Word for Word,
Christian
A Message of
Ancient Days
Page 315 begins with:
Lesson 3
Religious Developments
"A man was going down from Jerusalem to
Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him, and
departed leaving him half dead." So begins the parable of the good
Samaritan. Parables are stories that teach moral lessons. In
the first century A.D., a popular Jewish teacher named Jesus told this
parable to answer the question, "Who is my neighbor?"
(This is all true. But notice they limit the
stories of Jesus to what a mere man could do. This is what Islam
believes Jesus is limited to.)
According to this parable, told in the New Testament
of the Christian Bible, a priest came upon the beaten man, who was a
Jew, but did not stop to help him. Instead, he passed by on the other
side of the road. So did an assistant to a priest, also called a
Levite. Finally, a Samaritan came upon the man.
End of text. There is a picture of Jesus
surrounded by people and the captions reads:
The teacher called Jesus is shown
spreading his message in this Italian painting from the A.D. 1400s.
"The teacher called Jesus." Small
print. 19 times Jesus is referred to as teacher. Muhammad had headers,
MUHAMMAD AND ISLAM, THE LIFE OF THE PROPHET.
Side column:
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..T H I N K I N G....
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How are Judaism and Christianity related?
Key Terms
Page 316
This unit is flooded with parables and
sidenotes devoid of anything extraordinary about Jesus. My point is, 99% of what is written of Jesus is
limited to "teachings" and comments about artwork of Him. Islam
believes that Jesus is a mere teacher. They agree Jesus was
resurrected, but only a common resurrection, believed for all Muslims
who have achieved the favor of Allah.
After the "Good Samaritan" parable, there is
this:
Jesus taught people to respect and love other people, no matter who
they were. He stressed that the Kingdom of God was at hand and that
people needed to come into a right relationship with God. In time, his
ideas would grow into a new religion.
Notice "In time, his ideas would grow
into a new religion." What an understatement of what Christians
believe. According to this, any teacher could have started
Christianity.
The Teachings of Jesus
By the time Jesus started teaching, the
Jewish community had changed a great deal. Jews had been settling in
small groups all over the... (
Diaspora is discussed, the location of Jews...)
The Jews who returned to Judah after their exile
began to disagree among themselves about how they should practice
their religion. One major group, the Sadducees (SAJ uh sees), were in
favor of following the traditional rituals in the temple. The other
major group, called the Pharisees (FAIR ih sees), called on Jews to
strictly follow the laws of the Torah in their daily lives, too.
Other, more radical groups existed as well. One was made up of the
followers of Jesus. They believed that Jesus was the messiah promised
in the Bible.
Yes, Jesus was radical because He rebuked the
Pharisees and the Sadducees for their false witness of God. Yet
according to this account, Jesus remained in the Jewish teachings and
was followed by "a radical group," minimizing the impact and
purpose of Jesus.
The Life of Jesus
(If this is supposed to be what Christians
believe, why can't we have "The Life of the Savior" as Islam has "The
Life of the Prophet"?) Watch this, not one word of the virgin birth,
one would think by this account that Mary would have a child by Joseph...
The story of the life of Jesus is told in the
New Testament of the Bible. According to the New Testament, an angel
appeared to a woman named Mary in the city of Nazareth about 2,000
years ago. The angel told her that she would have a child. The angel
told Mary to name the child Jesus.
Islam believes this much.
Mary and her husband Joseph were Jews, and
when Jesus was born they raised him as a Jew. Jesus learned the laws
and customs of Judaism and studied the Torah. As he grew older, Jesus
became a religious teacher.
Oh so he did it by studying...oh, okay...
He based his teachings on traditional Jewish
beliefs. For example, he stressed that people should obey the Ten
Commandments and the teachings of the prophets. According to the New
Testament, he told his followers, "Think not that I have come to
abolish the law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but
to fulfil (sic) them." (Matthew 5:17)
According to the New Testament account, Jesus
called for a new covenant. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told
people that they should act with kindness and love toward others, even
their enemies. This teaching is best understood in the light of Jesus'
preaching about the coming of God's kingdom.
I think it would be best understood if they said,
"Christian's believe Jesus is the new covenant, that He died for our
sins, that He paid the price for sin and forgave those who killed Him.
But they omit all that.
Jesus taught that the day of judgment by God
was nearing. He said God would forgive all people who sincerely turned
to God. (Jesus said, "I am the way, the
truth and the life. No one can come to the Father except through Me." He stressed that the attitudes and beliefs in a person's heart
were more important than actions alone. In this way, Jesus emphasized
the aspects of the Torah that stressed the importance of love, such as
"You shall love your neighbor as yourself." (Leviticus 19:18)
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