You have probably heard about the over-zealous group of people in the Bible known as the Sadducees. But if you are not sure who they are, the Gospel of Matthew has it that they are a group of religious leaders who did not believe in resurrection from the dead.
That same day Jesus was approached by some Sadducees—religious leaders who say there is no resurrection from the dead – Matthew 22:3, NIV.
These same arrogant people came to Jesus and began to ask him an impossible question about marriage after resurrection. Relying on the provisions of the laws of Moses on the responsibility of a man to his deceased childless brother, they contrived a theoretical case of seven brothers who had died childless and who had in turn been married to the same woman.
Let us read the encounter with the Sadducees together:
Matthew 22, NIV: 23…They posed this question: 24 “Teacher, Moses said, ‘If a man dies without children, his brother should marry the widow and have a child who will carry on the brother’s name.’ 25 Well, suppose there were seven brothers. The oldest one married and then died without children, so his brother married the widow. 26 But the second brother also died, and the third brother married her. This continued with all seven of them. 27 Last of all, the woman also died. 28 So tell us, whose wife will she be in the resurrection? For all seven were married to her.”
Wait a minute, I thought the Sadducees didn’t believe in resurrection from the dead? How come they were asking Jesus about “who will marry who” in the resurrection?
Obviously, they must have had an ulterior motive just like their counterpart, the Pharisees, who wanted to “trap Jesus into saying something for which he could be arrested” by asking Him the question of whether or not tax should be paid to the government authority of the day (see Matthew 22:15-22).
Gratefully, Jesus caught them in the act and He gave them the profound answers that inspired this post.
29 Jesus replied, “Your mistake is that you don’t know the Scriptures, and you don’t know the power of God. 30 For when the dead rise, they will neither marry nor be given in marriage. In this respect they will be like the angels in heaven (emphasis mine).
How I love the wisdom of Jesus in tackling knotty situations!
There you have it. According to Jesus, the mistakes of the Sadducees are in two folds: Not knowing the Scriptures and not knowing the power of God.
What do you think?
Victors Corner Blog 
Hi Victor,
I’m not trying to deceive you or anyone else. Both Buddha and Jesus taught breath meditation. Even though there are many similarities between the teachings of Buddha and Jesus, their philosophies are somewhat different.
It is the practice of what Jesus and Buddha taught that I practice. You need to practice it as well. It is not a matter of choosing between Buddha and Jesus, but if you must choose, then Jesus’ method is probably better.
If you sit in the silence and breath in and out slowly, you can experience the presence which both Jesus and Buddha experienced and both the disciples of Buddha and the early disciples of Jesus (for approximately 300 years experienced. Try it, and see. Taste and see that the presence is good.
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It is a mistake to continue comparing Jesus with buddha. Each stood for different things.
Jesus came to the world to die for the sin of mankind. It is in having faith in this sacrifice that salvation comes. No one will know true peace except the one who acknowledges God.
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But if God exists, doesn’t he know the end from the beginning? So if people came to God through compassionate love (without ever hearing about Jesus or without seeing any Christian who credibly has lived the ‘gospel’), and they died without ever accepting Jesus, wouldn’t God know whether they would have accepted Jesus had they seen a credible witness from the church? So isn’t compassion more important than theological dogmas, bible doctrines etc. no matter if the person is an atheist or agnostic or a believer in another religion?
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Even if some one is an “atheist or agnostic or a believer in another religion” he or she can be saved, but not until he or she has put faith in Jesus Christ alone.
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So does that mean those those who never hear of Jesus Christ cannot be saved and are going to be tortured in hell forever?
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I like to think that everyone alive will have the opportunity to hear about Jesus, one way or another.
Apostle says this: “if you continue in your faith, established and firm, and do not move from the hope held out in the gospel. This is the gospel that you heard and that has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven, and of which I, Paul, have become a servant.” Col 1:13
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If Jesus died for the sin of humankind, then why wouldn’t all be saved (made whole)? Doesn’t God know (if he exists) all possible circumstances (in all worlds, actual as well as hypothetical) and how a person would react if faced by any hypothetical set of circumstances. So he knows that if they received love they would respond positively, therefore none will be lost. All will eventually be made whole, so hell will be empty.
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God would have loved for hell to be empty, that’s impossible because not eberyone will accept the salvation that God offers in Christ. Unfortunately only those who believe that will be saved.
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What about those who have never heard of Jesus and so don’t believe in him? Are these going to be burned forever in some lake of fire with unspeakable torture?
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Hi Victor,
Can your really sing this unless you practice breath meditation as taught by Jesus and Buddha?
“Breathe on me breath of God, fill me with life anew,
That I may love the way you love, and do what you would do.”
“Breath o me breath of God, until my heart is pure,
Until my will is one with yours, to do and to endure.”
“Breathe on me breath of God, and so shall I never die,
But live with you the perfect life, through all eternity”
Victor, you need to be born again by being born of the breath. Breathe is slowly and breathe out slowly, then the words of this hymn might become real to you. Practice a loving kindness meditation as taught by Jesus and Buddha. Then you will find true peace, the peace beyond human understanding.
You are a kind guy at heart in spite of your brainwashing by the Pentecostals.
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I am already born again by the Holy Spirit. That’s the best I could get and only Jesus offers that. Not budha not anyone else. If you call that being brainwashed, so be it.
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You say that you are “already born again by the Holy Spirit”. But Jesus said “Not everyone who says unto me, ‘Lord, Lord’ shall enter the reign of heaven but those who do the will of my Father.”
