h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

A interesting story to read but Cannibal comes from the semitic root canni-bal or priest of baal. First cetury Christians were accused of cannibalism because of the words used during the communion feast and "this is my body... this is my blood." When combined with the magical (and pagan) beliefs that the priest could in fact change the communion elements into the body and blood of our savior, this image was used ignorantly as the aphorism to describe those Carribeans.

I think the similarity to 'baal' is more of a coincidence. It was Columbus who coined the word 'caribales' to denote the inhabitants of the Carribean and in a closer sense, their habits. Later on this shifted to 'cannibales'.

Well, I had this (and more) in the original version but the Editors chose to leave it out

Please see also F64916?thread=108721 and A499322

I have noted the previous string and been through that logic a long time ago.

The passover as celibrated in Jerusalem at the time of the "Crucifixion" had been celibrated for around 1500 years. The truly unique thing about the "last supper" was the identification of Jesus as the Lamb Slain from the foundation of the world. Every year the Jews ate the roasted lamb they drank wine, and in a real sense that last supper noted the final fulfillment of the earlier promise God had made. All those lambs were like paper money (in heaven) backed up by the real gold of Jesus' sacrifice on the cross. Like the pound note or the dollar bill there is no inherent value except the power that backs it up. In the case of Jesus, his value was worth enough to pay for all the sins. Unlike the lambs who just stood in for Jesus.

In the Old Testament the worth of a life was in the blood. The blood of the pascal lamb was put on the door post as a sign. The wine was drunk to place it near our hearts where the New covenant was kept. According to the seder, the cup of redemption (the third drinking during the ceremony)was the one that was traditionally celebrated during our communion. Thus the eating and drinking were never more than symbols inspite of what the catholics may have said.

The hocus pocus was added so much later that there isn't any valid point in including it except to compete with local pagans in their ceremonies, and what they claimed they could do.

Chris Columbus was a catholic and knew the traditions, followed them and the local natives called themselves "caribs" not "cannibs" not a phonetically close proximity. However, whatever turns your clock. I guess we can agree to disagree on this one.

There's also the fact that often the wine they drank (in biblical times) was often called "new wine" as it was freshly made. In other words it hadn't fermeted or aged into the alcoholic beverage we are familiar with today. In essence it was grape juice. The bread and wine are symbolic of the body and blood of Christ just as the lamb was symbolic of the sacrifice that Christ was to make on the cross. Remember they offered up lambs as sacrifices for many years before Christ came to fulfill the promise.

And Christ isn't actually his proper name, but a title. Christ comes from the greek word Christos which means, "annointed one." Since only a king is annointed it's a way of acknowledging that Jesus is both God the father and God the son. Jesus wasn't actually his name either, but a translation of his name from the hebrew. His actual name (according to a minister I know) is close to Joshua so that some see the Joshua in the exodus (the time of Moses) as being like a forerunner before God became flesh. Many words in the Bible are not easily translated into english so that the translators often pick the word that comes closest in meaning.

For example "Thou shalt not kill" doesn't mean you aren't allowed to defend yourself. The actual meaning is ,"thou shalt not murder." If someone comes at you with a weapon and you have to kill or be killed the Bible doesn't have a problem with that. It's when you pull out a gun and shoot someone for no reason that you get into trouble.

Sorry, I didn't mean to ramble on. The point is there is the apparent surface meaning to things in the Bible, and then there is the deeper meaning that requires study to understand.