And what you think really happen before the stories where propaganda-ized by the establishment?

Jesus miraculously feeds and heals the 5,000 via miracles?

hhmm Or he leads a revolt and tans the local boots for medicines, ASDA for bread and wine, then redistributes the medicine and goods among the sick and the needy! 😆

Any other bible stories you maybe think aren’t telling us the whole truth? 🙂

the feeding of the 5000 only counts the men – he also fed the women and children but they were not counted.

For an atheistic statement on this forum, your standard of writing is in the top 5%.

Any other bible stories you maybe think aren’t telling us the whole truth?

All of them?!

mary was a virgin?? com ‘on
It astounds me that people who are religious would never believe that someone would get pregnant without having sex in this day and age so why is it anymore believable all those years ago. Also if mary was a virgin that says a lot about Joseph, afterall they were married, why didn’t she jump his bones on the wedding night? Did he have bad breath perhaps?

IIRC, the virgin birth and resurrection stuff was all added much later than the middles of the gospels.

The Roman empire had got too big to control by militaristic means, so they planted an agent (Saul of Tarsus) in a new Jewish hippy-peace-loving cult to expand it to the gentiles and make them easier to control.

Who wants to tell him what virgin use to mean?

“Who wants to tell him what virgin use to mean?”

I want you too, I might learn something as well.

What wheel sizes were used on the Pharaoh’s chariots?

hit me with the truth Drac, I’m over 18!

Never knew that either!

“The word ‘virgin’ did not originally mean a woman whose vagina was untouched by any penis, but a free woman, one not betrothed, not bound to, not possessed by any man. It meant a female who is sexually and hence socially her own person. In any version of patriarchy, there are no Virgins in this sense.”

badnewz – Member
For an atheistic statement on this forum, your standard of writing is in the top 5%.

Not sure whether to take this as an insult or a compliment!

Regardless, it’s a question not a statement! 😆 Guess a better way to phrase the question would be:

How would you re-write a bible story for the present day?

So, she was openly sleeping about then?

mary was a virgin?? com ‘on
It astounds me that people who are religious would never believe that someone would get pregnant without having sex in this day and age so why is it anymore believable all those years ago.

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCggUaOFET4[/video]

Never knew that either!

“The word ‘virgin’ did not originally mean a woman whose vagina was untouched by any penis, but a free woman, one not betrothed, not bound to, not possessed by any man. It meant a female who is sexually and hence socially her own person. In any version of patriarchy, there are no Virgins in this sense.”

Where’s that link from seosamh? I’m not convinced.

Also, you’re looking at a modern English word translated from medieval Latin, translated from classical Latin and possibly translated fom the original Greek.

You need to look at how Mary was described in the oldest possible version of the story.

The flood myth is pretty cool origins can be traced back to Babylon and the beginnings of monotheism,

Is it a hand me down history of the sea levels risings as the glaciers melted at the end of the ice age, such as doggerland dissapearing

somewhatslightlydazed – Member
Where’s that link from seosamh? I’m not convinced.

Also, you’re looking at a modern English word translated from medieval Latin, translated from classical Latin and possibly translated fom the original Greek.

You need to lok at how Mary was described in the oldest possible version of the story.

Came from there, Not idea of it’s veracity.

What if we used the word ‘virgin’ in accordance with its original meaning?

You need to lok at how Mary was described in the oldest possible version of the story.

Well if you do that then you’ll see it was never mentioned that she was a Virgin.

Virgin meant also harks to someone who was inexperienced in sex not necessarily meaning no penile insertion. The literal sense we use today wasn’t the origin of the word.

Why not try focusing on the part of the bible which outlines a social code for living together harmoniously ? The fact is our modern society and laws are based upon it.

of relavance to this thread:

10 Logical Explanations For Incredible Biblical Tales

Well if you do that then you’ll see it was never mentioned that she was a Virgin.

Well Luke 1.27 in the King James Version describes her as a virgin. The earlier(?) Greek version of Luke 1.27 describes her as “parthenos” which apprently means:

a virgin; a woman who has never had sexual relations; a female (virgin), beyond puberty but not yet married

Why do you say she was never described as a Virgin? do you have an earlier text/better translation?

What P-Jay says

Why not try focusing on the part of the bible which outlines a social code for living together harmoniously ? The fact is our modern society and laws are based upon it.

This is why it illegal to eat owls and to shave in England in 2014.

The Bible was written by humans. Humans have ‘built-in’ morals/ethics so they’re reflected in the ‘core’ laws of the Bible. If our modern laws are based upon the bible, the bible is based upon humanity and so our modern laws really reflect humanity not the bible. All human cultures have had laws based on not murdering, stealing or perjuring, regardless of their religion.

My guess is that a lot of them were simply made up. If journalists can invent stuff in this day and age of mass communication they sure as heck could’ve done it back then.

My guess is that a lot of them were simply made up. If journalists can invent stuff in this day and age of mass communication they sure as heck could’ve done it back then.

This seems to be the case with the nativity story; which seems to have been added to the gospels at a later date in order that lots of the OT prophesies were fulfilled and to link Jesus to King David.

Old Testament or New Testament?
Old Testament – many of the tales (e.g. Jonah) are re-telling of older stories from Babylon. So Jonah is Gilgamesh in the original etc…
Basic outline, Israelites have a great leader everything is going well and they are beloved of Yahweh, they get a bad leader and Yahweh is angry.

