What's so irritating about Christians?

[Randy Carson]

Indeed, I greatly enjoy these discussions. I just wish I had more time to join in, but my time is very limited. Keep up the good work - maybe you'll actually convince me to rethink my position on things.

I'm chatting with an atheist in another forum who is doing just that, so I'll do my best.

[Randy Carson]

Yes ... all true saints are female ;-)  They have to put up with men.  She was a former Catholic Sister as well.  So she knew what she was talking about.  But she wasn't Whoopee Goldberg in Sister Act ;-))

I'm still a bit curious...Catholic seminaries are for men considering the priesthood. Women cannot be priests in the Catholic Church, so how could she be a seminarian?

[widdershins]

Legend
Lunatic
Liar
Lord

Now, I know that you don't agree that Jesus is Lord/Divine. So, either he is a lunatic who claimed to be God or he knew he wasn't God but lied about it.

What do you think? Was Jesus crazy or lying when He claimed to be God?

You know, something about this list bothered me, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it until I let it sink in for a little while.  I finally figured it out.

First, apply that same list to Buddha, someone we know to have been a historical figure.  We can cross out legend and, I think we can all agree, we can cross out lord.  But does that really mean he was either a lunatic or a liar?

Next, apply that list again to Jesus, but this time assume that he was a real man who did not have magical powers, and ALSO that he didn't actually claim to have been God or the son of God, but was a simple preacher.  Now, since he was just a regular preacher, presumably preaching what he believed to be the truth we can easily cross out liar.  And unless you think every preacher who preaches the wrong thing accidentally is nuts, we can cross out lunatic.  Since, in this example, he never actually, himself, claimed to be God, we can cross out lord.  That leaves only legend, which WOULD apply, EVEN IF he had existed, in this case.

The problem is that you're making the assumption that what is written is absolute truth; that if Jesus existed then the Biblical account of him is, by necessity, accurate.  It is entirely possible that he did exist, but DID NOT claim to be God.  After all, the accounts of his life are well known to have been written well after his death and, thus, don't actually contain any eyewitness accounts or anything.  I think we all accept that FACT.  It is undisputed by intelligent people.  In fact, "catholic.com" has this to say about the dating of the earliest works:

While debate continues as to the exact dating of the Gospels, few biblical scholars believe that any of the four works were written after the end of the first century. "Liberal New Testament scholars today," writes Blomberg, "tend to put Mark a few years one side or the other of A.D. 70, Matthew and Lukeâ€"Acts sometime in the 80s, and John in the 90s" (Making Sense of the New Testament, 25). Meanwhile, many conservative scholars date the synoptic Gospels (and Acts) in the 60s and John in the 90s. That means, simply, that there exist four accounts of key events in Jesus’ life written within 30 to 60 years after his Crucifixion...

EVEN IF literally every other person in the world disagreed with this assessment, this site meets the two criteria for being the absolute authority, as set forth by Randy.  1, it has "catholic" in the name, so it sounds official and 2, it is saying what I want to hear, so it is the only source I need to accept as accurate.

So, the FACT that the gospels were not written until long after the supposed death of Jesus being definitively established as FACT, we can all accept that as a reality from here on out and, should anyone question it, we have declared it to be FACT, so we simply need to assert yet again that it is FACT going forward to make it true, never having the need to defend it because we capitalize the word FACT to make sure we don't have to defend it.

So, with the gospels being written so long after the supposed death of this so called "Jesus", it is ENTIRELY possible that these writers, themselves never having met Jesus, simply made shit up.  In this case we end up with a HISTORICAL Jesus AND a MYTH Jesus.  AND he could have ALSO been a liar AND a lunatic!  The only thing it's actually impossible for him to be is "lord" as fairies simply aren't real.  It's actually possible that he was ALL of the rest.

[Randy Carson]

You know, something about this list bothered me, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it until I let it sink in for a little while.  I finally figured it out.

First, apply that same list to Buddha, someone we know to have been a historical figure.  We can cross out legend and, I think we can all agree, we can cross out lord.  But does that really mean he was either a lunatic or a liar?

