Christianity: Was Jesus A Fraud?

[Craig Read]

1. Christ never lived

2. The early church was anything but pure and just.

Various historians of the early Christian era stated that Christians ate bodies of the deceased, engaged in sacrifice and incest, and were well noted for their rousing orgies.

I could go on ad nauseum about the early Church and its hypocritical construction. Prof Davidson summarises a lot of them in 'The Canon of the Bible'. He destroys the 3 early presbyters that formed the gospel doctrine namely; Irenaeus, Clement and Tertullian.

"No analysis of their authenticity and genuineness was seriously attempted....The ends which they had in view, the polemic motives, their uncritical inconsistent assertions, their want of sure data, detract from their testimony.."

The early Church fathers were vagrants - dirty old men - ie. presbyters [Greek word], who traveled from market to market preaching to the illiterate, and the more fantastic their story the larger the crowd. They enthusiastically combined all sorts of mythology, fables, religious ideals and pagan concepts into their stories. Less than 1 % of the population could read or write, and it is safe to say, the learned folk would not rush to the market to listen to dirty old men who smelled and could use a hair cut, spout nonsense.

Sources: Celsus is the best early expert and writer on the Church calling the early frauds, ie. presbyters 'charlatans and vagrants, dangerous to the civil ideals of the Roman state.'

Origen a church cleric and defender even admitted, 'You have altered three, four times and oftener, the texts of your manuscripts in order to deny objections made to you.'

Origen also admitted that lying to further the Church's interest was good [see also St. Jerome an early Cardinal who wore red ladies underwear and gave us the red robes of the Cardinals].

St. Augustine himself - a saint no less - admitted that he 'lusted to thieve and did it.' [Confessions, 2:9] St. Aug. confessed later that the Church was ' a religion of threats and bribes unworthy of wise men.' [see JW Sergerus, 1685].

As for the peaceful fun loving early Christians - a good meal of human followed by an energetic incestuous orgy seemed part of the fun of celebrating god. St. Justin Martyr circa 160 AD wrote; 'they met in secret to eat human flesh and once the lamps had been upset, to participate in promiscuous incestuous intercourse.' [see Flavius Josephus, Jewish Historian of the 2 century AD].

Emperor Marcus Aurelius concurred calling the early Church 'new and wicked superstition.' Minucius Felix a Christian apologist even confirms that 'the names of brother and sister hallow fornification as incest. Their foolish superstition makes a boast of crime, a condemned criminal is the object of their veneration. Finally there is infant murder, cannibalism, and the banquet with incestuous intercourse.' [Luke 10:1 Sinai Bible]

This cannibalism and wild sex is called 'love feasts' in the New Testament [Jude 12]. The early Cannibalism and ribald sex was the worship of the Eucharist. Jermome [347-420] and Augustine [395] both condemned these acts. Ambrose of Milan [333-397] tried to forbade these practices but was unsuccessful [Acta of Pilate it was called].

The early Church was peopled not by enlightened wise men with long flowing white hair and purple robes, but by a fanatical mob of pagan worshippers intent on amongst other objectives, challenging the Roman state. To ignore their ignominious beginnings is to miss a fascinating period of history.

[Elder]

Craig, that was an eloquent post with plenty of information to back it up. Both sound and clear. I would like to point out that you have probably not changed one Christian's mind. As I said earlier, the above information will probably enrage some Catholics, but that's about it.

I'm still a firm and devout Christian, but I'm not at all surprised that the early Church was fillled with such things. I personally believe that all Hell broke loose within the Church after the original Apostles were martyred. Without their leadership and guidance, the Church scattered and began take in some of these heathen practices.

I, being a non-Catholic, am not bothered a bit that early Catholic officials spoke against the Church or had such problems as corruption, if in fact they did. No offense meant to the Catholic Church with any of these comments. I still support any organization that helps people come to Christ, the Catholic Church included. I don't agree with all of Catholic doctrine, but I certainly have no problems with those who do, and I respect the Catholic Church for the good it does and for the fact that they are one of the few who actually claim to have some line of authority. On their defense, the accusations made by the secular authorities you cited are not to be considered unbiased. The Romans and the Jews were not fans of the Christians as they demonstrated by throwing them to lions, having them formally executed for being Christians, etc., etc. It would stand to reason that Hebrew and Roman historians would have a slanted view on the matter. I don't know whether what they said was true or not, it makes little difference to me, but I'm not going to take it for granted. As for the Catholic officials who you cited, the Catholics are well used to people pointing fingers at their authority figures. It's really not all that different to hearing the same things about the American founding fathers.