Heaven’s reign is compassion and you enter it by being born of the breath. This enables and empowers you to be compassionate and a peacemaker like Jesus and Buddha taught. You seem to have been so brainwashed by Pentecostalism that you have missed out on being baptised in the holy breath.
Your compassion and kindness seems to have evolved without you practising what Jesus and Buddha taught: breath meditation. But you would actually become “born again” if you were born of the breath. Please don’t miss out!
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Why are you calling yourself an atheist, yet you keep propagating your gospel of breath medication? Who are you deceiving? Maybe yourself – definitely not me.
It’s either you believe in Jesus or you don’t. You can’t get it right combining Him with someone or something else.
Salvation is in Jesus alone and in no other.
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Let’s assume that “Salvation is in Jesus alone and no other.” Then, those who have died and have never heard the Christian message must be saved through Jesus alone. So maybe these come to accept Jesus after death. Or maybe they are saved by the love of God, even if they never come to him during this life because they love other human beings. Those who practice breath meditation (loving-kindness meditation) are spreading love, no matter what religion they belong to or are atheists and agnostics.
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tha “Salvation is in Jesus alone and no other” is not an assumption. It is waht is required now, starting from since Jesus died on the cross ofr mankind. Before then, God gave everyone a conscience – a sense of right and wrong.
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Don’t we still have a conscience?
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Yes we will have conscience. But now that we are in the era of grace, conscience is not enough. You need Jesus Christ.
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But even today, many have not heard, and never will hear in this life, anything about Jesus Christ. So why wouldn’t conscience apply? Why would God cook all these people in hell forever, with unspeakable torture? What kind of a God does that? Only a moral monster!
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You have no way of proving that many have not heard the gospel. What I know is that everyone will have that opportunity in their life time. “if you continue in your faith, established and firm, and do not move from the hope held out in the gospel. This is the gospel that you heard and that has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven, and of which I, Paul, have become a servant.”
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The Greek word sozo is translated ‘to be saved’ or ‘to be made whole’. So salvation is that which makes us whole. It is compassion, mercy and loving-kindness which makes us whole and both Buddha and Jesus taught a loving-kindness meditation.
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You forgot that salvation also means “deliverance from sin and its consequences,”. You can’t have that except by faith in God through Jesus Christ.
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Well if ‘sin’ (a religious construct) is failure to love God through our failure to love others, then it is love that “delivers us from sin and its consequences”. A loving -kindness meditation as taught by Buddha and Jesus will help you breathe in peace and breath out kindness.
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Yes, Love delivers us from sin and its consequences. But that love is the love of God and nothing else. And except you embrace that love, through faith in Jesus, you cannot be delivered from sin and its consequences.
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If salvation is in Jesus alone and no other, then all ways to peace and compassion are ways to Jesus and therefore salvation, whether a person has heard of Jesus or not. Thus following Buddha is a way to salvation as is compassionate atheism, compassionate agnosticism and compassionate humanism or any other compassionate path, whether through a religion or not. Isn’t this true?
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Salavtion is by grace though faith in Jesus Christ. Nothing more, nothing less!
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But Buddha was saved through breath meditation.
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If I were you I would worry abouy my own salvation instead of talking about buddha. You know you need to be saved in Jesus name. This your lifetime is your only chance.
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But isn’t grace (the unmerited favour of ‘God’) found through breath meditation on loving kindness which both Buddha and Jesus taught?
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Yes grace is unmerited favour of God. But it is available only through faith the finished work of Christ, not in some mundane religious practices.
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Hi Victor,
The real reason that the Sadduccees were mistaken is that they did not know the power of the breath. Jesus said, “Except you be born of the breath (pneuma), you cannot enter the kingdom of God”. The early church for nearly 300 years was empowered by the breath and only when Constantine declared the empire Christian did breath meditation begin to cease as the Catholic church gained political control.
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I thoght atheist didn’t have any belief system? It appears your case is different afterall – you want to push your gospel of the breath across by all means. Aren’t you tired yet?
Anyway, your position about the Saduccees is incorrect. I choose to believe what Jesus said about them than accept yours:
Jesus replied, “Your mistake is that you don’t know the Scriptures, and you don’t know the power of God
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Don’t you guys in Pentecostal churches sing this hymn any more?:
“Breathe on me breath of God, fill me with life anew,
That I my love the things Thou lost, and do the things that Thou wouldst do”.
It is by practising breath meditation that the presence will empower you and open your mind to compassion and mercy. Some atheists and agostics practice breath meditation. It is not just Buddhists and Christians and people in some other religions who practice it.
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If we ask God to breathe on us it is not in the same context of what you are talking about. I know about meditation too, but definitely not in the way you are talking about it. My meditation is based on the word of God, not in some hollow space.
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Well, when you open your bible, breathe on the passage and let the holy breath guide you. Breath meditation, as Jesus taught it, is not “some hollow space”. It is about experiencing the beautiful “presence”, one so compassionate and kind that he would never order the slaughter of defenseless women, little children and babies like the so-called god of the OT commanded.
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If you knew God, you would know something about His love and justice. You don’t have what it takes to question what God does.
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So do you think it is okay for people in warfare to kill little chidren and babies?
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You already know the answer to that question.
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I take it that you think “Yes”. You think it’s okay to kill little children and babies in warfare. This is barbarism. It’s totally immoral.
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I will leave you to your conclusions.
