"To us the preaching of the Gospel is a New Beginning, from which we date all things; beyond which we neither desire, nor are able, to inquire."
When was the Bible created? (And please don’t say when “God created the heavens and the earth”) When was its first book written? When and please tell me when was the date of the revision (among a countless number of them) of your current version of the Bible?
All these elements play an important factor in the over all picture of things.
The truth is that your “truth” uttered by the “Mouth of the Living God” and written by the “Inspiration of the Holy Sprit” was ultimately handled by man in its execution of it being placed in the hands of people all across the world.
Can we agree on this?
Reasons and purposes can vary from person but this is fact.
Those same men responsible for its placement in your hands were also fighting against other faiths (namely, Gnosticism) during the construction of your current faith which is still receiving maintenance and face lifts this very moment. Those contentions are a direct result for the demeanor of Christianity today.
Irenaeus was born in the earlier part of the 2nd century A. D. and stands as one of the most influential pillars of organized Christianity. He wrote a series of books (among his other writings) called, “On the Detection and Overthrow of the So-Called Gnosis”. In Latin it is Adversus Haereses and is so comprehensive in its attempt to detail Gnosticism, if it wasn’t for the Library of Nag Hammadi being recovered his book would have been the only surviving description of the old faith!
You know why? Because he and others systematically pushed all other opposing creeds and religions in Rome out of view.
Men did this, not God.
Irenaeus was also the first Christian writer to approve not only the order of the Four New Testament gospels but their authenticity. But even today, if you know your facts, then you know they were anonymously written. How was it that he didn’t know this when the books surfaced only a couple centuries prior (if that) in his time?!?
Then there’s Eusebius of Caesarea. He is responsible for many things in regards to the structure of modern Christianity but especially of the New Testament and the exclusion of other cannons. He played an important role in the meeting in 325 A. D. which shape the Christian world as we know it into the faith that it is today.
It is the theology (read the section “Irenaeus’ Theology” via his hyperlink) of the two, especially Irenaeus that should be thought over. His entire theology was derived from his teachings from Polycarp but was an off shoot of Gnosticism. How can I say this? Read just a few pages of Adversus Haereses and then look at his theology outlined by Wikipedia. If you know his theology, he was merely using pre-existing elements and coming to conclusions based upon them. Nothing was of his own self discovery or research! This is very important to note.
The most important aspect of Gnosticism was the fact that the “Logos” could not be made flesh but that it was the spoken Word of the Divine, Unseen Creator. Modern day Christians have a tendency to “sin” and ask for forgiveness whereas the former strived for a more advance perfection. You see, that Divine Word was considered to be in us making us be the “firstborn of many brethren”. All of that said to say this: Christians today are like children riding a bicycle, constantly asking for forgiveness/pardon when they fall off the bike but never developing the necessary propensity to stop falling off the bike. Church going constantly reminds you that you have no balance. Your “brothers” and “sisters” admonish you in the fact that you are incapable of holding the handle bars straight by yourself. You are constantly told of a need to have the reassuring guidance of God and Jesus’ hand on the back seat to direct you. But you never learn how to ride the bike in and of yourself.
Is it possible? Of course it is! Wo/Man can do just about anything; the only source that animates us is our Creator. To do anything would mean that you did it by your "Father". But God forbid if one walks into a church and says “I can (ride the bike) because I am a direct offspring of my Father and I can do all things”
Why, if I didn’t know any better, I would say that person would have an outcome no different than your Jesus. He would have to leave before someone grabbed hold of him to try and throw him off a cliff.
