In essence then, people are demanding that Gibson place a loyalty to modern liberal political values ahead of his belief in Jesus Christ. Make your representation of the Bible fit in with what we want to hear.
Mel Gibson and Christians and Christ-killers, oh my!…
Article comments
26 - BB
Dearest Michael. In reference to your comment #24 please note the following:
It was Al that asked me in comment #14 to state it a second time as you so aptly pointed out. Sorry if that offended you.
You make sweeping comments with respect to the validity of Josephus and reference so-called "scholars outside of schools of divinity" without backing it up with any published works. The bottom line is your belief system is based on conjecture no matter what way you look at it. In fact you could refer to any work you wish but that doesn't make it so does it my friend?
The fact is over time archaeology has only proven the validity of the historical Bible. But there will always be the nay sayers who pursue their personal agendas to justify their unbelief and in so doing attempt to discredit the faith of others. If that is your thing then more power to you. If you are trying to attempt to discredit my opinion, well.. to quote yourself "the evidence doesn't support that conclusion" neither.
The point I am making is I am quite frankly weary of frivolous works that attempt to dismiss the validity of scripture based on matters of faith rather than fact. Discussions like this are a waste of time and it all boils down to who you want to believe.
Hence, (yawn) I believe that we have both made that clear and I suggest that should be the end of it. Peace bro :-)
27 - Shark
re: "...if you accept that Jesus was a great moral leader, then his statement that he is divine is either true or the ranting of a madman."
Specious logic warning!
1) We don't know that he claimed to be 'divine'. Many scholars question the authenticity of 'explicit' claims portrayed as direct quotes in the synoptic gospels
2) Under certain definitions, we could all be 'divine' (see Hinduism for more)
3) ...which means one could claim divinity for oneself, assume it's true, and also not be a 'ranting madman'. One could just be mistaken.
re. "If he is a madman, he cannot also be a great moral leader. You cannot have both.
Why not? It could be argued that many 'great moral' leaders were, under relative conditions, also mad. (It could be argued that to put yourself into a situation where you were viewed as a 'great moral leader' requires some level of madness. Sorta like running for office or wanting to be famous in Hollywood.)
Again, it's all in how you define your terms.
BTW: C.S. Lewis was trying to figure out a way he could intellectually & empirically justify his wacky, illogical religion.
Apparently blind faith wasn't good enough.
PS: "Extraordinary claims (returning from the dead, fer instance!) require extraordinary proofs." ---Which yer never gonna get. As I said before on another thread, there's a reason they call it 'faith'.
28 - Michael Croft
BB:"The fact is over time archaeology has only proven the validity of the historical Bible. "
Philip Davies, "What separates a Minimalist from a Maximalist? Not much," Bible Archeology Review, 2000-MAR/APR Vol. 26, #2, Pages 24 to 27; 72 & 73.This statement is completely unsupported by archaeological data or mainstream thought of contemporary experts in the field.
The most commonly cited archaeological findings (and fakes) do not make a compelling case.
Historians of the ancient world are similarly unlikely to agree with your claim. You can look through the Internet Ancient History Sourcebook for different documents and form your own opinions.
Regarding Antiquities of the Jews, Dr. Paul Halsall (editor of the IAHS) calls it "A much debated text. Many think it is all, or in parts, an interpolation." The passage in question became controversial in the 1700s and accepting it as an unaltered late 1st century source is definitely a minority opinion and asserting that historians accept it is just foolish. See this history of the controversy for a look that is sympathetic to parts of the text, while rejecting others as obvious interpolations.
BB: It may well all boil down to 'what you believe', but you undermine your own credibility by stating trivially refutable "facts" like the quote above.
But hey, if it helps you sleep at night, more power to you. Peace out.
29 - BB
I find it interesting that some people can be as fanatical in their desire to DISPROVE the faith as the most adamant of believers.
30 - Natalie Davis
How about that? People are more similar than different.
31 - Michael Croft
BB,
I certainly agree with you on #29, but don't think it applies to my comments on the state of the historical and archaeological record.
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The lack of historical or archaeological evidence does not disprove that there was a Jesus. There was no such evidence for the existence of Troy for nearly two thousand years (give or take a century, and Troy was bigger and moved around less than Jesus.
Conversely you could find the bona fide Very Secret Diaries of P. Pilate and it wouldn't prove or disprove the premise that Jesus was the messiah.
32 - Shark
BB: (in a rare moment of incredulity) "I find it interesting that some people can be as fanatical in their desire to DISPROVE the faith as the most adamant of believers."
BB, man-o-man, you should be on this side for a while! If we agnostics (et al) ever even approach a friggin' majority, we'll shut up with the fanatical desires to "disprove the faith."