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Hi Victor,
The Quakers often say that there is that of God in every human being, so all will go to heaven. Non-theist Quakers might say that there is that of the presence in every human being. All you have to do is to access this presence. You can do this by sitting in the silence and breathing in and out slowly. Practice a loving kindness meditation.
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There is no other way to God or to Heaven except through Jesus Christ. He is the Way.
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But the way of Jesus is the way of compassion, healing-mercy and loving-kindness similar to the way of Buddha. Why couldn’t Buddha be a way to Jesus? After all, Buddhists do practice a loving-kindness meditation. Doesn’t the bible say that no person can love God whom they haven’t seen unless they love those whom they have seen? And doesn’t it also command Jesus’ disciples to love their enemies?
So if God loves his enemies, why would he become a terrorist and evil dictator by burning people in hell forever? No compassionate persons ever burns anyone. There was a time when the church had political, economic and religious power over people and they burnt heretics at the stake. These cruel church people became like the God they believed in, did they not?.
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Your problem is that you neither know God nor His power. So it is very easy for you to discredit what you don’t understand.
Give your life to God first and you will know that He is nothing like what you have imagined Him to be. He is loving, compassionate and forgiving. But He is also a God of justice. How could He not be, with people like you are take delight in mocking Him and His existence?
Neither you nor your like can escape His judgement except you repent now before it is too late.
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Hi Victor,
You seem to be one of the good guys in Pentecostalism, in spite of the brainwashing that you have been subjected to by your Pentecostal leaders. May the presence of compassion, healing-mercy and loving-kindness envelop you and uphold you and give you a tender heart and a warm empathy for others. May you be empowered by the breath to inspire, uplift and encourage others and may this blog of yours be used by you to love people with all your heart.
May the presence bless you and keep. may the face of the presence shine upon you and give you peace. Praise the presence!
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Your compliment means nothing to me. What i really want for you, is to give your life to Jesus Christ. You will see what difference that will make in your life.
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I gave my life to Jesus Christ, but he is not any of the thousands of Jesuses that Christian Fundamentalists believe in. He is not the Jesus who is supposed to have promoted hell. He is not the mythical Jesus of Fundamentalism but the Jesus of compassion, healing-mercy and loving kindness. He is the Jesus of peace and compassion that I learned about through breath meditation. He way of compassion is similar to the way of Buddha. This Jesus doesn’t require me to hold a set of beliefs about God but to love other people. Have a great day, Victor!
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You have not given your life to Jesus, otherwise you would know and believe that God exits. No matter what you claim, it doesn’t change the fact that you are deceiving yourself. And that’s sad.
Untill you confess Jesus as Lord and that God raised Him from the dead, you cannot be saved.
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I think that it is you who should check your facts. I said that Christianity in the West (i.e. Western World) is on the decline. I said nothing about the poorer countries of the world. So stop trying to put words in my mouth. You are either deliberately or inadvertently misrepresenting what I say. You are in danger of bearing false witness.
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I am not going to waste my time arguing this one with you because I know you have trained your mind to believe only negative things about God and anything that has to do with Him.
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I haven’t trained my mind to believe negative things about God. I was a Quaker which is a Christian group established in 17th century England, by George Fox. Todays Quakers in the UK and in Australia are comprised of Christian Quakers (mainly Liberal with some Evangelicals), some who are inspired by Buddhist writings and others who are non-theists (mainly atheists and agnostics).
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Whatever you are, if you don’t have a personal relationship with God by accepting Jesus Christ as your Lord and perosnal Saviour, you are doomed.
“For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only begotten (unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts in, clings to, relies on) Him shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal (everlasting) life.” John 3:16
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No-one is “doomed”, as you put it. “Jesus” (whether mythical or not) is the Saviour of all human beings. all will eventually be saved (made whole) and this is likely to take place through breath meditation as Buddha and Jesus taught.
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Please make no mistake about it, those who reject Jesus are doomed forever.
You cannot be for Buddha and Jesus at the same time. Following Jesus requires exclusivity. It is either you are with Him (and with no one other) or you are not with Him at all.
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“You cannot go for Buddha and Jesus at the same time.” No0one is asking you to go for Buddha and Jesus “at the same time”. All I am doing is pointing out to you that both Buddha and Jesus practised and taught breath meditation. It’s okay to follow only Jesus but remember that Jesus also said “he who is not against me is for me”
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Jesus presented Himself as the Saviour of the world, because He is! You can’t say that about buhda. Jesus forgave people’s sins. Can buhda? No.
You like twisting scriptures to suit your deceptive whims. But you can’t fool me. . Here is what the Matthew 12:30 actually says:
“Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.”
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Did you forget this?
“John answered, ‘Master, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him because he does not follow with us.” But Jesus said to him; ‘Do not stop him; for whoever is not against you is for you.’ ” (Luke 9:49-50). Whose twisting scriptures with their deceptive whims?
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You forgot that the person in question was reported to be casting out demons in the name of Jesus! That clearly showed that he believed in Jesus. So he was for Jesus too. Unlike, you have denied Jesus so you cannot claim that you are for Him.
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Hi Victor,
The man who was casting out demons in Jesus’ name was not a Christian. The disciples said that he was not with them, but Jesus said that he that he who is not against me is for me.
Jesus also said that many shall say in that day: “Did we not cast out demons in your name.” and he will say,” I never knew you”. So just because the guy was casting out demons in Jesus name does not necessarily mean that he was a follower of Jesus, does it?
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No body was a christian up till that point in time in history. The disciples came to be called christian for the first time after Jesus had died, resurrected and ascended.
As for the man in question, Jesus confirmed that he was His follower even though he wasn’t with the disciples.
