Why did you frame the futility of "true Christian doctrine" in terms of what "Jesus taught"? In light of the fact that Christian doctrine is based on what the Bible on the whole says rather than what "Jesus taught". What's more what Paul taught serves as the basis for interpreting the rest of the Bible rather than what "Jesus taught". Ultimately this is what makes "true Christian doctrine" futile.

Jesus. The Bible. St. Paul. Take your pick. They all failed.

Anyone who has frequented religious forums has probably seen a similar discussion. Such discussions show the fatal flaw in the teaching of Jesus: sincere Christians can’t agree on what he taught and what is true doctrine. — Art48

Yeah, and you can see the same kind of discussions about quantum mechanics and what is the “true” interpretation, or is “realism”or “idealism” and which is the right metaphysical view, etc…..

And so, do we want to say this demonstrates the fatal flaw of anyone’s views and philosophies around these topics?

I think not.

Jesus. The Bible. St. Paul. Take your pick. They all failed. — Art48

Perhaps the most prevalent theme in the gospel preached by Jesus was the importance of HIS words. The words He spoke while He preached His gospel. Not the words of the Bible on the whole. Not the words of Paul. HIS words. Jesus went on and on about it. Emphasized the point time and again. Issued warning after warning.
Hear His word.
Not just hear His word, but understand His word.
Not just understand His word, but believe His word.
Not just believe His word, but follow His word.
Not just follow His word, but abide in and keep His word.

It is the failure of Christians, including Paul, to hear, understand and believe His word. Instead they hear, understand and believe the words of those other than Jesus. Ultimately this is what makes "true Christian doctrine" futile.

As but a few examples:
John 12
46 “I have come as Light into the world, so that everyone who believes in Me will not remain in darkness.
50 “I know that His commandment is eternal life; therefore the things I speak, I speak just as the Father has told Me.”
48 “He who rejects Me and does not receive My sayings, has one who judges him; the word I spoke is what will judge him at the last day.

John 18
37...For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.”

John 10
27“My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; 28and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.

Yeah, and you can see the same kind of discussions about quantum mechanics and what is the “true” interpretation, or is “realism”or “idealism” and which is the right metaphysical view, etc….. — Richard B

I expected this objection. The math of Quantum Mechanics works; it can describe phenomena within the accuracy equal to describing the distance from New York to San Francisco within the width of a human hair. Physicists argue about what the math means, not the math itself.

Besides, if Jesus/Bible/St. Paul didn't do any better than scientists then why should anyone believe they are teaching divine truth?

IFF a truth is "divine" (i.e. "revealed"), then it should not be open to interpretation; thus, Christian scriptures do not express "the divine, revealed truth".

Yep.

Seems to me that the notion of doctrine is of christian origin:

"the body of principles, dogmas, etc., in a religion or field of knowledge," from Old French doctrine (12c.) "teaching, doctrine" and directly from Latin doctrina "a teaching, body of teachings, learning," from doctor "teacher" — etymonline.com

One of the characteristic differences between classical and medieval thinking is the idea that there is one true belief, and that those who do not share it need be persecuted. Rome did not much care what you believed so long as you observed obsequence to the Emperor. They worried about what you did, not what you thought. Christianity seems to have been the source of right-think.

"Eppur si muove." ~Galileo Galilei

Rome did not much care what you believed so long as you observed obsequence to the Emperor. They worried about what you did, not what you thought. Christianity seems to have been the source of right-think. — Banno

Thought crime. :eyes:

IIRC, Camus drew totalitarian parallels between Communism and Christianity on this basis in The Rebel, which butt hurt Parisian communists back in the day and ended his friendship with Sartre and others. Or maybe it was Arendt ...

Perhaps the most prevalent theme in the gospel preached by Jesus was the importance of HIS words. The words He spoke while He preached His gospel. Not the words of the Bible on the whole. Not the words of Paul. HIS words. — ThinkOfOne

It's kind of ironic because as far as we know there are no records of Yeshua ben Yosef words or whoever the first century figure/s was who may have inspired the legends. So how much should we care about this?

