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The comprehensibility of God


Will Due

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On 6/3/2022 at 8:54 PM, Manwon Lender said:

You make an interesting point Zep, but we are all aware there is no perfect human.

ahem...really?  So, you are actually saying that I am not perfect?  I would take offense but, of course, because I am perfect...I will not.  But then, if I wasn't perfect, I probably would.  Now, grovel some and get back to work...slackers...jeeesh...smh...

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29 minutes ago, joc said:

ahem...really?  So, you are actually saying that I am not perfect?  I would take offense but, of course, because I am perfect...I will not.  But then, if I wasn't perfect, I probably would.  Now, grovel some and get back to work...slackers...jeeesh...smh...

Sorry Thumper, your perfect!:D

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5 hours ago, Will Due said:

Then how do you explain the traditional belief that the lad who went running naked out of the grasp of the Roman soldiers that night in Gethsemane was none other than John Mark.

I don't believe that a young man ran away naked that night in Gethsemane. I don't interpret gMark as asserting that, rather I think it is a comment, spoken either by the Narrator or possibly by Judas, on the poor preparation of the young disciples to carry on after losing their teacher - a recurrent theme in Mark's gospel.

I am also unsure that there's anything "traditional"  about any belief designating gospel authorship. Like all the canonical gospels, an author's name was attached to gMark after the text had already been circulating. Mark is one of the commonest Roman names for men. John Mark is a character in Acts (12:12 and following), supposedly a helper to Paul and Barnabas. There's nothing there about him being a writer. An alternative but widely told story is that Mark was Peter's secretary in Rome, and so Peter is effectively the senior author of the gospel.

What the two incompatible stories have in common is that either way Mark would have been a close associate of an apostle, and so an authority figure based on personal knowledge of historical persons and events learned from people who were supposedly among the earliest leaders in the movement. In other words, an invented lineage within the cult.

I don't know how the idea arose that the author of gMark worked himself into the story. The effect of the idea, however, parallels the other two stories about possible identities for Mark: he would be an eyewitness to one of the pivotal events of Christian origins, and so an authority figure in the next generation.

 

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On 6/22/2022 at 5:50 PM, XenoFish said:

Well, I've said too much. No more stories from me, back to the topic. Shoundn't have mentioned that stuff anyways.

Oh snap. So, we'll never hear about that period when you became proficient at summoning succubi? :(

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9 hours ago, Hammerclaw said:

you became proficient at summoning succubi? :(

I had cinemax back in the 90's :lol: :tu:

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Remembering it from Acts, Chapter 9 which tells the story of Paul and Ananias might that Ananias have been the father of Jesus ben Ananias? The former would have probably been old enough himself to have known Jesus ben Joseph. 
 

cormac

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2 hours ago, cormac mac airt said:

Remembering it from Acts, Chapter 9 which tells the story of Paul and Ananias might that Ananias have been the father of Jesus ben Ananias? The former would have probably been old enough himself to have known Jesus ben Joseph. 

No. According the Josephus, Jesus ben Ananus came from a low-status rural background. (War Book 6, chapter 5, part 3)

Quote

But what is still more terrible; there was one Jesus, the son of Ananus, a plebeian, and an husbandman, who, four years before the war began; and at a time when the city was in very great peace and prosperity; came to that feast whereon it is our custom for every one to make tabernacles to God in the temple, began on a sudden to cry aloud, “A voice from the east; a voice from the west; a voice from the four winds; a voice against Jerusalem, and the holy house; a voice against the bridegrooms, and the brides; and a voice against this whole people.”

https://penelope.uchicago.edu/josephus/war-6.html

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20 minutes ago, eight bits said:

No. According the Josephus, Jesus ben Ananus came from a low-status rural background. (War Book 6, chapter 5, part 3)

https://penelope.uchicago.edu/josephus/war-6.html

Do you have some background on the Ananias from Acts to support your definitive “no”?

cormac

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46 minutes ago, cormac mac airt said:

Do you have some background on the Ananias from Acts to support your definitive “no”?

Nope. I retract no.

War book 6 is all there is about Jesus's father, just as Acts 9 is all there is about that Ananias. There is nothing to connect them, just as there is nothing to connect either of them with the Ananias of Acts 23 or the other Ananias in Acts 5, or to connect those two with each other.

The rest of my post stands as written.

 

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37 minutes ago, eight bits said:

Nope. I retract no.

War book 6 is all there is about Jesus's father, just as Acts 9 is all there is about that Ananias. There is nothing to connect them, just as there is nothing to connect either of them with the Ananias of Acts 23 or the other Ananias in Acts 5, or to connect those two with each other.

The rest of my post stands as written.

 

There is nothing ruling a connection out either which is why I was wondering. Ananias from Acts 9 would have been of sufficient age to have at least been contemporary to Jesus ben Joseph. I find it at least interesting considering you and Piney are so sure Jesus ben Ananias and Jesus ben Joseph are one and the same. 

cormac

Edited by cormac mac airt
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21 minutes ago, cormac mac airt said:

There is nothing ruling a connection out either which is why I was wondering. Ananias from Acts 9 would have been of sufficient age to have at least been contemporary to Jesus ben Joseph. I find it at least interesting considering you and Piney are so sure Jesus ben Ananias and Jesus ben Joseph are one and the same.

Could you point to any post where I have ever said that Jesus ben Ananias and whom you call Jesus ben Joseph are "one and the same"?

@Piney and I express distinct views on this matter, although I respect his views and see much merit in his position.

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9 minutes ago, eight bits said:

Could you point to any post where I have ever said that Jesus ben Ananias and whom you call Jesus ben Joseph are "one and the same"?

@Piney and I express distinct views on this matter, although I respect his views and see much merit in his position.