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Hi Victor,
Nobody was called a Christian until the time you mentioned. This doesn’t mean that they were not Christians or followers of Christ. They just weren’t CALLED. this
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They were followers of Christ, all right. Jesus called them disciples. Even till today, some us prefer to be called disciples of Jesus Christ, because the name Christian has been misunderstood, misused or abused.
The disciples were called christians because they behaved like Christ. But today, you see people who are nothing like Christ and who live diametrically opposite to what Jesus stood for being called christians. That doesn’t jive at all.
Even some atheists claim to be christians. Is that not foolishness?
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Hi Victor,
Well there are Christian atheists. Google Christian atheism and you will see that it is true.
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Christian atheism is a contradiction. Anyone who is truly a christian will not be an atheist. And anyone who identifies as an atheist is not a christian, even if he or she claims to be one.
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I have a relationship with Jesus and Buddha based on their method of breath meditation. Breath meditation is taught in numerous passages in the NT (The Greek word pneuma is best translated breath). So by practising Jesus’ method of breath meditation, I am actually following him, unlike you who has been deceived by the Pentecostals. but you, too, can come to Jesus’ enlightenment and so enter a relationship with him.
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It’s either you have a relationship with Jesus Christ or you don’t. No you cannot have a relationship with buhda and Jesus at the same time. Jesus Himself said, “”No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”
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Buddha isn’t “money”. Jesus said that you cannot serve God and money, not God and Buddha.
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You are right. But it’s about dual loyalty here. Jesus does not want that.
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But following Buddha and Jesus on breath meditation is not about dual loyalty, especially if you prioritize Jesus’ method of the breath, is it? Isn’t it just like you who follows your interpretations of Moses and Jesus, but give priority to your understanding of Jesus?
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We look unto Jesus as the author and finisher of our faith. Buddha doesn’t just come close.
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I experience the “presence” of peace, compassion and kindness through the breath meditation taught by Buddha and Jesus. So I have eternal life. Your Pentecostal mates have led you astray. You seem to be a kind guy and compassionate (unlike Pentecostal leaders). Don’t let them continue to lead you astray. Jesus can help you with your breath meditation, if you find it too hard to do. It is all about grace and nothing to do with works, but it leads to works of compassion and kindness.
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Eternal means knowing God. So long as you don’t believe in God, you don’t have eternal life.
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Quakers usually believe that access to God is through the silence by sitting together in quiet contemplation and occasionally speaking when led to by the Spirit. Quakers who believe in God also believe that there is that of God in every human being. All Quakers (including non-theists) believe that a presence is activated in the silence. Christian Quakers and some Buddhists call it God whereas other Buddhists and non-theists do not call it God.
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The only Access to God is Jesus Christ. Every other way leads to destruction.
Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John14:6
“Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.” Acts 4:12
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Yes but Buddha also taught breath meditation. Even some agnostics and atheists practice breath meditation like Buddha and Jesus taught. Both Buddha and Jesus taught a loving-kindness meditation through breathing in and out slowly. You need to try it, so that you can be made whole. Then, you will give up your idea that God commanded the slaughter of little children and babies.
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I do not follow Buddha and never will. I am a follower of Jesus Christ and Him only. The life that He offerred me is well enough. Buddha cannot save but Jesus has saved me.
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But isn’t Buudha a forerunner of Jesus?
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Budha coould never compare with Jesus.
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But he could be his forerunner.
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Jesus had only one forerunner – John the Baptist. Other who claim to be His runners are nothing but impostors.
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Jesus was telling Jews that he was the only way but Jesus didn’t know about Buddhism and that Buddha also taught breath meditation long before Jesus existed. Jesus was telling the Jews that the violent Yahweh of the OT was not the way, but he (as the peaceful and compassionate one) was. Jesus was not addressing the topic of other religions as paths to “God”.
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When Jesus said He is the Way to God, He meant it with all His heart. And it applies to the whole.
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But both Buddha and jesus taught breath meditation as the way to the presence of peace and compassion, which some people call God. Jesus said that he was the only way for the Jews, not for people in Buddhist and Hindu lands.
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May be the Jesus in your imagination is different from the one revealed i Bibble scripture. Jesus taught the word of God which He described as spirit and life.
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Jesus is the one revealed in the Gospels. John 3:5 tells us that you must be born of the breath (pneuma).
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Please enough of your deception and misquoting of the Bible! Here is the correct quotation of John 3:5 :
Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit.
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If every other way than Jesus is destruction (and by destruction, it is pretty clear that you mean eternal hell fire) then the overwhelming majority of humankind who have dies are burning in hell suffering unspeakable torment in body and soul and this will be never ending.
What does this say about a God who commands us to love our enemies? Apparently, he doesn’t love his enemies otherwise why would be have an eternal torture chamber? This God is worse than that other character called Satan. Your God can’t be the true God. This is the violent God that your Pentecostal masters have brainwashed you with.
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If you say my God is a violent God, that means you agree in the first place that He exists! So stop calling yourself an atheist.
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Well, I agree that there is a presence experienced in breath meditation that Jesus and Buddha both taught. This may mean that there is a God external to myself but it may be just something that goes on in my heart without the existence of any God. I don’t know . But I do know that the presence will lead one to be more compassionate and peaceful. The Greek word pneuma, in the NT, is properly translated breath
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Of course, God exists without you – whether you believe in Him or not. And inside you is a craving for you to acknowledge God, but you keep waving it aside.
Take our conversations here as your opportunity to reconsider your position about God. Tomorrow might be too late.
