Was jesus born on the 25 december

[two sheds]

Or speak, or have consensual sex, or attempt to hold power of any kind, etc.

Yes, that too.

 

[danny la rouge]

Why do you think so many people came to believe he was god? I mean in the time he was alive or soon after his death/ resurrection?

Same reason there were sightings of Elvis soon after his death. And that there's a Church of John Coltrane.

 

[danny la rouge]

Is there any females involded

Hard to say.

 

[DotCommunist]

You need to brush up on your christian history. The Christians may have been persecuted but they were converting people with the sword long before Rome turned Christian.

Thats as may be, but your assertion that christ gained such belief was soley through conversion by threat of the pointy stick is ridiculous, first off cos there were many pointy sticks among many religious factions, and second off cos many people of many religions before and since have deified a redeemer/madhi/messiah figure. As I say it is as common as mother god themes and father god themes- and ancestor worship with it. It's all syncretic.

It just occurred to me that catholic reliance on saints is sublimated ancestor worship the same way as mary worship is mother goddess stuff. Must wind a catholic up with that one next time I see one.

 

[Santino]

Or death date. It is odd that Pontius Pilate, whose reports back to Rome are, at least partially, preserved, makes no mention of having crucified a man called Jesus, claiming to be the King of the Jews.

What reports?

 

[Santino]

I read a book a long time ago that claimed his birth would have probably been around Oct 18 or 19 in AD. 6 or so. He searched out the records for the census that Mary and Joseph were traveling to take part in and narrowed it down to the one near that date as the most likely.

What census?

 

[danny la rouge]

I read a book a long time ago that claimed his birth would have probably been around Oct 18 or 19 in AD. 6 or so. He searched out the records for the census that Mary and Joseph were traveling to take part in and narrowed it down to the one near that date as the most likely.

The Romans didn't require people to return to the town of their ancestors in order to take part in a census. They wanted to know where you were now, so they could tax you. The census story is a back formation, to make the facts fit OT prophecies. He was called Jesus of Nazareth for a reason. He was from Nazareth.

 

[Lock&Light]

What reports?

Official letters to Tiberius.

 

[free spirit]

The Romans didn't require people to return to the town of their ancestors in order to take part in a census. They wanted to know where you were now, so they could tax you. The census story is a back formation, to make the facts fit OT prophecies. He was called Jesus of Nazareth for a reason. He was from Nazareth.

really?

How would they know someone hadn't registered when they should have if they didn't return to the place of their birth, where their birth and deaths would presumably have already been registered.

I can certainly see the logic that could have led the romans to require everyone to return to the place of their birth to register their current whereabouts and occupation etc.

I was born in Burnley, but am known by virtually everyone as being from Leeds as this is where I grew up....

not intended as complete proof of anything, other than that your contentions aren't necessarily correct btw.

 

[danny la rouge]

I can certainly see the logic that could have led the romans to require everyone to return to the place of their birth to register their current whereabouts and occupation etc.

Except, in every Roman census we know of, that's not how they did it.

 

[Lock&Light]

The Romans didn't require people to return to the town of their ancestors in order to take part in a census. They wanted to know where you were now, so they could tax you. The census story is a back formation, to make the facts fit OT prophecies. He was called Jesus of Nazareth for a reason. He was from Nazareth.

Nazareth didn't exist in the time of Jesus.

 

[free spirit]

Except, in every Roman census we know of, that's not how they did it.

not exactly definitive proof though still, is it?

eta - and how many census are we talking about here over what time period?

strikes me as a fucking bizarre lie to put in to the public domain at a time when such a census would still have been a relatively recent event, within some people's lifetimes, or at least their parents lifetimes. Why would anyone base a religion around such an obviously disprovable lie?

 

[danny la rouge]

not exactly definitive proof though still, is it?

strikes me as a fucking bizarre lie to put in to the public domain at a time when such a census would still have been a relatively recent event, within some people's lifetimes, or at least their parents lifetimes. Why would anyone base a religion around such an obviously disprovable lie?

No it isn't in itself conclusive. Just makes the census story unlikely. That, and the censuses it could have been weren't done that way.

As to the second point about recent history. The slaughter of the innocents didn't happen at all. Yet that went in. (You'd think somebody might say "Wait a minute. I don't remember that!") But only so that OT prophecies could "come true". Like the Messiah being from the line of David (hence Bethlehem) but also come out of Egypt. (After fleeing the slaughter of all male infants to Egypt, then returning).

