"The NT has no law against image worship or human divinity"

The New relies on the Old, and fulfills it."

This is applicable only for christians. You cannot fullfil what you never observed, nor can you deem it fullfilled unless the one who gave those laws says so. Its like christians do not accept Mohammed - because JC was not present. The fact says, you were unable to fullfill it - not a single law in the OT is inactive today; not a single law from the NT was ever accepted by the world's institutions. There are no NT laws - other than its negation of the OT's majestic laws - and this was a failed execise.

We should be breathing a sigh of relief that Jews preserve God's laws, which is followed by the world, and that they did not seccumb to insane European Rome's sequal diatribe - which has corrupted Europe. Sorry to put it this way, but what christianity is saying is totally insane, racist, robbing another's beliefs, desecrating it - and hiding behind the Jesus figure. Christian monothiesm is doubtful - yes it does follow divine human worship, and has made an alledged son transcendent of the father, instead of using this only as a rung on the ladder. Its the OT which saved - all humanity - via laws you think are passe.

Christians did not demand proof of Jesus - nor did they get it. Its made such a mess and chaos for humanity.

IamJoseph,

Agree. Sumer-Western society does owe a debt to the Hebrews and the Greeks. The Hebrews [e.g., Moses] owe a debt to the Mespotamians.

The Code of Hammurambi:

http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/MESO/CODE.HTM

More vagueness, Boaz.

>>"Herod was alive when Jesus was born" happy?...There is no hard evidence for the contrary and there is strong evidence for the affirmative. That Matthew said it, and was a contemporary of that time, affirms it.<<

But...but... there is still doubt as to whether a) a Matthew did indeed write the Gospel that bears his name and b) whether it was the contemporary, or a later Matthew. So, nothing "affirmed".

>>As you can see, there is much conjecture. To me it doesn't really matter. I suppose one wishing to show "The Bible is wronggg" :) might enjoy the possibilities<<

If you didn't make such a fuss about how it is invariably right - even when you have to stretch the bounds of translation and interpretation to reach the meaning you require - maybe we wouldn't have to spend so much time pointing out its historical weaknesses.

Wouldn't it be a whole lot simpler if you just put the Bible into an appropriate historical slot, and simply used your much-professed faith to patch over the weak bits? It would save us all an awful lot of time.

Mind you, that approach would have to come with some caveats. The main one being that you would then cease and desist from using your holy book to beat up others' holy books.

It's just an instruction book, Boaz. Use the bits you like, lose the bits that you don't like, but stop pretending that it has a greater validity than any other set of ancient documents of similar antiquity and provenance.

And there's not a great deal left to say on the "objective" reading of texts, either. Especially when you try to equate the tangible with the abstract.

>>"That which has fur, barks, is pack oriented, etc etc.. we call objectively 'a dog'.. In the same way, 'The beginning' is an objectively agreed concept.<<

I can point to a dog in the street, stroke its fur and make it bark.

Show me a "beginning" that can, in fact, be proven to be exactly what it says, and nothing else.

"Have you been with me this long, and yet you do not know me" said Jesus to Philip...and I address that question also to you Joseph."

This is the problem that has stalked the world. There is no Jesus or NT writers who can tell others about their own beliefs - same as you would not want that happen to you - even if they claimed it as the true belief. The only source which can do so is the one who gave those laws. Period. And its not true to say this is not enforced. It is only the past 150 years where the chirch's power decreased, and it used this power corruptly - and is today emulated by radical islam. Europe destroyed Jerusalem, robbed this land, claimed its belief is now theirown, then persecuted and exiled its peoples - in conjunction with the church.

Did Jesus tell the church to ghetto Jews and bar them from returning - then transfer the name given them by Europe, namely Pelstinians, onto the arabs - as a political tool? This is not reigion at all.

'WE WILL NEVER SUPPORT THE RETURN OF THE JEWS TO THEIR HOMELAND BECAUSE THEY REJECTED JESUS' - Pope Pious.

That was a doctrine of genocide, compunding the crime of robbery and persecution of an already exiled, small nation.

"The presense or absense of a foreskin makes zero difference to the condition of a mans heart. You can be a sinner with or without."

I've heard this debacle, as if the giver of the law could not anticipate or know the consequence of its laws - and had to wait for christianity to correct it. FYI, Paul said its not what goes into you but what comes out of you. He was wrong. It is what goes into you which determines what comes out of you: europe is a fine example - fed with horrific antisemitism, and it resulted in two things: the holocaust - and the islamification of Europe.

Circumsizion is now advocated by all medical research as a health factor on many levels, including the negation of women's and mens cervical cancers. The honest reason Paul said what he sais, is because the European people would never accept the OT provisions, nor other laws such as the forbiddence of image worship and divine humans. The church also rejected the OT laws not because of anything said by Jesus or anyone else: the church and the people of europe would never accept circumsizion - it was alien to them. So we have the debacle of the church claiming to correct OT laws - while making a ridicule of them - that its wrong in the first place!

I say, pursue what you want to - but dont push it on others, nor tell others their beliefs, which predates the NT by 2000 years, is subject to the NT premise and interpretation. Else this is what will be done to you, and you will be called an infidel: how will you answer?

The correct premise is not to DO UNTO OTHERS WHAT IS GOOD FOR YOU - this can make you enforce your own laws upon others and you will eventually think it is good to even destroy them in this quest. Instead:

'WHAT IS HATEFUL TO YOU - DO NOT UNTO OTHERS'.

Just think how many millions of innocent souls would have been spared by the correct doctrine?

Boazy,

There is nothing bad about the Bible document being wrong. Ptolemy was proven wrong by Galilleo. It is progress.

Alternatively, if Mathew 2.16 is correct, then the Bible would have to shift its timeline, wherein, we should loose some faith [ahem] in the churches, for their constant incorrect interpretations.

If the Bible is wrong, it is fallible, and, therefore, can not the clear representation of a god. Yet, if Matthew is correct, we should regard what he Churches [and Hollywood] claim, suspect.

If Jesus was born in 7 BCE, as Barbara Thiering suggests, and he was crucified in 33 CE, then, he was thirty-nine not thirty-three, at the time. Incidently, to the best of my knowledge, Theiring was not aware of astronomy's support* of this claim, when she made her claim to the same date; based on the continuous Jewish calendar, if I recall correctly.

* There was a conjuction of planets, which "might" have given the impression of a bright star in 7 BCE.

Whichever of the two paths we take, I posit, secular methodologies have shown their superiority over religious interpretations.

Boazy, I'm about knowledge discovery, not proving the Bible wrong. However, the result can be the same.

Now, does the Christian Theist revise one's view of The Bible or The Church? Boazy, over to you. Sophie's choice