Not everything in the Bible is true...

[niky]

:D Very interesting political perspective, and pretty much correct.

[city]

wasn't jesus really a revolt leader? they wanted the romans out of their country right?

[oldblue]

Ah... that's a philosophical paradox that has no answer. The question is, would you be questioning the divine providence of such an occurence if the Romans hadn't had administrative power over the Jews at the time?

We would possibly be talking instead about the *** life of Aphrodite...

This is one of those paradoxes where you can only philosophically muse about the event because it actually happened.

true. and I agree very much with Aphrodite concept. but I dont like to consider it a paradox. but it would be interesting to trace the roots of the Romans before the Holy Roman Empire. The ancient Romans were of Greek origin. Their culture can be characterized with greek arts, designs, language, politics, educational systems, philosophy etc .... kumbaga the Romans are what we might call refined or "mutated" Greeks. hehehe

but who were the Greeks? Ancient Greece is considered by most historians to be the foundational culture of Western Civilization -> modern Europe. They were the first migratory settlers. but from where? but just like the bible, the mahabharata of India and other ancient books, historians cant go as far din. all they have are literary works of ancient writers like Homer's Iliad and the 3 famous philosophers.

[Flagg]

we have the Spanish and the Romans to thank for that, not Jesus.

Only partly true sirM54, remember, there were hundreds of religions nung Roman times. Why choose Christianity over them all? Lalo na, pre-Constantine medyo good entertainment lang mga Christians, pang lion food, pang crucify, pang bbq, etc.

Ito po analysis alam ko:

1.) 1 central unifying God (kahit trinity sya), so walang kaaway na worthy. Very nice symbolism for the Roman Empire.
2.) Promise of eternal bliss and salvation: by Constantine's time, parang pa-end of the world na mga Romans... the barbarians were at the gates... sacrifice and be united and you will be saved (besides ang tigas ng mga Christians noon, oks lang sa kanila to be fed to lions, di man lang sinapak yung lion, very good example). And so the Empire was safe, for a few hundred years.
3.) after Constantine, dating na mga Huns, Goths, Vandals, and others... and they were winning and massacring... talagang end of the world. So where do you turn? Why to the ones who can promise you eternal salvation in exchange for your suffering, kumbaga may point yung suffering mo. Kahit na-axe ka ni Attila, oks lang, you go to heaven. Very convenient.

No other religion was this 'lucky,' parang may divine plan. Is it the plan of God to make Christianity (His religion) greater through all this great suffering?

Ito imho na po, I don't think so, I think He just picked up and cleaned up after the mess of man, and did it through Christianity. He gave man hope, inspite of man abusing free will to the point of using His Name in vain (Crusades, Inquisition, Witch Hunts, Constantine's forced Baptism of the Empire). For example, the Popes may have been a$$hole$, but who were the ones writing books in the Middle Ages, and thus saving knowledge from extinction? Yes, the monks, no less Christian than those crazy Crusading Popes. You can see God's hand at work throughout history.

[oldblue]

continue ka lang:

with Ancient Greeks and philosophy (Plato/Aristotle's Atlantis), the Bible and the Indian epic of Mahabharata all speaking about destruction of ancient cities. three independent civilizations but with an almost similar view of what happened in the past,
it's not difficult to see the pattern.

[Flagg]

Sir oldblue, re Aphrodite (or should I say Venus) umm... married to a lumpo named Vulcan, tapos had affairs with a bunch of other gods, wakekek that's Western culture for you.

All I know about the Greeks was that they had 2 distinct phases: they began as Myceneans (supposedly wiped out by something like the Flood) then began again as Hellenes (which they still claim to be today). The Romans adopted Hellenic culture because it was dominant at the time due to it's liberalism and goal of seeking knowledge (of course, Alexander the Gay conquered everything from Greece to a part of India, including the Levant and Egypt, except Rome cuz it was worthless). At that time, Romans were rednecks from the 7 hills and of course they'd wanna be just a little bit more cono, growing empire and all.

[niky]

At that time, Romans were rednecks from the 7 hills and of course they'd wanna be just a little bit more cono, growing empire and all.

wekekeke... I wanna be coño, too... let's get greeky!

The empirical war and the cultural war often go hand in hand, but the winners aren't always the same. The stronger empire can crush the weaker empire, but if the weaker empire has a more advanced theology/culture/civilization, this will supplant the current culture of the stronger empire.

Roman religion isn't very strong. With so many different Gods, there really was no central worship or strong theological basis for the Romans before Christianity. Tama nga si Constantine, Christianity was a good tool for a conqueror, iconic, relevant to the people, and very easy for people to pick up. The dichotomy of the personally forgiving God and the vengeful militant God meant that it was easy to use to pacify populations, and then afterwards, use them for martial purposes.

Oh, it was also a good excuse to persecute Jews... sadly. Thank God that part is behind us now.

[oldblue]

:D Very interesting political perspective, and pretty much correct.

Constatine the Great may have some political agenda (like Roman empire is to Christianity, and the US empire is to democracy) but it is also interesting to know that he had a vision:

"This vision seen by Constantine was made up of two events. Firstly, while marching with his soldiers he saw the shape of an ambigram cross with the words "in this sign you will conquer" in front of the sun. After seeing that he had a dream instructing him to put a new sign (☧) as the standard. It is said that after this event Constantine was immediately converted to Christianity .......

In his later life he even turned to preaching, giving his own sermons in the palace before his court and invited crowds. His sermons preached harmony at first, but gradually turned more confrontational with the old pagan ways

[oldblue]

ever wondered why Rome's better half -> the whole of Italy, joined the axis powers? and Hitler never sacked the Vatican State for being anti-Nazi???

[4wrider]

medical sciences are not weird. Science has never been viewed as weird. Maybe scientology is weird or creation science...I'm not sure what's the basis of your statement. A quack doctor is also weird.

science cannot explain a talking donkey, stick turning into serpent, man walking on water, burning bush, lazarus coming from the dead, man surviving 3 days in a whale's belly.

Now, the great flood, the 7 plagues, etc have scientific explanations as these are not considered unnatural.. natural meaning occuring in nature. Obviously the first examples stated are unnatural so science cannot explain that.

when people get to heaven...assuming it's a real place...people won't be asking questions anymore.

god's ways and thoughts are higher than ours because he's up there..and we're down here...joke...comedy flavor lang...no offense meant.

the man who thought and said we can fly and land on the moon was called a loony.

When people do not understand things either they do not accept that it happened or call any attempt to explain it as weird. Science will all look rationale and all on things that can be explained by CURRENT AND PREVAILING principles and theories. But anything out of the current scientific mind set are ridiculed. And many of this crazy ideas eventually become acceptable science.

Eventually we will know that God

[Flagg]

Constatine the Great may have some political agenda (like Roman empire is to Christianity, and the US empire is to democracy) but it is also interesting to know that he had a vision:

That's right the "in hoc signo vinces vision." Si Constantine garapal na pulitiko din yan... he forcefully baptized everyone in the Empire to be Christian, siyempre to continue his unification thing.

Why do I say garapal? He was a devoted priest of Sol Invictus up to his deathbed. Nung pamatay na sya ay dun lang sya na-baptize, you know, just in case. harharhar

Btw, the birthday of Sol Invictus is Dec. 25. Sounds familiar? ;)

[Flagg]

ever wondered why Rome's better half -> the whole of Italy, joined the axis powers? and Hitler never sacked the Vatican State for being anti-Nazi???

Wakekek, the stuff he couldn't send to Switzerland, he sent to the Vatican, of course! Even if you were Hitler, you'd think twice about messing with the Vatican. You wouldn't believe it (in fact ako din hindi), when I went to church in Italy, ang daming Italiano! Di katulad sa France, talagang museum na mga church. Of course the Pope and he had a deal.

