Sorry friends its late and the last poll was wrong this one has the correct answers.

gravity says no.... (and in my case... so does the 200 pounds im hefting)

I say that the thought is rediculous simply because there was/is only one Messiah and I have a distinct feeling I'm not him.

Sadly, walking on water is only possible with:

1) unnatural buoyancy
2) an extremely loose definition of "water"
3) divine parenthood

If I'm the Messiah, the world is royally boned. I do like the underlying thought here - as Jesus was human, humanity is divine (What can I say? I'm a humanist.) but it's the same premise of superheroes. If everyone was Superman, we wouldn't need someone to protect us from Lex Luthor.

Get my point?

If everyone was Superman, we'd have Congress debating kryptonite control and kryptonite registration and a ban on assault kryptonite.

Well, half-human. And doubtless the Holy Ghost's genes were dominant...

Wait till it freezes, then try.

That'd depend on if you're a Basilisk Lizard now wouldn't it?!?

Well, yeah Commie, but that goes without saying. And Ri, I think you got my point, which, for those who can't tell was that my humanistic tendnecies like the thoughts of equality with God (you know, God is in oneself as much as he is an external presence which is a whole helluva lot. Yeah, I'm Christian) but don't think that it's true.

doesnt it say that man was created in gods image? Are we not all the children of god? maybe just maybe jesus was just the first to realize this.

It's a difficult question for me.

You can break it down into this:

Can I walk on water? No.

Do I believe that I ever could walk on water (when it's not frozen)? No.

Do I believe that a messiah could walk on water? No.

So if that was the question, then my answer is 'no'.

However, that was not the question on the poll itself, that was whether we could all have the power of a messiah. I consider those powers to be strength of leadership and intuition for making right decisions at a level that many others would consider divine, and if that is the question then I believe that, yes, we do all have the potential to be a messiah.

someone got it and it was mata. the question i asked was all a matter of interpritation. it all depended on how an individual would interpret it. to some it was a joke and others and infathomable question. But to some it was an idea that they wouldnt have thought of before or not for a long while. now the thought is there. remember to expand your mind and life "Just Wonder"......

'Sometimes there are rules that apply without our knowing.'

Yes we are created in his image, but not in body. We are in his image because of our souls.

I always thought, without solid reasoning, that we could all do what we wanted. I really don't think, although it seems like it, that we've got the physics of the universe figured any more than we ourselves can see the edge (or not) of it. It's a very big thought to start on, looking at it like that. The whole "there is no spoon" thing almost relates to what I'm trying to say.

So yeah, if you truly believed you could walk on water, I reckon you could. It's just that, living in a world where our knowledge of how things work is impressed on us as soon as we're born, there's no chance for our minds to break from that.

If a kid was born in a mountain hut, to parents that truly believed you could do anything, if you believed in it...if they taught them that from birth, lived believing in it...would the kid be able to do things some of us couldn't, really believing in the fact he could??

He would be able to do some things, but I don't believe walking on water would be one of them. As far as we know it, there is no way that the mind can influence the interaction between the molecules of our feet and the water, and the forces of gravity, cohesion and electromagnetism.

It's possible that we can walk on water, but when we get down to it, it's unlikely that it'll be due to mind power.

I always thought man created god in his own image, not the other way round.

This could lead to a very interesting theological debate.

Its all going to hinge on an individuals understanding and idea of just what/who 'god' is I guess, and as that is dependant on each one of us I'd say there were no right or wrong answer.

Hummm - I'm gonna get a coffee and call a christian friend of mine for a chat, we'll enjoy chewing over this one.

The Bible says God created Man, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's true...

I'm a member of the 'confus[ed|ing]' religion meaning that I'm not quite sure (agnostic). But in the end I think some bits are really stupid (Atheistic) but others are really quite cool (theistic) and that religion's not quite right but is generally a good idea...

Anyways, this all ends up with me probably not believing in God as conservative Christians would say.

Erm, well, the traditional view on that was that Jesus was wholy human and wholy divine at the same time...

So you're both wrong.

jesus was flesh and bone yet he could perform these miracles.

How many of you remember reading about the days when the earth was thought to be flat? but yet it was found to be round and that sailing to the end of the sea did not mean you would fall off. How does one walk across burning hot coles and not get burnt? how our fakiers able to slow or stop there bodily functions? how does a bear sleep through winter without eating for months? if all of these are possible is my idea so strange and improbable?.......JustWondering?

