From: altheimm@nextnet.csus.edu (Murray Altheim)
Subject: Re: The meaning of "pagan"
Organization: California State University Sacramento
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 00:01:34 GMT

In article <C09r8y.IG5.1@cs.cmu.edu> drake+@cs.cmu.edu (Drake) writes:
>billn@hpcvaac.cv.hp.com (bill nelson) writes:
>
>>From what I have read in the Bible - Jesus did not say this. He is  
>>supposed to have said "I am the way". That does not deny others as
>>also being valid. He was only claiming that his way was valid.  I
>>would expect, if the people who collated the mythology called the
>>Bible had meant "only", that they would have written it that way.
>
>I am the way.  Not "I am a way."  I am THE way.  Moreso, "I am the way,
>the truth and the life.  No man cometh to the Father but by me."  They
>did NOT write: "I am a way, one of many truths and a type of life.  Some
>men come to the Father by me, but not all."

Of course, this does assume that Jesus' name was "Jesus", had brown hair
and blue eyes, white skin, and spoke Jamesian English. And that the 
redactor of the text had access to either an authentic and correct text,
or to someone who had actually heard Jesus speak those words. And that the
text had not been edited or otherwise altered in the process of trans-
mission. And that one's ability to interpret the text was not clouded by
one's own personal beliefs and assumptions.

Not that his name was Yeshua or Joshua, had (most likely) black hair and
brown skin, and spoke Aramaic. That no author or redactor of the extant
texts, which are in Greek, ever met him, nor was likely to even have heard
him speak, that the Greek texts themselves have been demonstrably modified
to suit the purposes of the Christian Church, and that it is exceedingly
difficult to conceive and understand the thoughts and fears of first
century Palestinian Jews, which included belief in all sorts of devils and
angels, a pantheon of gods, legitimate and illegitimate, no concept of 
Hell, and the impending eschatological end of the world -- hardly makes
for a direct-line understanding of the early Jerusalem church. 

Quibbling over the English semantics of the King James Bible, please 
remember that not only is it full of errors in both copy and translation,
it is also in English, which is two translations away from the language
of first century Palestine, and written from at least second-hand oral
accounts. We may have in the last twenty or thirty years began to come
closer to understanding the original sources. It is ironic that many
fundamentalists reject most modern scholarship, preferring to remain
loyal to the erronious KJV because its language has become to them the
language of the Bible. It is not. The profound difference of meaning
engendered by the replacement of the definite by the indefinite article
should hardly be the main element of an argument regarding the nature of
Jesus' mission. Since we'll never recover the actual words of Yeshua
ben Joseph, we can either accept this and move on, or continue to ignore
the facts. Which some would obviously prefer to do.

Pardon me for being so pissy, but it's three weeks of pent up absence-
from-the-net tension. Good to be back.  :-)

Blessings,

Murray the Now-Networkly Released
 
-- 
Murray M. Altheim      "Ils ont l'orteil de Bouc, & d'un Chevreil l'oreille,
Instructional Consultant    La corne d'un Chamois, & la face vermeille
CSU, Sacramento          Comme un rouge Croissant: & dancent toute nuict
altheimm@csus.edu       Dedans un carrefour, ou pres d'une eau qui bruict."
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc