Thread: Does anyone think different ?

Originally Posted by hope2006

Okay , are you aware that the theory of reincarnation / foundation of Buddhism , Hinduism etc / was one of the dogmas of the Christian church and the Emperor Constantine removed it from the Bible in the 4th century ?
Why cannot we start with the beginning of the Christianity , to follow its development and changes as well as refer to the original Bible / not translated under the guidance of King James - the son of Mary Stuart /
but the Bible written in Hebrew .
I have a few interesting books to share
First question - why the theory of reincarnation was removed from the Bible ?
Second question - which Bible words are you following - the original , the Latin , the English version ? Before or after Constantine ?
There are so many parameters to set - just keep your mind open

There is som much wrong with your post that I don't know where to start.

I have studied the Bible in its original languages. The problems with the King James trnaslation are so few and minor as to be largely inconsequential. Many of these mistranslations are remedied by studying parallel cultures of the region which provide insight into terms that the King James translators had no point of reference for.

The idea that Buddhist-type perpetual reincarnation was ever part of the Holy Scriptures is patently absurd. Now, you may rightly say that the Jews and the Israelites at one time or another adhered to all sorts of oddball tenets borrowed from surrounding pagan cultures. This is quite different from claiming that it was part of the Biblical faith.

In your claim relative to Christianity, I believe that you are referring to some of the heresies that had already sprung up before John's Revelation was written. Christ speaks to John about the heresy of the Nicolaitans, for example, and warns of other error.

In answer to your specific question, "reincarnation" was not removed from the Bible because it was never part of the Bible, unless of course you refer to the single resurrection the Bible espouses. This is true of the Old Testament as well as the teachings of Christ.

Now, there were a number of heretical and apocryphal texts that emerged in the centuries following the crucifixion, many of them being "gnostic" texts that admixed the pervasive tenets of the Mithraic faith with parts of the Christian canon.

The best bet for determining which texts were and were not part of the canon is comparing them against the Dead Sea Scrolls. contrary to the Catholic claim that these texts were the property of the Essene sect and that they were stached somewhere in the century before the birth of Christ, these scrolls were almost certainly the temple scrolls that existed at the time of Christ and on through the leadership of the Temple under James, and that they were hidden beneath the Temple during the Judean Revolt. These were later unearthed by the Crusaders who liberated Jerusalem from the Muslims and became the Knights Templars. when Jerusalem was lost to another wave of Muslems a century later, it was unsafe to attempt to carry the scrolls back to Europe, so they were taken with the Templars to the caves around the Dead Sea where they continued to hold out against the Muslim armies while they awaited help from Christendom that never came.

I will agree that there were some texts that rightly belong within the canonized Bible but were, for various reasons, rejected. I disagree that any of those texts espouse the cycle of evolution en route to Nirvana espoused by the Hindu and Buddhist faiths.

Lastly, you do not appear to know much about the texts that make up the Bible. There are no original Latin texts. All original texts were either in ancient Hebrew, Aramaic or Greek. There were no actual "original" texts of the Pentateuch or other early books because they were lost by the time of the Babylonian captivity. Copies were preserved, however, and these formed the core of the holy texts that still were maintained in the Temple at Jerusalem all the way to the time of Christ. A large number of the texts now considered "original" (which is to say, the oldest and most accurate copies) were maintained in Alexandria after the fall of Judea. The amazing thing about the various ancient copies of the scriptures is their consistency. This si because they were copied by true believers who could imagine no sin greater than misquoting God, Christ, or the prophets.

Originally Posted by hope2006

By the way - I like a lot the phrase of Mary Stuart , mother of K.J.
" In my end is my beginning "..................................
I think this is a nice quote for the topic

LOL!!!

So are you saying that it is a mystery to you that practicing Christians believe that real life begins in the world to come under the leadership of Christ?