Many of the stories, such as that of Samson, are told from a different perspective as captured in other mythic tales such as the Persian Epic of the Kings.

New Testament – not so sure, however the mythic cycle incorporates some of the Roman Cult of the Invincible Sun… Sol Invictus

A lot of them are older stories from earlier myths and religions absorbed by the Jews on their wanderings
The middle east was the earliest site settled by modern humans as we left Africa
As we spread out from there it still would’ve been a nexus for trade and passing of skills, technologies and mythologies

In part its an accurate historical record obviously corrupted by those who used it to secure their own agenda, establishing patriarchal control over a desert dwelling people, things like not eating pork make sense In a hot part of the world before fridges !

How would you re-write a bible story for the present day?

Ctrl-A

Ctrl-X

My favourite bible story is the one where Elijah is mocked by children for being bald so god sends a bear to kill the children.

They should read that one more often in Sunday School IMO.

In part its an accurate historical record obviously corrupted by those who used it to secure their own agenda, establishing patriarchal control over a desert dwelling people, things like not eating pork make sense In a hot part of the world before fridges !

Some of what @kimbers posted here I agree with. Undoubtably in my mind the Old Testament grew from ancient stories and myths as kimbers says. I think organized religion was and remains fundamentally a social code for people living together in a community, it pre-dates the law as we know it today. In many ways it was quite socialist in establishing a greater authority than any one living individual, it was the religious code that was important not any individual king. Re the specific comment on Pork, yes it was very much a public health initiative !

It’s easy to poke holes in stories of the creation or miracles but that misses the hugely positive elements of the “social code” aspects of religion some of which where written 1000’s of years ago and which are still highly relevant today. You cannot argue with no murder, no adultory, no stealing etc

Is it a hand me down history of the sea levels risings as the glaciers melted at the end of the ice age, such as doggerland dissapearing

..or the tide came in, as it does

That time already?

Can we not just create a “sticky” thread – save you all having to come up with new thread titles each time. Why the fascination with all this stuff – it’s quite obsessive?

I wouldn’t believe much of what is said by Johnny-foreigner in any country now, so why would I believe Chinese whispers, lost in translation over 2000 years ago.
Bollx innit

and on the 3rd day he acescended into heaven

Quite clearly an alien being beamed up to his ship.

There’s some fun translation and context stuff with the virgin birth- the hebrew “almah” doesn’t mean virgin as we now mean it, it means more or less “young woman of childbearing age who hasn’t had a child”- which depending on context can imply virgin, or not. But when the book of Isaiah was translated into Greek, it got translated as “parthenos” which is pretty much the same as the modern “virgin”.

So, the gospel Matthew considers the birth of christ as the fulfillment of the prophecy of the birth of immanuel in the book of isaiah, but it’s referring to this incorrect translation with the “virgin birth” rather than the actual prophecy.

When you get further into Matthew and Isaiah, it ends up looking like he basically shoehorned the Isaiah prophecy onto the birth of christ and that the prophecy didn’t really apply to him anyway. So in other words, Matthew wanted to use the book of Isaiah to give Christ more heavenly legitimacy, rather than because it really fitted.

Luke provides a somewhat contradictory account of the virgin birth, but wasn’t an eyewitness in any case, and Mark and John I think don’t mention it at all. Ringo just played the drums. So the actual biblical accounts are all a bit shaky.

(I heard somewhere that the support for the virgin birth of christ is stronger in the qu’ran than it is in the bible!)

Ironically whether or not the literal virgin birth is true doesn’t really undermine the strength of the story of Jesus at all. But it does undermine the accounts a bit.

(I really like this stuff… Jesus as a real man and prophet is more impressive than Jesus the miraculous imo)

teamhurtmore – Member
That time already?

Can we not just create a “sticky” thread – save you all having to come up with new thread titles each time. Why the fascination with all this stuff – it’s quite obsessive?The orginal intention was hoping for some funny re-imaginations of the stories, but regardless, i don’t why we shouldn’t talk about. I find it interesting from a historical perspective too.

Agreed – it’s a topic that people clearly love to focus on…..

you have to wonder what the convo was twixt mazzer and joe when he discovered she was preggers without him doing the deed.
Maz: I’m pregnant
Joe: huh!? we’ve not done it, who was it?
Maz: it was God
Joe: What? God!? wtf.
Maz: Yeahhh God the almighty, the creator of all the heavens and earth. One night I’d had a few and he came down from heaven and took me in his arms and took me roughly, behind the sofa. Oh he was good.
Joe: Oh well that’s alright then, as long as it was God I don’t mind. Anyway up you get on that donkey then god****er.

edit: for some reason I’m reading this back in Eric Idle’s voice.

it’s a topic that people clearly love to focus on…..

And? Heaven forbid that people should be able to talk about things they want to talk about. I’d take that over your positive contribution of jumping in and whining about it any day. You know that reading every thread isn’t mandatory, right? If it bothers you, bleep over to one talking about tyres or phones or parking tickets or something, they almost never crop up.

I’m not sure I like the idea of Doggerland. Doesn’t seem the kind of thing you should base a theme park on.

I quite like the idea that Jesus was some sort of proto-David Blaine.

In a time where people were generally pretty uneducated, someone with a handle on early street magic and parlour tricks would’ve wowed them back then. Water into wine, making food ‘appear’ from nowhere, magicians have been pulling these stunts for donkey’s years. “That’s amazing, how do you do it?” the people would ask. “Ah, I’m the son of god” replies Jesus, and a legend is born.