<!--QuoteBegin-Bodhi+Nov 30 2006, 08:09 AM-->QUOTE(Bodhi @ Nov 30 2006, 08:09 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->Husky, for the complete package of 'facts', see this document: (History of Early Christianity In India) by "Dr" M M Ninan a missionary historian.[right][snapback]61552[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Only gave the propaganda pamphlet a cursory glance now. (Might look through it later, if I have insomnia and need a sure-fire remedy.)
- Christos are desperate. All they can do is appropriation. For example, ninan's claim that Om was stolen from Logos - itself not a christian concept at all but one appropriated from neo-platonism. Hence Logos is a pagan concept, as all scholars have stated. See also http://freetruth.50webs.org/B1b.htm#Logos
And Om is ancient in Hinduism, regardless of ninan's faith-based ramblings. And perhaps he doesn't know it's widely admitted that 'Amen', so important in christoislamic-terrorism, came from Osiris worship, a religion more ancient than Judaism?
http://freetruth.50webs.org/B1a.htm
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Osiris was a God in the ancient pre-Christian Egyptian religion. The 23rd Psalm in the Bible plagiarized an Egyptian scriptural prayer.
<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Many sayings associated with Osiris were taken over into the Bible. This included:
- 23rd Psalm: an appeal to Osiris as the good Shepherd to lead believers through the valley of the shadow of death and to green pastures and still waters
- Lord's Prayer: "O Amen, who art in heaven..."
- Many parables attributed to Jesus<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Link
Amen - a title of the Egyptian God who was Osiris' father, was also invoked at the end of every prayer.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->- Syrian christos appear to be even more desperate than the average christo considering their appropriation tactics, perhaps because they feel a need to have a claim on India since Syria is on track to becoming an islamic pardees?
For example, ninan calls Vaishnavites 'Aryan brahmins' - predictably only christos rejoice in the christo invention of oryans and dravidoids. I've never seen any oryans or dravidoids myself, but maybe apostle thomas originated from one of these two categories since ninan seems to know they existed with as much 'certainty' as he claims for thomas himself.
He also has the cheek to refer to the silly little churches in Kerala as Kovils. Kovil is Tamil (maybe also Malayali) for Hindu temples. Language appropriation, and attempted indigenisation of alien structures called churches.
<!--QuoteBegin-Bodhi+Nov 30 2006, 08:09 AM-->QUOTE(Bodhi @ Nov 30 2006, 08:09 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->By the way what is the authenticity in Gondophorus thing? Also see the other "proofs" of Thomas in India in that doc. I could not copy-paste as it did not allow.[right][snapback]61552[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->From http://hamsa.org, which is back up thankfully:
(1) http://hamsa.org/02.htm#_ftn6
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->[6] This king is the only character in the Acts (besides Judas Thomas) who can perchance be identified with a historical person. Some say he is the same as Gondophernes or Guduphara, the Indo-Parthian king who ruled over Arachosia, Kabul, and Gandhara (modern Afghanistan and Pakistan) from about 19 to 45 C.E. (the dates are disputed). The Acts gives no vital information about him, his reign, his city, or his country except to say that it is in 'India'. He can be identified as Parthian from his name, the original Persian form of it being Vindapharna.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Still doesn't make 'Pakthia' Pakistan.
(2) http://hamsa.org/04.htm - with some paras above and below for context
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->But Bishop Medleycott's victory went further. He got himself named as the St. Thomas authority in the prestigious Encyclopaedia Britannica, Fifteenth Edition, 1984, along with Chevalier F.A. DCruz, editor of the old Mylapore Catholic Register and author of St. Thomas the Apostle in India.
The unsigned main entry for St. Thomas in the Encyclopaedia is muddled and dissembling and simply wrong in some places. After giving the New Testament references, it says, "Thomas subsequent history is uncertain. According to the 4th century Ecclesiastical History of Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea, he evangelized Parthia (modern Khorasan). Later Christian tradition says Thomas extended his apostolate into India, where he is recognised as the founder of the church of the Syrian Malabar Christians, or Christians of St. Thomas. In the apocryphal Acts of Thomas, originally composed in Syriac, his martyrdom is cited under the king of Mylapore at Madras ..."
