Christmas Cheer from Palestine, Birthplace of Jesus

Originally posted by svmpua

Originally posted by DarknStormy
reply to post by svmpua

 

I'm not interested, but what does your whinging have to do with Christmas in Bethlehem and why is it such a bad thing to discuss Palestinians enjoying Christmas?

My original post had nothing to do with Palestinians enjoying Christmas.
So your question is baseless.

edit on 26-12-2012 by svmpua because: (no reason given)

The heading of this thread is - Christmas Cheer from Palestine, Birthplace of Jesus, not Can someone tell me why I cannot see Pro-Israel pages in the featured threads even though there are no Pro-Palestinian threads there either right now?

You question from the start is baseless because it has nothing to do with the topic in this thread. But hey, keep replying, the three pages of nothing will continue bumping up the replies and it may keep the thread there for a week or so

Why don't you 2 get a room and let this topic continue? The subject is Palestinians wishing Christians a good Christmas.

reply to post by intrepid


Hi mod.
I know you understand what I had to say.Thanks for the reply as it made me understand that you atleast saw the post.Now its up to you.
Merry Christmas to Palestine/Israel and all of you.

Originally posted by svmpua

Originally posted by princeofpeace
Where is Palestine? I know of no such country.

Me neither,

Here, let me help you guys out a little:

After upgrading status, UN officially switches from ‘Palestine’ to ‘State of Palestine’

While legislative scholars and political pundits continue to debate the exact meaning of the upgrade of the Palestinians to a nonmember observer state, the United Nations last week officially changed the way it refers to the body: it’s now the “State of Palestine,” as opposed to merely “Palestine.”

State of Israel, meet the State of Palestine...

You are welcome

Now may we please get back on topic?

Originally posted by buster2010
No permits for people between the ages of 16 and 35? What kind of moronic logic is that based on.

The age group that the majority of militants/soldiers fit into? Not really moronic logic, more like iron-fisted logic.

Originally posted by Corruption Exposed

Originally posted by svmpua

Originally posted by princeofpeace
Where is Palestine? I know of no such country.

Me neither,

Here, let me help you guys out a little:

After upgrading status, UN officially switches from ‘Palestine’ to ‘State of Palestine’

While legislative scholars and political pundits continue to debate the exact meaning of the upgrade of the Palestinians to a nonmember observer state, the United Nations last week officially changed the way it refers to the body: it’s now the “State of Palestine,” as opposed to merely “Palestine.”

State of Israel, meet the State of Palestine...

You are welcome

Now may we please get back on topic?

I appreciate your trying to help but when I click on the link,it says "Page not found".

Maybe you are reffering to THIS

Your welcome

reply to post by Corruption Exposed

reply to post by DarknStormy


Palestine never existed prior.

Originally posted by xszawe
op went fishing
and caught lots of fish

Agreed but what he and the Palestinians fail to realise that what they are celebrating is the birth of a Jew!

Now that's funny

Originally posted by DOLCOTT
reply to post by DarknStormy

 

Palestine never existed prior.

Thats like me saying "Merry Christmas and have a happy"

Originally posted by Hongkongphooey

Originally posted by xszawe
op went fishing
and caught lots of fish

Agreed but what he and the Palestinians fail to realise that what they are celebrating is the birth of a Jew!

Now that's funny

Not as funny as this fact from Bethlehem.

The town is inhabited by one of the oldest Christian communities in the world.

Originally posted by DarknStormy

Originally posted by Hongkongphooey

Originally posted by xszawe
op went fishing
and caught lots of fish

Agreed but what he and the Palestinians fail to realise that what they are celebrating is the birth of a Jew!

Now that's funny

Not as funny as this fact from Bethlehem.

The town is inhabited by one of the oldest Christian communities in the world.

