Davidf: "Christians traditionally did not think of the Jew in the image of God. This tradition continued in the applied Christianity of the Holocaust."

Exactly. Without this inherent hatred of the Jew as a part of fundamental Christianity, Hitler would've had stood alone.

http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/images/sturmer/dsrm34.jpg

>>> This is the cover to the most infamous issue of Der Stürmer, the 1934 issue accusing Jews of practicing ritual murder to secure the blood of Christians to use in Jewish religious rituals. The headline reads: Jewish Murder Plan against Gentile Humanity Revealed. The issue actually got banned by the Nazis after it had been out for a while, not because of anti-Semitic content, but because it compared alleged Jewish ritual murder with the Christian sacrament of communion. A full English translation of the issue was published in the United States in 1976 by a group in the "Christian Identity" tradition.

Special Issue: May 1934 <<<

Polycarp wrote:

“When David juxtaposes 'behavior/belief' he would be well advised to read the Book of James the brother of Jesus where he will find strong support.”

You would be well advised to read James Joyce’s ‘Ulysses’. It’s an accurate portrayal of Dublin on June 16, 1904 as opposed to the New Testament that is a highly unreliable narrative of the Middle East 2,000 years ago.

I really don’t think I would be well advised to read the New Testament. Books of mythology are entertaining. We can read about Zeus impregnating Leda in the form of a swan or Mary being impregnated by the Holy Spirit. We can read about Orpheus visiting the underworld or Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead.

In Greek mythology, there is the legend of the cornucopia. The original depictions were of the goat's horn filled with fruits and flowers: deities, especially Fortuna, would be depicted with the horn of plenty. The cornucopia was also a symbol for a woman's fertility.

The New Testament version of the cornucopia states that Jesus fed 5000 not counting women and children from an original 5 loaves and 2 fish, implying that Jesus miraculously created more food. The Gospels also state that after the meal was over, the disciples collected the scraps, filling 12 baskets.

I have enjoyed reading Greek, Norse, Biblical and other mythology. There are many books of fantasy such as “Lord of the Rings”, “Harry Potter” and the Bible. They are entertaining and may even contain useful insights. However, they should not be confused with reality.

I will be 83 years old. I still read both fiction and non-fiction. However, I no longer enjoy reading mythology, fantasy or science fiction even if it is biblical material.

Polycarp wrote:

“Spong simply looks around and asks "Hmmm what is the current state of humanity? aah.. like this and that and such and such.. lets now re-make Christianity in humanities image"”

That is what is good about Spong. He recognizes the evil in the Bible and Christianity. Christianity needs humanity to throw off the tradition of the Inquisition and anti-Semitism.

Evil is a concept, not a reality. Nothing is of itself evil. It's when man makes a judgement that something becomes good or evil.

Evil is hiding behind a false religion with a fake God. My judgement.

Original sin, give me a break TuTu. Sin is another concept used to scare and punish people with whom one doesn't agree. Not an announcement from above.

Sheesh, when are people going to outgrow their invisible buddy? Most kids do. Why don't adults have the same capacity to learn?

I would hope that such learned persons wld also look out at what is occuring in the world today and not only argue about what has passed, not that that also is not important.

I was enjoying reading some of *DavidF's* comments, though I like to think that the 2nd coming refers to the Spiritual interconnect that exists between us all and the potential to evolve and not stultify.

*Coogee Bear* taught in our history class that 1 of the lessons of WWII was the recognition of the inherent risk in "putting yr black boot on the neck of a people too hard and too long," in that a *Monster* is very often the result.

Is there anything for us to learn in this from Iraq? Other places too come to mind.

I think we need massive "displaced" people way stations, places where we can quickly attend "shattered" folk, be it as a result of conflict, global warming or otherwise. A place where we can show case our latest tech, business strategies, philosophies etc rehabilitate and send back out.

Sooner I would bring all those who are sick of the tired old arguments and warfare here temporarily for a breather.

Re Iran, not that I am an expert, but I doubt seriously that he intends to destroy the Holy sites. And does anyone seriously believe he would risk bombing any of the many Muslims in that place? Rather to me, he is just talking sh!t to give those who are downtrodden and terribly oppressed a spike, for want of a better term, and saying no, we will not relinquish our rights, we will not give away that which is also ours and we will not bow to your way of being simply because u tell us too.

Double standards .. for verily when dealing with those who believe in an eye for an eye, why is it a surprise that some say, "if u point a nuke wocket at me, I'll point a nuke wocket at u."

Why not let that Jewish poppet out of the monkey house? The one who knows about secret nuke bizness in militant israeli central. I would have given him asylum here. It seems some Jews too also are dissatisfied with the present prevailing "conventional wisdom."

What did he name such weapons? .. HOLOCAUST devices .. indeed none of us wld profit much from nuclear winter would we?

Alas, how the abused become the abusers? We need some shrinks from the media to talk about some of the banal behaviour common to us all.

...Adam...

DreamOn wrote:

"*Coogee Bear* taught in our history class that 1 of the lessons of WWII was the recognition of the inherent risk in "putting yr black boot on the neck of a people too hard and too long," in that a *Monster* is very often the result."

That has happened over and over again in history. The roots of apartheid South Africa grew out of the British concentration camps in the Boer War. Resurgent Germany and Italy grew out of the humiliation of their defeats at the hands of Napoleon and the Bourbons. Castro is a reaction to the US trying to make the Caribbean an American Lake. All the current Islamic states with the exception of Turkey were colonies of European powers. They are still angry at that.

I hope the US will start to work with other nations to rebuild the instruments of national cooperation like the International Criminal Court and the Law of the Sea that Dubya has torn down. Previous presidents including his father have helped build up these institutions. We need to break the cycle of revenge. Maybe Obama will do it.

Rudd said 'sorry' to the Aborigines. That helped. One can start by recognising a wrong.

Howard refused to recognise it and called it the black armband view of history. In the same way Polycarp refuses to recognise the wrongs carried out by Christianity and calls it 'vilification' when they are mentioned. Fortunately other Christians such as Bishop Spong are willing to admit what was done and go on from there.

Behind many monsters are many tragedies.