Um, the things aren't even in the same category. First off, no one alive remembers the days when the world was thought of as flat ( ), but the concept of a flatworld has now proven to be preposterous, so I'm not sure of your point. Anyway, walking across hot coals is a result of two things 1) sweaty soles, which cause a microscopic layer of insulation between the sole of the foot and the foot, and 2) the higher corticol ability of your brain to override its own pain perception, which is pretty well documented. As for fakirs being able to slow (not stop -- they simply slow bodily functions to the point that the average observer can't detect them) their heartbeat and what not, it's really a matter of again using your higher corticol function to slow the autonomic processes of your brain (read: your brain is a very powerful organ in coordinating body functions). A bear sleeps through winter by having enormous stores of fat that it slowly uses while staying in a state of hibernation (remarkably like the fakirs, above) where metabolic processes are slowed dramatically. Also, it's a fallacy that bears sleep the entire winter -- it's well known that they will periodically rouse from hibernation if required to get more food.

So, all the things you mention have a plausible and well-documented scientific reason as to why they happen.

Walking on water does not.

Therefore, the two do not equate. Walking on water remains impossible in lieu of divine intervention.

I used walking on water for the reason of makeing a point. But you have helped me prove this point a good bit. And i would agree that no one alive would remember when the earth was thought to be flat thats why i said "reading of it". But the point i was trying to make was that with the power of our minds we can do most anything if not everything. Wich is why i gave such example's. You yourself found (Maybe accidently) a conection between the bears and the fakirs. and you stated many facts as to why we can walk on coles and slow our bodliy functions. Now why cant we take that a step farther, I'm sure that once upon a time all that i wrote of and you had a scientific reason for was thought to be a miracle.......

Just wondering does god have a body or is he/she just a soul, a thought, A power or more?

so in theory of what your saying the traditional veiw is. Then jesus exsisted on 2 planes of exsistence at one time is that not impossible? or can it just be that we havent gotten that far yet or have we just stopped trying?

what about other religions? isnt there something about a dali lama somewhere?

This poll has gone farther than i first imagined it would have and for that i must thank everyone who has lent and idea to it. I am glad that it has become more than i originaly intended. My entire reason for joining this site was to fire off the ideas that have been in my head for years now. I love the fact that i have been able to help some of you and that many of you have helped me. I am also indebted to say that without all of you none of my off the wall thoughts and visions would have ment even a fraction as much as they do now. ty to all who have taken the poll and may this last for as long as it can.

Well until the next reply to my poll or my next far out thought I'm "insert catch phrase here" JustWondering.......

But until we do have scientific reason, it will be a miracle. The thing is, just because things have been proven wrong in the past does not mean everything is wrong - that's over-extrapolation.
We can't take it a step further because the brain regulates body processes, not the laws of physics. The only way to walk on water that we know of would be to be bouyant enough, and even then it's not true walking - just floating.

Perhaps if there was some way of preventing the water molecules moving out of the way of our feet then we'd be able to walk on water, but the brain cannot do that.
Perhaps the brain could regulate gases in our blood and stomach, though, so that we could float, in the same way that a fish uses its swim bladder to move up and down in water.

Well I saw an amusing little show called brainiac where they asked this question but to do so they had to add a load of custard (or you americans call it pudding) mix to the water first

Erm, no... Jesus existing as both fully man and fully God at the same time is something defined by the ancient church in the Definition of Chalcedon(click). We're talking about a time when "planes of existence" were not a viable concept (and I would argue they seem more a fantasy in today's world as well...) Also, you seem to be heading in the direction that we're all divine, or something, which would be considered heresy by this same church. (The Only-Begotten Son of God)

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Sorry about the people being alive and reading thing... it was late and I misread your post.

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Not very likely, unless we reach the next stage of evolution ... and seeing as how there's no selective pressure in that direction...

Yes, but I reckon it's more possible than defying "physics"....

Very, very true. The point is, unless you've got some sort of way of contravening the laws of physics (i.e., if there is some sort of God who can override the very laws of the universe, or you're walking on water very close to a black hole in which some of the laws of physics appear to become warped... but, by then, you'd be a very squished person, *or* quantum physics kicked in on a massive scale unlike the which has never been observed in history (which is highly highly unlikely)), no, you won't be able to walk on water.

did'nt god create the universe? didnt he give man the ability to create and procreate? did'nt he give man freewill and the ability to learn and grow and become more than what we are? when he created the angel's he made them perfect and devine, yet they could not grow or evolve in any way shape or form. they were what he made them and that was it. yet in man god gave us these other ability's and we have taken them for granted. they are devine in thetre own ways. a child's conception is creation wich is godly and devine. And once again i will say that the whole "walking on water" annology was just that an annology. But it has served it's purpose well. And i would like to point one thing out. You say that my theory would be herasy but you used the term "evolution" and as i recall in the church's eye's that was herasy as well.