Your point? The OP is not supporting Christians and the arguments are not about Christians, the thread has been used to argue (pointlessly) about whether Jesus was born in Palestinian or Jewish territory,but the point is mute because he was neither Christian nor Palestinian - Yeshua ben Yosef was a Jew, Jesus Christ was a Roman invention 300 + years after his death. What does any of this matter other than this date is an excuse for the world to enjoy the festivities however they see fit and to perhaps think of peace and what could be! yet all we have on ATS is more hatred and infighting between supposedly enlightened members who should know better and see through all the BS, PR and politics of all sides (Christian, Muslim & Jewish).

I hope everyone had a happy and enjoyable Xmas no matter where you are and wish you all a wonderful, healthy, and exciting new year which see's peace break out throughout the world and humanity embrace our brothers and sisters, waking up to who we really are and living up to our full potential! Love to you all, no matter what your race or religion, remember we are all HUMAN x

I enjoyed Christmas with my kids and then went round a pals house and had a good natter, watched a movie and talked some more about life in general.

As a Muslim I am bringing up my children to respect all religions so when I said Merry Christmas to my neighbours I did out of respect and to greet my neighbour acknowledging the festive day.

On Eid we gave out food to our neighbours making them aware it was Eid however most already knew which came as a surprise to me (and a relief).

That's what it should be about, mutual respect and understanding. I have made a point to explain to my kids the different faiths that they are exposed to like Judaism, Christianity and Hinduism because my eldest has friends from all of those denominations and those that are not religious (so I have made a point to tell him they he is no different to my son).

Children are great like that, they don't need dress stuff up with a layer of BS, they are just plain honest and blunt about everything.

So a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to my fellow Christian ATS members and (a Happy New Year to everyone else!).

Peace

Originally posted by Hongkongphooey
Your point?

You seem to think Palestinians don't realise they are worshipping a Jewish man. Maybe it doesn't matter what background he has. Maybe they just believe in him because of his teachings. The point is, not all Palestinians are Muslims.

The consensus of scholars is that neither of the nativity stories in Matthew and Luke is likely to be historically true. For this reason, Uta Ranke-Heinemann (Putting Away Childish Things) says that he was probably born in Nazareth.

wiki.answers.com...

Nazareth (pron.: /ˈnæzərəθ/; Hebrew: נָצְרַתNatzeret; Arabic: اَلنَّاصِرَة‎ an-Nāṣira or an-Naseriyye) is the largest city in the North District of Israel. Nazareth is known as "the Arab capital of Israel";

en.wikipedia.org...

Christmas is really a mixture of various pagan festivals in a thin guise of Christianity, reinvented by Coca Cola, it has become a tradition, I sort of celebrate it as in gifts and family dinner etc but the whole blindly following and giving to chain stores and multinationals that certainly don't need it, sort of churns my stomach and is really anathema to the supposed 'message' of kindness and holiness it is supposed to portray. Especially when Saturnalia, was about force feeding and torturing a victim until they died. Not nice, but if you even suggest the REALITY of the tradition and how it came about, you can almost guarantee it wouldn't be taken well.
www.simpletoremember.com...

E. The DePascha Computus, an anonymous document believed to have been written in North Africa around 243 CE, placed Jesus birth on March 28. Clement, a bishop of Alexandria (d. ca. 215 CE), thought Jesus was born on November 18. Based on historical records, Fitzmyer guesses that Jesus birth occurred on September 11, 3 BCE.

II. How Did Christmas Come to Be Celebrated on December 25?

A. Roman pagans first introduced the holiday of Saturnalia, a week long period of lawlessness celebrated between December 17-25. During this period, Roman courts were closed, and Roman law dictated that no one could be punished for damaging property or injuring people during the weeklong celebration. The festival began when Roman authorities chose “an enemy of the Roman people” to represent the “Lord of Misrule.” Each Roman community selected a victim whom they forced to indulge in food and other physical pleasures throughout the week. At the festival’s conclusion, December 25th, Roman authorities believed they were destroying the forces of darkness by brutally murdering this innocent man or woman.

