I had a link earlier, some jesuits and then there are Christodelphians, as well as some Christians from my own upbringing in Lutheran Sweden.
I don't see why the scriptures of Mormons don't count as somewhere other than the Bible from which they get information about Jesus. It seems to me they are not the only denomination to add text either.
Would you agree that for instance the Jefferson Bible is an example of someone explicitly and specifically removing the divine nature of Jesus from the Bible, and the Jefferson thus explicitly rejected an integral and definitional part of Christianity?
With respect, that's an utterly useless summary, and tells us exactly nothing. It's like being asked by a visiting extra-terrestrial "what is a human?", and answering "really really nice".
No it hasn't. Up until about 40 years ago, no one 'heckled' Christianity. Until then, people just differed in their religious preference. Proper dismantling of the whole concept of religious belief only began very very recently.
Haven't read it... ...and I don't know what the operating definition is here. The wiki page says he left out the Resurrection, without which Jesus of Nazareth is most charitably described as a delusional cult leader. Whether a manuscript he never published means Jefferson wasn't a Christian is another question, but he evidently did claim to be one.
John was a witness to the interactions of Christ. Of those that believe in Christ....we are all Saints.
Oh but Christ is so much more.... He is the Alpha and Omega. He made the earth that Mohammed set his feet upon. Either he did or he didn't Jesus is who He claimed to be or He died in vein. As C.S. Lewis said, He was either a liar, a lunatic ....or He is Lord.
YES .. Constantine did mandate that the Trinity become doctrine. Constantine exiles Eusebius because he refuses to sign off on the Nicene creed. Eusebius then relents and signs (doing the political thing) and is again in the Emperors good graces. Your claim that his support for Arianism is abject nonsense. Anyone with any political sense sided with the Emperor. It was all the bishops that showed up that were engaging in political expediency. A whole lot of bishops did not show up .. and the reason they didn't is because they did not support Constantines doctrinal position. It was Constantine that insisted on the word "homoousios" - essentially setting the debate on the nature of Christs divinity and turning Jesus into God (God of Abraham) by the stroke of a pen. Sad commentary that you are a minister and do not know this.
See this is what I'm talking about. Mormons change some interpretation about the details in how Jesus came about, and Jefferson takes all of the supernatural stuff out of Jesus, divine nature and origin as well as resurrection. It seems to me the Mormon interpretation is closer to Christianity than Jefferson was, theologically. Yet the arguments I hear from you guys (and in my experience, the Christian world in large) link Jefferson to Christianity more than they link Mormonism to Christianity. Now, I don't care which one is right, but it seems to me, both can't be. Of course, you are different people, you may not agree with each other, and I can't blame either of you for being inconsistent for something that you don't hold yourself.
Mormans are a dangerous sect that want to steal all your money and everything else. Anyone who is Morman is brainwashed. Same as any other sect. A sect is a religion that hurts you.
That doesn't really make sense to me. Unless the world was created 2000 years ago, that seems not so much like an argument that God doesn't interfere as that he just rarely interferes.
That doesn't really have anything to do with what I said though. If their theology is close to Christianity than Jefferson is, then it doesn't make any sense to call Jefferson a Christian while not calling Mormons Christians. I think this argument holds true regardless of whether it was made up to steal someone's money.
What did Jesus say about the nature of Satan? I'm not an expert on the Bible, but some wikipediaing indicates that the Devil as angelic (or even as one entity, rather than different entities under the different names mentioned in the Bible) is not a uniformly accepted interpretation of the Bible (in particular throughout history). Liberal Christianity often views the devil metaphorically. This is true of some Conservative Christian groups too, such as the Christadelphians[2] and the Church of the Blessed Hope. Much of the popular lore of the devil is not biblical; instead, it is a post-medieval Christian reading of the scriptures influenced by medieval and pre-medieval Christian popular mythology. (source) We are approaching this differently. I have no allegiance to Christianity or orthodoxy whatsoever, so I am not so interested in what you think the truth actually is. I am much more interested in the interactions between groups, political, religious, social and so on, so I was more interested in your statement that whatever strays from those points is not to be called Christianity. I am also a linguistic descriptivist, I'm suspicious of the idea that Jesus' words is what defines Christianity. I would argue that usage defines words, and that Jesus words only describes Christianity insofar that that's what we English speakers refer to when we say Christianity. Of course, at the moment, those happen to overlap, because English speakers generally use Christianity to describe Jesus teachings (although various interpretations and strictness stretch that a little bit), I'm more interested in the theoretical limits to that logic, and the wiggle room in your definition of Christianity provides an interesting perspective.
Jesus said Satan (the enemy) is a liar and a murderer. Taking away Jesus' deity is a heresy known as Manichaeism, and the Jefferson NT is something I will always hold against Jefferson. Talk about cherry picking scripture! Mormons are basically polytheists aside from their superstition about the book of Mormon.
I think a good study for you would be "George Washington's Sacred Fire" byPeter Lillback. Though Washington had a common goal with Jefferson for the good of the Nation, he kept himself a little guarded due to the mans religious views. Jefferson loved the Christian precepts, he just didn't honor the Miracles of Jesus as well as the resurrection. It might be pointed out that might have changed in his later years. Jefferson reconciled with John Adams who was a strong Christian. It also might be pointed out that Jefferson did have a copy of the Koran which he disregarded as nonsense. He did hold to most of the precepts of Christianity.
I know you define Logos as "philosophy" and I interpret it as "expression". Not real different. I will wait to see proof the world is 4.5 billion years old. There are many questions un answered.
Then what is a sect? Again, it seems to me people are flinging words with bad connotations around without actually worrying about whether it is true. Google suggests definitions like sect: a group of people with somewhat different religious beliefs (typically regarded as heretical) from those of a larger group to which they belong. a philosophical or political group, especially one regarded as extreme or dangerous. And that doesn't sound too far from Jesus' relation with established beliefs at the time.
I don't really care whether you personally agree with Jefferson, my point is about people drawing the lines around Christianity where it is convenient for them, not where theology behoves them to.
