Hi Daviy,

Yes, there could have been a Gospel of Daviy, were the true writer inclined to see value in adopted your name as a non de plum. St Davot has a god ring to it!The nomenclature used is meant to leand authotity. You might recall the Al Pacino chararecter stating there is as difference between in response from saying, "I'm Lowell Bergman" and, "I'm Lowell Bergman from CBS". The came principal applied then. Seems to be a case of setting-up agency for one much greater than one-self.

Regarding, agency today, the infallible (ex Cathedra)Vicar of Christ would seem relevant.

Dear Sympneology,

Intersting post. Thank you. Mack writing on the NT seems to suggest the Gospels fluid until 120 CE owing to different provincial themes.

Agree... we have sequence of ideologies; Early Hebrew from Canaanite, Tribal (henotheist) Hebrew, Legal Hebrew (Moses), Jesus' teachings, Christian-Judaism (Neo-Jesus), Judao-Christianity (after Pella, Latinization)), (Pauline Helenization), Christianity (Nicaea, Refit to Panganism and Institutionalization), Neo-Christanity (Constantinople).

Greetings Philo,

Christian or not, one wishing to follow the ideals of the Sermon on the Mount. Were one to place the following key religious constructs under the microscope of Lawrence Kohlberg's stages of morality, I think it would look something like this:

OT: (Before Moses): Reward and Punishment
OT: (Moses): Law and Order
NT: Law and Order
Institutional Christianity: Law and Order
Jesus: Post-Conventional

If one reads the above, we have the OT as redundant and the Christrian Churches and the Gospels, of a lesser moral kind than was Jesus. Moreover, there would have been many religious and non-religious peoles more moral than the moral kernel of the Churches.

It seems to make sense for a power elite to control subjects by adopting a Law and Order stance, as a opposed to a Jesus or Jesus-like stance in questionning the status quo.

When the English put the Gospels, into the Statute, the Coronation Oath 1688 ( Imp), that the Sovereign must take to be Sovereign, they rejected the rest of the Holy Bible as law. Those who have a KJV with the words of Jesus Christ in Red will understand why they did this.

There can be no doubt that Jesus Christ intended Church and State to be separated, because under the Romans it was not. The Roman Catholic Church, wanted it merged again. They wanted a monopoly on the Holy Bible, but the wily English mass published the Holy Bible, and everyone can now read it, as an International best seller. Jesus Christ prohibited one person from being Judge and Administrator. Matthew 7 Verse 1. He still insisted we honor Almighty God, but unless we honor Him, we don’t honor the Father, ( John 5 verse 22 and 23.) Jesus Christ did not want to be King. However he accepted his role, and did his duty, when at any time he could have become a Roman citizen and avoided execution. It is a pretty emphatic way to make a point.

The resurrection was to prove the dominion of Almighty God over all matter, and in Luke 12 verse 10, Jesus Christ gave us the one sin that cannot be forgiven. It is blasphemy. It is to deny the third part of the Trinity, the Holy Ghost. One disciple sold his Master and soul for thirty pieces of silver. It is fair to say Jesus Christ was not looking forward to his crucifixion, the state terror of the Romans.

Blasphemy as the one unforgivable sin, occurs every time a Judge denies a jury trial to a Christian. Because of jury trials, blasphemy as a Statutory offence, has never been prosecuted, because juries have common sense, but a blasphemer has none. Without a Capital letter, in S 79 Constitution, the word judges must when read in context with the Holy Bible mean juries. For 30 pieces of silver, or $6,000 a week, Judges are prepared to blaspheme. You cannot be a Christian Judge.

I think I must expand on why the Four Gospels are actually law. The system of Government established by the Holy Bible understands that there will be human error, in interpretation and translation. There will be human error by legislators, and by printers and writers, but the word of God, is timeless and everlasting. Jesus Christ understood all this and said, I will send you a comfortor. In Matthew 28 Verse 18, Jesus said, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. A Judge must deny this to give a judgment. He does not deny Jesus Christ when he takes a verdict. It is quick, and honest. The Magna Carta says: S 29, We will sell to no man, we will not deny or defer to any man either Justice or Right. Read in conjunction with the Holy Bible, the we means Her Majesty Elizabeth the Second, all Judges and Magistrates, and the We means Almighty God and a Justice or Sovereign.

