daveh@cbmvax.cbm.UUCP (Dave Haynie) (09/09/86)
> > > > In article <32500064@uiucdcsb>, mcewan@uiucdcsb.CS.UIUC.EDU says: > >>>> What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when you know you can >>>> come back from the grave at will? > >>> Christ's sacrafice wasn't His life-- it was going through the pain of >>> death. And crucifixion is a *very* painful death indeed. > >>For human beings. Trivial for an omnipotent God. > > Agony is trivial? News to me. > > Omnipotent or not, He was in *human* form. He felt everything that humans > feel, including extreme pain. > In human form, its very unlikely that being nailed to a cross would cause severe agony. Severe pain, yes, for a few moments. But overall, the loss of blood, shock, etc. would remove the pain and probably render the victim unconscious. Certainly not a way I would choose to die, but there are far worse. Professional torturers, like those in Nazi Germany or during the Spanish Inquisition perfected ways of sustaining pain for more than a few minutes. On a scale of what non-devine humans have felt in death, crucifixion is low on the scale. Unfortunately, men are far more efficient at hurting each other. -- /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ Dave Haynie {caip,ihnp4,allegra,seismo}!cbmvax!daveh "I gained nothing at all from Supreme Enlightenment, and for that very reason it is called Supreme Enlightenment." -Gotama Buddha These opinions are my own, though for a small fee they be yours too. \/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
mcewan@uiucdcsb.CS.UIUC.EDU (09/15/86)
>>>> What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when you know you can >>>> come back from the grave at will? > >>> Christ's sacrafice wasn't His life-- it was going through the pain of >>> death. And crucifixion is a *very* painful death indeed. > >>For human beings. Trivial for an omnipotent God. > > Agony is trivial? News to me. Are you a god? > Omnipotent or not, He was in *human* form. He felt everything that humans > feel, including extreme pain. But what is pain as we know it to an omnipotent being? For an immortal, omnipotent being to spend a finite amount of time experiencing pain as finite creatures know it is trivial. > BTW, in case you feel like another knee-jerk anti-religious response, I > just wanted to know that I'm an agnostic. This is something I thought about a great deal before deciding that the Christian reasoning about Jesus' "sacrifice" was complete nonsense. You, on the other hand, appear to have just parroted the Christian line without giving any thought to it. And I am not fanatically anti-religious, I just get irritated when someone spouts nonsense as though it were obviously true. > I just get ticked off when people > try to argue things they know nothing about. So do I. Scott McEwan {ihnp4,pur-ee}!uiucdcs!mcewan "Guy's brain-damaged, but he's not stupid."
mcewan@uiucdcsb.CS.UIUC.EDU (09/15/86)
>>>What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when you know you can >>>come back from the grave at will? >> >> Getting nailed to a large block of wood is FUN? (I'd be curious >> how you spend your weekends ...) > > There's a couple of things to remember. First, crucifixion is an incredibly > painful and demeaning death -- so much so that no Roman Citizen could be > crucified. Likewise the scourging with barbed whips. Next, remember that > Jesus was fully God but also fully human, with all the doubts, fears, anxieties > and other blessings of our human nature. Suppose I offered you the opportunity > to face crucifixion with the promise that I would somehow preserve you from > final death, and restore you to life a couple of ways later. Suppose that > you had seen me do it. Would you be especially thrilled at the thought? > > I have a colleague who had two root canal jobs performed with no anesthesia > (Suffice it to say that they were done in a communist bloc country and he is > a member of an ethnic minority which is not favored.) He was not killed; the > bruises have healed on his body and limbs (where he strained against the straps > holding him so that he couldn't run from the pain. > > The procedure was, overall, a good thing. So what would be the big deal of > going through with it? That isn't a good analogy, since the person you're responding to isn't (I assume) a god. A better analogy is "would you be willing to spend 1/100th of a second as an ant experiencing something that is very painful to the ant?" This still isn't a perfect analogy, since the 1/100 second is a much longer period (compared to total span of existence) than Jesus' time on the cross, and the difference between human and ant is much less than that between human and God, but you get the idea. Scott McEwan {ihnp4,pur-ee}!uiucdcs!mcewan "Guy's brain-damaged, but he's not stupid."
