I can't help smiling. This is true creationism.

They are trying to create a second reality, the determined rewriting of history to exclude elements they don't like. Some people never accept the most probable case, even when confronted with overwhelming arguments.

It's worth noting that the Jesus myth theory is quite new. The early opponents of Christianity didn't question Jesu existence. To be a believer of "the Jesus myth", one also have to ignore the evidence for the historical Jesus.

I'm sure everything fits well and you see confirmations of your theory everywhere.

True creationism.

No he was seen recently waiting for a train in Sydney.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/070108/23/11zxi.html

God: My beliefs and I will follow the crowd and make some rather flat , exclamatory statements of which I am sure many will disagree.

First I wanted to find out about God. I had heard years and years of mostly nonsense from the pulpits. Since my religion had only been around a few hundred years (Southern Baptist,Missionary type) I doubt that they had as much knowledge about God as they thought. In fact I found lots of confusion and contradictions.

Therefore I reasoned that God had passed the Torah to the Jews and that since it contained the first 5 books of the Old Testament, and that God had made numerous covenants with them and stated that they were his 'chosen people' and since they had therefore been studying and debating about God for a couple thousand years THAT perhaps they had more insight and knowledge than some country bumpkin preacher who said he was 'Called' and with very little theological or historial perspective ansdwas going to tell me how I needed to live my life and how to take care of MY soul.

I figured it was more my outlook than theirs anyway and I was taking on very little of what I had not proven or experienced my own self.

After a long time I descended into the realm of Jewish Mysticism. There I found the apparent bedrock of the issue. This is what I will briefly speak to:

God is not God's name. The name of God is never pronounced by Jews but another word is substituted instead. The 4 characters in Hebrew that are the name or not known presently. One a year the high priest went into the Holy of Holies in the Temple and spoke the then known name of God. With the disapora the name was no longer known. Still not to this day as I read and study.

The word substituted is Adonai,,or what we anglicized it to. Its possibly greek and translates as LORD. The Jewish word for God is Elohim. This can be pronounced and is and we translate this as the word God. Yet that is not the name of God. The word God does not exist in Hebrew..its Elohim(the sound of it in English--transliterated I suppose). The word Adonai(or Lord) was not in the Hebrew until Elohim had finished with the total creation. After that he was referred to as Adonai Elohim. Very important such distinctions. Almost no one except Jewish scholars note such as this. We do a surface read and never truly understand what is really being stated. Its more like a novel I suppose to many. They read it and then simply trash it and call it nonsense..all the while never having gotten a glimmer of the underlying structure and nuances.

The 4 hebrew characters are not printable here unless the Hebrew font is used. They are referred to as the Tetragrammaton(from the Greek).

Aside: The name of Jesus Christ is not Jesus Christ either. There is no J in Hebrew, none in Latin and none in Greek(as I read). There was also no J in English for a long time , until about the 17xx or 18xx(not going to google it right now) and it was apparently derived from the French.

Jesus was really Ieosus or more yet like Yeshua (pronounced as it sounds)or even other slight variants. Christ is Greek and means Messiah. The rightful name of Jesus would then be Yeshua Ben Yosef. Son of Joseph. The sign that Pilate placed on the cross was INRI Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum. Some may disagree but if you look at the sign on the cross in any Catholic Church that is what you will see. It means Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews(as we have rendered in our theology..protestant and catholic I believe) NOTE: No Js!!!!!

As I said we toss about the name God. Therefore what we have done is nicely tied up God, put a name on the unnamable, put him in a merchandisable package and marketed him/her/adonai/whatever.

When anyone makes a statement regarding God such as "God wants us to love one another"....they are telling us that they know the mind of God. Clearly they do not. Preachers do not either. No one knows the mind of God or even if he has one.

God is not definable. God has no limits. God can not be labelled. Gods works can only be judged or realized and yet that does not define God.

Even my stating the above is a travesty for I have no knowledge EXCEPT what I experience myself that I can label as enlightenment and what works for me in that spiritual aspect , I cannot attribute to being true for any other. There is no universal salvation except that which is personal. Mere words can not save anyone. Its actions and others are not able to judge you on what your internal belief system is. Supposedly if you find yourself in a hot place you have chosen wrong.
Perhaps if you chose NO belief then you have nothing to think about. You are simply worm food and there is effectively no soul to translate.