The Rebel is yet another text to which I have not paid due attention. It seems to chime with my preferred moral parable, Tolstoy's Three Questions, in emphasising the here and now and other. It offers release from the dogmatic enactment of the self in Sartre.

Added to my wish list. Thanks.

Indeed, a point so obvious one must be perplexed that is seems to have passed by.

One of the things Arendt focused upon was how international visions of a world fueled many local events. And thus, her distinction between mutual ethnic hatred from antisemitism as a phenomenon.

It's kind of ironic because as far as we know there are no records of Yeshua ben Yosef words or whoever the first century figure was who may have inspired the legends. So how much should we care about this? — Tom Storm

Interesting. Seems reasonable to place import on the quality of the underlying concepts conveyed. Evidently you place import on the quantity of records kept instead.

From what I gather, the words attributed to Jesus from the beginning of His ministry through His crucifixion as documented across the four gospels: Mark, Matthew, Luke and John are the only extant records.

So is your argument that we cannot trust the gospels, but can trust what they say Yeshua ben Yosef said?

And that's not problematic?

Or is it that only the stuff that is the same in all four gospels is true...?

That's quite the straw man. I made no such argument.

From what I gather, the words attributed to Jesus from the beginning of His ministry through His crucifixion as documented across the four gospels: Mark, Matthew, Luke and John are the only extant records. — ThinkOfOne

Much of the other stuff based on Mark, which is still decades after the supposed events. The gospels are anonymous documents which are copies of translations of copies of translations etc.

The first task here is to demonstrate that the Jesus story in the books comports with an actual life and words of a real person/god. Until anyone can do this, they are, it seems to me, just doing book reports.

From what I gather, the words attributed to Jesus from the beginning of His ministry through His crucifixion as documented across the four gospels: Mark, Matthew, Luke and John are the only extant records.
— ThinkOfOne

Much of the other stuff based on Mark, which is still decades after the supposed events. The gospels are anonymous documents which are copies of translations of copies of translations etc.

The first task here is to demonstrate that the Jesus story in the books comports with an actual life and words of a real person/god. Until anyone can do this, they are, it seems to me, just doing book reports. — Tom Storm

Telling that you intentionally omitted the following from my previous post:

Interesting. Seems reasonable to place import on the quality of the underlying concepts conveyed. Evidently you place import on the quantity of records kept instead. — ThinkOfOne

Pay particular attention to the sentence I placed in bold.

Then what was your argument? Why should anyone accept scripture as a part of any philosophical reasoning?

What is the True Christian Doctrine, apart from the stuff of which you, personally, happen to approve?

Telling that you intentionally omitted the following from my previous post:
Interesting. Seems reasonable to place import on the quality of the underlying concepts conveyed. Evidently you place import on the quantity of records kept instead. — ThinkOfOne

Interesting and odd way of looking at it from my perspective. You say 'intentionally omitted' as though I made a sinister choice. Is that what you intended?

Yes, for me the first principles are: what was, or was not actually said. Who was or was not actually a person/god.

Everything else comes after.

If we have no record of any such figure saying any such things, or doing any of the things described, then what you have is functionally no different to finding value in Harry Potter saying things. And there may well be value in the words and deeds of a fictional figure. I value the ethical world of George Elliot's novels.

Seems reasonable to place import on the quality of the underlying concepts conveyed. — ThinkOfOne

As what? What are you getting at - as truths found in myths, or is it something more?

What mechanism do you use to determine 'quality' and how do you identify 'underlying concepts'?

Besides, if Jesus/Bible/St. Paul didn't do any better than scientists then why should anyone believe they are teaching divine truth? — Art48

Alternately, a believer might just say that it not “divine truth” that get us in trouble but the fallible human that gets confused.

And the main point is just because disagreement exist does not necessarily mean “divine truth” is futile.

Scientists may disagree on the meaning of experimental results, but we would not go as far to say it is futile to think that there may be a better theory or a better experiment to perform.

How important are reading comprehension skills?

How important is it to understand context?

Perhaps a thought experiment will help.

Let's say that Einstein passed away in obscurity, but prior to his passing Einstein had fully developed his thoughts and fully documented them in a journal. Let's say that an author came across this journal and wrote a fictitious account of a scientist and liberally interspersed the novel with quotes from Einstein's journal depicting them as entries from a journal kept by the fictitious scientist. The author then destroyed Einstein's journal after the novel was published.

In and of themselves, off what value are the underlying concepts conveyed by the journal entries in the novel?

But the Roman Catholic Church is the “One, True Church©.” — Art48

The One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church, you mean. It has those four Attributes, as was decided in 381 C.E. or A.D.


The various schisms in Christianity all began, I think, with arguments over whether Jesus was/is God. Some said yes, some said no. "No" was found not to be quite good enough--he had to be God, in some way. So, some said he was a kind of subordinate divinity, created by the one God. Some said he became God. Others said that he really was God--one in being with the Father--having the same substance, not a similar one, so God became man, though not really man, being also God. Come to think of it, there's only one God, but God has three Persons, Father, Son and Holy Ghost (I prefer Ghost to Spirit). And so it all began, all derived from the seemingly foolish attempt to make someone God but at the same time maintain there's one God. Very different from the friendly pagan belief that a man may be or become a god, but so what? One more god among many.

In my humble opinion, if reason is brushed aside and that is exactly what Christianity does, fidei being its sole truth-bearer, there really is no point to accusing Christians of inconsistencies. It's like telling a person who doesn't care whether you live/die that you're sick! The fatal flaw, mon ami, is ours - trying to be rational with peeps who've abandoned, some would say transcended, rationality. :chin:

In and of themselves, off what value are the underlying concepts conveyed by the journal entries in the novel? — ThinkOfOne

The key difference is we can readily demonstrate that Einstein actually lived, was a real person and we can demonstrate what he did. And we can readily compare the real person to any novel he may have inspired. So it's a very different situation. Also it is not claimed that Einstein is a god and had supernatural power. But I get what you are trying to say.

Maybe it's more like that 2012 movie Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter wherein Lincoln is depicted as a killer of vampires who works secretly for the US government. Clearly based on a real person, place and time, but almost nothing said or done in the story actually happened.

In and of themselves, off what value are the underlying concepts conveyed by the journal entries in the novel?
— ThinkOfOne

The key difference is we can readily demonstrate that Einstein actually lived, was a real person and we can demonstrate what he did. And we can readily compare the real person to the novel he inspired. So it's a very different situation. But I get what you are trying to say. — Tom Storm

C'mon. Even here you once again intentionally omitted text from my post that is germane to the discussion:

Perhaps a thought experiment will help.

Let's say that Einstein passed away in obscurity, but prior to his passing Einstein had fully developed his thoughts and fully documented them in a journal. Let's say that an author came across this journal and wrote a fictitious account of a scientist and liberally interspersed the novel with quotes from Einstein's journal depicting them as entries from a journal kept by the fictitious scientist. The author then destroyed Einstein's journal after the novel was published. — ThinkOfOne

Did you miss the fact that it's a thought experiment? Did you miss the fact that in this thought experiment
"Einstein passed away in obscurity...The author then destroyed Einstein's journal after the novel was published"? As such, in this thought experiment we CANNOT "readily demonstrate that Einstein actually lived, was a real person and we can demonstrate what he did." In this thought experiment, it is NOT a "key difference".

Sorry, I didn't read it carefully enough.

you once again intentionally omitted text — ThinkOfOne

You need to watch this sort of claim. You don't know what was omitted by intention or otherwise. I usually read this stuff quickly during breaks at work.