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Why would anyone want to worship an eternal torturer? Hell is one of the chief doctrines in creating atheists. Atheists don’t believe in the existence of hell, God or gods, angels, demons nor Satan. There is just as much evidence for their existence as there is for fairies, leprechauns, goblins and unicorns and other invisible entities as there is for God, gods, demons, angels and that other fictional character called Satan: absolutely NONE!
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I see God as a loving father. He loves me a enough to save me from my sin and is preparing me for an eternal relationship with Him. And so can you.
God exists. So do satan, demons and angels. You underestimate that at your own perils.
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You say that you see God as a loving Father. Well, if God exists I think that he would be a loving Father, not a sadist who tortures people in hell forever. Victor, you are too kind a person to believe in hell as eternal punishment. Your Pentecostal masters have hoodwinked you. You need to become a Christian universalist like most of the early church of the first 3 centuries.
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I have not been hoodwinked as you claimed. Hell fire exists for those you reject God. You deny that truth at your own peril.
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The Quaker values are simplicity, peace, integrity, community and equality. All Quakers hold to these values. Some do so on the basis that the Jesus of the Gospels held to these values. Others do so because they practice a Buddhist loving-kindness meditation, still others do so as atheists and agnostics who practice meditation. It is Jesus (a mythical but respected myth whose story commands breath meditation) who commanded the practice of breath meditation when he told his disciples that they must be born of the breath. Of course, Buddha did this years before Jesus.
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Why settle for such a confusion when you can have the true peace that only Jesus offers?
Here is the assurance Jesus gave to His followers: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” John 14;27. Nothing better or greater than that!
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We’re not confused. It is Fundamentalists like you who are confused. You need to practice breath meditation. It’s one way to find peace, but it’s probably not the only way. You will never find peace through bible Fundamentalism. Some atheists, like myself and non theist Quakers, find peace through breath meditation on Buddha and Jesus. You need to give up your fear and try it.
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Away with this your breath meditation ramblings. It doesn’t help anyone. You cannot have eternal peace except you have Jesus in you.
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You’ve not tried breath meditation as Jesus taught you, have you? It’s no wonder you don’t have eternal peace. Buddha could also help you, but if you don’t want to follow Buddha then follow Jesus on being born of the breath.
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The peace of God rules my heart. Nothing else can compare. I am at peace because my mind is stayed on God. Atheism causes misery, just the much I can see all over you. but only God can fill the whole n your heart.
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Well, I have the peace of “God” in my heart because I actually follow Jesus and am empowered by the pneuma (breath) which you lack because you are following your faulty Pentecostal interpretations of the bible.
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Stop deceiving yourself please. You are not following Jesus. If you did, you would believe that God exists and you would be following Him too.
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You don’t know the presence (“God”) because, like the Sadducces, you don’t know the power of “God” nor the Scriptures. You need to follow Jesus and practice being empowered by the breath of God. There’s still time for you to learn. Please learn Greek and pick up a Greek NT. Then you will learn that Spirit, spirit and breath are the Greek word pneuma.
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You know God, you don’t know His power, you don’t know anything about Him.
You are just following some philosophies that will lead you to a dead end. There is no other way, except Jesus.
Exept you accept the life He offers, you are doomed. “I tell you the truth, anyone who believes has eternal life.”
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Hi Victor,
The following link will show that Jesus was a Buddhist. thezensite.com/non_Zen/Was_Jesus_Buddhist.html
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The budhist Jesus is the one in your imgaination. The One I know, that the Bible reveals to us is the Son of God and Saviour of the world.
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Hi Victor,
Although I had not seen evidence (until today) that Buddhist missionaries were in Palestine in the first century, if this is true then it is possible that Jesus adopted Buddhist breath meditation and taught it to his disciples. Whether he adopted Buddhist breath meditation or not, he seems to have been empowered by the breath as the Greek NT says.
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It is now obvious that you have been misguided. The earlier you retrace your steps (beliefs) the better for you.
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Hi Victor,
I’m not following philosophies, as you allege, but I am following Jesus (whether a myth or a real human person who once lived) who taught his disciples breath meditation. You seem to be kind hearted for the most part, except that you have been brainwashed by Pentecostal cultists who preach the terrorist doctrine of hell as eternal punishment. Jesus promised eternal life which I have because I breath in compassion and breath out peace. You can, too if you so choose.
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When you start following Jesus, I will know. But right now you are deceiving yourself that you are following Him when you know you are not. If you say Jesus is a myth and you are following Him, is that not foolishness?
We follow Jesus because we know He is real. He lived, died, resurrected and is alive forever more. That’s the Jesus I want you to surrender to.
The doctrine of hell fire is in the Bible. As much you try, you cannot wish it away. God has reserved hell fire for satan and his followers. You don’t have to go there, that’s the point of my conversations with you all these while.
“Anyone who believes and is baptized will be saved. But anyone who refuses to believe will be condemned.” Mark 16:16
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Well Jesus IS in me, through breath meditation and loving-kindness. I have been saved (made whole) through Jesus’ method of breath meditation which you seem to deny. You need to be born again. That is, you need to be born of the breath. Even if Jesus was a mythical figure, his story of compassion and kindness inspires me and it could inspire you, too.
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I am born again by the spirit of God, not in the sense of your breath meditation as you call it. I think that’s what you need too. – be born again by water and by spirit just as Jesus wants us to do.
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The problem with groups like the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the Fundamentalist Christians and other religious groups is that most of them are nutters, not that they lack power. The only sensible groups are agnostics and atheists.