If Siddhartha did not claim to be God, then Buddhism is radically different from Christianity.

Next, apply that list again to Jesus, but this time assume that he was a real man who did not have magical powers, and ALSO that he didn't actually claim to have been God or the son of God, but was a simple preacher. 

Since his claims to be God are unmistakable (he was tried for blasphemy and convicted), so evasion of Lord is not an option.

And, of course, his followers worshiped him as God, so his claims clearly made an impression on them.

Now, since he was just a regular preacher, presumably preaching what he believed to be the truth we can easily cross out liar. And unless you think every preacher who preaches the wrong thing accidentally is nuts, we can cross out lunatic.  Since, in this example, he never actually, himself, claimed to be God, we can cross out lord.  That leaves only legend, which WOULD apply, EVEN IF he had existed, in this case.

And we should give him some credit even if it's done so begrudgingly: his code of ethics is exceptional and his parables and sermons are excellent.

However, the error in your logic is that Jesus did claim to be God and he accepted the worship of his followers which only God can do without blaspheming.

The problem is that you're making the assumption that what is written is absolute truth; that if Jesus existed then the Biblical account of him is, by necessity, accurate.

I am making this argument in another thread, yes.

It is entirely possible that he did exist, but DID NOT claim to be God. 

The evidence for his claims is extensive.

After all, the accounts of his life are well known to have been written well after his death and, thus, don't actually contain any eyewitness accounts or anything.

I have demonstrated in another active threads why the gospels can be dated to within 15-30 years of his resurrection. And the gospels themselves attest that they were authored by eyewitnesses. In addition, there were still living witnesses who could confirm or deny the accounts contained in the gospels; therefore, anything that was incorrect would have been challenged by those who knew the truth.

I think we all accept that FACT.  It is undisputed by intelligent people.  In fact, "catholic.com" has this to say about the dating of the earliest works:

EVEN IF literally every other person in the world disagreed with this assessment, this site meets the two criteria for being the absolute authority, as set forth by Randy.  1, it has "catholic" in the name, so it sounds official and 2, it is saying what I want to hear, so it is the only source I need to accept as accurate.

So, the FACT that the gospels were not written until long after the supposed death of Jesus being definitively established as FACT, we can all accept that as a reality from here on out and, should anyone question it, we have declared it to be FACT, so we simply need to assert yet again that it is FACT going forward to make it true, never having the need to defend it because we capitalize the word FACT to make sure we don't have to defend it.

If you think the dating of the gospels presented in my OP is incorrect, show me why.

So, with the gospels being written so long after the supposed death of this so called "Jesus", it is ENTIRELY possible that these writers, themselves never having met Jesus, simply made shit up.  In this case we end up with a HISTORICAL Jesus AND a MYTH Jesus.  AND he could have ALSO been a liar AND a lunatic!  The only thing it's actually impossible for him to be is "lord" as fairies simply aren't real.  It's actually possible that he was ALL of the rest.

I think it is becoming clear who is making stuff up.

The gospels were written early enough to have been produced by eyewitnesses.
They claim to have been authored by eyewitnesses.
They contain details that have been verified by archaeology and other sciences.
There is no obvious motive for the authors to have lied.
They are corroborated on the major points by non-biblical sources.
They are quoted by second-generation believers who knew the apostles personally.

I could go on, but at some point it becomes apparent that we have an accurate text written by honest men who were eyewitnesses to what they claimed to be the resurrection of Jesus. Their lives were radically transformed by their belief that they had seen him alive again, and the Church which grew as a result of their preaching exists to this day.

Why did all of this happen?

[Baruch]

I'm still a bit curious...Catholic seminaries are for men considering the priesthood. Women cannot be priests in the Catholic Church, so how could she be a seminarian?

She stopped being Catholic, because it was too restrictive of her mission ... as many Catholic women do complain about.  Also, remember that in Orthodox Christianity, the priests do have to marry (just not bishops etc) ... though they also don't allow women priests.  That monthly discharge you know ;-)