From: watson@sce.carleton.ca (Stephen Watson)
Subject: Re: In My Humbel Opinion?
Organization: Carleton University
Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1992 02:02:46 GMT

David.Rice@ofa123.fidonet.org writes:

>1: watson@sce.carleton.ca (Stephen Watson)
>ID: watson.721755779@space.sce.carleton.ca
> 
>>>JJL> "The local chapter of Ambassadors for Christ [...]
> 
>DR> "Since He refuses to come Himself. But then, since He never
>DR> existed, He has a good excuse.               ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>.   ^^^^^^^^ 
> 
>SW> "David, kindly support this assertion, or else qualify it with
>SW> an "IMHO".
> 
>That stands for "In My Humble Opinion." Me, humble?! (SMILE!)
>I will, however, qualify it below.
> 
>SW> "It does not appear unreasonable (given the available
>SW> documentation) to believe that there was a first-century Jew
>SW> named "Yeshua", who led some sort of religious movement in
>SW> Roman-occupied Palestine."
> 
>Look at line four above. It reads "Christ," not "a Jew named
>Yeshua." You added your knee-jerk biases and concluded that
>"Christ" equals some long-dead Jew that people call Jesus. I

OK, so you wish to distinguish between the term "Jesus" (referring to
an historical person), and "Christ" (referring to a theological
concept).  Fair enough, it's a valid distinction to make, IF you tell
people before-hand that you're doing it.  The term "Christ" is, by
convention, frequently used as a proper name of the person Jesus (vis.
the "C" in "B.C."), and it was therefore not unreasonable for me to
believe that you were using "Christ" in this sense.  My admitted
biases (yes, I am a Christian) have nothing to do with it, nor does
the state of my patella: merely a widely(i.e. not just by Xns)-accepted 
definition of the word.  I apologize for misinterpreting you.

>submit that Einstein, and Pasture, and Mm Curie, were Christ.

In that case, I submit that you have a private definition of "Christ"
at variance with that found in a standard dictionary.  All respects to
the scientists you just mentioned, but I just checked in my OED and
I'm at a loss to see how it fits any one of them.

In future, perhaps you could make clear when you're using a possibly
non-standard definition of a common term?

[snip of my old post & David's post]
>I -did not- say Jesus never existed. I said Christ never existed.
>Do you understand the distinction?

As I have indicated above, the distinction is crystal clear to me.  On
the question "Who was Jesus?" I think you and I must agree to
disagree.

>The issue of "Christ" or "Jesus" or other like occultism is better
>discussed in some theology newsgroup, except when addressing
>origins (*IMHO*).

Agreed!  However, recently someone (Bruce Korb?) said "God caused the
Big Bang" and was reproved for not making clear that this was a
statement of his personal theology, rather than a scientific fact.  If
Christians are to be required to disclaim statements of conviction on
religious matters, it is only fair to ask that atheists do so too.
Accordingly, I've taken the liberty of prefixing the following with a
strong disclaimer:

In David Rice's Ever-So-Humble-Opinion:                  ;-)
> Jesus has nothing to do with origins any more 
>than He had anything to do with Godhood, any more than Jesus had
>anything to do with Christ. It is well and good for theists to use
>smoke and mirrors to distract from the issue of origins here, but
>surely they should be called on the carpet to explain their claims?

I object to the implication that I jumped on this issue to distract
from the issue of origins.  Since I am, in fact, an evolutionist, I
would have no motive for doing so.  *You* were the one who brought up
the issue of Jesus==Christ / Jesus!=Christ by what seems a completely
gratuitous attack on the name "Ambassadors for Christ".  I am merely,
as you put it "calling you on the carpet".

>Occultism is counter-productive and anti-Commonwealth.
                                     ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Pardon me?  Could you share with us your definition of "Commonwealth"?
I would *so hate* to misinterpret you again! :-)

>SW> "Steve Watson: watson@sce.carleton.ca===Carleton University
>David Rice, the Evangelical Atheist.
                 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Gee, is that an admission?  Does this mean you have accepted *my* definition
of the term? ;-)

Now back to the business at hand... like...what's happened to Rich Rearden?
--
==Steve Watson: watson@sce.carleton.ca===Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario==
| The above is the output of a 7th-order Markovian analysis of all posts on   |
| this group for the past month.  Not only is it not Carleton's opinion, it's |
| not even *my* opinion: it's really just a mish-mash of all YOUR opinions!   |
Newsgroups: talk.origins