religious harmony

last SG · 2008-05-31T05:15:21+00:00

lol, i got flamed in the sim thread also hahaha. i realise that you can't be a flamer and be a christian la. if you want to win, you can't pull punches.but i...

domonkassyu SG

hi all..i was discussing about religious harmony the govt worked so hard to maintain with my friend. and we kinda got stuck when we talk about islam,judaism and christianity.he's a muslim that wants to quit his religion and im still observing religions.

what we found was....

islamic allah is the God of abraham

judaism God is the God of abraham

christianity God( at least 1 of the 3) is the God of abraham.

so the qn is,do they worship the same God? is it just a war of different sects like within christianity?

hope to get some informative replies from here. thanks

Chin Eng SG

Depending on who you are asking.....

Also depending on who you are asking....

domonkassyu SG

jus felt kinda strange that all 3 worship the God of abraham. and obviously abraham had only 1 God. so y allah not the same as the other?? and is the God the same as judaism and christianity in your views?

dumbdumb! SG

i guess it depends on which perspective ba.

i definitely know the jews and christians are more linked. no idea about islam.

and i agree.. it's hard for jews and christianity to get along, because of the appearance of the Christ.

They are still waiting for the Christ, and they don't believe in the idea that Jesus is God too. Which is probably why they conspired to kill Him (aided by satan)

domonkassyu SG

its no wonder that judaism and christianity hardly get along..cuz even in christianity oso got so much conflict.

but the post i started really left me wondering....thats y im here to ask mainstream christians to help lor =)

Gackt247 SG

So if everyone is fighting over religions, why not abolish them all together. 1 less reason to fight?

If they cant co-exist, for the greater good, all shouldn't exist.

God suppose to promote peace and love and yet religion almost always end up as the obstacle of peace and love and the reason for war and hatred.

domonkassyu SG

ahz..Gackt has a very common view(btw gackt the jap singer dam awesome) the religious wars thingy has been around for too long.biasness that deep hard to root out.

in biblical point, it was foretold since the moving out of babylon and end with God using man to destroy all false religions.

in worldly view, say if u r a buddist and the govt suddenly announce they are goin to ban all religions including patriotism. what would you feel? especially if they say start with banning buddhist 1st. sub diff religions in for all your needs to feel.

lies when spoken enough time and long enough becomes the truth.

deathmaster SG

heard this interesting story from a friend:

according to Islam beliefs, christ is not a god, but one of the muslim prophets.

according to christian beliefs, christ himself claim that he is the son of god.

as we all know, i'm sure the muslims will also agree, that prophets are men of honour, and they do not lie.

since christ, is a prophet, and that he only speaks the truth, is he a god, as he claims to be?

_____________________________________________________________

interesting perspective. but the person failed to remember that no one really know whether Christ did himself proclaim himself as god. there is no Gospel of Christ to prove so.

all we have is the gospel of others, written many many years after his earthly death. are those accounts still reliable? especially when they are written by mere men, (since they are neither gods nor prophets), how do we know that they speak the truth?

one more thing. the story left out the fact that Christ's divinity, is acknowledged only in the Creed of the Nicene Council. this council of MEN agreed on Christ divinity. other than this, there is no solid proof proving his divinity.

no offence mean to christians, muslims and others. this is written as a thought-provoking post. please feel free to share your opinions.

24/7 SG

_____________________________________________________________

Hi d,

what would be a reliable way of ensuring reliability? the closer the historical record is to the event rite?

we accept the authencity of many works of antiquity, for instance, we accept the authenticity of Thucydides’ historical work (460–400 b.c.) even though we have only eight manuscripts and a few papyrus scraps.

With Thucydides, Caesar, Tacitus, Sophocles, or Euripides—we have gaps of hundreds or even over a thousand years from the time of writing to the earliest extant manuscripts.

But with the NT, it has close to 5,000 manuscripts and manuscript fragments, larger than any work of antiquity.

By comparison, the gap between the writing of the New Testament books and the earliest manuscripts of the New Testament we possess is far narrower.

Take, for instance, the famous John Rylands papyrus fragment of John 18:31–33; 37–38, which dates to around a.d. 140; the manuscript was written only fifty years after John wrote his Gospel. This is just one of many such examples.

Another evidence comes from the Dead Sea Scrolls Cave 7. Jose Callahan discovered a fragment of the Gospel of Mark and dated it to have been written in A.D. 50. He also discovered fragments of Acts and other epistles and dated them to have been written slightly after A.D. 50

So from a textual point of view, the Gospels are excellent, reliable ancient documents.

24/7 SG

heard this interesting story from a friend:

according to Islam beliefs, christ is not a god, but one of the muslim prophets.

according to christian beliefs, christ himself claim that he is the son of god.

as we all know, i'm sure the muslims will also agree, that prophets are men of honour, and they do not lie.

since christ, is a prophet, and that he only speaks the truth, is he a god, as he claims to be?

