Converting to Judaism in ancient times

[Valmy]

Pretty sure we could find some nefarious preaching on the part of "true Christians" as well.  Moving away from those aspects should be a cause for applause.

I know everything is equal and I should never use my brain and have an opinion about anything I know.

Holding onto obviously false and evil beliefs until your church fathers suddenly turn around and say the words have changed is a cause for contempt not applause.  Your mileage may vary.

[Valmy]

Having met, conversed and communicated with some, I grant them some respect for their beliefs.

I respect alot of people as good people.  Every religion has good people but that does not mean their beliefs all deserve respect, unless it is your policy to respect everything equally.

[Barrister]

Your opinion seems based on ignorance and misinformation to me. 

How is my opinion based on ignorance and misinformation?  My opinion is very simply that people can call themselves whatever they want, and that we should accept the label that people choose to use to describe themselves.

[Valmy]

No, but rather that everyone who says they are a Christian can be called a Christian.  It's not like there's any magical advantage to being called a Christian after all.

It may be "boring", but trying to come up with needlessly complicated and obscure definitions and barriers on who is or is not a Christian seems to have little point.

So when somebody from a different faith asks you 'so tell me about Christianity' you say that it is whatever anybody wants to believe who calls themselves a Christian?

[Valmy]

How is my opinion based on ignorance and misinformation?  My opinion is very simply that people can call themselves whatever they want, and that we should accept the label that people choose to use to describe themselves.

Even if that label is used as an intentional attempt to decieve?  Because essentially you are telling me to accept anything people tell me regardless of their motives.

[Queequeg]

Minsky and Malthus; if this hypothetical "Jew for Jesus" followed all the Mosaic laws and respected (and studied) the Talmud in addition to the new testement, and was matrlineally okay, could they then be a Jew and a Christian simultaneously? I think the Ebionites and earliest Christians would take exception to the idea that the two religious labels are totally mutually exclusive.

This is a hypothetical person because 'Jews for Jesus' specifically deny the Talmud.

Now a Jew who happens to have beliefs identical to the very early Jewish Christianity thing?  I have never heard of such a group but they would probably be disowned by both modern Jews and Christians.

IIRC The Early Christians denied the Talmud, and so do the Kararites as Minsky pointed out. I think if someone is of the right ancestry and keeps up all the Mosaic laws, and they are descended from Jews on the matrilineal line, then I think a reasonable argument could be made for their Jewishness. 

The issue is that I'd always be skeptical (as I'm sure Minsky and Malthus ) that it wasn't some Trojan Horse of Evangelical Christianity, where in a generation or two they are all eating ham hotdogs and getting drunk and running around on Friday night. If anything I'd expect them to follow the laws about as stringently as the more Conservative Conservative Jews do, even the Orthodox maybe.

[viper37]

What if I think Christ is a divine goat in human form?

Don't think that counts.
At the source, it says "God created man in his own image".
So God looks like us, and we are not goats.
Hence, if you don't believe in that, you can't be Christian.

There's nothing wrong with having an offshoot religion of Christianity that believes God is a goat, but that is no more christianism, just as modern Christians are not Jews.

[Valmy]

IIRC The Early Christians denied the Talmud, and so do the Kararites as Minsky pointed out. I think if someone is of the right ancestry and keeps up all the Mosaic laws, and they are descended from Jews on the matrilineal line, then I think a reasonable argument could be made for their Jewishness. 

The issue is that I'd always be skeptical (as I'm sure Minsky and Malthus ) that it wasn't some Trojan Horse of Evangelical Christianity, where in a generation or two they are all eating ham hotdogs and getting drunk and running around on Friday night. If anything I'd expect them to follow the laws about as stringently as the more Conservative Conservative Jews do, even the Orthodox maybe.

So long as it is in good faith.  My problem with 'Jews for Jesus' is it is an Evangelical trick.  They realized the biggest problem in converting Jews to their faith is that Jews want to remain Jews, so they invented this thing so they can convert Jews to evangelical Christianity and still be Jews in some sense.  They try to pass Evangelical Christianity off as 'true Judiasm' and so forth and are led by members who deceptively take Jewish names and so forth.