Today, Christians in the West are continually on the decline but religious nones (e.g. atheists and agnostics) are on the rise. Beware of religion, Victor! It will eat like a canker at your “soul”. You really know better than to propagate religion. It only leads people astray. Get with the strength of reason, not with the irrationality of religion.
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Who has been feeding you with lies? Your statistics are faulty. There are more Christians in the world today than there were at any time other time in history.
You are seriously mistaken to think that I have lost my sense of good reason or rationality. Being a believer in God does not preclude those. It is not my fault that atheism has blinded you so much.
For the records, I do not preach religion. Religious does not save anyone. It is Jesus that saves, so that’s why I would encourage even you to have a relationship with Him.
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Hi Victor,
How can anyone have a relationship with a mythical figure? Isn’t the Jesus figure a myth created out of Paul’s imaginary visions? How can a mythical figure save anyone? And what do they need to be saved from and for?
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Jesus is not mythical. He was a real figure that once lived still lives.
Speaking of Himself, Jesus said, “I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.” Revelation 1:8.
There was Jesus long before there was Paul. So it is incorrect for you to suggest that Paul created Jesus from his imaginations.
A mythical figure cannot save anyone. But Jesus is not a mythical figure so He can, and saves people. People need to be saved from their sin. Everyone in the world – including you you- is a sinner, having fallen short of the standard of God.
And the was wages of sin is death – eternal death. People need to be delivered from eternal death and eternal suffering in hell fire, which is the punishment for rejecting God.
People need to be saved so they can have a relationship with God and then be with Him after this life on earth is passed away.
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Yes, Buddha will lead you to become compassionate and kind and so will Jesus, if you follow their method of breath meditation. I’m only trying to help you, Victor. You desparately need to breathe slowly.
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That’s where you are missing it. It’s either you believe in Jesus alone or you don’t . He only can give salvation. Not Buhda, not anyone else.
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Hi Victor,
Maybe you need to be born of the breath. Breathe in slowly. breathe out slowly. You will find the peace that you are longing for. Jesus said that you should be born of the breath, did he not ? (Jn. ch3) Except you be born of the breath, you cannot enter the kingdom of God.
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What I have is the peace that only God can give. There is no better alternative anywhere.
I am born of the Spirit, not of breathe (whatever that means). As i told you in another thread, please stop misquoting Jesus. Here is what He said:
Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.” John 3:3
Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. John 3:5.
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“Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and of the pneuma.” (John 3:5). This Greek word pneuma can be translated spirit, Spirit or breath. Only if you were born of the breath would you know that you are “born again”, which you obviously don’t know.because you don’t understand Buddha and Jesus on breath meditation.
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You have are started distorting things again! I am born again of water and the Spirit. (not breath)
God is spirit remember? Buddha doesn’t save but Jesus does.
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That’s only the opinion of the unknown author of the Gospel according to John which was written nearly 70 years after Jesus is supposed to have died. This unknown author turned the human Jesus (if he ever lived) into a god.
God (if he exists) is love and only love. It is love that saves (makes people whole), not spirit. It is the breath (pneuma) that enables people to be peaceful and compassionate just like Buddha and Jesus (whether Jesus was a human being or just a myth).
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Stop making the mistake of comparing Budha with Jesus. Jesus as God-incarnate, is in a class of His own.
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The church for the first 300 years was a church of peace and compassion. it was non-violent and taught universal salvation. It was only when the church gained political, economic and religious power that the terrorist doctrine of eternal hell came into the church and the poor and the oppressed were abused by the religious terrorists (the priests of the church).
The churches (Catholic, Protestant and Pentecostal/Charismatic) are full of evil psychological terrorists who torment their congregations with the doctrine of eternal hell fire. The churches need to repent of their grave evil and begin to once again proclaim peace, compassion, tenderness and universal reconciliation instead of showing hatred towards atheists, agnostics, other religions, same-sex oriented persons and the poor.
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You are not even half as good as you are trying to sound here. You are not qualified to tell the church what to believe, teach or practice. The God you don’t believe in is the owner of the church. The Church asnwers to Him and not to you.
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One of the chief reasons the churches of the first 3 centuries was predominantly pacifist and very compassionate was that they practised breath meditation. Even Jesus himself was empowered by the breath. “The breath of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor, to heal the broken-hearted, to set at liberty the oppressed and to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord (the year of the Jubilee when the slaves would all be liberated).
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The first Church wasn’t pacifist. They unsettled the powers of the day
Stop your deception, Jesus did not practice breath meditation. This is the correct quote of Luke 4:18: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed,”
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Hi Victor,
The early church was predominantly pacifist. They followed Jesus by loving their enemies and so refused to kill them. They were able to do this because they applied what Jesus taught them about breath meditation.
They challenged the powers not with the sword but with the love of “God” that they learnt from Jesus and from his breath meditation. Their ‘rattling” of the powers was by their non-violent compassionate obedience to Jesus that they learned in the silence through breathing in compassion and breathing out peace.
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Yes, the early didn’t foment trouble by being violent or carrying arms. But the gospel of God which they preached with the power of God unsettled the authorities of the day.
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The early Christians followed Jesus in practising breath meditation and this was Jesus’ (and Buddha’s) method of liberation. Today the churches need to return to Jesus of the Jesus story (whether he was a real of a mythical figure). They need to become non-violent, compassionate and believe that all will be made whole through breath meditation.
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Stop this deception already. The early christians never practiced your breath meditation. They were men and women anointed by the Holy Spirit for exploits.
