Merged Topic - Historical Reliability of the Gospels

[Randy Carson]

What are you tring to do, Randy? Increase your post count? Split your response only to get them to come below the posting limit. Fucksake.

No, it's really annoying responding to these epic posts. You probably don't like responding to mine. So, for simplicity and ease of use, I'm breaking them up into single concept chunks. Like this.

[Hakurei Reimu]

No, it's really annoying responding to these epic posts. You probably don't like responding to mine. So, for simplicity and ease of use, I'm breaking them up into single concept chunks. Like this.

Fine. Your only task now is to defend the scientific possibility of the resurrection. Until you do so, that's the elephant in the room sitting on your claims for the historical reliability of the NT.

[Randy Carson]

I've really run out of patience with you. You are making the case of believing that the bible is a book that may be relied on when it tells you (amongst other things) that the resurrection is a thing. That's the lynchpin of your entire faith, isn't it? The claim that a man came back from the dead two thousand years ago after three days being dead. To you, it seems more likely that a man came back from the dead after being stone cold for three days, than the stack of manuscripts that tells such a tale is just wrong.

Actually, I'm a Catholic, so I don't rely on the Bible to tell me that. I have Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition and the Magisterium of an infallible Church. If every Bible on the planet were to vanish tomorrow, the authority of the Catholic Church, and my faith, would be unfazed.

There is nothing in science that supports the resurrection. We know too much about biochemistry, about the process of death, for this claim to be credible in any context. Even if we were to find a way to resurrect a body after three days of being dead, it would take whizz-bang technology unavailable to ancient Judea. Even in philosophy, where we can propose bizzare scenarios that break our normal sensibilities, resurrection is pretty dicey (is the risen Jesus a philosophical zombie?). As such, the claim of the resurrection is a textbook example of an extraordinary claim, and while not the most extreme case, it's pretty up there.

It would take a detailed and in-depth scientific investigation and a revolution in medicine and biology to establish even the possibility that a resurrection may have happened, with careful observation, experimentation, and replication of the phenomenon before the possibility is even on the table. Your book, the bible, that you admit is mostly second-hand, is insufficient to support the claim that any resurrection took place. Out of everyone who has lived in the past, every one of them has died once and stayed dead, or will die and stay dead. Each and every animal and plant on the Earth has died once and stayed dead. Everything that lives has and will have one chance at life, and when it dies it stays dead.

Actually, Elijah did not die, either. But I understand your point.

However, it is my contention that because gospels can be demonstrated to be reliable works of honest men, the accounts of the resurrection they contain are plausible even probable.

Except, so claim Christians, this single person in ancient Judea. This one sole exception that violates all natural law and precedent and future prospects and to them is more credible than the possibility that their entire religion simply bullshit.

And you have the gall to wonder why athiests think you're fucking insane.

Actually, it has never occurred to me that athiests [sic] think me insane. I thought was indoctrinated...but still sane. This is a disturbing development...a new low...in our relations.

I would sooner believe the Swoon Theory than believe that a man could come back from the dead. I would sooner believe that the Council of Nicea concocted the entire NT out of whole cloth, forging the corroborations by Josephus and Tacitus, forging and burying the dead sea scrolls, and planting the various pieces of evidence throughout the world and acedemia than believe a man could come back from the dead. I would sooner believe that all of the diciples were tripping balls and sharing a single hallucination synchronized through psychic waves than believe a man could come back from the dead. I would sooner believe that the entire christian church was a big prank that gotten out of hand two thousand years ago before I would believe a man could come back from the dead. I would sooner believe that the diciples encountered Jesus's doppelganger and imposter than believe that a man rose from the dead.

I would sooner believe grand conspiracy theories, pychic powers, mistaken identity, and Judean candid camera before I would believe a man could come back from the dead, because those things have some semblance of being possible.

I know. Except that I can counter each of your alternative theories pretty convincingly. And you still have to answer for the Five Minimal Facts. Frankly, the Resurrection is the last theory standing.