Jesus Christ said: In Matthew 6 verse 24, that no man can serve two masters. A delegate of the Sovereign, sworn to service to the Queen, cannot at the same time serve the State. In 1984, in Act no 27, the Labor Party legislated S 15AB into the Acts Interpretation Act 1901 ( Cth). It allows passages of the Holy Bible to be used as extrinsic material in interpreting an Act. The Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900 is an Act, and s 79 is so ambiguous that for nearly 39 years, Judges have been allowed to rule in the Commonwealth. The word is judges, and it means more than one. When read in conjunction with the Gospels, it can only mean juries which until the parliament prescribes, should remain as twelve.

The Habeas Corpus Act 1640 16 Charles 1 Ch X. which is fully transcribed in Victoria, in a searchable public website, declares all judgments not taken in accordance with the Magna Carta void. It declares as an Act of Parliament, in force in 1900, that no jury means no court

Dear Opinionated2,

According to Mosaic Law found in (Exodus 31:15), to violate the sabbath is a capital offense: A clear example of the law being enacted may be found at Numbers 15:32-36.

“And while the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering sticks on the sabbath day. And they that found him gathering sticks brought him to Moses and Aaron, and to all the congregation. And they put him in ward, because it was not declared what should be done to him. And the LORD said to Moses, The man shall be surely put to death: all the congregation shall stone him with stones without the camp. And all the congregation brought him without the camp, and stoned him with stones, and he died; as the LORD commanded Moses.”

A view of what was the usual punishment in biblical times can be gleaned from Christian scripture which states: (John 8:1):

“The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?” This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” And once more he bent down and wrote on the ground. But when they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the older ones, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.”

(continued)

(continued)

However, Judaism like other religions has evolved. The Jewish Bible was canonized in 90 CE. In 200 CE Jewish sages and rabbis started writing the Talmud. This is a commentary on the Jewish Bible. The Talmud and not the Bible determines Jewish law. To the best of my knowledge there is no comparable document in Christianity or Islam. The Talmud limits the death penalty to such an extent the Israel does not have it.

In fact Talmudic Law has been employed in a brief against the death penalty in Florida.

Following from http://www.come-and-hear.com/editor/capunish_1.html
In December 1999, the United States Supreme Court set a precedent by accepting for consideration an amicus curiae brief in a death penalty case (Bryan v. Moore). Aside from mentioning the Eighth Amendment of the US Constitution in passing, the brief was based wholly on Talmud law. The Jewish Journal reports:
A man who will argue before the U.S. Supreme Court next year that his planned execution in Florida's electric chair constitutes "cruel and unusual punishment" can point to a 2,000-year-old Jewish law when he pleads his case.

A friend-of-the court brief filed last week in the Supreme Court by the National Jewish Commission on Law and Public Affairs, which advocates the position of the Orthodox community, and the American Section of the International Association of Jewish Lawyers and Jurists, backs Anthony Bryan's position.

In citing only Jewish law and excluding any reference to previous Supreme Court decisions, the brief is believed to mark a first for America's highest court.

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CONCLUSION: If execution by the electric chair, as administered in Florida, results in unnecessary pain and disfigurement, it would be unacceptable under the principles underlying the traditional Jewish legal system applied 2000 years ago, and should also be unacceptable under the Eighth Amendment today.
— National Jewish COLPA and IAJLJ (17)
Talmudic law is closer to the words of Jesus regarding the death penalty than the law of the United States.

The basic conflict in this discussion is between those who treat the words of their scripture as final and unchangeable, to be obeyed without question or demur, the Fundamentalists, and those who regard it as an interesting insight into the times in which it was written with some useful guides to ones behaviour in society, the Pragmatists.

David F has pointed out how the Pragmatists wrote the Talmud to counter the Fundamentalists in Judaism. That has not always worked as the struggles between the two sides still continue in modern Israel.

Like the Talmud, the New Testament arose from the Pragmatists, led by Jesus, Peter and Paul, trying to find a peaceful via media with Rome rather than the path of violence of the Fundamentalists like John the Baptist, Simon Magus and the Zealots at Masada.

This conflict seems to be common to every ideology. It is found in Islam, first in the split between Sunni and Shia, and then throughout the history of Islam. The same sort of split also occurs in Hinduism.

King Henry VIII and Luther may be regarded as Pragmatists of their day and Oliver Cromwell as a Fundamentalist.

Even in Communism there are Fundamentalists like Stalin and Mao and Pragmatists like Yeltsin, Gorbachev and Deng Shao Ping.

While the way of the Pragmatists may not always lead to an ideal society, the way of the Fundamentalists does always seem to lead to repression, discrimination, violence and death.