The purpose of the Messiah was to deliver the new Word, and to sacrifice Himself in order to redeem humanity of its sin so that we may enter Heaven. I know I'm not capable of that, and I don't know anybody who is. So my answer remains 'no'.

It's my understanding that the soul is made up of imagination, freewill, and reasoning. No other life form on earth has any of these aspects. Unfortunately, we have abused these through sin. So therefore we are not divine because of our impurities. But perhaps a soul who is as divine as Jesus's was could walk on water. But such a case is next to impossible.

Erm, what Sean said. Humanity has never been understood to be divine, perhaps as containing a spark of the divine, but there's a big difference. Jesus *was* God. As far as I know, no one else can measure up to that claim, yanno?

And I was talking about the ancient church, to which a concept of evolution had never occurred, so no, it wasn't heresy at the time (although, it was considered so many years later), but that's beside the point. If you want to change the definition of Jesus to be... well, whatever you want, that's fine. Go ahead. I was simply making a snide comment that Jesus wasn't half-God with Dominant Divine Genes ™ like Commie was saying. Because of the Chalcedonian formula. Y'know. Nevermind.

Jesus is God. How do we know? The Bible says so. Who wrote the Bible? God. Who is God? The creator. How do we know? The Bible says so.

Does anyone else see a problem in this line of reasoning? or, maybe this line of reasoning makes more sense:

The Bible is the Holy word of God, and must never be questioned. How do we know this? The Bible says so.

Erm, I wasn't actually claiming *I* believe Jesus was God... that's a matter of faith that's neither here nor there. I was saying the only way taht the only way that Jesus could have walked on water (which I personally doubt, but anyway) was 1) he was God as traditional Christianity has claimed, or 2) he was a space alien.

You become a Christian through faith. At some point you have to forget reason and (as my minister put it) step out like Indiana Jones onto his test of faith. And hope you don't go AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASPLAT!

Basically, the most conservative Christians you meet will not question the Bible. I believe this is, frankly, quite stupid, seeing as there's so much irrelevant c*** in the old testament, and indeed some in the new. This is due to the time, not necessarily God's wishes.

Liberals, on the other hand, tend to take the view that the Bible is not infallible (A good idea, since it contradicts itself so often) and that it was written by people. Not be Jesus, God or any divine force - it was God speaking through man, but man is imperfect, and in the end it was he who wrote the Bible.



Well, unfortunately I didn't take this as an 'analogy.' Perhaps you meant example? I can't think of much akin to this - just general miracle working?
Perhaps all of these can be God given, but I'm too humanist to believe it. It's my opinion that Jesus' miracles worked by people believing he would heal them, so they got better themselves. This is not miracle-working, this is psychology - the placebo effect.

"The Bible is the Holy word of God, and must never be questioned. How do we know this? The Bible says so." qoute of quoth the raven.

so it's the holy word and must not be question'd, but then why did god give man freewill? Why do we have the power to ask questions if we are not suposed to?

So god wrote the bible in his own hand? he used parchment and ink and sat down and wrote this great text we call the bible. Or was it a human, a man who wrote down the words of god? if this is the case then is it not what this human interpreted the word of god to be? So wouldnt the whole bible be interpritation?

Was jesus god? i have always heard he was the son of god, so how can he be god?

How did he heal those he touched? did they heal themselves? Maybe but how does one heal him or herself of a terminal deseise? how does one make one's self rise from the dead?

......Justwondering

Yeah, I think that that was the paradox Quoth was trying to point out...



Traditional interpretation: God wrote the Bible through the hands of men.



That would be the concept called the Trinity. God in three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.



Um, that would be another case of divine intervention...