hydar@ernie.Berkeley.EDU (Dan Hydar) (09/17/86)
In article <221@dione.rice.EDU> scorpion@titan.UUCP (Vernon Lee) writes: >>>> What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when you know you can >>>> come back from the grave at will? >>> Christ's sacrafice wasn't His life-- it was going through the pain of >>> death. And crucifixion is a *very* painful death indeed. >>For human beings. Trivial for an omnipotent God. >> Scott McEwan Trivial if and only if He MAKES it trivial for Himself. (I am assuming that you are not taking the crucifiction as being some elaborate hoax put on by the Supreme Being -- if this is the case, it's just a matter of "faith" for you and there's no point in going back and forth on this ... ) In fact, I think it's pretty obvious that it would be MORE difficult to endure that kind of suffering if you are used to NO suffering at all. (Not to mention reducing yourself from an infinite being to an extremely finite human being..) >If God is omnipotent, why should ANYTHING be difficult >for him? Omnipotent people can do ANYTHING, just A N Y T H I N G! ... including experiencing human pain and weakness first hand? >People who claim God (god, Gods, gods, whatever) is incomprehensibly >big and huge and powerful who also claim he thinks or suffers or shares >any human weaknesses whatsoever are making two contradictory assumptions. > scorpion This seemingly contradicts your first statement -- given that God is omnipotent, He must therefore be able to take on human limitations if He were to so chose. Your statement ONLY makes sense if you assume that the Diety in question would not CHOSE to do so. |Dan| "Just browsing in the K-mart of ideas"
dhk@ptsfa.UUCP (David Krause) (09/17/86)
In article <32500078@uiucdcsb>, mcewan@uiucdcsb.CS.UIUC.EDU writes: > > >>>What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when you know you can > >>>come back from the grave at will? [ Lines deleted in interest of space ] > > I have a colleague who had two root canal jobs performed with no anesthesia > > (Suffice it to say that they were done in a communist bloc country and he is > > a member of an ethnic minority which is not favored.) He was not killed; the > > bruises have healed on his body and limbs (where he strained against the straps > > holding him so that he couldn't run from the pain. > > > > The procedure was, overall, a good thing. So what would be the big deal of > > going through with it? > That isn't a good analogy, since the person you're responding to isn't (I > assume) a god. A better analogy is "would you be willing to spend 1/100th > of a second as an ant experiencing something that is very painful to the > ant?" This still isn't a perfect analogy, since the 1/100 second is a much > longer period (compared to total span of existence) than Jesus' time on > the cross, and the difference between human and ant is much less than that > between human and God, but you get the idea. > > Scott McEwan > {ihnp4,pur-ee}!uiucdcs!mcewan > Scott, If span of existence is inversely related to sensitivity to pain, then my dentist should able to predict how long people are going to live by how much drilling they can take before they shout for the novocaine! Here's another analogy for you to consider. My wife's delivery of our youngest son was (like her earlier child deliveries) was one of the most excruciatingly painful experiences of her life. Yet, when I was accompanying her out of the delivery room afterwards, she remarked that the whole experience suddenly seemed like something in the distant past. She forgot her recent anguish in the joy that a little boy was brought into the world. Likewise, the Biblical record (in Hebrews 12:2) is that Jesus "endured the cross, despising the shame", "for the joy that was set before him"-- the joy of redeeming from the slave-markets of sin the likes of you and me. David
MIQ@PSUVMA.BITNET (09/18/86)
In article <32500077@uiucdcsb>, mcewan@uiucdcsb.CS.UIUC.EDU says: >>>>> What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when you know you >>>>> can come back from the grave at will? >>>> Christ's sacrafice wasn't His life-- it was going through the pain of >>>> death. And crucifixion is a *very* painful death indeed. >>>For human beings. Trivial for an omnipotent God. >> Agony is trivial? News to me. >Are you a god? Nope. Are you? >> Omnipotent or not, He was in *human* form. He felt everything that >> humans feel, including extreme pain. >But what is pain as we know it to an omnipotent being? For an immortal, >omnipotent being to spend a finite amount of time experiencing pain as >finite creatures know it is trivial. You sure seem to know a lot about omnipotent immortals. I suppose you could compare it to a human, with a life-span of about 70 years, experiencing agony for about 5 minutes. It's not