We get foolish driveby trolls.

[pecunium]

Three weeks afer the fact some Palin supporter has arrived to inform me of my ignorance. I, you see, am not clued in to Bible Truth. I screwed up. I said Jesus was a community activist. It was a snide comparison of Palin to Pilate, as a means of showing her to be in cahoots with the wealthy, while Obama was looking out for the people who acually need help.

I am informed by someone too shy to append their name to the Witnessing they are doing for Christ that I have it all wrong.

Please get your Bible facts straight. Jesus is the Messiah. It was
Barabbas who was the community activist.

So... Being the Messiah means Jesus couldn't have been a community activist. He was too busy being Godly, or something. Those passages where he says be kind to one another, you will be judged on how you treated the least among you, all that. Nothing to do with community at all.

Barabbas ("son of the father") was a community activist. We know this because he's so prevalent in the New Testament. There are ten whole references to Barabbas to him: Five in Matthew, three in Mark, and one ea. in Luke and John. That's being generous, and counting each verse. If you take them as units, there is one referece in each gospel.

My favorite, the one which shows his dedication to the community is Mark 15:7
And there was one named Barabbas, which lay bound with them that had made insurrection with him, who had committed murder in the insurrection..

John 18:40 is a little more spare,
Then cried they all again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber..

Funny idea of activist.

But that's not the point. The point is to play with people who actually don't know the bible. This coward (I plead my case under my own name, if my witness brings me scorn and opprobrium, well Jesus said the birds of the air have their nests, and the foxes of the fields have their dens, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head) is trying to make a connection to the murdering revolutionary Barabbas. I am sure the, vague similarity in names (Barack, Barabbas) is part of the meme they are trying to sow.

Retro me Satanas.

Comments

[pnkrokhockeymom.livejournal.com]

I heart you.

[ammitbeast.livejournal.com]

Heh. Nice.

Bible triva: In some earlier translations of the New Testament Barabbas is called "Jesus Barabbas." Also, it appears that "Barabbas" is a corruption of the Aramaic "bar-Abba," meaning "son-of-the-father" -- how Jesus supposedly referred to himself at times. The original "Jesus Barabbas" references were eventually censored.

So there's a theory that the Barabbas verses are a pun, a joke. And when Pilate asks the crowd who should be saved... he's really just referring to just one man.

Oh, those wacky Bible authors.

[calimac.livejournal.com]

Possible. But Jesus was a common enough name anyway.

I read once an account of a guy named Jesus who came to Jerusalem, claimed he was the Messiah, was arrested by the Romans, etc etc - except that, instead of crucifying him, they decided he was a harmless nut and let him go. It was, of course, a different Jesus.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

I did make reference to that.

But, given the context, that one was released, and the other executed, it's not so believable.

Were I to go for political subtext, I'd point out the Douai translation says, "sedition," and part of the point (about no crime) was to make sure the Jesus in the Bible wasn't confused by the Romans with some other Jesus who was a rebel against Rome (which is one take on the, "bandits" crucified with him, one of whom says Jesus did no wrong, unlike them... which has the effect of 1: Stressing the non-seditious nature of Jesus, and that real rebels knew this).

I think it quite possible that Jesus was, in fact, such a rebel and the charge for which he was crucified was, from the Roman POV legit.

Oh, those wacky Bible writers.

[ammitbeast.livejournal.com]

There's always been a question of whether or not such a passover release story is believable. Jewish scholars/historians have suggested that it's not a true story.

Personally, I tend these days toward the belief that there may have been a rebel like Jesus (though that may not have been his name), and he became the basic core of the New Testament story. Everything else was myth and allegory borrowed from other sources, and also in part stories of other religious and social rebels merged into one story long after the supposed events.

[phonemonkey.livejournal.com]

Sounds plausible to me, although I may be biased due to repeated viewings of Life of Brian...

[onyxlynx (from livejournal.com)]

As far as I can tell, the Jesus your correspondent seems to believe in is the one who said "I have come to bring not peace but the sword." (Matthew 10:34) Everything else was spoken by an identical guy with the same name.

[red-silk-robe.livejournal.com]

In the words of Ghandi:

I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.

Pity too many 'christians' fit that category. Not all, by any stretch, but many.

[wetdryvac.livejournal.com]

Fascinating. Having very little background in the bible (One course in college, "The Bible as Literature," Using the King James as source.) I find myself generally rendered curious by folks quoting the bible (whichever one they have as gospel) as foundation for arguments. A post like this gives me a bit of insight into something I'm barely on the fringes of - something which moves rather a lot of people - and provides the opportunity to see a call and response set operate.

Thank-you.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

The bible is important, because there are so many tropes we take from it; even those who've not studied it have bits of emotive response to things/ideas from it.

The Golden Rule, Turn the other cheek, etc.

Some of them (The Golden Rule) have consistent misunderstandings (the Golden Rule doesn't tell you to be nice to people, and not hit them, it says if you don't want to be hit, don't hit. If you don't care that someone hits you, you can [in keeping with the letter, not the spirit] hit them to your hearts content), but there are so many which fly below the radar, even of those who don't believe.

So knowing the tools of the trade is important.

[discoflamingo.livejournal.com]

The devil quotes Scripture to suit his purposes. Well-played, sir.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

Let us hope we are not working to his ends.

[davidkevin.livejournal.com]

I don't know, at his level of Biblical scholarship, he probably thinks a.) the Douai translation is Satanic because it's both Catholic and not the King James Version, and b.) translates Retro me Satanas as "Satan is Retro."

[editrx.livejournal.com]

I grew up with theology at the National Cathedral School for girls. Then my BA (psych/lit) was at a Christian liberal arts college which is now quite fundie, but at the time I went there was a good basic college that happened to be founded by Christians (and its Catholic and Anglican students were comfortable with the place -- wish they still were, but that's another story...). I ended up with a good theological background and good exegetical skills. They've stood me in good stead in any number of situations, not even closely related with people necessarily ignorant of the Bible. Tools of the trade -- yes, I heartily agree.

I suspect your troll has been reading emails with that talking point -- sounds like he isn't even conversant with the Bible as a standard fundamentalist or even standard Protestant. Sad.

[martyn44.livejournal.com]

It is difficult to communicate when they use the same words but give them different meanings. But of course, they don't really want to communicate, do they. Just crush.

And Pilate turn over a criminal against Rome to the local theocrats? He'd have been a remarkable Roman governor if he had, and a very short lived one.