It might be different if we had our own 'stuff' we could shove down others' throats, but alas and verily I say unto thee: we're pretty low in that department.
(I mean--- when was the last time an agnostic knocked on your door and wanted to share a booklet with ya? Or a chorus stood outside in the snow and sang hymns about the miraculous birth of Jean Paul Sartre?)
See, one of the drawbacks to bein' an agnostic is that if I ever make a dogmatic movie about my most personal religious beliefs, I won't have shit for tie-ins.
Mel's got Nail Pendants.
Lucky bastard.
33 - Thomas M. Sipos
I don't see that a Christian needs to accept the whole Bible to be a believer. In fact, I'm pretty sure most Christians and Jews don't accept Adam and Eve as the literal truth. The real question then, between all sects and religions, is what do you accept as literal truth, what as metaphor, and what as error, and why?
34 - Michael Croft
"...Hymns about the miraculous birth of Jean Paul Sartre..."
That sounds like a challenging hymnal to write, Shark.
Hmm. May be too hard. Can we try pop or rock? Sartre Me Up would be easier...
35 - BB
#32 -> BB on the floor laughing in hysterics as he turns various shades of red and blue fighting for air!
Shark you are so funny man. No matter what you say I don't think I could ever get pissed off with you.
But seriously, surely you understand somebody has to keep you heathen in line (Just kidding bro).
Point well taken!
36 - Bb
#31 Michael -> not that P. Pilate could be considered an authority :-).
37 - Michael Croft
BB: You can send Timmy the Time Tripper back in his Time Vortex to Holy Week with his digital camera and his Mr. DNA home genetic sampling kit and get irrefutable proof and it still doesn't touch on the question of the truth or untruth of the divinity of Jesus (although Dan Brown will want to test your samples).
So, is it fair to say that you're opposed to my interpretation of the content of the secular historical and archaeological records because claiming that they do not support the existence of Jesus implies that Jesus did not exist? I don't want to put words into your mouth, but I also don't want you to be under the impression that I believe that.
BTW: Shark? About the Symbols? Become a Discordian.
- We get Hot Dog Buns (on Fridays)
- Our symbols rawk
- Our goddess is a babe
- No one will ever really know if you're pulling their leg about your religion
You can keep being agnostic while faithfully believing in Eris. It's all good.38 - BB
Huh? Now you're losing me Michael. You should be a lawyer because you don't give easily do you?
What I'm saying is it is a futile discussion. What is known today will be refuted tomorrow, which in turn will be reversed upon the next archaeological dig and subsequent theory.
The so-called facts grow cold with time and when we reach back thousands of years there are going to be gaps in the record. The bottom line is we will choose to believe what we want to believe regardless of the so-called facts.
In the end it is a decision of faith no matter which side of the fence we sit on. I have personally looked all of the theories and facts and made the conscious decision to believe that Jesus is the Christ and Son of God. So do have faith brother?
39 - BB
Michael - not to propagate the argument, but here is an interesting link for your reading pleasure.
40 - SK
Shark: "I mean--- when was the last time an agnostic knocked on your door and wanted to share a booklet with ya? Or a chorus stood outside in the snow and sang hymns about the miraculous birth of Jean Paul Sartre?"
True, agnostics aren't very organized. Maybe that's because most intelligent people don't choose doubt as a way of life. Sometimes doubt is helpful as a means to strengthen one's faith, but it's pretty uncomfortable to spend one's whole life sitting on the fence.
For everyone's edification: C.S. Lewis was an ATHEIST for the majority of his life, then experienced conversion and spent the rest of his life writing about Christianity and his relationship with it -- not "to figure out a way he could intellectually & empirically justify his wacky, illogical religion" -- but because he BELIEVED, and wanted others to come to belief also.
I recommend C.S. Lewis's very convincing arguments in "Mere Christianity" and "God in the Dock" to every person who's posted to this board.
41 - Shark
SK: "Maybe that's because most intelligent people don't choose doubt as a way of life."
Boy, where do I aim my harpoon of disdain on this lumbering whale of a whopper?
SK, sorry, but I DOUBT that your truism is true. Even a casual perusal of history (especially science... y'know some of the most "intelligent" people in history?) would show how friggin' WRONG you are.
Doubt leads to questions, curiosity, and if yer lucky, knowledge.
*True Believers don't doubt.
*eric hoffer version
Most unintelligent people NEVER express doubt. I'd even go so far as to say that one reason this world is so fucked up is that so few people have the balls or the intellectual integrity to DOUBT some of the crap they're constantly spoon-fed.
The Holocaust, brought to you by people who never doubted!
Wars, racism, genocide, most of the monumental evils of history, brought to you SPECIFICALLY by people who never doubted!