an *exact* ratio, of course, since a ratio including infinity is meaningless. But it's a decent approximation. Anyhoo, you have a human who lives for about 70 years, and spends 5 min. in agony. Sure sounds trivial-- unless you're the human and in the middle of those five minutes. And you voluntarily opted to go through it. >> BTW, in case you feel like another knee-jerk anti-religious response, I >> just wanted to know that I'm an agnostic. >This is something I thought about a great deal before deciding that the >Christian reasoning about Jesus' "sacrifice" was complete nonsense. You, >on the other hand, appear to have just parroted the Christian line without >giving any thought to it. > >And I am not fanatically anti-religious, I just get irritated when someone >spouts nonsense as though it were obviously true. Uhhmmmm... it seemed to me that the whole point of this was that, even *given* that the death & resurrection occurred, it wasn't any big deal. I'm not spouting nonsense (by that I assume you mean the Christian belief in Who Christ was). And again I say, that regardless of what Christ was (or wasn't) before and after the crucifixion, for those hours on the cross He was human, and He could and *did* feel pain. Dave Krause was nice enough to send me some e-mail, in which he pointed out some of the biblical accounts which back me up on this. Of course, you'll be quick to say that the Bible isn't dependable as a historical account. But again, this whole thing was started by someone who said that even *given* the Christian beliefs as true, Christ still didn't make any noteworthy sacrafice. If you're assuming Christian beliefs as true, then biblical accounts become admissable as evidence. As an aside, someone else mentioned that after a short time, shock would have caused Jesus to pass out-- or at least stop feeling pain. I have a friend who works as an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) who agrees with this, saying that people who lose fingers/hands/limbs usually feel no pain because of shock. On the other hand, I've got another friend who has actually lost a finger. He said it hurt like hell. >> I just get ticked off when people >> try to argue things they know nothing about. >So do I. Well, when you get through being ticked off at yourself, try sending an intelligent reply. ------- --------------------------- James D. Maloy | THIS SPACE FOR RENT | The Pennsylvania State University | Call 555-2317 | --------------------------- Bitnet: MIQ@PSUECL UUCP : :akgua,allegra,cbosgd,ihnp4:!psuvax1!psuvma.bitnet!miq Disclaimer: The above is not intended to represent the views of The Pennsylvania State University, or those of the Penn State Computer Center. "The term 'informed opinion' is redundant. An opinion without some factual basis isn't an opinion, it's a prejudice." -- James Phillips
waynec@tekcrl.UUCP (Wayne Cook) (09/18/86)
In article <1795@ihlpa.UUCP> nikbek@ihlpa.UUCP (Moseley) writes: >> >>What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when you know you can >> >>come back from the grave at will? >> > Getting nailed to a large block of wood is FUN? (I'd be curious >> > how you spend your weekends ...) >> >> "Yeah, that's it. An' you get... uh..." >> "Some six-penny nails?" >> "Yeah! An' you drive the nails right through your palms... > >I recall some studies which indicate that nails through the palms of >a person's hands will not support the person's weight. The nails >were actually driven through the wrists, which will support a person's >weight. I also believe that posts were actually used. I'm not sure where >the idea of a cross came from. > R. C. Moseley This is an interesting discussion about the pain of crucifiction. The people who feel that there are other people who have suffered about as much physical pain as hanging on a cross are probably right. The main suffering and taking on the sins of the world was done in the Garden of Gethsemane. There Jesus bled from every pore because of the pain (and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down on the ground - Luke 22:44). No other human or animal has been able to survive the pain that causes blood to come from every pore. He did. I am sure the crucifiction was not easy, and it was an important part of the overall plan, but it was probably not the most painful.
griffith@cory.Berkeley.EDU (Cutter John) (09/21/86)
In article <1024@tekcrl.UUCP> waynec@tekcrl.UUCP (Wayne Cook) writes: >This is an interesting discussion about the pain of crucifiction. The people . . . . etc. It sure is interesting, but does it belong in net.jokes? Jim Griffith griffith@cory.Berkeley.EDU.UUCP
showard@udenva.UUCP (Steve "Blore" Howard) (09/22/86)
Please keep this religious bullhonk out of net.jokes.
--
"The king is gone but he's not forgotten.
This is the story of Johnny Rotten."