The Acts does not "cite" this at all of course, as we have shown by direct quotation; it does not even remotely suggest it. There is no known record that Mylapore had a king in the first century and if it did, he was not a Zoroastrian with the name of Mazdai. The story in the Acts and the Mylapore legend have nothing in common, though the latter can be said to exist only because of the former. Further on the article says, " He allegedly visited the court of the Indo--Parthian king Gondophernes ... though some of the Acts of Thomas is probable, evidence remains inconclusive."
Now even if some of the Acts is accepted as probable, the composer of this entry has still got the story wrong. He uses the word "allegedly" for the visit of St. Thomas to the court of Gondophernesâassuming that Gondophernes is the same as Gundaphorusâwhen he could correctly cite the Acts for the reference.
These errors are deliberate and motivated, given their context and arrangement, and this St. Thomas entry in the Encyclopaedia has been written by a Catholic scholar who not only subscribes to the apostle's alleged South Indian adventure, but wishes to place the Mylapore tale over that of the Malabar tradition. He does this by mixing the North Indian legend, represented by the Acts, with the South Indian fable that the Portuguese left in Mylapore, to promote his particular South Indian view. He gets away with the deception because nobody has read the Acts of Thomas and studied its references to the kings Gundaphorus and Misdaeus-Mazdai, and the execution of Judas Thomas on a mountain that contained an ancient royal tomb.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Qualifications necessary to become an apostle:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Ignorant rolemodels invented for Christianity
From <i>The Christ</i>, by John E. Remsberg:
<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"Palestine was one of the most backward of countries; the Galileans were the most ignorant of the inhabitants of Palestine; and the disciples might be counted among the most simple people of Galilee."
-- Renan, historian
"His followers were 'unlearned and ignorant men,' chosen from the humblest of the people."
-- [F.W.] Farrar, a Bible scholar
"A dozen knaves, as ignorant as owls and as poor as church mice."
-- Voltaire<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd--><!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->Maybe ninan and other christos are exercising their ability to be as much like an apostle as they can in doing their 'research' on christian history?
- Christos are desperate. All they can do is appropriation. For example, ninan's claim that Om was stolen from Logos - itself not a christian concept at all but one appropriated from neo-platonism. Hence Logos is a pagan concept, as all scholars have stated. See also http://freetruth.50webs.org/B1b.htm#Logos
And Om is ancient in Hinduism, regardless of ninan's faith-based ramblings. And perhaps he doesn't know it's widely admitted that 'Amen', so important in christoislamic-terrorism, came from Osiris worship, a religion more ancient than Judaism?
http://freetruth.50webs.org/B1a.htm
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Osiris was a God in the ancient pre-Christian Egyptian religion. The 23rd Psalm in the Bible plagiarized an Egyptian scriptural prayer.
<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Many sayings associated with Osiris were taken over into the Bible. This included:
- 23rd Psalm: an appeal to Osiris as the good Shepherd to lead believers through the valley of the shadow of death and to green pastures and still waters
- Lord's Prayer: "O Amen, who art in heaven..."
- Many parables attributed to Jesus<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Link
Amen - a title of the Egyptian God who was Osiris' father, was also invoked at the end of every prayer.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->- Syrian christos appear to be even more desperate than the average christo considering their appropriation tactics, perhaps because they feel a need to have a claim on India since Syria is on track to becoming an islamic pardees?
For example, ninan calls Vaishnavites 'Aryan brahmins' - predictably only christos rejoice in the christo invention of oryans and dravidoids. I've never seen any oryans or dravidoids myself, but maybe apostle thomas originated from one of these two categories since ninan seems to know they existed with as much 'certainty' as he claims for thomas himself.
He also has the cheek to refer to the silly little churches in Kerala as Kovils. Kovil is Tamil (maybe also Malayali) for Hindu temples. Language appropriation, and attempted indigenisation of alien structures called churches.