In the past humanity beleived itself to be the children of god. In every religion we were, are, and will always be his children. my daughter has my eye's. she has my hair color, she even acts a lot like i did as a child. she has a lot of her mothers fetures as well. genetics is a funny thing and i dont claim to know much about it but what i do know is that the parents pass on genes to the child giving that child looks from th parents, some behaviuors, even certain gifts. I was blessed with a immune system from wich i have never gotten more than a slight sniffle. my daughter has the same and has yet to ever get sick. all that was for this. if our children have these gifts from us. then why wouldnt we have gotten some from our holy father? who's to say that the devine spark is'nt within all of us? a gift passed on from god to his chilrden who he loved so much that he gave his only begotten son. so who knows maybe we do have these gifts this spark when our we going to open ourselves to it?

Mmm, it's true that the Christian faith has always said that all people are children of God. However, traditionally there has always been a distinction between that and the Son of God (which, in terms of the Trinity, ~is~ God, or at least one of the three Persons).

The claim you seem to be making is that basically every person is divine at their core, and not different than Jesus was, except perhaps that Jesus himself understood his divinity better than other people. Fine, I can see where that belief comes from... myself, I hover somewhere near that point in my beliefs... but realize it's definately not a traditional Christian view. The only way that that would work, with what you're proposing, (that any person could walk on water) requires Faith (to move mountains...) and a Divine Intervention. Ie. you can't walk on water by yourself, you have to have God step in and intervene in the natural order of things.

Does'nt it say somewhere that god is in us all? that each of us has a small peice of god's divinity in us? so then maybe what i have been saying for days is possible with just our own power and that small peice of him/her/allmighty in us. maybe he put those shards of power in us and maybe jesus was'nt suposed to die for our sins but to teach us that we all have this gift and that we should be using it. I know I know the church is gonna be pissed and i may be wrong but at least i have the freewill to ask...........Justwondering....

Sure, you have the free will to ask. Question away! I like questioning established doctrine, it's a favourite pasttime of mine.

The Bible doesn't say that there's a piece of God's divinity in us, no, that's but an interpretation... it says that God made us in his image, that's about the closest thing you can get to that. That can be interpretted in any number of ways. One, which the mystics are quite fond of, is the concept of the divine spark within us all... so that's where you're coming from.

But regardless, people can't walk on water. It's breaking the law of physics. Unless we have some ability to magically change the universe, that ain't going to change.

I always interpreted being made in His image to mean the gift of sentience, separating us from nonhumans. The Bible also implies that on those occasions when God walked the Earth, He took human form - perhaps we are literally made in His image: we look like Him.

You say the laws of physics. the laws that we created, the laws as to wich we set our own limitations. If we can make admendments to other laws why not the laws of physics. Why must we settle for what we have been told? Why do we have to go along with original thought? there has'nt been an original thought since the first thought, we have just built upon it and in doing so stop ourselves from taking that step forward. I say beleive the unbeleivable test the boundaries of freewill and think not outside the box, but outside what we have been told we are and see what we can be. the future is ours now lets make it something we want........

It's all very well saying "This isn't impossible, that's just what we've been told" but scientific experiment has found this to be so - it's not just that some randomer said "Walking on water's weird - it must be impossible."

Possibility was not invented to restrict you - it was invented to explain the world and universe around us.

The explanations end up describing why things happen, and with that you find that some things are not possible. For example, we explain electricity with electrons. This shows why metals are good conductors - they have free electrons. The fact that a plastic does not conduct <well> is not because it's been told it cannot, but because it doesn't have the free electrons (Or rather, free charged particles - it doesn't have to be electrons).

Thinking 'outside the box' may open up new ideas challenging current ones, but thinking 'The laws of physics are restrictive - they're wrong' is simply not the way to go about it. You may want to find out whether it's really possible to walk on water - therefore you conduct an experiment. So far, we have no evidence other than Jesus that it's possible to do this. Therefore we can assume Jesus was an anomaly in our results and either a) repeat until concordant or assume that the rest of our evidence is correct and get to the next idea.

You may not like the explanations of the world because they're 'restrictive' but that appears to be the way things are - not that someone decided that that was what we should be able to do.

I just think you're all looking at it too seriously. Ever read Tom Holt? Try it. Brilliance. I mean, maybe all these proofs were stuck there by a higher intelligence than us. Just because we've determined we know no way of doing something, doesn't mean it can't be done.
It's kind of arrogant of us, as the human race, to always assume we've proved things.
I mean, no-one 2000 years ago, looking at the moon, would have believed that it was possible for us to fly in machines in the air, let alone to the moon. Or possibly even what a machine was.
Ok, flame me now. I'm tired, and this is shoddily constructed. Just my thoughts, that's all