Steve "Blore" Howard, a Fun Guy from Yuggoth
{hplabs, seismo}!hao!udenva!showard
or {boulder, cires, ucbvax!nbires, cisden}!udenva!showardvizard@dartvax.UUCP (Todd Krein) (09/22/86)
> In article <1795@ihlpa.UUCP> nikbek@ihlpa.UUCP (Moseley) writes: > >> >>What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when you know you can > >> >>come back from the grave at will? > >> > Getting nailed to a large block of wood is FUN? (I'd be curious > >> > how you spend your weekends ...) > >> > >> "Yeah, that's it. An' you get... uh..." > >> "Some six-penny nails?" > >> "Yeah! An' you drive the nails right through your palms... > > > >I recall some studies which indicate that nails through the palms of > >a person's hands will not support the person's weight. The nails > >were actually driven through the wrists, which will support a person's > >weight. I also believe that posts were actually used. I'm not sure where > >the idea of a cross came from. > > R. C. Moseley In the original language (greek?) the word use to describe the area where the nails were drivin in constitues the middle fore-arm to the palm. It was mistranslated somewhere... > This is an interesting discussion about the pain of crucifiction. The people > who feel that there are other people who have suffered about as much physical > pain as hanging on a cross are probably right. The main suffering and taking > on the sins of the world was done in the Garden of Gethsemane. There Jesus > bled from every pore because of the pain (and his sweat was as it were great > drops of blood falling down on the ground - Luke 22:44). No other human or > animal has been able to survive the pain that causes blood to come from every > pore. Not true... It's an uncommon but not necessarily dangerous thing.. (As I recall, it's blood passing into the sweat glads through the capillary walls..) > He did. I am sure the crucifiction was not easy, and it was an important > part of the overall plan, but it was probably not the most painful. Somehow, the idea of asphyxiating for 10-12 hours, slowly, sounds REALLY painfull, esp. given that his only respite was to put all his weight on the nail in his foot to releave tension on his diaphram. Todd Krein vizard@dartvax
dhk@ptsfa.UUCP (David Krause) (09/24/86)
In article <5171@dartvax.UUCP>, vizard@dartvax.UUCP (Todd Krein) writes: > > In article <1795@ihlpa.UUCP> nikbek@ihlpa.UUCP (Moseley) writes: > > >> >>What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when . . . > Somehow, the idea of asphyxiating for 10-12 hours, slowly, sounds ... > Todd Krein > vizard@dartvax To regular readers of net.jokes from a talk.origins denizen, my apologies for the above posting from our newsgroup. To those in talk.origins and talk.religion.misc who are continuing to cross-post this topic to net.jokes (even after their repeated requests to quit doing it): *** PLEASE SHOW SOME NET ETIQUETTE AND STOP CROSS-POSTING TO NET JOKES! *** David Krause
alm@tekecs.UUCP (Al Moak) (09/25/86)
In article <7457MIQ@PSUVMA> MIQ@PSUVMA.BITNET writes: >In article <32500077@uiucdcsb>, mcewan@uiucdcsb.CS.UIUC.EDU says: > >>>>>> What's the big deal about "dying" to prove your love when you know you >>>>>> can come back from the grave at will? > >>>>> Christ's sacrafice wasn't His life-- it was going through the pain of >>>>> death. And crucifixion is a *very* painful death indeed. > >>>>For human beings. Trivial for an omnipotent God. > >>> Agony is trivial? News to me. > >>Are you a god? > > Nope. Are you? > >>> Omnipotent or not, He was in *human* form. He felt everything that >>> humans feel, including extreme pain. > >>But what is pain as we know it to an omnipotent being? For an immortal, >>omnipotent being to spend a finite amount of time experiencing pain as >>finite creatures know it is trivial. > > You sure seem to know a lot about omnipotent immortals. I suppose you >could compare it to a human, with a life-span of about 70 years, experiencing >agony for about 5 minutes. It's not an *exact* ratio, of course, since a ratio >including infinity is meaningless. But it's a decent approximation. > > Anyhoo, you have a human who lives for about 70 years, and spends 5 min. >in agony. Sure sounds trivial-- unless you're the human and in the middle of >those five minutes. And you voluntarily opted to go through it. > >>> BTW, in case you feel like another knee-jerk anti-religious response, I >>> just wanted to know that I'm an agnostic. > >>This is something I thought about a great deal before deciding that the >>Christian reasoning about Jesus' "sacrifice" was complete nonsense. You, >>on the other hand, appear to have just parroted the Christian line without >>giving any thought to it. >> >>And I am not fanatically anti-religious, I just get irritated when someone >>spouts nonsense as though it were obviously true. > > Uhhmmmm... it seemed to me that the whole point of this was that, even >*given* that the death & resurrection occurred, it wasn't any big