Ancient mystery religions and the possible psychedelic roots of Christianity

Your stumbling blocks of the resurrection, virgin birth and hell (see my reply to Coco) are just the tip of the iceberg. How long did it take you to excise the things Jesus said that you’d find revolting from the things he said you find winsome ?

 

Why don't you read what Jesus says about the last judgment in Matthew 25? He says, "When the Son of man comes in his glory," he will separate all the nations "as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats." Then he will tell the goats, "Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels." Then, Jesus says, "they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

I don't know how you get can more literal than that. But go ahead, call it figurative language or something. After all, he likened the condemned to goats, right? He was waxing poetic, it was just some holy BS to make people lose some sleep.

 

Jude 7 says the fires of Sodom and Gamorrah are everlasting. Seems like satellite photos could bear this out ?

I’m actually not apologizing for whatever mode God proposes to punish his enemy. I just reckon that Jesus has reference to the Fall of Jerusalem.

 

"Poets priests and politicians...have words to thank for their positions...a do do do a da da da...that's all I have to say to you..."

 

Only one person in that group provides testable proof of claims.

 

Sure, if you believe everything in the Bible.

Sure, the gathering of all the nations for judgment just refers to the Fall of Jerusalem.

Over and out. Trying to argue with you is an everlasting child's game. I told myself that I wouldn't do it. But I guess everything I say (even to myself) can't be taken literally. Gee, I'm a lot like Jesus!

 

YES

 

Let’s assume you are correct on the lack of emphasis on Christian praxis in evangelical circles for a moment. Many people sincerely devote themselves to practicing the morals and ethics of the New Testament, and yet they fall short. They fail to live up to the Sermon on the Mount. They fail to live up to everything Jesus commanded. What happens to people who fail to meet the standards laid out by Jesus? What did Jesus teach happens to disobedient people?

 

Just a snippet. YouTube has the whole list of evil stuff this “saint” did. Or as full as ever counted.

 

Right, and his answers always breed new questions. Regardless. there is way more to all of it than any scientist will ever discover.

 

Yeah, so let's just make stuff up instead.

 

I have felt the wind my friend.

 

same with the philosophers and theologians. Nobody knows shit. Only morons claim to have all the answers.

 

Again, you say that until you feel the effects of the wind.

 

@Contra - No doubt Matthew 25:46 is on your radar and I will address it later in this post, which will necessarily be long and possibly of no interest to most of the people reading this thread.

@mrhansduck, my apology to you for your thread going off track, and the part I have played in it. I do have some information I want to post wrt the OP, which greatly interests me, and will return to the thread topic after I answer the question asked and quoted in this post.

@Contra - As you well know Jesus spoke of hell as a place of destruction where the fires never went out. The English word 'hell' was translated from the Greek Hades, but the actual place referenced was the garbage dump known as gehenna in the Hinnom Valley outside the city walls of Jerusalem "where the fires were never quenched" burning continuously as 'unclean' things were destroyed. Those who sinned because of what they looked at or what they did, were hyperbolically instructed by Jesus to pluck out the offending eye or cut off the offending hand and throw it into the fires of gehenna. There was no mention of eternal torture.

From Matthew 7:13;14...13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

Knowing what Judaism believes or teaches on this topic is relevant as the early church adopted some of the Jewish beliefs into their own doctrines. The Catholic teachings on purgatory were derived from Jewish beliefs about gehenna and its cleansing purposes where unclean things were destroyed.

https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/282508/jewish/What-Happens-After-We-Die.htm

"When the soul departs from the body, it stands before the heavenly court to give a “judgment and accounting” of its earthly life.mitzvot and positive actions is the exquisite pleasure of Gan Eden (the “Garden of Eden”—Paradise); its experience of the destructiveness it wrought through its lapses and transgressions is the excruciating pain of Gehinnom (“Gehenna” or “Purgatory”).

"The truth hurts. The truth also cleanses and heals. The spiritual pain of Gehinnom—the soul’s pain in facing the truth of its life—cleanses and heals the soul of the spiritual stains and blemishes that its failings and misdeeds have attached to it. Freed of this husk of negativity, the soul is now able to fully enjoy the immeasurable good that its life engendered, and “bask in the divine radiance” emitted by the G‑dliness it brought into the world.

"For a G‑dly soul spawns far more good in its lifetime than evil. The core of the soul is unadulterated goodness; the good we accomplish is infinite, the evil but shallow and superficial. So even the most wicked of souls, say our sages, experiences at most twelve months of Gehinnom, followed by an eternity of heaven. Furthermore, a soul’s experience of Gehinnom can be mitigated by the action of his or her children and loved ones, here on earth. Reciting kaddish and engaging in other good deeds “in merit of” and “for the elevation of” the departed soul means that the soul, in effect, is continuing to act positively upon the physical world, thereby adding to the goodness of its physical lifetime."

_______________________

I don't know, and make no pretense to know, what process the soul (consciousness?) goes through when the body dies, but believe the truth of the words in Ecclesiastes 12:7 - Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.

Sorry for the early post. It was 'slip of the finger' posted prematurely; will complete and combine in a subsequent post when I have completed my response to Contra.

 

This is idiotic. How does feeling wind give you any answers?

 

Oh I’ve felt the wind. There’s more than one way to skin a cat. Doesn’t mean you have all the answers. It just seems that way.

 

Fine with me. I never get anywhere with wooden literalists. I’ve had better success arguing with Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses.