theCrushHeb

but honestly, as a teacher i want to make a metaphor.

first some facts to nail down that I won't go super into but things to pay attention to:

- jesus didn't fulfill any of the messianic prophecies as written in the prophets (and christians have a "spiritual fulfillment" thing to justify this but even if we pretend thats true, how were people supposed to see it?)

- god warns against following people who do miracles directly in the torah

- god makes ridiculously clear that he has no image or form that walks the earth (reiterated in a hundred different ways in the torah)

- and finally, the "new testament" and Christian theology is majority from Paul who said the law no longer applied

In Türkiye, there's the Hagia Sophia which was initially constructed as a church during the Byzantine Empire. It was a very grand monument, supposedly to rival Solomon's Temple.

The Byzantine Empire collapsed and the Ottomans took over Constantinople, which renamed it Istanbul. The Hagia Sophia was then converted into a Mosque, and they also covered up all the Christian imagery

Then after the fall of the Ottomans, the Hagia Sophia became a museum. In a way, this honoured all previous Greek Orthodox and Latin Catholic history, making it as a sign of Turkish modern secularism. Then in 2020, the Turkish president Erdogan decided to make it a mosque again. Obviously this pissed off plenty of people, but the Muslims greatly welcomed it

Well, it's not as extreme as the Muslims simply building their Mosque atop the Jewish Temple. In fact, the restored Christian imagery is still preserved, just hidden behind curtains whenever there are prayers. And it's still open for visitors, but they also have to pay a fee now.

But yeah, there's a similar feeling. I know while Israel has sovereignty over the Dome, for regional peace they leave it under Jordanian custodianship, and the Jews are even barred from going into the Mosque

Preferably the site should have been a museum where all can visit. But no, the Muslims have to make it a mosque to restrict people from entering it

Anyway, these are some of my thoughts. I hope I didnt offend anything, but raising another example of how a historical site is being appreciated for another purpose

When a Christian realizes something they're conditioned to say that "god revealed to me" and when they have a thought that seems to come out of nowhere (something that happens to everyone) they're conditioned to either think its God giving them that thought or some nefarious voice, rather than things bouncing around their subconscious so if they randomly think of a line of scripture, God is showing them something that will explain or help them answer whatever they're going through.

They have this saying that "you're not supposed to interpret scripture, the spirit is supposed to interpret for you" which means if you read scripture and suddenly make a connection/realization about something, then the spirit has given that to you. Except it's exactly the same as when someone else does this. The difference is that without using the language of "this was given to me by the spirit" they can write off anything other people say as someone "interpreting" because nobody who is not a Christian would act like they're sure of something that just came to them while reading Scripture so much that they say it was given to them by god, and can interpret scripture however they want even if its a bad translation - that is prioritized over good translations that negate their "understanding given by the spirit".

Carlos feels a bit feckless and anxious, not satisfied in his life and less energetic and fit. Don Juan tells him "you think about yourself too much" and goes on to explain that this causes fatigue and dissatisfaction, because when you think about yourself too much you end up spending a lot of energy trying to learn about the world by looking inward rather than at the world, and this just ends up with you entrenching yourself in your own beliefs and lose lots of energy trying to make your experience of the world fit that.

1. His words constantly contradict the word of God in the books of Moses, which in turn contradicts Jesus' words directly who said the law would never pass away. So no jew would ever listen to him, but also people who want to follow jesus should be at minimum skeptical by now. 2. He lived at the same time as people who actually did know jesus. There was a Church in Jerusalem that was Jesus' church and apparently was led by Jesus' own brother! Pretty simple test here: how did these people who knew and learned from the real actual person Jesus feel about Paul who claims authority of Jesus from prophecy? They were constantly battling each other, to put it bluntly. It is modernly framed as a simple "christianity for jews vs christianity for gentiles" contention, which of course Paul's followers championed (acts). But if Jesus actually did have intent for some completely different deal for his gentile followers, wouldn't he have told... well, anyone? I mean look at the battles that ensued over it. Clearly the people who knew Jesus thought Paul was full of shit too.

it's really too bad Paul's followers redacted all of the texts and the jerusalem church's writings and things were all destroyed by rome. Makes sense though, the evidence we are left with is pretty damning despite us having so little.

Biggest problem though is an enormous central pillar of Pauline Christianity: Salvation and redemption from sin is only through faith in Jesus. We ask, is this something Jesus taught or believed? Well, we have one piece of evidence that says that this is also just a fabrication of Paul's. When Paul visited Jerusalem, he was harangued by the jewish followers of jesus, and to make a long story short, he was made to go to the temple and make a sacrifice. But wait, didn't Jesus replace the whole sacrificial system? Why would the Jerusalem church push him to do something like this? Well, I think by now our answer is obvious. Even this central teaching was not an actual teaching of jesus - just something Paul invented.

the Rabbi says these are clearly not only added which is not allowed, but also they are absolutely wrong. he says clearly Christians agree, because you'll never meet one who actually follows these.

it is actually spiritually degrading to turn the other cheek when you are struck. I'm not saying to always strike back, but the "turn the other cheek" for that to be struck too, is genuinely spiritually degrading. to accept abuse and pretend you're okay with more. and despite the common refrain of "you cant take your possessions into the grave anyway!" human beings actually do need things. number one, so you dont just become a burden on everyone else who does have things. but two, because our spirits need connections with things, owning and caring for things is fulfilling. I know it seems like this should not be the case, but it simply is. even people who like a minimalist life of few things have those few that are special to them.