<!--QuoteBegin-Bodhi+Nov 30 2006, 08:09 AM-->QUOTE(Bodhi @ Nov 30 2006, 08:09 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->By the way what is the authenticity in Gondophorus thing? Also see the other "proofs" of Thomas in India in that doc. I could not copy-paste as it did not allow.[right][snapback]61552[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->From http://hamsa.org, which is back up thankfully:
(1) http://hamsa.org/02.htm#_ftn6
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->[6] This king is the only character in the Acts (besides Judas Thomas) who can perchance be identified with a historical person. Some say he is the same as Gondophernes or Guduphara, the Indo-Parthian king who ruled over Arachosia, Kabul, and Gandhara (modern Afghanistan and Pakistan) from about 19 to 45 C.E. (the dates are disputed). The Acts gives no vital information about him, his reign, his city, or his country except to say that it is in 'India'. He can be identified as Parthian from his name, the original Persian form of it being Vindapharna.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Still doesn't make 'Pakthia' Pakistan.
(2) http://hamsa.org/04.htm - with some paras above and below for context
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->But Bishop Medleycott's victory went further. He got himself named as the St. Thomas authority in the prestigious Encyclopaedia Britannica, Fifteenth Edition, 1984, along with Chevalier F.A. DCruz, editor of the old Mylapore Catholic Register and author of St. Thomas the Apostle in India.
The unsigned main entry for St. Thomas in the Encyclopaedia is muddled and dissembling and simply wrong in some places. After giving the New Testament references, it says, "Thomas subsequent history is uncertain. According to the 4th century Ecclesiastical History of Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea, he evangelized Parthia (modern Khorasan). Later Christian tradition says Thomas extended his apostolate into India, where he is recognised as the founder of the church of the Syrian Malabar Christians, or Christians of St. Thomas. In the apocryphal Acts of Thomas, originally composed in Syriac, his martyrdom is cited under the king of Mylapore at Madras ..."
The Acts does not "cite" this at all of course, as we have shown by direct quotation; it does not even remotely suggest it. There is no known record that Mylapore had a king in the first century and if it did, he was not a Zoroastrian with the name of Mazdai. The story in the Acts and the Mylapore legend have nothing in common, though the latter can be said to exist only because of the former. Further on the article says, " He allegedly visited the court of the Indo--Parthian king Gondophernes ... though some of the Acts of Thomas is probable, evidence remains inconclusive."
Now even if some of the Acts is accepted as probable, the composer of this entry has still got the story wrong. He uses the word "allegedly" for the visit of St. Thomas to the court of Gondophernesâassuming that Gondophernes is the same as Gundaphorusâwhen he could correctly cite the Acts for the reference.
These errors are deliberate and motivated, given their context and arrangement, and this St. Thomas entry in the Encyclopaedia has been written by a Catholic scholar who not only subscribes to the apostle's alleged South Indian adventure, but wishes to place the Mylapore tale over that of the Malabar tradition. He does this by mixing the North Indian legend, represented by the Acts, with the South Indian fable that the Portuguese left in Mylapore, to promote his particular South Indian view. He gets away with the deception because nobody has read the Acts of Thomas and studied its references to the kings Gundaphorus and Misdaeus-Mazdai, and the execution of Judas Thomas on a mountain that contained an ancient royal tomb.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Qualifications necessary to become an apostle:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Ignorant rolemodels invented for Christianity
From <i>The Christ</i>, by John E. Remsberg:
<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->"Palestine was one of the most backward of countries; the Galileans were the most ignorant of the inhabitants of Palestine; and the disciples might be counted among the most simple people of Galilee."
-- Renan, historian
"His followers were 'unlearned and ignorant men,' chosen from the humblest of the people."
-- [F.W.] Farrar, a Bible scholar
"A dozen knaves, as ignorant as owls and as poor as church mice."
-- Voltaire<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd--><!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->Maybe ninan and other christos are exercising their ability to be as much like an apostle as they can in doing their 'research' on christian history?