The Holy Grail...legend or fact?

Good work gcle2003, but didn't Zeus visit in a shower of gold? I thought of that one, but wasn't quite sure of  the virginity of Danae. You are right of  course in that the gods always came first. The god thing happened with Rhea Silvia the mother of Romulus and Remus. As a vestal Virgin she was  taken by Mars the god of war and gave birth to the founders of Rome. When born they were set adrift in a reed boat on the river Tiber to die of exposure, but a she wolf found and suckled them until the shepherd Faustulus found then and took them to his home to raise as his own.

Edited by gcle2003 - 28-Jul-2007 at 06:44

Originally posted by JanusRook Most people, contemporary or otherwise,�would accept having a baby as proof the mother was not a virgin. Surprisingly though in the ancient world this was not held to be a problem.

Certainly not for mythical figures it wasn't. For living people it was.

Also, Jesus is seen as a human incarnation of God, and Parthenogenesis does occur in organisms, so it could be that God forced Mary into a state of Parthenogenesis and the Y chromosome is the divine incarnation of God, to use genetics as a possible explanation.

The only problem here - especially in the ancient world in Judea - is that Jesus could then not have been the Messiah. To fulfill prophecy, he had to be a descendant of the flesh of David, ie Joseph had to be his father.

The Church has always been in favor of pacifism

Definately not. Pacifism was popular at some periods (eg the Pax Dei movement) and not at others. The Pope sanctioned wars, and the fact that there were demands made does not change the fact that this is not pacifism. The pacifism evident in the Sermon on the Mount does not entail merely giving a potential victim an out, it demands "no resistance" to violence.

It was just a natural consequence of the times to make war.

Granted, but this does not make it pacifism. It just makes it conform to medieval patterns of violence.

The Church has NEVER killed anyone ... It was always the Secular courts that executed people for heresy, witchcraft and rebellion, and there was no church approval for these actions either.

Oh really?

http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1440491

Merely one example in a veritable mountain that go against that particular claim.

whereas like the bloodline of Christ any belief that she wasn't a virgin is a fairly recent concoction.

You've got to be joking. It's been around since the earliest days of Christianity, or maybe you never heard of Arianism.

The origins of the Grail? How could I miss on  this one before? If this is too old a thread perhaps I should start another? As a Celtic warrior, I need to put that one question above all back on the right track. To begin here was part of the lost religion of Europe; they simply did not worship gods and considered Nature as their overall entity rather than God!

When you have any sort of god that represents the earth�s powers then you subconsciously use your current understanding of nature to get a grip on what you are talking about. To deny this is risking being in denial of life itself. Here is the most basic process of the mind.  The processes of nature always happen and deny them causes us grief. This holistic understanding is not subject to the same challenges as are the countless divisions of other �religions�. Please consider the modern consequences of ignoring nature. Climate change and all that stuff is happening!

Nature is the cup from which we drink. This pure and simple teaching came from the Mother religion and has never been bettered.  The opponents of the Mother of all religions said God is their meat and drink and have such things as communion to prove it. Dare I say something seems to be missing in the chain of cause and effect there and we haven�t work our way up the food chain for nothing. The chalice of history is overflowing with references to this minor point. Consider the cornucopia the Roman goddess, Fortune carried. The Old Testament is dripping with illusions to the cup of life. Previous religions had it for here is one of the most basic symbols of all religions.

Dan Brown keeps on alluding to the cup is a major reference to a woman�s internal body parts, but Brown probably has a dirty mind as well. Okay so he explains that theory and so we all know about being male and female. What is the Celtic connection? I would suggest the Irish stories, but there are many others from all over Europe.

The Church (i.e. the Catholic church) may have ordered the death of some heretics - which of course is gruesome and not Christian at all - but their reputation of malicious actions has been exaggerated with the rise of secularity.

The church has never said that "Holy Days" had to conform to their actual days in history. quote JanusRook

I was talking more than just Holy Days 

      Seems you cannot prove or disprove this assuption either.

The insult is to presuppose that the doctrine of belief is man-made. quote JanusRook

      

 

The bloodline of Jesus isn't a new concept as newly written by Dan Brown and a few numpty conspiracy theorists.        That particular Magdalene tale has been around a long time.

Give me just one instance where a pre-modern religious figure, text or cult believed that Mary Magdalene gave birth to the child of Jesus.

What other alterings of history did you have in mind? quote Hope       Where to begin!     Anything from Jesus birthday being 25th December; let alone Easter;  to the Virginity of the Virgin Mary.

The church has never said that "Holy Days" had to conform to their actual days in history. All of those are celebrations of the event and can occur at anytime. My birthday is January 25th but I could celebrate it on Mar 12th, does this alter the history of my birthday, no. But unless you were educated you could believe my birthday was Mar 12th, ignorance of the masses doesn't mean something's being hidden from them.

Also, give me one contempary source that proves that Mary was not a virgin. Many people throughout history have remained virgins till their death, why can't you believe she did as well.

It shows that the Church has decided some details regarding celebrations, but it does not prove anything regarding the question whether Christianity is false or true. That is a matter of faith only.

The Church does not need to prove that it is false or true, since it is assumed by it's very nature that it is true. That isn't to say that many Church theologians and philosophers haven't gone to great pains to explain using logic why the Church is the way to the truth, it's just they too are under the basic assumption that the church is true. Which is faith which is held in every philosophical and scientific thought.

I am very sceptical to the idea of such authorities in general and the papacy in particular. Although we are in need of priests as guides in faith, yet what is true and false is up to each person to decide.

Exactly, but you must remember, the authority does not lie within the person who holds the post, but to the position of his office.

So what is my actual transgression against you? other than I cannot accept Man made doctrine.

The insult is to presuppose that the doctrine of belief is man-made. We as Christians have just as much evidence to show that it is divinely created. Just because we operate under a different starting opinion doesn't make our opinion less valid. (The starting opinion is that God acted upon the creators of the doctrine- which you cannot prove or disprove).

My intent was to have folks ponder if the early Christian Church peeps had in fact suppressed wisdom, light & truth in favour of a fabricated doctrine.

Doctrine has NEVER EVER EVER been fabricated with a malicious intent. Everytime something has been changed it was under great theological scrutiny beforehand or it was because of conflicting sources. The early church fathers were merely human and took what they thought to be truth and made it their beliefs. The Church has never altered texts but edited them. If you want to look at a religious text that has been altered beyond recognition look at the King James Bible, where it was specifically edited to serve Henry VIII's morality.

 I could have been a little more diplomatic.

Edited by Scorpian - 19-May-2007 at 08:20