This thread is getting interesting.
Storch...you mention that there are a number of prophesies in the bible which are correct, what are they? Are you referring to the 'hidden prophesies' which a professor claims to have found by running computer programmes through the text?
Of the events you describe, I am most interested in the the geneological tracing of all human DNA to one specific female living in ethopia not more than 10,000 years ago. I can check this out with a friend of mine who was the director of museums in Kenya.
I am also interested in this statement:
"I won't have to respond because my sins have been paid for. Jesus put them on his Master Card for me. "
By this, do you mean that you can sin as much as you like, but as your sins have been 'paid for in advance' you don't need to worry about sinning?
To answer a few of your questions to frogman:
The apocrypha:
Funnily enough I am reading a book at the moment called 'Rubicon' about the death of the Republic. The Sibylline oracle is mentioned (the one about the crone who brings the scrolls to the Roman King ('pre republic so they had kings then') and in it, fortold the trojan war. But we will never really know as the scrolls were destroyed.
Whilst Christ was alive (assuming that he was born in 0 AD of which there is some doubt), the Emporor was Augustus - although I'm not sure where that takes us.
The Praetorian Guard:
I'm sure we all have at least a vague idea of whom the Praetorians were, if only by seein the movie 'Gladiator'. Certainly, Gibbons, in 'The Decline and Fall' paints them out in their later years to have been king makers and only after lining their own pockets. It was, as you know, the Praetorians who 'crowned' Claudius Emperor of Rome, amongst many others.
Jesus claiming to be the son of God:
I don't think there is a passage in the bible where he makes this claim. The closest he gets is at his trial with Pilate. However, if one is familiar with the times, prophesies of a new messiah abounded and it is not beyond the bounds of thought that Jesus acted out some of the prophesies (the inconvienent ones were forgotten) such as riding through the eye of the needle on a Camel.
There is a fairly solid body of thought that the term 'Jesus of Nazereth' was in fact an afterwriting of his true moniker 'Jesus the Nazerene' - the Nazarene's being the Roman equivalent of 'terrorists' who wished to see Judea released from the yoke of Rome.
As for the ressurection, again there is a fair chance that Christ was not actually dead when he was removed from the cross. It was more common in those days to tie people to the cross rather than to nail them to it. Also it is common thought that the Romans allowed followers to feed those being crucified for the duration of the crucifixion.
My sources for much of this is a book called 'the messianic legacy' which was written by two historians about the life of Christ by looking at as much historical evidence that they could find about the time (including the bible in many of its iterations).
I do not decry your belief, but I do think that if you are going to commit yourself heart and soul to something, you ought to be extremely sure about it, particularly when what is alleged flies in the face of common sense and our experiences.
Ravs