Feh.
Oh, and lastly, (Shark screaming at the top of his lungs, blood vessels bursting from his forehead)
FAITH IS BASED ON DOUBT!
PS:
"An intellectual is someone whose mind watches itself." ---Camus
"Never give a sucker an even break." ---Fields
42 - Shark
Hail Croft,
re. Discordianist ---
shhhh, I'm been one for over three decades.
No wife, no horse, no mustache.
PS: No relation to Syd and Marty, are ya?
43 - ms. k
It sounds like you have a pretty fair background with the New testament scriptures--but the early church had only the old testament. That is what is referred to as the scriptures. That is why in the epistles, the OT is quoted so often. And it is there that you will see that while the Jews did reject and crucify their own Messiah, God has not utterly rejected them. Carefully read Romans 9-11 and you will find a clear mandate to the church to not be arrogant toward the non-believing Jew.
I think the problem with anti-semitism is Not the source material, but sinful attitudes that say,"my sin is better than yours!"
Israel will be restored by their very own God and Messiah!!
44 - Al Barger
Ms K- Point well taken about the early church not having the New Testament. I hadn't thought of that.
45 - J.
Interesting. There sure are a lot of assumptions about what "scholars say." I imagine you read a book by Rudolph Bultmann (or Borg, Crossman["Suppose we were marshans"], etc) and now its "scripture." But that's not tha part that "gets" me most; your presupposition are equally as faulty and doubtful. (See Hume, i.e. You can't even know if the sun will rise tomorrow.) My question, whether Jesus is fake or real, to you isn't there something in the heart and actions of Jesus worth imitating? To love the unlovely, forgive the unforgivable, to serve people, to love your enemy? Cannot the world be changed this way? Ghandi seemed to think so, C.S. Lewis, Mother Teresa Chesterton,and Newton, Bacon, Galileo,etc all believed this way. Are you greater than them? You probably think so somewhere in your mind thanks to Nietzche, Sartre, and Deridda and their postmodern rhetoric. (i.e. If you make it have some type of meaning then it has the meaning that you make of it.) This certainly has killed God. What if a man gains the whole world yet forfiets his soul?
46 - J.
Oh, and anyone who reads BAR or NEA or other historical and archeological periodicals as well as theological and historical works knows there is always two sides to the arguments. (Though interestingly enough, most Historians do not doubt that there was a Jesus of Nazareth but it is the Liberal Theologians who have casted doubt upon him, now that's interesting, a bunch of sweaty old farts sitting in an office unable to live up to the Sermon on the Mount had to find a way out, if only they had realy believed what he said about the spirit filled life...) I could match the quote from BAR with the equal amount of quotes supporting the opposite argument. The irony is thick here. The Bible, oh know here he goes, actually says, "There is nothing new under the sun. Everything is meaningless. Except this..." You thought Sartre was the first Existentialist. Ecclesiastes, check it out.
47 - Al Barger
Oh J, puh-lease. Is God like Tinkerbell or what? This certainly has killed God. No belief or lack of it on my part would kill God if He existed.
Nor would reading Sartre make one think they were hot stuff. It would just make you want to get sick at the sight of a tree, or some such.
The teachings of Jesus may or may not be worth imitating, but that is a very different question from whether or not he was/is GOD.
48 - J.
"killing God" is an allusion to "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" (sp) by Nietzche (sp). I think that was the work with the quote in it. The killing is the subjective killing of God which is what he meant. No one thinks that you can actually kill God. Maybe the life of Christ is worth imitating. Try imitating and then you may have a different mind to the facts.
49 - Corinna Hasofferett
J at #45:
"...isn't there something in the heart and actions of Jesus worth imitating? To love the unlovely, forgive the unforgivable, to serve people, to love your enemy? Cannot the world be changed this way?"
I strongly believe that if Jesus/the New Testament preached/taught: "... hate the unlovely, never forgive the unforgivable, especially if they were innocent, abuse people, hate your enemy and claim the Other is The Enemy etc...." -
Then and maybe only then anti-semitism, pogroms, the Holocaust, the bloody Expulsions and even the Inquisition would have never come to embalm and emblem our faithfull world...
ms.k #43
"...it is there" (in the OT) "that you will see that while the Jews did reject and crucify their own Messiah, God has not utterly rejected them."
Isn't it a bit imperialistic?...
If Jesus is Jew's Messiah, then we are all Christians, as allowed by the Inquisition but not by Hitler. I'm lost in this labitynth.
By the way, it's been claimed here behind closed doors that I'm the real Messiah, and believe me, although I'm strongly rejected, God has utterly not rejected my people, nor yours. Or has She?
