Sometimes tangential comments on other blogs can get a bit out of hand.

I've brought just such an attached thread here because I dig it.

This is the thread begun by my response to Lisa's questions which I hope may develop here more deeply than is characteristic of most blogs. if things get lost in the daily shuffle, please search for terms you rememeber.

Eric's collected responses/suggestions/positions (admittedly taken out of the conversational order):

In the last post [Brandon] said he would like to find a discovery that shows Jesus didn't really espouse most of the modern theological views projected on Him. Well, I have to admit, that is an even better answer than the Ark of the Covenant, and while there may or may not be something out there that would fit the bill, there is something that would start.

It's called the Didache. I probably told you about it too. It's an awesome manuscript found a little over a hundred years ago and now universally accepted as a genuine document written no later than AD 70. While it perpetuates many of our ideas, it also opens the door to a MUCH broader interpretation, and it also shows us that the main focus of the early church was altruism - helping the poor, etc. One could not walk "in the light" unless he or she put others first.
It is also astoundingly inclusive in its wording. Instead of using all the male-centric vocabulary of the traditional books of the Bible, it uses non-gender-specific words nearly all the time. It's just an awesome book, and you can get a paperback copy for almost nothing.

The Didache was hotly debated for a long time, but its *veracity* is pretty much universally accepted. Many other first and early second century documents have been found that quote part of it. Nearly everyone agrees that the absolute latest it was written would have been the very beginning of the second century, but most scholars accept that it is an authentic first century Christian manuscript.

Its *content* is an entirely different matter. It seems that almost everyone has a different view about it. That's understandable, though. I personally like Aaron Milavech's writing about it.

Of course, your fantasy would be the most amazing discovery. I think it would change the world more than any other, because whether or not we like it, Western Christianity has probably shaped the world more than any other thing, including science. Our ethics, which stem from the Judeo-Christian culture (whether genuine or not), color everything. Imagine what it would be like for the new "religious right" who have turned God into a commodity, if they found irrefutable evidence of Jesus' outright compassion. That is one thing I loved about the Didache. It stresses compassion and personal ethics over our modern "outward" ethics, and shows the "abominations" of the First Century Christians were things like "turning away the needy, weighing down with toil the oppressed, [being] advocates of the rich." That puts a major dent in the whole "Moral Majority" right-wing theology so pervasive today.

We owe our modern (and largely false) religious doctrines on three things:
1) Constantine - made Christianity the state religion, but mixed in pagan ideologies thoroughly.
2) Augustine - decided sex, pleasure, and prosperity were evil, and single-handedly shifted Christianity from a religion of peacemaking, generosity, and social altruism into a religion of self-condemnation and judgment.
3) The Dark Ages - we lost so, so, so much in the Dark Ages. Basically, Bibles were completely outlawed, and this is when Christianity turned from a personal belief into a clergy/laity paradigm where the church has absolute power and spiritual authority over "the common man." Before this, all were considered brothers and equals in the church. After, we got the sacred/secular dichotomy we have today.

That's a very condensed version, of course...

Actually, a couple hundred years before Manicheanism, Gnosticism started the sacred/secular paradigm in the church as early as AD 60. By the time Constantine came around, Gnosticism had already infiltrated much of the church, and was a major point in the Nicene and Arian Controversies.

As for Abraham with Isaac, it was a prophetic enactment of what God would do later with Jesus. And Jewish tradition and the book of Hebrews say that Abraham wasn't afraid to do it because he had faith that even if God did make him go through with it, He would raise Isaac from the dead according to His promise. There is a lot of violence in the Old Testament, but it can certainly be argued that most of it is culturally relevant: God speaking to the people on their terms rather than His.

It's not [a question] of true theology, but is really about history when it all boils down to it.
By the way, I know vocal intonation can't really come across in this. I hope it doesn't come across as a lecture. Just trying to explain some history.