If there there is anything today’s church needs to return to, it is returning to working by the power of God like the early disciples did.
The church is not violent. Stop imagining things.
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Hi Victor,
The early Christians were baptized in the holy breath and that is why they were able to do great exploits for Jesus. Everywhere in the NT where you see it translated as Spirit, it should be translated as breath. It was the pagan Christians of the Catholic, Protestant churches who were indoctrinated with their pagan ideas who translated it Spirit. Thus was breath meditation (the practice of Jesus and the early church) suppressed by the political, economic and religious power of the priests. The priests brought the pagan concept of hell as eternal punishment into the church to scare their flocks
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You can carry your gospel of holy breath elsewhere. What the early Christians had was baptism in the Hold Spirit. Don’t cheapen it please.
You can say whatever you like about hellfire. But remember that you do so at your own peril. Hell fire is real. Jesus preached it. The Bible shows it. Anything else is a lie.
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God is the owner of the true church, for those who live by his grace and follow Jesus’ breath meditation. But if grace (compassion, mercy and loving-kindness freely given to others) triumphs over ‘sin’ (failure to love) then the doctrine of endless torture of non Christians in a literal hell shows the abject failure of grace to triumph over sin. Your Pentecostal pastors and prophets have been preaching falsely and prophesying falsely. If love wins, then none will be lost. Hell is a pagan doctrine that seeped into the church, especially after Constantine took political power in the 4th century CE. You’ve been listening to misguided pastors who preach this pagan doctrine.
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Your accusation is baseless. Besides, you don’t even believe what you are talking about.
You have been deceived. Only by accepting God will you be free from the devil’s deception that has entangled your life. You will never understand spiritual things as long as you close your mind to the God.
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Hi Victor,
“The church is not violent. Stop imagining things.”
Well the church of the first 300 years was predominantly non-violent because they actually followed Jesus’ call to love their enemies, not to kill them. But after the Roman Emperor, Constantine, declared himself a Christian then things began to change in the church. The Church began to persecute non-believer; they burnt heretics at the stake and they committed all sorts of violent torture in the name of Jesus. So the church has been for most of its history a violent church.
But today, because Churches lack political power, their violence is more psychological violence which comes from terrorizing their congregations with the doctrine of hell. This doctrine is pagan and is Satan’s prime doctrine used by the Church. If only the church would return to Jesus’ practised of breath meditation, churches would once again become instruments of peace and compassion in the midst of a broken world.
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The doctrine of hell is a biblical doctrine. Any one who believes the Bible would have seen that there is eternal reward for those who believe in God and eternal punishment for those who reject Him.
It doesn’t make a complete sense to accept that there is Heaven on one hand and reject the notion of hell on the other.
Heaven or Hell, both are actual biblical concepts and future possibilities. The earlier you realise that, the better for you.
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The real Jesus (if he actually existed) proclaimed breath meditation which resulted in peace and compassion, so he didn’t preach ‘hell’ as everlasting torture. No person who is compassionate would ever consider burning someone at all, let alone eternally. So if Jesus was compassionate (which the Jesus depicted in the Gospels was, whether he existed or is just a myth), then he could not have proclaimed hell as eternal punishment. The Pentecostals and Charismatics as well as the Catholics and Protestant Fundamentalists are preaching the doctrine of the Devil (diabolis = the diabolical one).
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If you knew God, you will not be talking like this.
Yes, Jesus preached love, compassion and mercy, but He also preached judgement. In many instances He said “Not at all! And you will perish, too, unless you repent of your sins and turn to God.” Luke 13:3.
Hell fire will be the final judgment of satan and for every one that rejects God. If the thought of a hell fire scares you so much, why don’t you accept the love that God offers in Jesus Christ now? That way, you wouldn’t end up in hell fire.
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If you were born of the breath, you would know that Yahweh of the OT is a fictional character and barbaric monster who was created by the power elite within Israel who adapted and created Yahweh in their own likeness.
You would also know that Jihadi Jesus of the Book of Revelation is a moral monster with rivers of blood flowing for several miles during an imaginary Great tribulation and differs from the peaceful Jesus of the Sermon on the Plain.
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Stop repeating your mindless ramblings and stop twisting things too.
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You can’t answer me, can you so you claim that I am repeating mindless ramblings. I am not twisting anything. Please provide evidence of my twisting things.
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You have variously displayed confused understanding of who Jesus or Paul is. And yet you don’t even wat to learn properly.
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I am learning properly because I consult biblical scholars, unlike you who displays amazing ignorance of the last 250 years of such scholarship.
Your assertion that I am confused about who Jesus and Paul are is absurd. I study different point of view, which you seem to refuse to do. There are thousands of different interpretations of who Jesus and Paul were in Christian history. Did you know that there are over 40,000 different Christian denominations in the world today with different theologies, different ethic and different biblical views. What a babel of confusion and tongues speakers are among the most confused.
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If you want to continue concocting your own version of Jesus or Paul, go ahead. But stop using my blog as a platform.
The Jesus I believe in and the Paul in the New Testament are different from the ones your atheist mind have come to envision.
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“The Jesus I believe in and the Paul in the New Testament are different from the ones your atheist mind have come to envision.”
Firstly, I am not using your blog as a platform. I am jut trying to show you from the NT that the Jesus of the Gospels practised breath meditation and taught his disciples to do likewise.