I would suggest that anyone in search of THE TRUTH must investigate upon their own. This is where one departs from the dogma and bullshit of the various religious factions and delves into a personal realm of belief or not as they choose. Its a solidarity path IMO. You go it alone.

Basically in my opinion God(if you believe) does interact with his creations(humankind). How this is effected I am uncertain. I have looked very closely to Quantum Mechanics. It might be possible that the electromagnetic spectrum and energy forces (simplistic I know) might be a form of communication or networking , to put it in a vague light.

I simply believe this. Your thoughts and soul are yours to take where you wish. What comes back may depend on you and what you seek.

This I believe. Those who would place God in a box are those who would cheapen the spirituality and effectively place man's value upon God. This is when it all breaks down.

The worst sinners in the world IMO are the tele-evangalists who are nothing but destructive ego driven con men of the lowest ilk of the lowest scum sewers of the earth. They are not preaching the TRUTH nor the LIGHT. They are filth.

Notes: My wife is a Catholic. My mother is a Catholic. My son is a Catholic, my grandparents on my mothers side were all Irish Catholics.I am by choice a Baptist since the basic baptist creed is that NO ONE needs to come between the individual and his God/salvation. That all he needs is scripture and that is it. Each person is his own priest. No priesthood required and none needed.

Some other points:
1.God did not offer eternal life(heaven). He never placed it on the table. Jesus did,,big time. Look and you will NOT find it in the Old Testament.

2. Jesus told his disciples that he came ONLY FOR THE LOST SHEEP OF THE TRIBE OF ISRAEL. Not to the gentiles(us).

3. Jesus NEVER left the holy land(Israel) and in fact expressely told his disciples to NOT go to the gentiles.

4. Jesus NEVER wrote a single word down. His was an oral message.

5. The Jews never really professed a belief in a SOUL. The translations are not usually correct.

Here is the biggie:

6. Man was created by God from the earth(humus) and God breathed the spirit of life into his nostrils. God 'fabricated' woman from man and not from the soil and did not breath into her nostrils. In others words you could say that she derived from Adams DNA.

# 6 will cause many females to become outraged and absolutely NO preacher or priest will speak of this but it happens to be scripturally sound. Translate it your self or not. Thats what is says.
The point I make is that you are not being told the absolute truth about what the bible says. Most are being gulled by scoundrels.

I refer the reader to The Five Books of Moses by Robert Alter
As well as the Kaballah(in all its books) in many interpretations by noted scholars.
Also there are many websites devoted to the study of the Torah and other areas. The Dead Sea Scrolls as well as The Nag Hammadi and other
areas. Study of the Gnostics and Essenes are also of value.

IMO the phsical church needs to be more of a POINTER and less of a end unto itself. They become social clubs the longer they control peoples minds. They allow people to sit in pews, drop money in the collection plate and smirk at all the rest whom they consider lost.
The RCC is very serious in this area. I have sat thru the entire RCIA and spent many hours in deep discusssion with priests of the RCC.

The truest religion must have been among those early christians who were chained up and waiting to be fed to the lions for the amusement of the roman crowds or placed on many crosses lining the roads to Rome. Murdered and murdered and yet they held to their faith.

Here in Amurkah were get all pissed off if a sports event is blacked out on the TV.

Perhaps the hungry lions are waiting and we are being led unwitting to the coliseum. I will take whatever faith I can garner and hope for the best. Not a time for me to be shouting denials from the rooftops. Not on your sweet ass it isn't. I been heading down this path a long long time before I started noticing the price of gas and a back-water internet website called TheOilDrum.

I am not slighting in the least the masterful(perhaps arrogant?) work and endeavors that the owners and contributors make on this website. They are truly the modern day prophets crying in the wilderness of this 'fruited plain'. Mostly they go unheeded.

airdale - my story and I wrote it myself so I am sticking to it
everyone gets a chance to write their own

P.S. I do love the women folk. Really I do.
P.P.S.Please don't take it personal...I did not write the bible,
I just read it and try to make it thru.