If not then I apparently misunderstood Piney as that’s the impression I got. My apologies. 
 

cormac

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5 hours ago, cormac mac airt said:

There is nothing ruling a connection out either which is why I was wondering. Ananias from Acts 9 would have been of sufficient age to have at least been contemporary to Jesus ben Joseph. I find it at least interesting considering you and Piney are so sure Jesus ben Ananias and Jesus ben Joseph are one and the same. 

cormac

I'm not so sure. I just think he was the closest to the age and description and was conflated with Ben Sira, who was a teacher.

I also think Christianity started out as a doomsday cult instead of a messianic one and Ananias fits the MO as the founder of such. 

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2 hours ago, Piney said:

I also think Christianity started out as a doomsday cult instead of a messianic one and Ananias fits the MO as the founder of such. 

There is also a curiosity about ben Ananus: he was supported for years and years, according to Josephus, even though he plainly could do no useful work, not even "teaching" unless you count the endless repetition of that curse on Jerusalem. It is also odd that he managed to energize the big hats to expend effort to get rid of him, with due process no less, and yet somehow inspired the procurator to let him go and leave him alone ultimately.

It interesting to think about the psychological mechanics of such charisma (?). Josephus says that Jesus continued repeating his rant even while being flayed to the bone. That would be something new to the Romans, being unable to beat someone into silence. When the soldiers finally stopped (why? they would have shut him up eventually), might one of them have remarked that there was something unnatural about this one (Mark 15:39)?

If we only had Mark as the quasi-historical narrative, and so couldn't "harmonize" it with the more religiously devout books that ripped off Mark (or rewrote it from scratch, like John), then it would be easier to see what Mark is actually about. That is, the riotously wide variety of reactions that different people would have to a figure like Jesus. (The Man who Fell to Earth has some of that quality, IMO, or Cool Hand Luke).

Bottom line: the concrete resemblance between ben Ananus's run-in with the law and Mark's Passion is what grabs the attention. But it is more than an anecdote. There must have been a context to the ben Ananus drama, which Josephus treated very lightly (except to place the story as the capstone of supernatural portents of the destruction of Jerusalem), which seems to fit in nicely with a theme that Mark frames his narrative around.

Yes, coincidences happen, but I think it is an excellent bet that Mark knew the ben Ananus story and mined it for his own literary purposes.

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How many Yehoshua / Joshua / Jesus were there, really? 

Dunno, cause Ben Yehoshua / Joshua / Jesus ain't sayin'

:D

~

 

 

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8 hours ago, Piney said:

I'm not so sure. I just think he was the closest to the age and description and was conflated with Ben Sira, who was a teacher.

I also think Christianity started out as a doomsday cult instead of a messianic one and Ananias fits the MO as the founder of such. 

Now you’ve lost me as Ben Ananias was only mentioned in the timeframe of AD 62-69/70 and Ben Sira/Sirach lived circa 180 BC so how could they have been conflated? 
 

cormac

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The universe is our god, we were forged by it. Shall return to it. It is a cold indifferent god. It has no emotions, doesn't feel, thus it can not care about us. Everything thing that we are made of shall exist within the universe forever, it some form. Yet, we like the universe shall have no conscious experience of it. 

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2 hours ago, cormac mac airt said:

Now you’ve lost me as Ben Ananias was only mentioned in the timeframe of AD 62-69/70 and Ben Sira/Sirach lived circa 180 BC so how could they have been conflated? 
 

cormac

Gave Ananias his aspects as a wisdom teacher. 

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14 minutes ago, Piney said:

Gave Ananias his aspects as a wisdom teacher. 

That’s a bit of a stretch I think considering they were separated by circa 250 years. 
 

Jesus Ben Pandira was closer in time. 
 

cormac

Edited by cormac mac airt
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25 minutes ago, cormac mac airt said:

That’s a bit of a stretch I think considering they were separated by circa 250 years. 
 

Jesus Ben Pandira was closer in time. 
 

cormac

I'm going by how they constructed King Arthur. 

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28 minutes ago, cormac mac airt said:

That’s a bit of a stretch I think considering they were separated by circa 250 years. 
 

Jesus Ben Pandira was closer in time. 
 

cormac

I can't see a real historical references to him. Unless you mean Jesus the sorcerer. Who is still only in Jewish writings.

He was stoned and hung with his 5 lieutenants  but he seems to sorta fit.

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6 minutes ago, Piney said:

I'm going by how they constructed King Arthur. 

Owain Ddantgwyn and Riothamus were both contemporary to Arthur’s lifetime. 
 

cormac

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36 minutes ago, Piney said:

I can't see a real historical references to him. Unless you mean Jesus the sorcerer. Who is still only in Jewish writings.

He was stoned and hung with his 5 lieutenants  but he seems to sorta fit.

His story in Sefer Toledot Yeshu is also reworked in an attempt to equate him with Jesus ben Joseph. One has to wonder why ben Pandira if ben Ananias were the true inspiration for the Biblical story? 
 

cormac

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The comprehensibility of God is futile without the comprehensibility of man first.

Take this for example from the life and teachings of Jesus:

 

"Lord, I knew you and realized that you were a shrewd man in that you expected gains where you had not personally labored; therefore was I afraid to risk aught of that which was intrusted to me. I safely hid your talent in the earth; here it is; you now have what belongs to you.’

But his lord answered: ‘You are an indolent and slothful steward. By your own words you confess that you knew I would require of you an accounting with reasonable profit. Knowing this, you ought, therefore, to have at least put my money into the hands of the bankers that on my return I might have received my own with interest.

"And then this lord said: ‘Take away this talent from this unprofitable servant.

 

“To every one who has, more shall be given, and he shall have abundance; but from him who has not, even that which he has shall be taken away.

 

 

 

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