Darth InSidious

Continuation of previous botherments! Sorry for the extended wait between.

53 - I agree that the crucifixion was extremely important to the Gospels. However, I think Nietzsche was talking more about the simple fact of martyrdom -- that it doesn't show one thing or another, besides the fact that people are likely to die for something they believe strongly in. I think that Nietzsche's argument is more about martyrs in general (which includes Jesus, although it's not limited to him. I'd suggest reading the source material from The Antichrist).

44 - I think we can agree on this one.

33 - Of course. When I said living like him, I meant following the general idea of his teachings - that's usually what I understand "following in his footsteps" to mean, but I digress. Sorry for the fogginess. I certainly hope that no one is going to go around declaring they're the Christ!

As for the intention, I pasted one about Kierkegaard in the chat - that faith is a passion. Perhaps it would be a sign of their intense belief that they try to throw demons out of people!

Another note is that JP2 wrote an interesting book called "Theology of the body". Now I have not read it in its entirety just yet, but I found it curious that JP2 would advance a subjective account of faith. This strikes of Kierkegaard to me, although his influences are said to be Kant and Scheler. What I am curious about, however, is: why is there no influence of ordinary language philosophy, which had been the VERY dominant philosophical school up until that time (the 70's)? It seems to me, on the face of it, that OL would have been much better than phenomenology in offering an explanation of the subjective experience. Well, I suppose that Humani Generis was well known to JP2 and he didn't want to use a philosophical school that was so new. Still...