Now if there are some Jews out there who want to go back to the original Jewish form of Christianity and so forth...well that is different but I do not know anything about these sorts of people.

[Barrister]

So when somebody from a different faith asks you 'so tell me about Christianity' you say that it is whatever anybody wants to believe who calls themselves a Christian?

Uh, no?

If someone asks me to tell them about Christianity I'll tell them about Christ, the Gospels, the early church fathers, the Reformation, that kind of thing.

If they ask me what the definition of a Christian is, I can tell them what I believe.  But I'm just a man.  It's up to God to judge who is or is not a Christian, not me.

Perhaps this is just a question of perspective.  I know I've mentioned I belong to a fairly liberal denomination, the United Church of Canada.  The UCC does not have any definitive declaration of faith, and instead strives towards inclusiveness.

[Valmy]

Perhaps this is just a question of perspective.  I know I've mentioned I belong to a fairly liberal denomination, the United Church of Canada.  The UCC does not have any definitive declaration of faith, and instead strives towards inclusiveness.

I solve that problem myself simply by claiming to not be a Christian but rather have my own beliefs.  I guess we come at this from different angles.

Anyway my dislike of Mormons and Jews for Jesus got my blood up a little more than was probably justified in this thread.  Sorry.

[crazy canuck]

Your historical point is of course correct, but I'm not sure how it's important today.

Its because to call yourself a Christain continues to be to call yourself someone who is separate and apart from the wider community and unfortunately continues to animate politics to a great degree.

The day public policy is not dictated by what people percieve as the correct biblical interpretation is the day I will agree with you that the word Christian (and all that is wrapped up in that word) has become meaningless.

Case in point.  Doctors who consider themselves christian perform abortions.  Others who think they are better christians seek to kill those same doctors.

[crazy canuck]

IIRC The Early Christians denied the Talmud

No not all Early Christian sects did.  No doubt there were some sects that wished to exclude even what Chrsitians call the Old Testament since they wished to avoid any Jewish "taint" but it still made it in - given that the argument for Jesus being the Messiah rested entirely on a particular interpretation of the Jewish Prophets.

[Valmy]

No not all Early Christian sects did.  No doubt there were some sects that wished to exclude even what Chrsitians call the Old Testament since they wished to avoid any Jewish "taint" but it still made it in - given that the argument for Jesus being the Messiah rested entirely on a particular interpretation of the Jewish Prophets.

Well by 'Talmud' at that time you really mean the oral tradition.  It wasn't necessary to write all that stuff down while the Kingdom of Judah was still around.  I think the Talmud didn't start to get written down until the year 200, well after the Christian-Jewish split.

So there was no Talmud around for them to reject.

[PRC]

I know everything is equal and I should never use my brain and have an opinion about anything I know.

Holding onto obviously false and evil beliefs until your church fathers suddenly turn around and say the words have changed is a cause for contempt not applause.  Your mileage may vary.

Those beliefs, at their base, anti-black, were pretty standard for the times and is still the norm in a lot of places.  I'm surprised you think that to suddenly turn around and say we've changed those beliefs is a cause for contempt... most would call that progress.

[Barrister]

Your historical point is of course correct, but I'm not sure how it's important today.

Its because to call yourself a Christain continues to be to call yourself someone who is separate and apart from the wider community and unfortunately continues to animate politics to a great degree.

The day public policy is not dictated by what people percieve as the correct biblical interpretation is the day I will agree with you that the word Christian (and all that is wrapped up in that word) has become meaningless.

Case in point.  Doctors who consider themselves christian perform abortions.  Others who think they are better christians seek to kill those same doctors.

Do you really need to go to the "killing abortion doctors" point?  Shouldnt there be a Godwin's-type law about it when discussing religion?

And I never said the word Christian is meaningless.  As you point out it if far from meaningless - it in fact has a great deal of meaning for a lot of people.  It has so much meaning for people that I don't see how I can dictate how others would chose to use that word to describe themselves.