deal. >I'm not spouting nonsense (by that I assume you mean the Christian belief >in Who Christ was). And again I say, that regardless of what Christ was >(or wasn't) before and after the crucifixion, for those hours on the cross >He was human, and He could and *did* feel pain. > > Dave Krause was nice enough to send me some e-mail, in which he >pointed out some of the biblical accounts which back me up on this. Of >course, you'll be quick to say that the Bible isn't dependable as a historical >account. But again, this whole thing was started by someone who said that >even *given* the Christian beliefs as true, Christ still didn't make any >noteworthy sacrafice. If you're assuming Christian beliefs as true, then >biblical accounts become admissable as evidence. > > As an aside, someone else mentioned that after a short time, shock would >have caused Jesus to pass out-- or at least stop feeling pain. I have a >friend who works as an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) who agrees with >this, saying that people who lose fingers/hands/limbs usually feel no pain >because of shock. On the other hand, I've got another friend who has actually >lost a finger. He said it hurt like hell. > >>> I just get ticked off when people >>> try to argue things they know nothing about. > >>So do I. > > Well, when you get through being ticked off at yourself, try sending an >intelligent reply. > > > -- James Phillips > I don't desire to call anyone ignorant, especially those like yourselves who are obviously not ignorant in any general sense, but I do feel that you are ignorant of the facts of Christ's sacrifice. Yes, the pain was intense. The agony of crucifixion is horrible. But EVEN that was not THE sacrifice. Consider someone whom you love intensely. Consider that that person has been very, very good to people, but the people to whom he was good are now trying to do away with him discredit him, villify him, etc. But you, in your intense love for him, along with your intense pitying love for the people who hate him, decide to volluntarily assume their guilt - in such a way that you are actually counted as guilty of every one of their terrible attitudes, wrongful actions, etc. In your assumed guilt, you are executed. In your execution, you are absolutely disowned and totally deserted by your beloved. In the midst of your agony, he tells you that he disowns you and will desert you. You accept this as though you had been the one to hate him, though you love him. Your heart breaks. Obviously, Christ's agony is all this and much more, because we can't even begin to fully understand the intensity of His love for the Father. Now, if you truly understand this, you see wherein His SACRIFICE consisted. May He enable you to see it, at least a little. -- Al Moak
daveh@cbmvax.cbm.UUCP (Dave Haynie) (09/25/86)
> As an aside, someone else mentioned that after a short time, shock would > have caused Jesus to pass out-- or at least stop feeling pain. I have a > friend who works as an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) who agrees with > this, saying that people who lose fingers/hands/limbs usually feel no pain > because of shock. On the other hand, I've got another friend who has actually > lost a finger. He said it hurt like hell. I may have posted on that. There's going to be a period of time starting immediately with an injury like that, in which the victim wouldn't feel any pain, do to shock and maybe endorphans (sp?) or other naturally produced pain killers. This effect will eventually wear off, though I would think that the blood loss resulting from spikes being driven through one's wrists would be sufficient to result in unconsciousness during the hour or so of shock. The hour is really a guess, based on personal experience, your EMT friend might have a better idea of how long one would have to wait before the pain sets in. I had a reasonably serious hand injury resulting in a deep cut (fortunately, not all of the way through) that severed the large thumb muscle, etc. I didn't experience any pain for around an hour after the injury, which fortunately just about coincided with my arrival at the hospital. So no severe pain set in until the anesthetic wore off after surgery, but the natural pain relief seemed to last about an hour. I imagine the worst part of Jesus's execution was the day leading up to the crucifixition. Being nailed to a cross seems more like the idea of being hung from a tall tree. Neither a great way to go, but its more a show for the public than a torture of the victim. > --------------------------- > James D. Maloy | THIS SPACE FOR RENT | > The Pennsylvania State University | Call 555-2317 | > --------------------------- -- ============================================================================ Dave Haynie {caip,ihnp4,allegra,seismo}!cbmvax!daveh These opinions are my own, though if you try them out, and decide that you really like them, a small donation would be appreciated.