[oldblue]

well taka lang talaga ako kumbakit naging buddy buddies si Hitler & Mussolini + the Japanese Empire. what's the connect? hehehe with the Italians ok siguro maging resbak bec. they were once a proud race kasi nga sila yun modern version ng Roman Empire.

and why is Hitler proud to call the axis powers the Aryan nations or the Aryan Race? if you google it, Aryan is an ancient Indo-Iranian term. again, India na naman hehehe

Nazism portrayed their interpretation of an "Aryan race" as the only race capable of, or with an interest in, creating and maintaining culture and civilizations, while other races are merely capable of conversion, or destruction of culture.

and Hitler knew by heart that the inferior race who can be self-destructive were the Jews.

[nugundam93]

Only two things are true in Islam.

...

Two:

The Qur'an tells us: "not to make friendship with Jews and Christians" (5:51), "kill the disbelievers wherever we find them" (2:191), "murder them and treat them harshly" (9:123), "fight and slay the Pagans, seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem" (9:5). The Qur'an demands that we fight the unbelievers, and promises "If there are twenty amongst you, you will vanquish two hundred: if a hundred, you will vanquish a thousand of them" (8:65).

yikes. so no chance to help the non-believers into their fold? kill, kill, kill lang?

and if written sa Qur'an yan, it makes it scary.

[EL Chicane]

Related pa ba sa Bible yang pinag-uusapan niyo? May nababasa na akong mga hitler-hitler ah.

[nugundam93]

ehehehehe. babalik din sa topic yun. :D

[CoDer]

yikes. so no chance to help the non-believers into their fold? kill, kill, kill lang?

and if written sa Qur'an yan, it makes it scary.

Yes, hatred and killing is written all over Qur'an. The peace embracing muslims are the reformist this very people are commiting the sin of apostacy according to Qur'an and they deserve to die, the true muslims are the radical muslims. Those who kill and die for allah are indeed martyrs as written in Qur'an.

That's why I find it disturbing when people claims that Islam is just another religion. Islam is a religion that has no tolerance, its faithful are mandated to kill for Islam. If you're going back to history and find out who mohammed is, you'll find out that he is a blood thirsty criminal using religion as his excuse.

[empy]

sir *M54 Powered, very true. but they used one weapon, Christianity. I consider it miraculously to convert a bunch of natives and barbarians on other parts of the world to forget their old ways and follow Christ.

bosing, i think that the horse and chariot, iron (steel?) weapons and armor, and superior military tactics in the Legions had a little bit more to do with it

[empy]

remember, there were hundreds of religions nung Roman times. Why choose Christianity over them all? Lalo na, pre-Constantine medyo good entertainment lang mga Christians, pang lion food, pang crucify, pang bbq, etc.

that's a good point. i have no idea why the Romans chose to embrace Christianity over the other religions, and your theories seem to be as good as any. and there's no denying that it really helped Christianity because they gave it to Spain, who took care of the rest of the world...

[beebs]

i believe in the bible 100%. i'm worried about people in this thread making harsh remarks about Jesus, God and the Bible.

We all are sinners. only Jesus is the spotless Lamb. He came to earth so He can show us how we should live our life.

Hell is definitely real. When you go to hell, there will be eternal sufferings and gnashing of teeth, as what Jesus described it to His deciples.

God offered His Son Jesus so we can be saved from hell. all we have to do is accept Him as our Lord into our life. He will make us separate from sin (adultery, stealing, etc..)

How can we be saved? Ask Jesus to enter your heart by accepting you're a sinner and to turn back from your habitual sins. Treat Jesus as your friend in your everyday life, not only on sundays. He is alive and always looks upon us. You don't have to read a prayer, just talk to Him like a real live person.

Why do we experience sufferings and confusions? It's because Jesus will be coming back (it's all in the Bible)