B. The ancient Greek writer poet and historian Lucian (in his dialogue entitled Saturnalia) describes the festival’s observance in his time. In addition to human sacrifice, he mentions these customs: widespread intoxication; going from house to house while singing naked; rape and other sexual license; and consuming human-shaped biscuits (still produced in some English and most German bakeries during the Christmas season).

C. In the 4th century CE, Christianity imported the Saturnalia festival hoping to take the pagan masses in with it. Christian leaders succeeded in converting to Christianity large numbers of pagans by promising them that they could continue to celebrate the Saturnalia as Christians.[2]

D. The problem was that there was nothing intrinsically Christian about Saturnalia. To remedy this, these Christian leaders named Saturnalia’s concluding day, December 25th, to be Jesus’ birthday.
E. Christians had little success, however, refining the practices of Saturnalia. As Stephen Nissenbaum, professor history at the University of Massachussetts, Amherst, writes, “In return for ensuring massive observance of the anniversary of the Savior’s birth by assigning it to this resonant date, the Church for its part tacitly agreed to allow the holiday to be celebrated more or less the way it had always been.” The earliest Christmas holidays were celebrated by drinking, sexual indulgence, singing naked in the streets (a precursor of modern caroling), etc.

F. The Reverend Increase Mather of Boston observed in 1687 that “the early Christians who first observed the Nativity on December 25 did not do so thinking that Christ was born in that Month, but because the Heathens’ Saturnalia was at that time kept in Rome, and they were willing to have those Pagan Holidays metamorphosed into Christian ones.”[3] Because of its known pagan origin, Christmas was banned by the Puritans and its observance was illegal in Massachusetts between 1659 and 1681.[4] However, Christmas was and still is celebrated by most Christians.

G. Some of the most depraved customs of the Saturnalia carnival were intentionally revived by the Catholic Church in 1466 when Pope Paul II, for the amusement of his Roman citizens, forced Jews to race naked through the streets of the city. An eyewitness account reports, “Before they were to run, the Jews were richly fed, so as to make the race more difficult for them and at the same time more amusing for spectators. They ran… amid Rome’s taunting shrieks and peals of laughter, while the Holy Father stood upon a richly ornamented balcony and laughed heartily.”

H. As part of the Saturnalia carnival throughout the 18th and 19th centuries CE, rabbis of the ghetto in Rome were forced to wear clownish outfits and march through the city streets to the jeers of the crowd, pelted by a variety of missiles. When the Jewish community of Rome sent a petition in1836 to Pope Gregory XVI begging him to stop the annual Saturnalia abuse of the Jewish community, he responded, “It is not opportune to make any innovation.”[6] On December 25, 1881, Christian leaders whipped the Polish masses into Antisemitic frenzies that led to riots across the country.

edit on 26-12-2012 by theabsolutetruth because: (no reason given)

Originally posted by intrepid
Why don't you 2 get a room and let this topic continue? The subject is Palestinians wishing Christians a good Christmas.

I second that. I skipped right through the "Palestinian Politics" pissing contest.

This sort of holiday behavior which was the original topic of the thread ought to be seen more often by Christians, but the political pissing matches seem to get in the way, seemingly by design on someone's part, probably to prevent and obscure just such sightings.

I was recently treated to the spectacle of Christian reactions to a Muslim wishing them well at Christmas time, up to and including the exchange of gifts. I heard a lot of "butbutbut... your a Muslim!"

It sort of made me wonder just WHO is losing sight of the intent behind the season... It seems that all too many are marching to the pipes of a Pied Piper, and not looking and thinking for themselves.

Folks really CAN get along, if they ever develop the fortitude to walk their own paths, rather than letting someone else point the way.

reply to post by theabsolutetruth


There is a dark side to many modern traditions (which incidentally have pagan roots).

The supposed cheer and gift giving origins of Christmas
www.simpletoremember.com...

