"Why does the world hate the Jews?" Article

I know they truly feel like they are doing a justice by showing people the "light".

& what we are saying is that there is no "they".

[equazcion]

um... okay.....

[Griff]

Originally Posted by equazcion

I'm not sure what you mean by this. Yes, I do come from an exclusive tradition, but that exclusivity hardly entitles me to exclusive love from God. As was mentioned in the original post's quoted article, Judaism believes that everyone is loved by God, but the Jews have a special responsibility to him.

What I'm getting at is that Judaism developed in a tribal time/place among competing gods. Maintaining an exclusive group identity was crucial to survival. Christianity developed first as a minor Jewish sect but being mostly unsuccessful embraced its mission to the gentiles. Expansion became critical to its survival. Of course that is just my construct of it, I don't know how it squares with official histories.

That is very accurate. In fact, for some time, there were several different "Christianities". It took some doing to get a consensus, or a semblance of one... there is not really one now.
Early Bibles had many books that do not exist in today's and each had different books from each others. One would have two or three different Gospels that another did not have and vice-versa.

[equazcion]

Originally Posted by Griff

Expansion became critical to its survival.

Ok... Even if that's true, I'm not sure what bearing it has. Unless you're saying that the whole idea of "saving" people was just an excuse to get more people and keep the religion alive... which I don't think is what you were trying to say.

[Griff]

That is pretty much what I'm saying. They had a message that they found important. At some point the delivery system of the message became more important than the message itself and here I am 2k years later sifting through the layers of institutional debris for the real message.

[Flint]

Originally Posted by equazcion

Unless you're saying that the whole idea of "saving" people was just an excuse to get more people and keep the religion alive...

That sounds accurate, to me. However, the expansionist aspect loses it's luster, when the actual message is forgotten.

[equazcion]

So you're saying the real message has gotten lost. I'd say that's accurate.

[equazcion]

Agreed.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by equazcion

So you're saying the real message has gotten lost.

I'd say it is still there available but don't expect the institutions to hand it to you without amendment.

[equazcion]

I don't expect that at all. Kind of a shame.

[Griff]

Yeah, its like any organization. You put NASA together to get to the moon, you get there but now you've got a bureacracy to run and you don't want to put a bunch of nice folks out of work.

As a Catholic and a sometime cynic I can watch the company men, church/state combiners and the prosteletyzers with pretty dark humor. I know my church was (and many in it still are) awful that way, but groups broke away to protest and helped reform things. Now the descendents of some of those break away groups are busy losing the message in the name of promoting their true way. Speaking of charlatins, Billy Grahams kid is coming to town... as my Jewish/Irish Catholic roomate used to say oy ve Maria

psst... the message is love your neighbor as yourself

gee whiz that doesn't sound exclusive to Christians at all does it?

[equazcion]

Not at all. As I've always said, I don't think Jesus was a bad guy, and his teachings alone are pretty much in line with universal truth. It's the perversion of organized religion and politics that got in the way of something that's essentially good, as it usually tends to do.

Read the Sermon On The Mount and then the Diamond Sutta... pretty astounding.

[Sheldonrs]

Originally Posted by equazcion

"Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable." (Leviticus 18:22)
"If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads." (Leviticus 20:13)

Does it count if you're not really laying with the other guy; just standing behind him and going at it?