History And The Search For True Christianity

by pronomono 20 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  pronomono

  What happened to the original Christian churches named in the Bible - Philadelphia, Thessolonica, Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, and Laodicea to name a few? One would think that since these were the original churches, if we could trace the history of these churches down to our day, we could find who is preaching truth today. Obviously this doesn't lie with JWs because it is a new religion, although I do not doubt the sincerity of their belief.

  There are two likely cases that I can see: 1) these became what is now known as the Roman Catholic Church, 2) the Roman Catholic Church was an apostate Christianity that seperated from these true churches and used their power to snuff out the true churches from history.

  Which one do you think is correct? What do you believe happened to these original churches?
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  itsibitsybrainbutbigenoughtosmellarat

  Visit Doug Mason's site http://www.jwstudies.com

  He has addressed these questions and many others in great detail, and as far as my research has lead me it is fair and accurate.
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  Phizzy

  I second that Smella ! Doug's latest paper, see the thread The Greek Scriptures , is most illuminating, on this aspect, and others.

  What you have to bear in mind is that no Church has remained static in its Doctrine or its Organization.

  One of the interesting ones to look at is the Coptic Church, not a single entitiy even then, but they claim to go back to Mark, as their first Bishop, and they certainly were immune to a lot of the wrangling etc that went on in the Roman church.

  We can never know ,I fear, what the original Jerusalem Christians taught and believed, or those in Antioch, because the survivng "Christianity" all comes from Paul, seen as an Apostate by a number of early Christians.
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  Hortenzie

  They became muslim, like most Christians in Middle east and North Africa. (Just throwing it in as another possibility )

  As pertaining to Christianity I believe there was never a time when all Christians believed and practiced exactly same things. Actually before the unification efforts (and lot of tweaking and editting to make it more resonable and palatable to the educated pagans), the early Christians believed some strange and crazy things...
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  pronomono

  Thanks, itsibitsybrainbutbigenoughtosmellarat. I'll give that a read.

  In my mind true Christianity comes down to the two basic commands: love God with whole heart and soul and love your neighbor as yourself. Absolute truth is impossible in our limited capacity. And for that reason, I am very reserved when it comes to religions that claim their teachings to be such.
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  Phizzy

  The Golden Rule is not unique to Christianity, in fact it predates it by many centuries. Please read the excellent resources you have been directed to above.

  It is possible to lead a full, satisfying, meaningful and valuable life with no religious attachments whatsoever.
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  fulltimestudent

  Pronomono:

  What happened to the original Christian churches named in the Bible - Philadelphia, Thessolonica, Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, and Laodicea to name a few? One would think that since these were the original churches, if we could trace the history of these churches down to our day, we could find who is preaching truth today. Obviously this doesn't lie with JWs because it is a new religion, although I do not doubt the sincerity of their belief.

  There are two likely cases that I can see: 1) these became what is now known as the Roman Catholic Church, 2) the Roman Catholic Church was an apostate Christianity that seperated from these true churches and used their power to snuff out the true churches from history.

  Which one do you think is correct? What do you believe happened to these original churches?

  We can actually trace the history of some of those churches. However, they did not become Roman Catholic. Rome was never the centre of the early church, and after Constantine moved his capital to Constantinople (now Istanbul), the eastern section of the empire became more and more dominant. When Rome fell to the 'barbarians' the eastern empire became even more influential and the Patriarch of Constantinople gave only nominal recognition to the church in Rome. It is really true to say that the real successor of the early church is the Orthodox church.
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  jgnat

  http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/schweitzer/
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  NeverKnew

  With Christianity being a blend of Gentiles and Jews and, save for the Pentateuch, even the Jews not agreeing on the "official" canon of their own scriptures (some recognized only the Pentateuch).

  Didn't Paul tell us that it was only human to follow your preferred teacher at 1 Cor 3:4? Different voices speak to different personalities - nothing wrong with that.
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  maccauk11

  What happened was Messiah came back for them in the first centruy just as he had promised them along with the Apostles. He said he would return with his KIngdom,itwasaspiritual event that occurred afterthe destruction of jerusalem and the templein 70 AD just as Messiah said it would happen in thatgeneration. All your modern day end time delusions have missed the fulfillment of all things. It was for those faithful ones back then 2000 years ago.