_____________________________________________________________

interesting perspective. but the person failed to remember that no one really know whether Christ did himself proclaim himself as god. there is no Gospel of Christ to prove so.

no offence mean to christians, muslims and others. this is written as a thought-provoking post. please feel free to share your opinions.

about Christ's divinity, i've mentioned to domonkassyu that the Council merely formalized His divnity. In the same thread, i've suggested people (b4 the Council) who affirm His divinity.

domonkassyu SG

according to christian beliefs, christ himself claim that he is the son of god.--deathmaster

never have i, in any bible saw any phrase or verse stating Christ claiming he is God.it was shown always that he always subjected himself to a higher power.

deathmaster SG

Take, for instance, the famous John Rylands papyrus fragment of John 18:31–33; 37–38, which dates to around a.d. 140; the manuscript was written only fifty years after John wrote his Gospel. This is just one of many such examples.

.....

Another evidence comes from the Dead Sea Scrolls Cave 7. Jose Callahan discovered a fragment of the Gospel of Mark and dated it to have been written in A.D. 50. He also discovered fragments of Acts and other epistles and dated them to have been written slightly after A.D. 50

do you trust the account of A person of another person, written 140 yrs after birth of Christ? not only is it not first hand information, the original version may have been watered down or exaggerated many times over.

even 50 years is also very long. many statements, memories may "change" during these 50 yrs.

look at the autobiographies of Fidel Castro. he kept changing his stance in each of his autobiographies.

if Christ is already divine when he's alive, wouldn't there be any records of his divinity from that brief period of time when he is alive?

24/7 SG

hang on, what i said was "the famous John Rylands papyrus fragment of John 18:31–33; 37–38, which dates to around a.d. 140".

What im comparing is if people area able to take those works of antiquity as authentic, why cant they afford the same privilege to the NT documents?

People copy manuscripts and pass them around. What that papyrus did was that it was identical to that portion of John - it demonstrated the acuracy of the documents in circulation.

Jesus' ministry was from A.D. 27-30. New Testament scholar, F.F. Bruce, gives strong evidence that the New Testament was completed by A.D. 100.Most writings of the New Testament works were completed twenty to forty years before this.

domonkassyu SG

very true regarding what death master says in the 2nd post. however, from the 1st writer, the biblical moses til the last writer. the content of the bible does not contradict. with humans,that is impossible. hence the explaination that the writeers are divinely inspired to write. writers like daniel did not know what he was writing about except that it concerns God's plans.

24/7 SG

never have i, in any bible saw any phrase or verse stating Christ claiming he is God.it was shown always that he always subjected himself to a higher power.

Then why did the Jewish Pharisees want to kill him?

24/7 SG

interesting perspective. but the person failed to remember that no one really know whether Christ did himself proclaim himself as god. there is no Gospel of Christ to prove so.

i wonder if there really was a gospel of Christ written by JC himself, would people believe it.

would you believe if there was a book about how great i was, and it was written by ... me?

domonkassyu SG

it was stated in the bible he was the son of God, not God. he went on to preach love your enemies when in the mosiac law was an eye for an eye. he heals on sabbath and denounce the system on earth. many rabbis seat of power were every much shaken. powers that they enjoyed very much. ask u lor..if u r the rabbi, u wan get rid of him or not?

Gauze SG

The Quranic position on the divergent doctrines of the semitic religions has been to suspend judgement until the judgement day itself where "unto the Sustainer shall you return, and He will make you understand how you were wont to differ."

It is an allusion to those who assert only the followers of their religion/denomination shall partake in God's grace in the hereafter. (Non-muslims also go to heaven.)

To me, up to a point, the different religious vehicles becomes irrelevant.

googoomuck SG

The Pharisees said that Jesus claimed to be God. Jesus never claimed that he is God.

Jesus had the authority to do the things that only God can do, like healing the sick.

John 3:16 “God so loved the world that he sent his only son, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life.”

Matthew 14:23 - After dismissing the crowds, he went up on a hillside by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone.

24/7 SG

The Pharisees said that Jesus claimed to be God. Jesus never claimed that he is God.

Hi googoomuck and domon,

Jesus did claim to be GOD. In fact, he made it very obvious in

John 8:58, "before Abraham was born, i am".

Using that very distinct name God reserved for Himself in Exodus 3:14 and throughout the OT, to leave no room for misunderstanding.

In fact, it was so obvious that the Jews stoned him (refer to Lev 24:16), cuz that was the punishment for those guilty of blaspheming the name of God. I dont think Jews would stone him just because they thought he meant he existed before Abraham.

John 10:30 "I and the Father are one." -->

This isn’t talking about unity in purpose or vision because later in v33, the Jews said they stoned him for blasphemy because he claimed to be GOD.

John 10:33 "We are not stoning you for any of these," replied the Jews, "but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God."

Ok, even if i dont' use the Gospel of John to make this point. Let's look at Mark

Mark 2:5, "When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, "Son, your sins are forgiven." Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, "Why does this fellow talk like that? He's blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?" Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, "Why are you thinking these things? Which is easier: to say to the paralytic, 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, 'Get up, take your mat and walk'? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins...."

Very strong statement of divine authority. Everybody knows that only God can forgive sins, yet Jesus says it like it is right in front of them!

Did Jesus say he was God? Certainly! He did what only God can do. Not merely simple stuff like making the Pharisees angry.