And, btw, I don't think your insistence is very...scientific of you. I mean, aren't men of science supposed to be dispassionately following the evidence wherever it leads? I don't think you are actually that open-minded. As you prove now...

The claim of the resurrection is a deal-breaker for the veracity of the bible, and it doesn't matter how many "renouned scholars" tell us to the contrary. It is more parsimonious to assume that this one anomaly of the resurrection simply didn't happen and that every biblical scholar and believer who thinks otherwise is simply wrong, than to accept that this one exception in death exists. No matter how unlikely it seems to you that all of those people can be wrong in their belief, once you have eliminated the impossible (the resurrection) whatever remains, however unlikely, must be the truth.

Dude, once you have eliminated all the logical and natural explanations, the only thing left is the unthinkable: Jesus rose from the dead.

Until you demonstrate that the resurrection is even a possibility, it's off the table, along with any claims that the bible demonstrates the proof of the resurrection. The bible is not accurate here, because it contains a claim that is literally as impossible as they come.

Let me begin with one simple question: If an all-powerful God exists, would raising Jesus from the dead be impossible for him?

[Randy Carson]

Fine. Your only task now is to defend the scientific possibility of the resurrection. Until you do so, that's the elephant in the room sitting on your claims for the historical reliability of the NT.

I'm not going to defend the "scientific possibility of the resurrection"...I'm going to defend the supernatural possibility of the resurrection.

That was the point of my closing question in the post above.

[Unbeliever]

Randy is shadow boxing with the Holy Ghost ... but the Holy Ghost will win.

A shadow is more substantial that any Holy Ghost, as Magellan may have known:

"The Church says that the Earth is flat, but I know that it is round. For I have seen the shadow of the earth on the moon and I have more faith in the Shadow than in the Church."

[Mike Cl]

Actually, I'm a Catholic, so I don't rely on the Bible to tell me that. I have Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition and the Magisterium of an infallible Church. If every Bible on the planet were to vanish tomorrow, the authority of the Catholic Church, and my faith, would be unfazed.

You have nothing, little guy.  Sacred Scripture=fiction.  Sacred Tradition=blind fiction.  Magisterium=bullshit.  Infallible Chruch=the blind being lead by the hierarchy while bleeding the flock dry.  There is no authority--just fiction.  So, your Catholic Church has no authority, except that granted by the secular govt.  And I fully understand that your faith would leave you unfazed--it is fully that blinding for you.  Whoopty damn dooo--I'm happy for you.   

[Hakurei Reimu]

Actually, I'm a Catholic, so I don't rely on the Bible to tell me that. I have Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition and the Magisterium of an infallible Church. If every Bible on the planet were to vanish tomorrow, the authority of the Catholic Church, and my faith, would be unfazed.

You're still defending a resurrection. You're still defending the indefensible.

Fucksake.

Actually, Elijah did not die, either. But I understand your point.

However, it is my contention that because gospels can be demonstrated to be reliable works of honest men, the accounts of the resurrection they contain are plausible even probable.

How would you know what a resurrection would look like? Have you seen one? Has anyone seen one? And so what if they're honest? You can be honestly, yet bizzarely wrong.

I know. Except that I can counter each of your alternative theories pretty convincingly.

"Convincing" is relative. You need to make the resurrection more convincing than any of these. So far, you are insisting on the impossible as an alternative.

And you still have to answer for the Five Minimal Facts. Frankly, the Resurrection is the last theory standing.

In a pig's eye. I doubt the existence of every one of the major players in the Jesus story, including Jesus himself. (Jesus mythicist in the house.) Nonexistent people can't die. That's your first Minimal "Fact" taken care of.

And, btw, I don't think your insistence is very...scientific of you. I mean, aren't men of science supposed to be dispassionately following the evidence wherever it leads? I don't think you are actually that open-minded. As you prove now...