Buddhism-2500 years old
Hinduism - 3000 years old
Taoism - 600B.C. origin
I think this is a very biased opinion to refer to these religions - " oddball tenets borowed from...pagan cultures "
Personally , I have a great respect for something which survived for so long and still very alive today

Reincarnation is present in ALL world religions - whether you like it or not .
"Original " language - I had to give choices because many people do not know that the translation from the original language into Latin and English changed the meaning of the verses
King James had 50 scholars who combined all the English versions of the existing Bibles / changing them a bit ! / and this is what we have nowdays . They took different English versions for their work / when Original is Hebrew /

The first verse from the original Hebrew Bible says " Beresheet bera elohim et ha-shemayim v-et haaretz "
The translation is - In the beginning the gods created the heaven and the earth "
If you see - the gods - not god - this is just one little phrase which really has a very deep meaning
That is why it is so important to go to the originals
Now , the Christ was 40 days in the desert / so did Buddha /
Many more similarities to present if needed
there were 3 temptations for the Christ and for the Buddha / Mara and Satan /
Essens / you've mentioned / were practicing vegetarianism and healing
Dead Sea scrolls contain gnostic texts

Esoteric - exoteric
gnostics- Christianity
sufi - Islam
Kabbala- Judaism
Buddism
Taoism
Hinduism

Abraham is the ancestor of Christ . Also Judaism , Islam , Baha'i Faith claim him as a part of their lineage

How many more " coincidences " we need to go through to see that there is no need to fight who and which religion is the best , because they are all just parts of the big whole .

Regarding Mary Stuart - the phrase belongs to her refusal to renounce her claims to the English throne - I think that after so many years spent in isolation and meditation she could foresee the glorious future of her son who was the first king ruling over England and Scotland .
I like this phrase - it is inspiring to me

Originally Posted by hope2006

Buddhism-2500 years old
Hinduism - 3000 years old
Taoism - 600B.C. origin
I think this is a very biased opinion to refer to these religions - " oddball tenets borowed from...pagan cultures "
Personally , I have a great respect for something which survived for so long and still very alive today

Reincarnation is present in ALL world religions - whether you like it or not .

That is quite simply not true.

Originally Posted by hope2006

"Original " language - I had to give choices because many people do not know that the translation from the original language into Latin and English changed the meaning of the verses
King James had 50 scholars who combined all the English versions of the existing Bibles / changing them a bit ! / and this is what we have nowdays . They took different English versions for their work / when Original is Hebrew /

FALSE. The King James translators used the original language (Masoretic Hebrew) for the OT and used the Textus Receptus as the basis for the NT translation. It did not "combine the english verions of existing Bibles." You appear to be repeating nonsense that you heard from some anti-christian rather than relying on anything resembling direct knowledge through study.

Originally Posted by hope2006

The first verse from the original Hebrew Bible says " Beresheet bera elohim et ha-shemayim v-et haaretz "
The translation is - In the beginning the gods created the heaven and the earth "
If you see - the gods - not god - this is just one little phrase which really has a very deep meaning
That is why it is so important to go to the originals

Yes and no. The term does not translate as "Gods' (another common errant claim made by pop theologians), but is rather possessive. It means "those of (or from) God." The term elohim is repeatedly mistranslated as the singular "god". So there are references to the elohim and there are references to the singular God, as when Moshe has his encounters in the Sinai.

Again, you appear to be attempting to regurgitate secondhand info obtained from some other source.

Originally Posted by hope2006

Now , the Christ was 40 days in the desert / so did Buddha /
Many more similarities to present if needed
there were 3 temptations for the Christ and for the Buddha / Mara and Satan /

What you appear to have missed is that it was the later Buddhist traditions that were modified to accord with the Christian traditions, not vice versa. The same is true when a pre-existing lesser Vedic deity was modified into Krishna as a Hindu version of the Hebrew Christ.

The modifications were not all one-way. The Church of Rome began to accrete Mithraic traditions to the Christian messiah, just as Mithras had been created from an old Pharsi deity combined with the Babylonian Tammuz or Dummuzi.

Again, you're hitting around the points, but you have your facts all upside down and sideways.

Originally Posted by hope2006

Essens / you've mentioned / were practicing vegetarianism and healing
Dead Sea scrolls contain gnostic texts

Esoteric - exoteric
gnostics- Christianity
sufi - Islam
Kabbala- Judaism
Buddism
Taoism
Hinduism

Um, no. First off, you would have to settle on a functional definition of "gnostic." The term has been so abused and applied to so many divergent philosophies as to be meaningless. Typically, however, the term relates to Manicheanism or other heresies that incorporate the old pagan mysteries. The Church of Rome attempted to apply the term to faithful sects of the biblical faith in order to villify them. For example, they so defined the rival Cathar faith in order to justify its extermination in the Albigensian Crusade.