Secondly, you seem to have been brainwashed by the Pentecostals to accept their churches’ interpretations of Jesus and Paul. The Greek word pneuma means breath, spirit, Spirit. The original NT (which we don’t have) was written in koine Greek. The earliest manuscripts are known as uncial manuscripts. All the words are in Greek capitals and their scripts are continuous.
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I am not brainwashed. You think you know, but you are living a lie, deceiving yourself.
Context is everything in Bible interpretaion. Pneuma is intepret as spirit. But you are cheapening it by your concept of breath theology.
If you are not using my blog as a platform why are you pushing your deceptions on breath meditation, budha and the likes here? It’s either you are not an atheist as you claimed or you are a confused one.
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Hi Victor,
I’m not cheapening pneuma by my breath theology.
(1). It is not my theology that I am presenting, but the theology of Jesus. Jesus taught his disciples to be empowered by the breath (pneuma). English translations of the bible are not infallible but men, who are textual scholars, translated pneuma as Spirit because they were brainwashed by later church tradition from the apostate Catholic Church and its apostate Protestant daughters. They refused to let the Greek text be read as the early church read it.
(2). These translators had given up the early church practice of breath meditation taught to the disciples by Jesus.
(3). By following Jesus’ breath theology I am trying to encourage you to become like the early church.
(4). Buddha practiced breath theology also and has many ideas that are similar to Jesus. So those who follow Buddha are, in reality, following Jesus at least in the practice of peace, compassion and loving-kindness.
(5). Although there are significant differences in the theologies of Buddha and Jesus their essential practice of breath meditation is practically the same.
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I don’t buy into your theology of the breath, because Jesus never preached it, contrary to your claim.
No, those who are following budha are not following Jesus. To follow Jesus, you have to follow Him and no other. Simple.
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You say that Buddha could not be a forerunner of Jesus. You also say that you can only follow Jesus and no other. But you are following others. You follow Moses, Paul, Peter ,John etc. do you not? So why couldn’t those who followed Buddha also be following Jesus, not directly but implicitly. Both Jesus and Buddha practised breath meditation.
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I follow Jesus the author and finisher of my faith. Neither you nor buhda believes in Jesus, so you not following Him ‘implicitly.’
To follow Jesus, you have to explicitly believe in Him. Paul, Peter, John, etc all believe in Jesus. If you don’t believe in Jesus, stop claiming to be His follower.
And by the way, speak for yourselve, and leave budha alone. Budha never claimed to be a follower of Jesus and you cannot come here and be making that claim for him.
Jesus knows His followers and His followers know Him.
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I am only an atheist with respect to the Fundamentalist god and all the other gods who have been invented by humans. I don’t know for certain whether any god exists or not, but if one does exist, I choose to believe that such a being is full of compassion, healing-mercy and loving-kindness and would never punish anyone in a place called “hell” for finite sins committed by finite persons in finite time. Such a punishment is totally unjust and the true God (if he exists) is not unjust . He seeks to restore people and make them whole again through love which is often experienced through the breath.
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If you don’t know “whether any god exists or not,” then you are not an atheist. Atheist sare foolish enough to be sure God does not exists.
But you see God exists, He is full of love and compassion. He wants you to come to Him through Jesus Christ and no other.
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Many atheists are agnostics. They don’t know whether God exists or not (agnostic), but (based on the evidence) they think that the probability of God’s existence is likely to be pretty low, therefore they are theists. These atheists do not say for certain that God does not exist.
The probability that the Fundamentalist God exists is almost zero because he is a God of terrorism who punishes people in hell forever for not following Jesus whether they heard of him or not. He is also a God who is supposed to have commanded the killing of little babies and children during the Canaanite conquest and later the slaying of the Amalekites.
If a God actually exists, then he is a God of infinite compassion, healing-mercy and loving-kindness who has compassion on all and who saves all, including atheists and agnostics.
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I meant to say “therefore they are atheists”, not “therefore they are theists”.
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Boths atheists and agnostics are wrong, because God exists and we can know that He does.
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On one hand you are an atheist, on another you are agnostic. See how confused you are?
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Hi Victor, you say that you know that God exists. Well, how do you know? What evidence do you have?
You say that I am confused because I said that the probability of the existence of God is low and concluded that probably God doesn’t exist and that therefore I am an atheist. I also said that I do not know for certain that God doesn’t exist, so I am also an agnostic (don’t know). There is NO inconsistency here. What don’t you understand?
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I was only reflecting your shifting positions to you. You are not even sure who you are.
But I can help you a little. God created you and He has a purpose for you. If there was no God, you would be here in the first place. In other words, God created you: that in itself is enough evidence that He exists.
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Hi Victor,
You say that because I exist that proves God exists. What a lot of drivel! Rather, if God exists then he used evolution as his method of creation. But you haven’t shown that God exists. The mere fact that you or I exist shows nothing about the existence of God, does it?
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If you say that God did not create you, you are mistaken. If you truly believe that you are a product of evolution, you are mistaken as well. And if you still believe that God doesn’t exists, it means you have not fully evolved. Lol
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Hi Victor,
Well, we both agree that context is everything in biblical interpretation, but this idea that pneuma means breath or spirit or Spirit is not a matter of context but is a matter of the meaning of the Greek. The earliest manuscripts of the NT were written in koine Greek. Substitute the word breath in English translations of the NT everywhere where you read Spirit in these translations. Then, it will become clear to you that Jesus told his disciples, “Except you be born of the breath, you cannot enter the kingdom of God.”
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At this point, I don’t want to continue to over-flog this issue. You know where I stand. Believe what you want, but I am sure you got my point as well.
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