That's nice. Someone who has never done any actual science is trying to tell me how scientists do things. Science considers eyewitness accounts the lowest form of testimony, fit only for establishing the most mundane of claims. The resurrection is not a mundane claim. The resurrection is such a flagrant violation of all tested, reliable scientific theory that there is no point in entertaining it until it is reliably established, using much better quality evidence than eyewintess testimony, as an exant phenomenon. All of the apostles could swear up and down that they saw Jesus arose from the dead, and their testimony will not establish the claim.

And the apostles didn't even witness the resurrection proper, did they?

Dude, once you have eliminated all the logical and natural explanations, the only thing left is the unthinkable: Jesus rose from the dead.

Since when have you done any of this?

Let me begin with one simple question: If an all-powerful God exists, would raising Jesus from the dead be impossible for him?

'All-powerful' is not even a coherent concept. Your question is meaningless, and any answer I could give would be wrong.

I'm not going to defend the "scientific possibility of the resurrection"...I'm going to defend the supernatural possibility of the resurrection.

That was the point of my closing question in the post above.

"Supernatural" is a cop-out.

[aitm]

Talk sense to a fool, and they call you foolish.

[Baruch]

Unlike Socrates, who knew that he didn't know ... your think you know what you know.  This is solipsism.

[Baruch]

I didn't realize you guys had so many pearls to throw ... but I am not anti-pig in saying that.

Randy doesn't have an experience of the living G-d ... just like most people who post here.  That is fine, nothing wrong with that.  Different strokes for different folks.  But he posts so much here, because he has so much in common with many of you ... even though you are both in denial of it ;-)

[Baruch]

Because we are not Jews, and the New Covenant abrogated the old.

Which at least one uneducated Jew does not understand, apparently.

Plain reading shows that Jesus never stopped being Jewish (on his own terms).  He was more pious than the Pharisees, who were hypocrits.  It was Paul that opened the door to uneducated and unconverted Gentiles.  So go worship Paul.

[Baruch]

The NT has Jesus saying this:

“For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass the law until all is accomplished. Whoever then relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but he who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” â€" Matthew 5:18-19

“It is easier for Heaven and Earth to pass away than for the smallest part of the letter of the law to become invalid.” (Luke 16:17)

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest part or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place.” (Matthew 5:17)

It seems to me if Paul knew Jesus said the above (supposedly) he would pass it along a what Jesus taught.  But you are correct in that we don't know that the NT is accurate to what Jesus taught--or even if the man existed.

Clearly Paul didn't know the Jesus of the Gospels.  The ordering in the NT is clearly sophistry.  For Paul, Jesus was a metaphysical person in a mystery religion, as was popular at that time.  He may have had a theophany or not.  When Paul was alive, Jerusalem hadn't been destroyed ... we don't hear him telling fellow Jews there to flee to the hills ... it is Jesus who did that, in fiction, after the city was destroyed.

[Mike Cl]

Clearly Paul didn't know the Jesus of the Gospels.  The ordering in the NT is clearly sophistry.  For Paul, Jesus was a metaphysical person in a mystery religion, as was popular at that time.  He may have had a theophany or not.  When Paul was alive, Jerusalem hadn't been destroyed ... we don't hear him telling fellow Jews there to flee to the hills ... it is Jesus who did that, in fiction, after the city was destroyed.

It is amazing how many people think Paul is talking about the NT writings when he referrers to scripture.  And reading the NT in chronological order changes the story quite a bit.

[Baruch]

The authentic writings of Paul, and reading things in actual chronological order (along with knowledge of edgy Judaism of that time) clearly shows that Paul was a Kabbalist.  The whole theoretical substitutionary atonement, of original sin ... is directly taken from Kabbalah, the New Adam cancels out the Old Adam.  This is a long used theme, dating back to Bronze Age Canaan ... of Ba'al defeating Yam ... of in Babylon, of Marduk defeating Tiamat.

[Poison Tree]

You argue like a girl.

WTF does that even mean? Using your tits to type? Arguing in short bursts in-between checking on the cake in the oven? Arguing in such a way that it is apparent that your gender out preforms boys in every school subject are is more likely then boys to earn a bachelors degree or enroll in graduate school?