Greetings, Skye
I see from your profile that you are still grouchy.
I hope you will soon have reasons to be cheerful again! :)
I am not sure that I see myself fitting the description of "fundie who is here to indoctrinate others into their brand of thinking" :giggling:, but I will give you my thoughts on some of the points you have reaised anyway ...
format_quote Originally Posted by
Gossamer skye
How much of the commandments did this alleged God break?
I don't think Jesus did any of those things you mention. He was a Jew and therefore followed the practices of the Jews. He almost certainly didn't eat pork and he was himself circumcised.
Jesus is reported to have broken certain laws, which the pharisees of the day upheld and felt strongly about.
Namely he allowed his disciples to break the Sabbath law by picking grain on the Sabbath. Jesus himself is reported to have healed people on the Sabbath - which also broke the Sabbath law.
He allowed his disciples to eat without following the hand-washing ritual.
What Jesus' actions in those situations shows is that he
put people before the law.
Jesus said:
"The Son of Man is the Lord of the Sabbath." (Matthew 12:8)
and
"The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath."(Mark2:27)
When asked which laws were the most important ones to uphold, Jesus replied:
" 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'
All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." (Matthew 22:37-40)
As for the points you mentioned:
1-unusual brand of prayers
Jesus would have worshipped as Jews worship.
But there are many different ways to praise and worship God:
Abraham raised his hands to the Lord.
David danced before the Lord to the sound of cymbals and singing.
People in the Bible are said to have kneeled, stood, danced, sang, prostrated themselves ... there are no right or worng ways to express praise to God, only different ways. :)
2-no circumcision for males
When the church spread there was some debate between Jesus' disciples with regards to circumcision. The outcome was that circumcision was only seen relevant to those of Jewish background, but not for those who were Gentiles.
The New Testament speaks of the 'circumcision of the heart' rather than the physical circumcision. The latter is only a physical symbol of the first, it is the 'circumcision of the heart' - i.e. the submission and giving of oneself to God, which is of importance.
As mentioned above, as a Jew Jesus almost certainly did not eat pork.
But when asked about cleanliness Jesus said the following:
"Are you still so dull?
Don't you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man 'unclean.' For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what make a man 'unclean'; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him 'unclean.' " (Matthew 15:16-20)
After Jesus' death, his disciple Peter has a repeated vision in which God tells him to eat food which Jews consider to be unclean. (See Acts 10)
Peter is a Jews himself, so the vision disturbs him and he rejects it - until it is confirmed by strangers coming to his house.
4-Ok to make idols in churches and bow before them
Interestingly enough I read not so long ago that statues and images of Jesus were not used in churches in the first centuries.
Perhaps people's understanding of what an 'idol' is has changed over time.
Personally I would see an idol to be something which distracts me from God, and which becomes more powerful than God himself. Would you agree with that?
On that basis
anything and
everything can become an idol. My career, my marriage, money, hobbies, etc etc can all become idols.
Are statues idols? Do they distract us from God and become godlike in themselves? Perhaps that depends on us individually.
When I go to church and look at the image of Jesus on the cross, it acts for me as a reminder of Jesus' life, death and resurrection, and of the very premise of my faith. It is something which concentrates my focus and attention, rather than distract me from God.
I don't think the statue has any magic powers - it is a wooden, man-made thing, no more no less.
Perhaps you could compare it to prayer beads, which I know are used in Islam too ... They are simply tools to help the prayer focus and concentrate. In themselves they have to power or magic at all.
Were we to believe that the statue/beads have powers, which we are praying to,
then we would be idolators!
5--ok to forgo monotheism and logic all together...
There are many very informative and helpful posts in other threads, which explain very clearly that Christians clearly and without any doubt consider themselves to be monotheists (try
this thread, for example), so I won't comment further on it here.
6- Ok to sin, since sin is forgiven through his self-immolation
Christians believe that God is a God of mercy, and that he forgives our sins if we sincerely repent.
Christians believe that by Jesus' death he reconciled humanity with God and overcame the rift between God and mankind which has been caused by the sinfulness of man.
Christians do
not believe that it is okay to sin, and that we can go on sinning because God forgives us anyway ...
Again, this has been discussed many times before. I shouldn't take you long to find the appropriate threads in the Comparative Religions section.
I wonder whether this thread might fit better into the Comparative Religion section? Perhaps the mods can move it, if you are happy with that, Skye.
Salaam :)