Birth of Jesus - Christmas

Cypress said:
You could cut the miraculous conception and virgin birth story out of Luke and Matthew, and it literally wouldn't have any effect on basic Christian concepts of salvation, grace, and ethics.

Especially since Jesus' divine agency is established universally in other ways in the NT.
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Wrong! Because Isaiah 7:14 ,would be a false prophecy!
Like Federal Trumps State Law!
Old Testament prophecy Trumps!Everything!
 
Daylight63 said:
But Christ was revered as divine almost IMMEDIATELY after his crucifixion. The concept you are alluding to of homoousiosness (of the same substance as God) was not until later, but DIVINITY was clearly established very early after his death. (https://www.catholic.com/tract/the-divinity-of-christ).

This is crucial to understanding Christianity. One has to understand the evolution of Christology. You are taking one FORM of Christology which was developed and enforced centuries later, but the DIVINITY of Jesus was believed long before that.
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I don't think that had any bearing on the points I made in the OP.

The nature of Jesus' humanity vs. divinity was an open question in the first century.

The miraculous conception and birth in Bethlehem were theological frameworks to establish Jesus as the Messiah, and are only reported in Luke and Matthew, so it doesn't seem like it was a critical and momentous issue in the first century tradition. What really established Jesus as a person of divine authority was the resurrection. The resurrection is what defines Christianity in it's core intrinsic essence. The resurrection is what everyone agreed on and reported - Paul, Mark, Luke, Matthew, John, James, Peter.
 
Hume said:
Then Jesus is just a moral teacher.
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Not that easy! Thomas Aquntis had it right
Christ was either ''Liar,Lunatic,or LORD"!
He said he was YHWH incarnate! " Before Abraham I AM"
"When you've seen the Son ,you've Father" .
Jesus is either YHWH incarnate or a liar! He said he was God!
He either was or wasn't!
 
Margot said:
Wrong! Because Isaiah 7:14 ,would be a false prophecy!
Like Federal Trumps State Law!
Old Testament prophecy Trumps!EveEverythingg
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The resurrection was what seemed to convince Paul, Mark, Peter, James, John that Jesus was the Messiah.
They never mentioned or said anything about the miraculous conception and virgin birth. Almost as if they didn't know about it.
 
Cypress said:
A premarital pregnancy would have been a scandal in first century Jewish Galilee, bringing dishonor to the family of the woman.

Most scholars are predisposed to accept a historical reality of Mary becoming pregnant outside of wedlock. When such a damaging story appears in the gospels the underlying oral or written tradition was too persistent to ignore by first century authors. The Babylonian Torah seems to claim Mary was impregnated by a Roman soldier.

Luke and Matthew get around this problem by using the Hebrew Bible to frame the birth of Jesus in a theological context. The question is whether the birth narratives in Luke and Matthew are only based on prophecy, or based on an authentic and long standing oral tradition.

The miraculous virgin birth narrative is only briefly mentioned in Luke and Matthew, composed around 80 to 85 AD.

Authors writing much earlier, Paul and Mark, make no mention of a virgin birth. Paul seems to allude that Jesus did not become divine until after he was crucified.

John and the author of Peter I and II make no mention of a virgin birth.

The gnostic gospel of Thomas and the other recognized Gnostic writings do not mention a virgin birth.

It is remarkable that an event so momentous and unprecedented as a virgin birth fulfilling Hebrew prophecy is not mentioned by these other authors.

Conclusion: the miraculous Virgin birth narrative is a later legendary account composed and framed by Luke and Matthew for theological reasons.
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Whatever actually went down, as a secular person, I have no gripes with Jesus and his New Testament values.
Too bad so few Christians have a similar view.

In any case, whether we get along or not,
I wish the forum a very enjoyable holiday season
in whatever format everyone chooses to observe it.
 
Cypress said:
There are exaggerations, hyperbole, embellishments in the NT, but people doesn't risk their lives and die for things they know are complete fabrications.

There is no way for me to rationally conclude that the apostles and evangelists of the mid to late first century thought they were selling lies.
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why? because tyranny was unknown in the Roman empire?
The most rational conclusion is that they genuinely believed Jesus was and agent of divine authority - the messiah. Whether or not they were mistaken in that belief.
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that belief is not the point of christianity, so for Christians with discernment, your points are stupid.
 
NiftyNiblick said:
Whatever actually went down, as a secular person, I have no gripes with Jesus and his New Testament values.
Too bad so few Christians have a similar view.

In any case, whether we get along or not,
I wish the forum a very enjoyable holiday season
in whatever format everyone chooses to observe it.
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You're right.
 
Cypress said:
The resurrection was what seemed to convince Paul, Mark, Peter, James, John that Jesus was the Messiah.
They never mentioned or said anything about the miraculous conception and virgin birth. Almost as if they didn't know about it.
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Isaiah 7:14 Had already been written, if Mary didn't give a virgin birth to Jesus, Isaiah 7:14 ,wouldn't be in the book!
Paul,Mark,Peter,James and John are off stage!
Sooner or later you have to decide what you truly believe.
There's only one real question in Christianity, or Judaism, possibly Islam! That question is Jesus was either YHWH incarnate in the flesh! Or he wasn't! Everything else is a side issue! Why is this important now? Your soul,and time is short,And it's something you can't sit on the fence!
 
Cypress said:
It's plausible, and I am willing to entertain it as a plausible hypothesis.

If we take Luke and Matthew at their word, Mary was pregnant out of wedlock.