A. The Origin of Christmas Tree Just as early Christians recruited Roman pagans by associating Christmas with the Saturnalia, so too worshippers of the Asheira cult and its offshoots were recruited by the Church sanctioning “Christmas Trees”.[7] Pagans had long worshipped trees in the forest, or brought them into their homes and decorated them, and this observance was adopted and painted with a Christian veneer by the Church.
B. The Origin of Mistletoe Norse mythology recounts how the god Balder was killed using a mistletoe arrow by his rival god Hoder while fighting for the female Nanna. Druid rituals use mistletoe to poison their human sacrificial victim.[8] The Christian custom of “kissing under the mistletoe” is a later synthesis of the sexual license of Saturnalia with the Druidic sacrificial cult.[9]
C. The Origin of Christmas Presents In pre-Christian Rome, the emperors compelled their most despised citizens to bring offerings and gifts during the Saturnalia (in December) and Kalends (in January). Later, this ritual expanded to include gift-giving among the general populace. The Catholic Church gave this custom a Christian flavor by re-rooting it in the supposed gift-giving of Saint Nicholas (see below).[10]

D. The Origin of Santa Claus
a. Nicholas was born in Parara, Turkey in 270 CE and later became Bishop of Myra. He died in 345 CE on December 6th. He was only named a saint in the 19th century.
b. Nicholas was among the most senior bishops who convened the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE and created the New Testament. The text they produced portrayed Jews as “the children of the devil”[11] who sentenced Jesus to death.
c. In 1087, a group of sailors who idolized Nicholas moved his bones from Turkey to a sanctuary in Bari, Italy. There Nicholas supplanted a female boon-giving deity called The Grandmother, or Pasqua Epiphania, who used to fill the children's stockings with her gifts. The Grandmother was ousted from her shrine at Bari, which became the center of the Nicholas cult. Members of this group gave each other gifts during a pageant they conducted annually on the anniversary of Nicholas’ death, December 6.
d. The Nicholas cult spread north until it was adopted by German and Celtic pagans. These groups worshipped a pantheon led by Woden –their chief god and the father of Thor, Balder, and Tiw. Woden had a long, white beard and rode a horse through the heavens one evening each Autumn. When Nicholas merged with Woden, he shed his Mediterranean appearance, grew a beard, mounted a flying horse, rescheduled his flight for December, and donned heavy winter clothing.
e. In a bid for pagan adherents in Northern Europe, the Catholic Church adopted the Nicholas cult and taught that he did (and they should) distribute gifts on December 25th instead of December 6th.
f. In 1809, the novelist Washington Irving (most famous his The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Rip Van Winkle) wrote a satire of Dutch culture entitled Knickerbocker History. The satire refers several times to the white bearded, flying-horse riding Saint Nicholas using his Dutch name, Santa Claus.
g. Dr. Clement Moore, a professor at Union Seminary, read Knickerbocker History, and in 1822 he published a poem based on the character Santa Claus: “Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, in the hope that Saint Nicholas soon would be there…” Moore innovated by portraying a Santa with eight reindeer who descended through chimneys.
h. The Bavarian illustrator Thomas Nast almost completed the modern picture of Santa Claus. From 1862 through 1886, based on Moore’s poem, Nast drew more than 2,200 cartoon images of Santa for Harper’s Weekly. Before Nast, Saint Nicholas had been pictured as everything from a stern looking bishop to a gnome-like figure in a frock. Nast also gave Santa a home at the North Pole, his workshop filled with elves, and his list of the good and bad children of the world. All Santa was missing was his red outfit.
i. In 1931, the Coca Cola Corporation contracted the Swedish commercial artist Haddon Sundblom to create a coke-drinking Santa. Sundblom modeled his Santa on his friend Lou Prentice, chosen for his cheerful, chubby face. The corporation insisted that Santa’s fur-trimmed suit be bright, Coca Cola red. And Santa was born – a blend of Christian crusader, pagan god, and commercial idol.

reply to post by old_god


I know that, doesn't make it feel any better when their origins are exposed.