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Thursday, December 22, 2011

OVERVIEW OF CHRISTIAN DOCTRINES

Concept of God: Christians claim to believe in One God. But practically they don't believe in monotheism. They have a concept called trinity, which means, God is made of three aspects or personalities, Father, the son and the Holy Ghost. They say "Three in one and one in three" that is, Father is God, Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God, there are not three Gods but One God! All three are equal in power and present from the beginning.

Original Sin: Christian doctrine teaches that because Adam and Eve disobeyed God and ate of the tree of knowledge, all of their descendants bear the stigma of sin and are condemned to doom. Therefore, as per the above doctrine, every newborn child is a sinner.

Atonement and Redemption: Christian doctrine teaches that as all the human beings are sinners, crucifixion of man-god Jesus on the Cross, paid the price of original sin. Just by believing in this doctrine is enough to attain salvation.

Second Coming: All true believers in Christ will disappear from the earth and enter into spiritual realm - Rapture. Then comes the time for Tribulation marked by wars and oppression will then take place leading up to the appearance of the Anti-Christ. When the Anti-Christ tries to invade Israel with his armies, Jesus will return with hosts of angels and defeat him in the great battle called Armageddon. A thousand years of peace will follow, with Jesus acting as a King.

FORMULATION OF THE BIBLE

(Here we are using CE (Christian era) instead of AD)

40-45 CE - Letters of Paul
50 CE Gospel of Mark written
60 CE Gospel of Matthew written
65 CE Gospel of Luke written
90-120 CE Gospel of John written
120-325 Hundreds of Gospels in circulation

325 Council of Nicea - Organized by Roman Emperor Constantine to settle doctrinal disputes. Emperor was from a Pagan background and favored Trinitarian view of Christianity. Therefore, the four Gospels, which supported his views, were chosen by a majority vote.

367 CE - The Final Version of the Bible was accepted - contained over 70 books.

382 CE - All other Gospels supporting Oneness of God and original teachings of Jesus were banned, including Gospel of Barnabas and Gospel of Thomas (discovered in 1945 in Egypt)

500+ CE - Unitarian church broke off

1000 CE - Western and Eastern church broke off - The Great Schism
Western Church: Catholic churches
Eastern church: Eastern Orthodox church
1600 CE - Protestants broke off - led by Martin Luther and John Calvin
1611 CE - King James Version of the Bible was made - most widely used today

1952 CE - Major revision of the King James Version was made because of its great errors

Important points to Note:

Oldest New Testament available - dates back to fourth century. Three centuries after Jesus Christ left the world.
Bible not available in the language of Jesus (Aramaic) in which it was originally revealed - The oldest New Testament present now is in Greek.
Bible was not written down during the time of Jesus
Bible was not memorized in the time of Jesus or any other time.
Many versions of the Bible available - differing in many passages.

OVERVIEW OF THE BIBLE

Bible is the collection of books. Protestants' bible contains 66 books and the Catholics' bible contains 73 books (7 extra books - Apocrypha=doubtful). The bible is divided into two parts namely, Old Testament and New Testament. Old Testament has 39 Books
First five Books are called Pentateuch i.e., Torah, according to the Jews. New Testament has 27 Books. First, four are called gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John)

Was the Old Testament Written During Moses' Lifetime?

Deut. 34:5-10:'So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord. And he buried him in a valley in the land of Moab over against Bethpeor: But no man knows of this sepulcher unto this day...and the people of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days...and there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord know face to face.'

Oldest copy of the Old Testament: 10th century CE - Not in the same classical Hebrew spoken during Moses' time.

Was the New Testament Written During Jesus' Lifetime?

Jesus spoke Aramaic and Hebrew and not Greek, but the current and ancient Bibles are in Greek.

True disciples of Jesus, who are described in the Qur'an as Muslims, would never write any blasphemous statements about Jesus and God. Therefore it can be concluded that the present bible has some other source unrelated to Jesus.

Words NOT found in the Bible

Bible
Torah
Christianity
Judaism
Original Sin
Trinity

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