/lit/ - Literature

What are the essential works to understand early Christianity?

>God made Mormons so Christians would know how Jews feel
Does Christianity do anything better than Judaism? Is it just Judaism + Jesus? What do I need to reed to be enlightened on this matter?

>>21273975
Christianity is Greek.

The most relevant part of the bible is the New Testament, wherein it spends several books explaining just how not-Jewish it is.

Although the story begins with Semitic mythologies, its essence and conclusions are fundamentally Greek.

The climax of this story is the life and death of a Semitic man, Jesus, who in an awesome display of neo-Platonic stoicism, wrestles with His ancestral faith, the laws of the state, and ultimately pursues His own death in the name of what He believed, much like Socrates before him.

When Socrates challenged the state and sacrificed himself centuries prior, we were left with the question: "But was it Good?".

Three days after Christ was murdered, we finally got our answer.

>>19624315
I'm a bit big headed so take the the next sentence aS straight...I AM not a human.

>>19209889
>Trust a Jew
Yes.

>>19160340
We're just debunking anti-Christians who are trying to psyop Christians
>>19160489
Sorry Mohammed, Jesus wasn't a gulf Arab mixed with blacks. He was a Greco-Roman-era Levantine. See >>19160126
>Make Jesus White
No, just portray him as a Roman-era Levantine, not as Osama bin Laden (a gulf Arab with black admixture)

>>18367304
Read Pope Pius XII's encyclicals.
While he wasn't a fan of National Socialism, he eventually had quite a amiable relationship with Mussolini.
Falangism is worth reading into.
Pope Pius XI too is well worth reading.
Pope Leo XIII's encyclical Rerum Novarum is basically fascist economics.
I'd also read Dante & Aquinas' political writings and Eusebius because they basically present quasi-fascistic models (albiet monarchic models that were far superior to Fascism).
I'd also really recommend Maistre and Schmitt.
The latter was the chief jurist of Nazi Germany and a devout Catholic, the former was the most vicious reactionary Catholic post-Revolutionary France.
The role of the Christian Emperor especially in Eusebius' writings is something that you can see many fascist leaders trying to embody, regardless if they were actually Christian or not - the role they fill is the same.
Integralism, to varying degrees, is also of this strain. The Social Kingship of Christ is what makes Christian variants of Fascism unique.
Here's a general list of things to read:
>Plato - Laws
>Aristotle - Politics
>Eusebius - History of the Church
>St. Thomas Aquinas - Political Writings
>Dante Aligheri - De Monarchia
>Joseph De Maistre - The Generative Principle of Political Constitutions
>Joseph De Maistre - The Pope
>Joseph De Maistre - St. Petersburg Dialouges
>Pope Leo XIII - Rerum Novarum
>Pope Pius XI - Quadragesimo anno
>Pope Pius XI - Ubi arcano Dei consilio
>Pope Pius XI - Dilectissima Nobis
>Pope Pius XI - Divini Redemptoris
>Carl Schmitt - Political Theology
>Carl Schmitt - The Concept of the Political
>Carl Schmitt - Roman Catholicism and Political Form
>Cornelius Codreanu - The Prison Notes
>Cornelius Codreanu - For my Legionnaires
>José Antonio Primo de Rivera - Anthology
>Thomas Crean, Alan Fimister - Integralism

>You are right. Holy Scripture is not preeminently "a" book, but a witness to the word of God, which was sent forth to us in Christ. This word has been written down, so that we may have something solid to support us. It is, however, not Christ's will that we read him like a book; he himself has written nothing: "My words are spirit and life." During the lifetime of the apostles and immediately afterwards, there existed no "New Testament". The apostles proclaimed the life of Christ, and they did this with their own lives. Saint Paul is not presumptuous when he says: "Observe me, Christ lives in me; imitate Christ the way I imitate him." And further: "You have accepted the word for what it really is: not my word, but the word of Christ." The word of God cannot be simply recited, but requires the testimony of a living Christian, because the Word had become flesh; and hence one has to demonstrate with one's flesh what the word is.

>And he said, "Humankind is like a wise fisherman who cast his net into the sea and drew it up from the sea full of little fish. Among them the wise fisherman discovered a fine large fish. He threw all the little fish back into the sea and with no difficulty chose the large fish. Whoever has ears to hear should hear."
-The Gospel of Thomas 8

>>17208176
You are cringe my man. Jesus is there in all days of your life. Repent

Have any books managed to give you a completely new outlook on Christianity?
I felt pulled to Christianity for a while, but no matter what I do, I just can't seem to believe in the Bible. It doesn't feel true.

is he right, lads? unironically making me question the idea christian sacrifice:

>"This is all to explain why there are so few selfless, e.g. Christ-like, Christians: to be drawn to the faith, like a political movement, requires an original act of egoism, and to remain in a faith, like a political movement, means only: the ego is at home; the self has found a home; pride may express itself. Religion cannot fully commit to its war on the ego or on pride, lest it would have no followers—though these enemies must exist as perennial mainstays of the battle-banner. To this end, we must see pride/egoism as the great pharmakon of organized religion. To put this another way: has any soul ever converted for the sole purpose of martyrdom?—that is, has any person become a Christian in order not to save their own soul, but the soul of another? Perhaps more importantly: has any soul relinquished their Christianity—in order to become truly Christ-like? The true martyr severs his link to god, a self-excommunication which stands as the Faustian bargain to save alterity, whether it be a single other, a whole society, and so forth. True martyrdom is the cancellation of its own promise: it is a sacrifice without return. If one were to barter one’s soul for another’s preservation, and barter not with God, but the devil—where would this soul, which gave up not material life, but all eternity in their sacrifice—end up? Would this soul count itself among his most favorite sheep? Would it stand condemned? The politicalization of this Faustian ethics would be something like Machiavelli’s notion that the ends justify the means along the threshold of the common good. It is a severe and harsh consequentialism that takes seriously the promise and curse of a full “deliverance.” What hero has been so poetic, so selfless, so endlessly giving—that they have given all not to be remembered, but to be forgotten?"

>>15453035
I don't deny Christ, I'm a Christian Gnostic afterall

The truth is inner light, know that nothing can separate you from the Christ within, this world is an illusion and parody of the true kingdom

Thoughts on the Pistis Sophia?

>>14245834
To love pain

>>14227599
Explain, in rational terms, why an atheist could possibly care about anything that will happen after they cease to exist? If things are worse when you leave this earth, you won’t know they are worse. Atheism is an absence of all consequence. An absence is actually a very comforting state of being. To know, to be positively certain, you can get away with anything, is a powerful sensation. The problem is everyone has doubt, they doubt if they will be punished or rewarded for their actions, or if they are a morally good person (atheists can’t be moral and if you think they can you NEED to go back) etc
So any set of ideas that eliminates doubt is a form of cope, since the most painful aspect of existence is having to make decisions. Atheism, is an abdication of the will, as is any religion. However because most religions have gods with personalities, Muslims must still ask themselves “am I interpreting the words of Allah correctly”, however an atheist doesn’t need to ask that question. An atheist is immediately free to become a vegetable and simply respond to his or her environment.

how is your prayer life?
have you had any success in your spiritual life this week?
what have been your struggles?

The Tao became flesh so that you may follow Him.

You have read the New Testament of our Lord Jesus Christ haven't you /lit/?

>>13283063
>>if I convert I'll always be LARPing
Not so, have you tried praying?

BABY I AM MONEY