 

[danny la rouge]

Nazareth didn't exist in the time of Jesus.

It did, and was referred to in non Biblical histories hundreds of years before the birth of Jesus.

 

[danny la rouge]

Official letters to Tiberius.

Are you sure about that? You don't mean the story in Philo?

 

[Olle]

why was he called jesus and where did the name come from

 

[Lock&Light]

It did, and was referred to in non Biblical histories hundreds of years before the birth of Jesus.

From Wiki:
"Nazareth is not mentioned in pre-Christian texts............

James Strange, an American archaeologist, notes: “Nazareth is not mentioned in ancient Jewish sources earlier than the third century AD."

 

[Olle]

was the name Jesus about brfore JESUS

 

[free spirit]

The slaughter of the innocents didn't happen at all.

again, I don't see how anyone can say this with any certainty. The killing of a few children in one village would have been pretty low on historical significance outside of its significance for the story of Jesus, and entirely in character for a king who killed his own kids, brother in law etc.

 

[free spirit]

not that I'm hugely bothered either way, it's just that while I don't particularly go for all the son of god malarky, I do generally tend towards the idea that there's a reasonable degree of truth about a lot of it - ie there was a preacher called Jesus who probably was the son of Mary and Joseph, who was a proper thorn in the side of the establishment and ended up being crucified, and many of the tales told about stuff he did and said would have been relatively accurate at a base level, but then seriously exagerated to beef up the claim for him being the son of god.

One point that really does intrigue me is whether Jesus actually described himself as being the son of god, or whether that bit was added in later by his disciples / later scripture writers.

 

[Lock&Light]

One point that really does intrigue me is whether Jesus actually described himself as being the son of god, or whether that bit was added in later by his disciples / later scripture writers.

Everything that Jesus says was added later by scripture writers.

 

[Olle]

not that I'm hugely bothered either way, it's just that while I don't particularly go for all the son of god malarky, I do generally tend towards the idea that there's a reasonable degree of truth about a lot of it - ie there was a preacher called Jesus who probably was the son of Mary and Joseph, who was a proper thorn in the side of the establishment and ended up being crucified, and many of the tales told about stuff he did and said would have been relatively accurate at a base level, but then seriously exagerated to beef up the claim for him being the son of god.

One point that really does intrigue me is whether Jesus actually described himself as being the son of god, or whether that bit was added in later by his disciples / later scripture writers.

good read

 

[Olle]

to all my first day has been great .I have learnt loads

 

[TruXta]

Olle is a bot based on the chinese room idea.

It's an interesting idea for a human spambot that. Useless as a philosophy of mind argument, but a worthy experiment in the making.

 

[DotCommunist]

It's an interesting idea for a human spambot that. Useless as a philosophy of mind argument, but a worthy experiment in the making.

I came across it in Peter Watts 'Blindsight' sci fi novel and followed it up. As far as wikipedo

For three days this team think they are communicating with a sentient being until the linguist realises they are being had by a very advanced chinese room mechanism the thing possessed without sentience. One of the bleaker things in that novel is the meat puppetry one. Read it when stoned and you start to wonder who is the Robot.

 

[TruXta]

I was thinking it could be useful as a way of throwing trackers off the scent. Hm. Maybe not.

 

[Santino]

was the name Jesus about brfore JESUS

Yes, it's the same name as Joshua.

 

[Santino]

Everything that Jesus says was added later by scripture writers.

Added to what?

 

[DotCommunist]

I've got a copy of the new testament that has the words of jesus done IN RED.

Case closed.

 

[scifisam]

No idea. some prog I half watche dmany years ago something about some star being brighter than normal and my sister's birthday which made it stick in my head.

Haley's Comet. It appeared in about 5BC, and, especially in desert cultures where the sky is fuck-off huge, these things are taken seriously. They're often meant to portend something or other, and in this case it was - possibly retroactively - taken to portend to the birth of someone who was going to be a saviour.

The date also makes sense (as much as anything can) with the other reports about Jesus's birth, like the census (which is why he was born in Nazareth - the Lord of the Census-Takers) taking place just after harvest time, when the people can still travel and they haven't had time to hide the wheat; there were actual censuses at that time of year in Roman-occupied territories.

For those who are willing to believe in a God that lets people go hungry while murderers prosper, getting a date right is no big deal.