Quote:
Originally Posted by SantaClaus
I don't want to completely hijack this thread, but having spent five years as a biblical studies and philosophy major I can assure you that we know what the original authors said that Jesus said. And we know that the oldest and best documents show that those authors were contemporaries of Jesus, and that their writings were distributed at the time that witnesses to the events were alive (and therefore could refute the claims). The tiny fraction of the text that remains in question (on the order of half a percent) is footnoted in any good Bible and none of those variants are of theological significance. Finally, I'm certain that Mr. O'Reiley had no difficulty finding experts to present a controversial viewpoint, there are always folks around who are more interested in getting published or booking speaking engagements than winnowing out the truth. I'm not saying this as a matter of faith, just as a case for the reliability of the documents. We actually have better evidence of what Jesus said than we do that Plato or Julius Caesar ever lived.
All that said, I do not see a demon behind every bush. I think man is fully capable of the worst kinds of evil all on his own and seldom needs prodding from the devil. Especially when we teach our kids that they are nothing but grown up germs, that terminating a pregnancy is no more significant that having a wart removed, and that all that awaits us is the tomb (that sweet Nirvana of escape). Ok, flame suit is on.
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You should check out this link--
Historicity of Jesus - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus
O'Reilly does have a section of other books to read about the historicity of Jesus. I minored in Religious Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno and have two BAs in History and Philosophy. Not sure that Jesus as a historical figure is as clear as many would hope.
On the subject of this kid--
We should wait and see what exactly influenced the Pittsburgh knife attacker. I am about 6' feet and was frequently bullied by much shorter boys in junior high as well as elementary school before became tall. Attitude seems more important when looking at who gets bullied.