Dec 7, 2015
Show notes can be found here:
http://tparkatheist.blogspot.com/2015/12/episode-0077-men-without-heads.html
This episode is part two of the chapter "Why Christianity
Prospered" from Bible
Myths and Their Parallels in Other Religions by TW
Doane. In this chapter we learn about a Buddhist prophecy
from 600 BCE which could be used to predict the birth of Jebus, as
well as the birth of Joseph Smith!!!! (Actually, however,
you'll see that the prophecy could be used to predict any number of
religious nutters, and has really no meaning at all.) Doane
lays out the case that the Essenes (who were known by a number of
different names in ancient times) were Buddhists who later became
Christians because they had a prophecy which "predicted" the
appearance of Jebus. Doane discusses other contenders for the
throne of 1st Messiah, and then proceeds to quote various church
fathers who happily admitted to lying if they thought it would help
spread the gospel. One of them St. Augustine even claimed to
have preached a sermon to a race of people who had no
heads!
There will be a part 3 to this chapter, if not a part
4, and I apologize for the sound quality of the episode, but as I
explain in the beginning of the podcast there were some problems
with setting up my new PC.