As for your Bible references, even a Christian must be careful in using the Bible. There are hundreds of translations, and pastors, priests, and just about anyone else, all seem to interpret their translation differently. You quoted the Sinai Bible. I personally go by the King James Version. Someone else may go by one of the thousands of others. I'm going to check the scriptures you listed, but I may find them to mean something completely different, or they may even say something completely different. I use my Bible references to put a foundation on my moral statements, to show where I got that particular idea. I don't find the Bible to be at all practical for proving or disproving anything to anyone. I use it for myself, but I've tried it before, and I will tell you that you can't prove something to someone else with the Bible. It's not what it was written for.

Look, we could all go on and on about whether Christ existed, what Church is right or wrong, etc. etc. etc. We will never get anywhere. No one will back down on this, and I'm willing to bet no one will change their mind because of this. I'm a Christian who strongly advocates the spreading of Christianity and who actively participates in it. I'll tell you right now that you can not convert anyone to or from their faith in a debate, especially when you attack their faith. I've seen people converted and that's not how you do it. Craig, for all your information, evidence, and writing skills, you have picked an arguement that you can't win. Honestly, neither side can.

[widowsmite]

Sources: Celsus is the best early expert and writer on the Church calling the early frauds, ie. presbyters 'charlatans and vagrants, dangerous to the civil ideals of the Roman state.'

Celsus owes his prominence in the history of Christian polemics not so much to the pre-eminent character of his work, as to the circumstance that about the year 240 a copy of the work was sent to Origen by his friend Ambrosius, with a request to write a refutation of it. This[,] Origen, after some hesitation, consented to do, and embodied his answer in the treatise "Against Celsus" (katà Kélsou). So careful is Origen to cite the very words of his opponent that it is possible to reconstruct the text of Celsus from Origen's answer, a task which was accomplished by Jachmann in 1846, and more successfully by Keim in 1873. The original of Celsus's treatise having perished, the text reconstructed from Origen (about nine-tenths of the original has in this way been recovered) is our only primary source. 

More here --> http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03490a.htm

I find it strange that you would put so much faith into Celsus as a source, when our current knowledge of Celsus' work has only been sourced through Origen's citation of it in the course of refuting it...

Origen a church cleric and defender even admitted, 'You have altered three, four times and oftener, the texts of your manuscripts in order to deny objections made to you.'

So, what does Origen say?  This is from Book II, ...

27. After this he [Celsus] says that some believers, as though from a drinking bout, go so far as to oppose themselves and alter the original text of the gospel three or four or several times over, and they change its character to enable them to deny difficulties in face of criticism.  I do not know of people who have altered the gospel apart from the Marcionites and Valentinians, and I think also the followers of Lucan.  But this statement is not a criticism of Christianity, but only of those who have dared lightly to falsify the gospels. And just as it is no criticism of philosophy that there are the sophists or the Epicureans or the Peripatetics, or any others who hold false doctrines, so those who alter the gospels and introduce heresies foreign to the meaning of Jesus' teaching do not give ground for any criticism of genuine Christianity.

More here --> http://www.tertullian.org/rpearse/celsus/celsus.htm

St. Augustine himself - a saint no less - admitted that he 'lusted to thieve and did it.' [Confessions, 2:9]

What then was this feeling? For of a truth it was too foul: and woe was me, who had it. But yet what was it? Who can understand his errors? It was the sport, which as it were tickled our hearts, that we beguiled those who little thought what we were doing, and much disliked it. Why then was my delight of such sort that I did it not alone? Because none doth ordinarily laugh alone? ordinarily no one; yet laughter sometimes masters men alone and singly when on one whatever is with them, if anything very ludicrous presents itself to their senses or mind. Yet I had not done this alone; alone I had never done it. Behold my God, before Thee, the vivid remembrance of my soul; alone, I had never committed that theft wherein what I stole pleased me not, but that I stole; nor had it alone liked me to do it, nor had I done it. O friendship too unfriendly! thou incomprehensible inveigler of the soul, thou greediness to do mischief out of mirth and wantonness, thou thirst of others' loss, without lust of my own gain or revenge: but when it is said, "Let's go, let's do it," we are ashamed not to be shameless. 