Originally Posted by hope2006

Abraham is the ancestor of Christ . Also Judaism , Islam , Baha'i Faith claim him as a part of their lineage

How many more " coincidences " we need to go through to see that there is no need to fight who and which religion is the best , because they are all just parts of the big whole .

Coincidences? I realized that you didn't have a very good spprehension of the facts, but this is the equivalent of theological illiteracy.

Abraham was the progenitor of all Israel, so of course he was the ancestor of both Christ and Judaism, which is scarcely surprising given that Christ is a Jew! If you had gotten through theology 101 you would realize that even the Bible tells us that Abraham was also the father of the Ishmaelites through his son by a Canaanite handmaid. The modern Arabs are among the Ishmaelite descendants, so of course they claim their lineage back to Abraham.

This is no "coincidence." It's well-documented history. It is also a fact that Abraham is the patriarch of many of the peoples of Northern Europe, but that's another story.

Originally Posted by hope2006

Regarding Mary Stuart - the phrase belongs to her refusal to renounce her claims to the English throne - I think that after so many years spent in isolation and meditation she could foresee the glorious future of her son who was the first king ruling over England and Scotland .
I like this phrase - it is inspiring to me

Do yourself a favor and actually study the religion you have so thoroughly confused. A little serious historical reading wouldn't hurt either.

Attack sometimes is not the best form to defend the debate .

The baby should not be thrown out with the bath water .

And you should not apply cut-and-dry techniques to the topics which were existing and discussed many thousands years before us and will be existing and discussed after .

By trying to apply the biased mind and to make the things fit - the vision of the universal view is lost .
I can follow the Christianity , respecting it as a part of the universal religion - uniting , not dividing the world and it fits nicely into every breath we take and every aspect of our lives , giving the room to the rest of the world to come .
I do not use personal attacks either. This is cheap .
Simply trying to shut someone up because the person has a wider view means applying controlling , selective and biased mind to the topics which cannot be even discussed with this attitude .
Everything in the world boils to the loving-kindness in the end , I take it as my center - whether it appears as words of Jesus , Buddha or just a person in the street .
If the message and energy are the same - any vehicle which brought them is PRECIOUS

Originally Posted by hope2006

Attack sometimes is not the best form to defend the debate .

The baby should not be thrown out with the bath water .

And you should not apply cut-and-dry techniques to the topics which were existing and discussed many thousands years before us and will be existing and discussed after .

By trying to apply the biased mind and to make the things fit - the vision of the universal view is lost .
I can follow the Christianity , respecting it as a part of the universal religion - uniting , not dividing the world and it fits nicely into every breath we take and every aspect of our lives , giving the room to the rest of the world to come .
I do not use personal attacks either. This is cheap .
Simply trying to shut someone up because the person has a wider view means applying controlling , selective and biased mind to the topics which cannot be even discussed with this attitude .
Everything in the world boils to the loving-kindness in the end , I take it as my center - whether it appears as words of Jesus , Buddha or just a person in the street .
If the message and energy are the same - any vehicle which brought them is PRECIOUS

You seem to confuse attack and factual rebuttal. Were you wrong on various points in your defense of your position? Yes, you were, and demonstrably so. If being called wrong when you are wrong is an insult, then how on earth do you ever engage in any meaningful discussion? My guess is that you do not. You form your opinion and then vainly try to defend it in the face of contrary fact. I believe that is called dogmatism.

Were you wrong on various points in your defense of your position? Yes, you were, and demonstrably so. [/quote]


You are asking questions about my position and you are presenting your own opinion as the answer ........all by yourself ..................It looks like you prefer debating for both sides in turn
Since my presence and my opinion is not required , I will keep doing my work with your permission .
The only request is - please , study my side of the debate well ,
there is a lot to learn

Originally Posted by hope2006

Were you wrong on various points in your defense of your position? Yes, you were, and demonstrably so.