So, in your hypothetical, the person is not a god or a miracle worker and not the founder of a religion. That's the first critical difference. Because if they were then there's a different kind of scrutiny involved. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. They are not equivalent examples. Also, even an obscure and almost totally hidden 20th century scientist can be identified fairly readily using records and research.

That said - if the journal has actual science documented in it that can be tested empirically and validated, then we can accept that part of the information. The testable part. The other information we would be unable to confirm. It might not matter if Einstein was fictional as the methods described could be confirmed.

But now you have another problem. Trying to fit your hypothetical into the Yeshua/Jesus story.

Where is the equivalent of a journal with actual words in it as source material for the gospels which are copies of translations of copies of translations, written decades after the events? Your thought experiment is predicated on a real and ordinary person who has left direct first hand source material via a written record of actual words said. And only one person involved in the process which took those words and recast them in fiction. Can you demonstrate that Yeshua kept a diary? Can you demonstrate that any notes were ever taken of Yeshua's itinerant preaching? Can you demonstrate that there is any connection at all between any words as they appear in the gospels and any words said by any actual person?

↪ThinkOfOne Sorry, I didn't read it carefully enough.

you once again intentionally omitted text
— ThinkOfOne

You need to watch this sort of claim. You don't know what was omitted by intention or otherwise. I usually read this stuff quickly during breaks at work. — Tom Storm

It isn't out of character for you to omit text from my posts that is germane to the discussion, then criticize what you've quoted as if it were written without the omitted text. Have you considered that perhaps if you had it sitting in front of you, you wouldn't keep losing track of what I've written? Regardless, your omitting text isn't "inadvertent". As such, it's "intentional".

So, in your hypothetical, the person is not a god or a miracle worker and not the founder of a religion. That's the first critical difference. Because if they were then there's a different kind of scrutiny involved. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. They are not equivalent examples. Also, even an obscure and almost totally hidden 20th century scientist can be identified fairly readily using records and research.

That said - if the journal has actual science documented in it that can be tested empirically and validated, then we can accept that part of the information. The testable part. The other information we would be unable to confirm. It might not matter if Einstein was fictional as the methods described could be confirmed.

But now you have another problem. Trying to fit your hypothetical into the Yeshua/Jesus story.

Where is the equivalent of a journal with actual words in it as source material for the gospels which are copies of translations of copies of translations, written decades after the events? Your thought experiment is predicated on a real and ordinary person who has left direct first hand source material via a written record of actual words said. And only one person involved in the process which took those words and recast them in fiction. Can you demonstrate that Yeshua kept a diary? Can you demonstrate that any notes were ever taken of Yeshua's itinerant preaching? Can you demonstrate that there is any connection at all between any words as they appear in the gospels and any words said by any actual person? — Tom Storm

Well, perhaps you don't understand thought experiments. Or you've lost track of the context of this thought experiment. Perhaps it's once again due to the fact that you "read this stuff quickly during breaks at work."

If you are unhappy with a comment or an approach, just say so plainly. This is a dialogue. No need to embroider your comments with imputations of a person's motives or intentions. That isn't good manners, doesn't demonstrate good faith and muddies an otherwise interesting conversation.

Oh, and are you able to address my response? Particularly this which you can't avoid with a scenario which doesn't remotely match the situation we are discussing.

Where is the equivalent of a journal with actual words in it as source material for the gospels which are copies of translations of copies of translations, written decades after the events? Your thought experiment is predicated on a real and ordinary person who has left direct first hand source material via a written record of actual words said. And only one person involved in the process which took those words and recast them in fiction. Can you demonstrate that Yeshua kept a diary? Can you demonstrate that any notes were ever taken of Yeshua's itinerant preaching? Can you demonstrate that there is any connection at all between any words as they appear in the gospels and any words said by any actual person? — Tom Storm