window of time, yet no date for his birth, deeds or death is offered anywhere. Since his invention in 1939, Batman has also exhibited over fifty entirely unique versions of himself depending on which account you read. In the original 1939 version Bruce Wayne becomes Batman, but in DC Comics Azraels version its the computer science graduate student, Jean-Paul Valley, who assumes the role of masked crusader. In Batman Earth Two Bruce Wayne is born in 1910, but in Gotham by Gaslight Batman starts his crime fighting career in 1889. In The Batman of Arkham Bruce Wayne is a psychiatrist who runs the Arkham Asylum for the Criminally Insane, while in Castle of the Bat, Bruce Wayne is a geneticist who brings to life a patchwork corpse containing bat DNA and the brain of his father.
Like Batman, Jesus is a character literally impossible to pin down, and if there is any semblance of mild uniformity in the pseudepigraphical synoptic gospels then its only because Mathew and Luke were copied directly from Mark; itself an embellished document which originally didnt even mention a resurrection event (Mark 16). Although divergent the edited and re-edited synoptic gospels are, however, the aberration. In the Gospel of Peter it is Herod Antipas, not Pontius Pilate, who orders Jesus death, and in the Gospel of Truth he is nailed to a tree, not a Roman cross. Perhaps even more unfamiliar to our ears is the Jesus found in the Gospel of the Egyptians who not only demands total abstinence but preaches for the outright separation of the sexes, stating that sorrow and error will remain with man As long as women bear children.
What is however perfectly clear to anyone curious enough to look is that 1,650 years ago some mindful, temperately script-savvy church publicists figured a murderous, bloodthirsty, psychopathic baby Jesus probably wasnt the type of character they wanted to sell as their frontline product. A similar decision seems to have been made by the studio executives at DC Comics when in 1994 they passed on commissioning a second instalment to The Tyrant; a freakishly bizarre story where a corrupt Batman takes control of Gotham City, drugs the citys water supply and turns it into a police state before he is brought down by the villains he once terrorised and then burnt alive inside Wayne Manor by the good citizens of Gotham.
http://salemhistory.blogspot.com/2013/10/excuse-me-but-which-jesus-are-you.html