Full Text here --> http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/jod/Englishconfessions.html

That's why he titled it Confessions.

Emperor Marcus Aurelius concurred calling the early Church 'new and wicked superstition.' Minucius Felix a Christian apologist even confirms that 'the names of brother and sister hallow fornification as incest. Their foolish superstition makes a boast of crime, a condemned criminal is the object of their veneration. Finally there is infant murder, cannibalism, and the banquet with incestuous intercourse.' [Luke 10:1 Sinai Bible]

After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go.

Compare various Bible translations here --> http://www.biblegateway.net/cgi-bin/bible?...=NASB&x=20&y=11 Sorry, no such thing as Sinai Bible at that site...

"No analysis of their authenticity and genuineness was seriously attempted....The ends which they had in view, the polemic motives, their uncritical inconsistent assertions, their want of sure data, detract from their testimony.."

Could say the same of your sources, more justifiably.

1.  Christ never lived

And Mr. Read has lived for 2000 years to ever so definitively conclude thus? Or is he a person of great faith in his trusty sources?

[widowsmite]

And just to clarify, Book Two of Augustine's Confessions "depicts the falling away from God that comes from adherence to the flesh." He concentrates on his sixteenth year, a year of idleness, lust, and adolescent mischief. The memory of staying out late with friends and stealing some pears from a tree next to their vineyard, pears that they barely ate and fed to hogs instead, prompts a deep probing of the motives and aims of sinful acts, a treatise between apparent motives and genuine motives.

when it is said, "Let's go, let's do it," we are ashamed not to be shameless.

A depraved soul, falling away from security in thee to destruction in itself, seeking nothing from the shameful deed but shame itself.

A quaint way to describe what we casually denote today as peer pressure and thrillseeking. This book is a classic not just for religious reasons. St. Augustine is foremost and thorough in publicly confessing that he was far from saintly in his younger years, but many motherly tears and prayers later, he converted to Christianity at age 32 and thereafter wrote these great books, Confessions, and City of God. You do him and his Master great injustice by taking his words out of context.

Online reference: http://ccel.org/a/augustine/confessions/co...onfessions.html

[Craig Read]

Not out of context. A guy who says he steals, lies and perverts cannot be taken out of context. Augstine repudiated the Church before he died, citing corruption and fraud as the main reasons.

Let's face reality the Church is built on a number of MYTHS one of which is Christ himself. The Church is a social movement of organisation and ethical roadmaps. Referencing God, hell and creationism is used to bolster its claims on absolute truth and power. In an age of science and education i would expect that people have a more intelligent view of religion and a historically inaccurate though entertaining work such as the Bible.

The church does itself no service, by clinging to medieval mythogology.

[Elder]

The church does itself no service, by clinging to medieval mythogology.

And that is why 86% of Americans believe there is a God? Craig, please watch what you call an "intelligent view of religion." You seem to believe you speak on behalf of all intelligent people. Let me assure you, you do not.

Frankly, I'm sick of trying to convince you that Christ truly did exist. I guess I read my own posts. This is the worlds most useless arguement. It can not be won by intelligence, whit, cunning, or evidence. Can we please just drop it. We are getting no where here.

[widowsmite]

Not out of context.  A guy who says he steals, lies and perverts cannot be taken out of context.  Augstine repudiated the Church before he died, citing corruption and fraud as the main reasons.

So which is it for you? Augustine is a liar in any context, and "Augustine repudiated the Church before he died, citing corruption and fraud as the main reasons". So Augustine cannot be taken at his own word, liar that he is, except when it happens to support your stand, and even then, without regard for the context in which it was said? Nice work. You want us to accept your claims as truth? How intelligent are we supposed to be in your mythology?

I realize by the above bit of sarcasm, I am opening myself to be quoted out of context. Don't you dare!