#myth of jesus

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

"What sorts of things do pagan authors from the time of Jesus have to say about him? Nothing. As odd as it may seem, there is no mention of Jesus at all by any of his pagan contemporaries. There are no birth records, no trial transcripts, no death certificates; there are no expressions of interest, no heated slanders, no passing references -- nothing. In fact, if we broaden our field of concern to the years after his death -- even if we include the entire first century of the Common Era -- there is not so much as a solitary reference to Jesus in any non-Christian, non-Jewish source of any kind. I should stress that we do have a large number of documents from the time -- the writings of poets, philosophers, historians, scientists, and government officials, for example, not to mention the large collection of surviving inscriptions on stone and private letters and legal documents on papyrus. In none of this vast array of surviving writings is Jesus' name ever so much as mentioned." -- Bart Ehrman

How can believers claim to have "found Jesus" when nobody in history has been able to?

[theoihalioistuff]

The ways Zeus is characterised in ancient sources is ~ fascinating ~ to me.

The overbearing patriarch of the Iliad who keeps his godly family in check with constant threats of abuse and domestic violence. The conciliatory diplomat of the Odyssey, acquiescent to the desires and honours of his fellow deities. The ideal king of the Theogony, commonly elected, virtuous alloter of good and evil. The frightened tyrant, the cruel tormentor of Prometheus Bound. The all-encompassing orphic entity, who swallowed down and brought forth and is the entirety of the cosmos. The enigmatic, ambivalent, and sometimes undignified figure who refuses to appear on stage. The embodiment of righteousness, of majesty, the ultimate good, the promoter and dispenser of justice, the adulterer, the rapist, the upholder of oaths who perjures himself in the name of "love".

Above all the mastermind, the constant plotter, whose plan and will [Διὸς βουλή] permeate greek literature from epic to philosophy, whether it be synonymous with fate or not.

This is why I generally dislike simplistic takes on him. Sure, almost any way you choose to characterise him will probably have a sourced basis, his multifaceted "identity" almost guarantees it. But the massive loss of complexity is so disappointing imo.

[apollo18]

Concept: the justice league finds out that Blaze and Satanus, the rulers of hell, are kids of their ‘even more of a boy scout than Superman’ coworker’s “boss” and think Shazam is the Christian God. They ask Billy really vague questions that lead Billy into confusing them even more and they become convinced that Marvel’s Wizard guy is God with a capital G and Marvel’s either an angel or the second coming of Jesus.

Meanwhile Shazam doesn’t even know what the Bible is and his knowledge about religion is so outdated he still thinks Solomon’s Judaism is new age and not worth his time to research such a ‘fad’ religion, but he knows humans will make a religion out of anything as well as bastardize existing ones and very well could have mixed up actual tales that involve him, his allies, and his children into some sort of melting pot of a religion.

So when someone finally asks Marvel outright if his “boss” is God, Billy goes ‘wait… old guy in white robes and sandals, with long white hair and a beard… lives in space… aka the “heavens”, whose a ghost(Holy Spirit), and knows everything(historama)??? I need to dig deeper into this hold on guys’ and goes off to ask the wizard.

So when Billy asks the Wizard he just tells Billy “well, my boy, if so many things match up, maybe it is so and the tales of myself and my champions grew so estranged from their origins or mixed in with other beliefs that it can explain the things that aren’t true to our reality.”

Then The Canonical Character To The DC Universe, Jesus of Nazareth, shows up.

[whereserpentswalk]

There was a preacher who died, and became one of the few humans to go to the heaven of his god Christ after his death. He was greeting by a golden city, filled with strange angels with firey wings and shining eyes. The sky was above him and below him, and it was black and it was bright.

When he stepped into the gates of this heaven, the golden city was massive, yet almost empty, few walked it's streets. It had been made big enough for every human to live to walk through it, yet it had been open to so very few, most of the buildings were empty, the streets always wider than they needed to be, and lights rarely on. Even most of the angels had fallen away.

A lone angel guided the preacher through the city, and the first thing the preacher asked was, "I would like to see my daughter here. She had died before me, she would be waiting here for me I'm sure."

The angel replied in a glassy and I human voice, "No. She is elsewhere. She was a homosexual. You had preached many times that her kind would not be accepted here when you lived on earth. I recall you had said such words exactly to her. You should not have been suprised to be correct." The angel did not understand when the preacher wept.

The preacher than asked the angel, "Still then, perhaps I may see my father. I always wished to see him again here."

The angel replied, "He is here neither. I question why you wonder this? He was an adulterer, for that you cursed him well, and gave him your anger. Why do you want him here now for what you cursed him for on earth?"

The preacher wept again, but than asked, "Than may I at least see my brother? He has committed no act of grave sin has he?"

The angel replied, "Your brother was an atheist. Did your books not so clearly say that he who rejects the lord may not be let to his kingdom? You had preached such words on earth, and said such words to him? Why have you changed so much in death."

The preacher wept again and replied, "Than I am alone here. So may I at least see Christ so that I may than have someone?"

The angel walked him up a castle with a thousand steps, past great cannons and ballistas that were used to fight non christian spirits. Past the endless hallways and the rivers of wine that was blood and blood that was wine. And Christ sat on his golden throne, with his crown still of thorns, and his eyes still black, and wrists and ankles still bleeding endlessly into the night.

And the preacher begged Christ, "Please. Send me away. Send me to whatever hell you have dammed the others. I cannot be here if I am alone."

[sawbeaver]

From Hermes to Virgin Mary

*Mixed Dionysus myth from the Orphism.