You are asking questions about my position and you are presenting your own opinion as the answer ........all by yourself ..................It looks like you prefer debating for both sides in turn
Since my presence and my opinion is not required , I will keep doing my work with your permission .
The only request is - please , study my side of the debate well ,
there is a lot to learn

Hope, you repeatedly claimed that Constantine removed reincarnation from the Bible, yet have presented nothing to back that claim.

You made the ludicrous assertion that somehow the fact that the religions of those peoples who historically claim descent from Abraham also claim descent from Abraham is a "coincidence." How is a historical fact a "coincidence"?

You claimed that the King James Bible was compiled from various English translations at James' behest, when in fact James' involvement was that he allowed the translation, which was not from English but from Masoretic Hebrew and the Textus Receptus. You are all sideways on your facts in that case.

You try to make much of translation problems that are well known and in no way support your claim of either gross mistranslation or for reincarnation. You mistakenly translate elohim as the plural "gods" rather than as the plural possessive, "those of God." the suffix -im is used repeatedly in the Bible to edsignate the people of a place or descended from a given patriarch. That's why Anakim, for example, is trnaslated as "sons of Anak." Elohim means "those of El," which was the regional name for the high God.

Your claims regarding the commonality of the nominal creators of the various faiths appear to be ignorant of the fact that the messianic prophecy was spread throughout the ancient world by the Persians, who considered their faith and that of the Hebrews to be one and the same (up until the point that Zoroastrianism was contaminated by the pagan mysteries following the conquest of Babylon). Rather than the messianic prophecy being transmitted in its pure form, it was accreted into the other religions in the same way that the Romans incorporated foreign religious tenets into their state religion.

By referring to the "Essene texts" and calling them "gnostic," you ignore two issues. The first is that regardless of how stridently the Church of Rome insists that the Dead Sea Scrolls are old Essene texts, that claim is refuted by subject matter contained within some of the texts that were subsequently translated and clearly contain post-Christian subject matter. you also parrot the Catholic claim that the texts are "Gnostic" without even addressing that there is no good definition of what "gnostic" is. As a matter of fact, by the criteria applied to the Dead Sea Scrolls by the Church of Rome's theologians, the entirety of the Gospel of John would be "gnostic."

I'm sorry, but I cannot provide for you a full theological education in a few posts on a website, but I can point out your blatant errors fostered by your New Age leanings.

So CrocketsGhost I see that you use similar tactics pretty much everywhere you go on this forum.

Total bully yet that is what I thought intially anyways.

After reading this thread it sounds like you have a serious intolerance for anything but the orthodox view of christianity etc etc.
Being a self proclaimed student of theosophy as well as a 18 year fully recovered minister's son I enjoyed your claim that Christianity shares few simularities with other religions

Ignorance must be bliss.

Nope no need to try and convince your type of anything because you feel that you already know everything.

Ego - the beam in thine eye.
Now your posts to the gasoline price thread makes more sense.
New conservatives never cease to amaze me.

I read the entire thread and it seems there are alot of people making sense and the majority of them are women
good going ladies

Originally Posted by texascowboy911

So CrocketsGhost I see that you use similar tactics pretty much everywhere you go on this forum.

Total bully yet that is what I thought intially anyways.

After reading this thread it sounds like you have a serious intolerance for anything but the orthodox view of christianity etc etc.
Being a self proclaimed student of theosophy as well as a 18 year fully recovered minister's son I enjoyed your claim that Christianity shares few simularities with other religions

Ignorance must be bliss.

Nope no need to try and convince your type of anything because you feel that you already know everything.

Ego - the beam in thine eye.
Now your posts to the gasoline price thread makes more sense.
New conservatives never cease to amaze me.

I read the entire thread and it seems there are alot of people making sense and the majority of them are women
good going ladies

Oh goody, I've picked up a stalker.

The only similarity here is that you and Hope share a penchant for posting unadulterated BS on a "because I said so basis" and then thoroughly refuse to substantiate your nonsense even as you DEMAND specific citations of fact (which are provided yet left unanswered).

You guys represent a type that frequents these sites, pressing absurd dogma not only as fact, but as unassailable fact even though you cannot hold your own in an honest debate.

Theosophy, huh? Well, that explains a lot...



Oh, and I note that you ALSO fail to address any of the above points or to acknoweldge Hopes various blatant errors which can be easily revealed as such by any kid with access to a good encyclopaedia.