Matthew had a vested interest in a miraculous conception narrative. Matthew was primarily writing for a Hebrew audience, and he was probably interested in connecting Jesus to Hebrew prophecy in the Septuagint.

Paul, Mark, James, John, make no mention of a miraculous conception and virgin birth. An event so unprecedented and miraculous it's hard to understand why they would ignore it.

If Matthew and Luke are correct that Mary was pregnant out of wedlock, either it was a miraculous conception, or Mary got pregnant by Joseph prior to being wedded.
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Exactly! So the question to you is which is it?
"Miraculous conception" or "Mary got pregnant by Joseph''!
What's does Cypress think?
1.IDK
2. Virgin Birth fulfilling Isaiah 7:14
3. Pregnant by Joseph ,Jesus is a mere man but not divine!
 
Margot said:
Exactly! So the question to you is which is it?
"Miraculous conception" or "Mary got pregnant by Joseph''!
What's does Cypress think?
1.IDK
2. Virgin Birth fulfilling Isaiah 7:14
3. Pregnant by Joseph ,Jesus is a mere man but not divine!
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Peppered throughout the New Testament are references to Joseph being the biological father of Jesus, and statements that Jesus is biologically a descendant of the House of David. Given those attestations, the balance of probability suggests to me that Jesus was begat biologically from Joseph
 
Cypress said:
Right,
I never said that any person acting with what they believe is divine agency - prophet, sage, or messiah - has to be God the father. Muhammed and Moses were supposedly agents of divine authority, but they were human nonetheless. Some people like to think that about Jesus as well - Unitarian Universalists, for example.
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Mason claims he's Melchizedek in
Melchizedek-Files.com
It would seem ,not a chance in Hell Mason's Melchizedek
Except Dead Sea scrolls 11 Q 13 interpreted by Gaza Vermez in
The Complete Dead Sea scrolls in English, says that
Melchizedek is Michael !Mason is named Michael,was born on
"Old Michaelmas on Oct 11,And was baptized on
Orthodox Michaelmas ,and when YHWH revealed all this to Mason ,YHWH said one thing to Michael Mason!
YHWH said " What Day is Michaelmas on"?
 
Margot said:
Now lets take our friend Cypress,he's waiting for YHWH to explain logically, what's going on! YHWH is waiting for Cypress to take one step in Faith! A Mexican stand off!
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This is presenting a theologically problematic version of God. To wit....

Who knows more?
God or Cypress?

Let me go out on a limb here and say God knows MORE than Cypress. God is perfect. God is all-powerful. God sees all and knows all. Cypress is a human being. Flawed and imperfect and lacking universal knowledge.

God effectively CREATED Cypress and God KNOWS Cypress' limitations. Inside and out.

So is it a "game" God is playing?

This is a version of God that fails the "worthy of worship" test for me. It is not unlike the "mafia boss" God we discussed earlier. One in which God holds all the cards and seemingly just wants to play with his creation.

To what point does God create an imperfect being and then punish the imperfect being for failing to become more perfect? And what debt does the created being owe to that God? The created being didn't ask to join the game. But at the end of the day only the created being will ever be eternally tortured for failing to play the game to God's required level.
 
anonymoose said:
4th option: God impregnated Mary. Makes the most sense.
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Remember the bounds of the OP. The OP is predicated on the concept that if one is accepts that the Nativity narrative is, at it's heart, a real historical event but one doesn't believe in the supernatural aspect, the goal is to then created a version of the story that would, a prior, appear to be the Nativity narrative but without the supernatural stuff.

As such the supernatural things aren't really in consideration here for the purposes of this discussion.
 
Daylight63 said:
This is presenting a theologically problematic version of God. To wit....

Who knows more?
God or Cypress?

Let me go out on a limb here and say God knows MORE than Cypress. God is perfect. God is all-powerful. God sees all and knows all. Cypress is a human being. Flawed and imperfect and lacking universal knowledge.

God effectively CREATED Cypress and God KNOWS Cypress' limitations. Inside and out.

So is it a "game" God is playing?

This is a version of God that fails the "worthy of worship" test for me. It is not unlike the "mafia boss" God we discussed earlier. One in which God holds all the cards and seemingly just wants to play with his creation.

To what point does God create an imperfect being and then punish the imperfect being for failing to become more perfect? And what debt does the created being owe to that God? The created being didn't ask to join the game. But at the end of the day only the created being will ever be eternally tortured for failing to play the game to God's required level.
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Didn't A Prophet tell Cypress, YHWH is waiting for Cypress to take a single step in Faith? How hard is that?
Risk ,reward situation!
 
Cypress said:
No, it's possible other people decades after Mary started an oral and written tradition that a pregnancy out of wedlock somehow became a virgin impregnation narrative.
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Here's where I find your position confusing:

You, yourself, openly seem to claim that Mary was not a virgin as the narrative says she was. Instead you say she was probably impregnated out of wedlock. So you believe at least part of the narrative in the gospels is made up.

Yet when I suggest that the entire narrative could easily be made up (NOT the entirety of the Gospel, just the nativity) and for some reason that seems to upset you and you gasp that I am saying the authors of the Gospel were liars (!)

But for some reason the stuff you think they made up isn't calling the authors of the Gospels liars.

You prefer Isbouts' presumable credulity on the Nativity narrative for literary criticism reasons. I prefer other theologian-writers' suggestion that the nativity narrative actually likely serves only a religious purpose and has no necessary reality to it.
 
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