[habunshu]

jesus christ homotron 6000

[midorinpd]

thanks YouTube for promoting this fucking garbage

btw if you see this ad, report it, block it, whatever. I can’t believe they’re pushing this bullshit.

[l-bubee-l]

Little people on boat.

Little people on boat :DD

—

[wwillywonka]

☆GET TO KNOW ME♡: [2/?] Favorite Movies

Jesus Christ Superstar (1973): dir. Norman Jewison

I don't know how to love him. I don't know why he moves me. He's a man, he's just a man. He's not a king. He's just the same as anyone I know. He scares me so.

[mobblespsycho100]

something something browns and grays/silver being a prominent part of Kabru's color scheme/design (and his blue eyes) something something the Earth something something Orbit. The moon is Earth's only natural satellite. something something steel sword. the blade of the world

[callmelittlesanshine]

Did anyone else notice, how they used the LED sign and funeral wreath from the whiskey a go go exhibition for the Jesus He Knows Me MV?

it somehow feels more important now that the name of the exhibition was Reverence and Resurrection..

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

• Not one word written by Jesus • Not one word about Jesus from any witness • Not one word about Jesus written in the time of Jesus • Not even one credibly sourced reference to Jesus • No inscriptions to Jesus from the time of Jesus • No monuments to Jesus from the time of Jesus • No artifacts for Jesus from the time of Jesus

Jesus is JUST A STORY!

"In the entire first Christian century Jesus is not mentioned by a single Greek, or Roman historian, religion scholar, politician, philosopher or poet. His name never occurs in a single inscription, and it is never found in a single piece of private correspondence. Zero! Zip references! In other words, there is no non-Christian evidence from the first century of a 'historical Jesus'."

-- Bart D. Ehrman, Bible scholar, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

"Still, to press yet further on the issue of evidence we do not have. I need to stress that we do not have a single reference to Jesus by anyone pagan, Jew or Christian - who was a contemporary eyewitness, who recorded things he said and did."

-- "Did Jesus Exist" - Bart D. Ehrman. HarperOne Publishing

Believers sometimes say things like, "are you really going to claim that Jesus didn't exist?"

Yes. Yes, I am. What other intellectually honest conclusion can I come to when history cannot find anywhere history's purported most important person? When you're even quoting things he supposedly said, this absence of evidence isn't some minor quibble that can just be brushed off. What is anyone supposed to do when the evidence for Jesus is even worse than the evidence for Bigfoot?

[satellitesunset]

I need people to touch grass asap.

[branwendaughterofllyr]

I’ve always maintained that Jon is as much like Catelyn as he is like Ned. There’s a ruthless practicality they both share, and a lot of their chapters are back to back in order to highlight this, I think. Jon is willing to do the dirty, terrible thing, or the “cowardly” option, if it means at the end of the day that someone is saved, and it’s so much like Catelyn, who cares more about her family and people being safe than the honorable method. They both are “the ends justified the means” if the ends are important enough. I really do think that Jon follows the words “Family, Duty, Honor” in that order the most out of the Starklings, which is ofc ironic for obvious reasons, since Jon’s treatment is like the ultimate culmination of Catelyn’s ruthless practicality and her house words. (Since she rightly views Jon as a threat, but can’t do anything about the actual perpetrator of both her and Jon’s situation.) Thats why I think Jon’s approach where family and duty supersedes honor, is like his ultimate legacy from Catelyn, or something. And also “Family, Duty, Dishonour” sounds very cool.

[whereserpentswalk]

When the human known to us as Christ arrived in the underworld, gods and shades alike were horrified. It was always a big deal when demigods arrived in the underworld, but this one had died so brutally, a young man, not even old enough to grow a beard, tourtued to death at the will of his own divine parentage, the blood dripping from his shade's hands.

The high gods of the underworld brought him up to their tower to figure out what happened. Christ had recoiled from them at first, thinking they were Devils, but had to take Anubis's hand to ascend the tower's steps, as his legs were badly wounded. The gods of the dead looked at him with both sympathy and horror, it was the first time a he had seen a god look at him with either of those emotions.

Hades swore that this was his brother's doing, but even then it crossed a new line. The description of a god impregnating a young girl in Bethlehem fit what Hades knew of Zeus, but to harm his own son in such a way, as part of a ploy to try to gain all of Rome for him alone, had proven his brother's reign growing darker. Still, he took mercy on the young man, promising him at least three days safety in the underworld without his father trying to claim him again. Hades wondered if the poor girl knew when she held her child that he was born to suffer and die, just as the mothers of great heros knew their destiny. Hades hoped Chrsit would have a chance to stay longer, his wife would return in the fall, and he had the same kind eyes as her, she would probably like to know him.

Hel came to comfort Christ once he had a chance to rest. She helped tend his wounds, and pet his head, and for the first time christ was held by a divinity that didn't expect anything from him. And she told him stories of her father to cheer him up after meeting with such a horrible fate. And she told him that no father should ever do such a thing as what his father had done to his child, that if she had known in time she would have saved him. And she let him be comforted as a human, instead of being a lord of all humanity. And for a momment he didn't have to be the son of god who felt alone while bleeding and dying, but the son of the carpenter Joseph who had been reminded of home when he felt the wood of the cross.

He wasn't allowed to stay, his father wanted him back, back to be the bleeding prince of a new and lonely kingdom. And the underworld wept for him, not because the underworld was deprived of Christ, but because Christ was deprived of the underworld.

[bugwolfsstuff]

*shakes Mr D like a maraca*

I must give the boy trauma