{"quotes":[{"text":"In my view, the gospels are true, not historically, but theologically, or, as I would argue, prophetically! What we have is, the Messiah’s history written in advance in story form.","author":"Eli Of Kittim","tags":["academic","apocalyptic","bible","criticism","exegesis","gospels","hermeneutics","inspirational","interpretation","literary-analysis","new-testament","prophecy","symbolism","theology"],"id":4038,"author_id":"Eli+Of+Kittim"},{"text":"By shattering my preconceptions and cultural stereotypes, what materialized was a massive personality who was astonishingly winsome yet gravely terrifying. A man whose breathtaking compassion would draw you in, but whose ferocious honesty could cut and slice like a razor. Someone who was the most controversial, confrontational, divisive, yet compellingly beautiful man who has ever lived. Which is precisely what we would expect if the Creator of the universe happened to invade our world.","author":"Timothy J. Stoner","tags":["jesus","jesus-christ","new-testament","scandal"],"id":17051,"author_id":"Timothy+J.+Stoner"},{"text":"If we could believe that he [Jesus] really countenanced the follies, the falsehoods, and the charlatanism which his biographers [Gospels] father on him, and admit the misconstructions, interpolations, and theorizations of the fathers of the early, and the fanatics of the latter ages, the conclusion would be irresistible by every sound mind that he was an impostor... We find in the writings of his biographers matter of two distinct descriptions. First, a groundwork of vulgar ignorance, of things impossible, of superstitions, fanaticisms and fabrications... That sect [Jews] had presented for the object of their worship, a being of terrific character, cruel, vindictive, capricious and unjust... Jesus had to walk on the perilous confines of reason and religion: and a step to right or left might place him within the gripe of the priests of the superstition, a blood thirsty race, as cruel and remorseless as the being whom they represented as the family God of Abraham, of Isaac and of Jacob, and the local God of Israel. They were constantly laying snares, too, to entangle him in the web of the law... That Jesus did not mean to impose himself on mankind as the son of God, physically speaking, I have been convinced by the writings of men more learned than myself in that lore.[Letter to William Short, 4 August, 1820].","author":"Thomas Jefferson","tags":["cruel","fake","freethinker","freethought","god-of-abraham","imposter","jehovah","judaism","lies","new-testament","reason","skeptic","skepticism","yahweh"],"id":26060,"author_id":"Thomas+Jefferson"},{"text":"Daniel 12:3 '...And those who turn the many to righteousness will shine the stars forever.","author":"Craig W. Dressler","tags":["bible","bible","daniel","god","new-testament","old-testament","prophet","prophetic","quote"],"id":38124,"author_id":"Craig+W.+Dressler"},{"text":"My knowledge is, if you will follow the teachings of Jesus Christ and his Apostles, as recorded in the New Testament, every man and woman will be put in possession of the Holy Ghost; every person will become a Prophet, Seer, and Revelator, and an expounder of truth. They will know things that are, that will be, and that have been. They will understand things in heaven, things on the earth, and things under the earth, things of time, and things of eternity, according to their several callings and capacities.","author":"Brigham Young","tags":["jesus-christ","lds","mormon","new-testament","prophet","revelator","seer","truth"],"id":59279,"author_id":"Brigham+Young"},{"text":"Christ did to the Jewish orthodoxy, what Buddha did to the Hindu orthodoxy.","author":"Abhijit Naskar","tags":["bible","bible-reading","brainy","buddha","buddhism","christ","church","church-leadership","compassion","fundamentalism","hindu","hinduism","holy-bible","inspirational","inspiring","love","love-thy-neighbor","new-testament","nirvana","old-testament","orthodoxy","philosophy","religion","religious-extremism","religious-faith","religious-tolerance","religious-violence","truth","violence","wisdom","wise-sayings","words-of-wisdom"],"id":65003,"author_id":"Abhijit+Naskar"},{"text":"The New Testament is the very best book that ever was or ever will be known in the world.","author":"Charles Dickens","tags":["bible","new-testament"],"id":67251,"author_id":"Charles+Dickens"},{"text":"To be skeptical of the resultant text of the New Testament books is to allow all of classical antiquity to slip into obscurity, for no documents of the ancient period are as well attested bibliographically as the New Testament.","author":"John Warwick Montgomery","tags":["apologetics","bible","christianity","new-testament"],"id":68476,"author_id":"John+Warwick+Montgomery"},{"text":"The telescope destroyed the firmament, did away with the heaven of the New Testament, rendered the ascension of our Lord and the assumption of his Mother infinitely absurd, crumbled to chaos the gates and palaces of the New Jerusalem, and in their places gave to man a wilderness of worlds.","author":"Robert G. Ingersoll","tags":["absurd","ascension","bible","bible-vs-science","chaos","firmament","heaven","jerusalem","jesus","lord","mary","new-jerusalem","new-testament","science","science-and-religion","science-vs-religion","telescope","the-bible","virgin-mary"],"id":69447,"author_id":"Robert+G.+Ingersoll"},{"text":"Theologically, the demand for “circumcision” can take many forms, even today. It appears whenever one thinks along these lines: “Faith in Christ is fine as far as it goes, but your relation to God is not really right and your salvation not adequate unless…” It does not matter how the sentence is completed. Whenever such fine print is introduced to qualify trust/faith, there is “circumcision,” and Paul’s defense of the adequacy of trust/faith can come into its own again. The Galatian situation is never far; in fact, it is all too familiar.","author":"Leander E. Keck","tags":["christianity","jesus-christ","new-covenant","new-testament","paul"],"id":71454,"author_id":"Leander+E.+Keck"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":42,"pages":5,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}