Oh, Shark, you have no teeth, yet you are an eternal living proof that a healthy sense of Humor is Our Savior.
50 - Babaganoosh
I got the fattest boner.
51 - J. Clark
To Corinna and fellow runners,
Far from true. You know little of history if you believe this. Men and women have always hated, killed, lusted, and devoured one another in the name of truth, justice, and God. Evil is shifty because it has the appearance of goodness. Also, you are being anachronistic by pretending that somehow based on today's knowledge (hindsight) that you would have thought or acted different than some of the people you mentioned. Christ's message was hope for those who would hear. He clearly says you will know my disciples by the way they love one another. This is the fruit of those who follow. What you have is a false position. You are equating Jesus' message with human action and this is furtherest from truth. You also did not mention the millions of people who have transformed lives because of Jesus.
52 - Michelle
Dear Luke,
I find it amazing that a Christian could view "The Passion of the Christ" and come away with a message centering on brutality rather than hope and forgiveness as did I.
Without a portrayal of the brutality suffered by Jesus, would his message of forgiveness and love be as strong?
If Jesus could love, forgive and pray for men who tortured him, certainly we can all love, forgive and pray for ALL of our fellow "men".
Had the portrayal of the violence suffered by Jesus been less graphic or consumed less time on the screen, perhaps Jesus' forgiveness might not have been viewed as something as truly inspiring!
The world is in dire need of a message such as this!
You seem to have missed the fact that this movie is ONLY telling the story of Jesus' suffering leading up to and including the crucifixion. While it DOES only focus on the 12 hours leading up to his death, that IS a very important part of the "point of his life and death". Mel Gibson doesn't pretend to tell the whole story of Jesus' life. Of course there are other important messages and stories in the Bible and perhaps they will also be told on the big screen some day. In the mean time, take this movie for what it is. A portrayal of one part of Jesus' life!
Michelle
53 - borntrippy
tired of all the 'anti-jewish' stuff.
Schindlers list can be seen as unnecessarily making Germans look bad, but Germans shooting Jews, it HAPPENED. It was put on screen. So there. I'd still make friends with german dudes.
The Passion isnt even ABOUT jews. You have to sit down and REALLY think what its really about, what its about for you not as a jew but as a HUMAN BEING.
54 - Sandra Smallson
JESUS CHRIST! I really did try to read all the posts but I got tired. There is one underlying factor here. Why is it always the non-believers who have a whole lot to say about whether there was a Jesus or not? Was he divine or not? Blah blah blah. IF U DO NOT BELIEVE, SCRAM! BUGGER OFF! FUCK OFF. Has anyone held a gun to your heads to believe? Are you strapped in the pews at the Cathedral? What is all this about?!
Arnold, as far as your comment about the Roman Catholic church, you have revealed yourself to be an ignorant buffoon. Now, you start your sentence with "I'm not a believer but if I was"...LOL> Stop there! YOU ARE NOT A BELIEVER. Why give yourself a headache about how you would feel if you were? If I was not a believer, I would have no time whatsoever for the issues that seem to have consumed your little brain so much you have chosen to lambast the entire RC church as a community of pedophiles. May God forgive you, and have mercy on your soul for you know not what you say.
The bottom line is this..Mel made a movie about his beliefs, with his own money inspired by his own faith. I have seen the movie. As a christian I was moved and wept through out and I almost found myself kneeling during the crucifixion. This is saying a lot since one is not exactly a holier than thou character. I was moved. I did not come out hating all Jews. I did not come out hating all Romans. I don't feel like slaughtering anyone with the exception of Arnold and his likes;). I have known this story forever. It is from THE BIBLE. If the Bible has not incited anti-semitic feelings all these years, Passion of Christ is not going to do so.
Jesus is the son of God. Jesus is the Messiah. You can only get to heaven through Christ. THAT is the Christian belief. The Jews can believe whatever they want. Though I remain puzzled since it seems after the crucifixion they realised the truth. Somewhere along the line, they reverted back. Who knows?! Who cares! To each his/her own. The Muslims can believe whatever they want to believe. I have no problem with different sects debating or trying to understand. What I find most annoying is when we have these so called non believers roaming around like headless chickens, talking about evidence and history and theology and archaelogy. GIVE IT A REST! As a non-believer you should be living a stress free life. Guilt free. No conscience issues. Why trouble your little heads? If we believers are being naive and misled, what's it got to do with you? Afterall, you don't believe in a Heaven or Hell we are destined to inhabit..at the end of it all, "one" of us is going to be disappointed. Why don't we wait and see which group of us is?:)
55 - jrs
You should read TRUE LIFE IN GOD at www.tlig.org.
It has strengthened my faith in God so wonderfully.