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I've written in my introductory chapter to my gospel edition: The “Gospel of Thomas” All but the four Gospel accounts have been graded “apocryphal”, meaning that their origin is not known. This would correspond to the weak grade. There among are not many scriptures that are considered to...

It's a long and good discussion I hadn't noticed so far. There are roughly 3 meanings of the verb "to believe" 1 believe something: accept an assumption to be objectively true, based on indications, although lacking an objective proof 2 believe someone: trust a person and assume that he or...

Maybe on a dump ;-) In fact, I consider it to be a valid 5th source, not completely reliable but a collection of an upright author. Nevertheless, it has been discarded by scholars of the majority church, so it may have not been considered a sacred text at all by the one who threw it away.

Small correction: the Oxyrhynchos papyri of Th were found first and are estimated to be earlier as well.

Thanks for the correction. As I said, my knowledge in Hebrew is very deficient. But what about Eloh? At least in Arabic, Allah is grammatically certainly masculine (I'm not an expert in Arabic either but at least I can communicate and read it, whereas in Hebrew, I rather have to analyse word by...

There's certainly a difference between monotheistic prophets and the wise teachers in Indian religions. There's no real equivalent to what we perceive as God. But is the teaching of the wise a self-enhancement without a relationship with other people, animals, plants ?

You made me doubt my very limited knowledge of the Hebrew but i looked it up and it confirmed that -im is always a masculine plural ending.

Did any prophet recommend to run a Marathon? Animating yourself to do something doesn't mean anything more than that. We may have several images to think of God, but God is certainly not an undefined function you can use. Any references to God, in my understanding and conviction, needs to...

Is there? The authors didn't even mention their own names. John (suppose that the Gospel has been written on his explicit authority) even avoided it actively.

It's hard to grade the authenticity of a hadith. You can formulate criteria for it, but if they are hard and formal, they may be misleading, and others are very subjective. In Islam hadith science, we have the isnad criterion: scholars who reported the hadith had to tell the entire chain A...

It's the Semitic gender. But we know that God is not male and His Spirit is not female.

I think a "love for all" is too much. If this love doesn't result in an adequate engagement, it is shallow. If you really take it serious, you will result in a burn-out. We are limited. It's better to concentrate on those who are near. We can try to be respectful and friendly to all, give...

What if You remove/discard it, but other brothers (including myself) don't? Off course it's an utopia. But it's not just a slogan. For the personal attitude, you cannot love all, but be ready to respect anyone who comes across your way. It doesn't mean to approve all deeds, in fact this is even...

I wrote something about that in another thread... Although I was supposed to be a Muslim by birth, I grew up with Christians. I even attended Christian religion. So I hesitate to say that Christianity is a foreign religion to me. My mother as well as her parents were "modern" people. I know the...

The problem is that Truth Social has close to zero correlation with truth. Meaning that if Trump says something you can neither conclude that it is probably true nor that it is probably false.

Seems that unfortunately @MAC4 has left, so I can answer. Sunni Muslim is a big group. All Sunni disagree with the Ahmaddiya in that they don't accept the claim of the founder of the sect, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, to be the Mahdi. In general, Sunni accept members of Shia sects as Muslim. Some...

Heaven and hell? I thought Indian religions teach rebirth or perfection ?

What we experience: We are able to reach a state of openness of the mind to let our mind step back from our daily haste and leave a space for other thoughts. We can direct our thoughts in the sense of what we know from the prophets and other wise persons. Prayer is the combination of both: We...

I think that the Sufi schools arose out of serious more or less ascetic scholars. Until about 1000 CE, there was no strict difference between different access to belief; scholars may have had a strict, literal and mystic access at the same time. The break between more "legalist" and more...

Don't forget John, the prophet and Jesus. Indeed, Islamic ascetic traditional root in monastic Christian traditions of the East (today Iraq, Syria, Iran, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia). There must also have been Jewish ascetic groups. Ibn Hanbal collected many traditions attributed to Jesus and to...