Historical Case for the Resurrection of Jesus

[leroy]

As far as history goes I stick with the Oxford University standards

And does this university says that sources from non-witnesses are not acceptable?......... (I bet no)







are you going to adress the OP?
1 provide a hypotheis

2 expalin why is it better according to the standards mentioned in the OP

 

[shunyadragon]

And does this university says that sources from non-witnesses are not acceptable?......... (I bet no)

You missed the elephant in the room concerning the issue cited concerning the resurrection. It is a claim of a supernatural event, and like ALL claims of supernatural events in ALL ancient religions, the events and persons defined in terms of the supernatural are beyond verification by standard historical methods.

The main issue is not non-witnesses as far as the limits of historical methods. Historical methods rely on different sources including non-witness sources to confirm events, people, and times in history

are you going to adress the OP?
1 provide a hypotheis

The hypothesis has been provided.

The conclusion is clear and specific all events surrounding the life of Jesus are natural ordinary events based on the available evidence during his life. there is no evidence for the resurrection that can be confirmed by Standard Historical Methods defined by Oxford University. Personal testimony of supernatural events is insufficient today to confirm any supernatural event today or any time in the past.

2 expalin why is it better according to the standards mentioned in the OP

It fits the available evidence available during the life of Jesus.

 

[paarsurrey]

Historical Case for the Resurrection of Jesus​

Left Coast said: #8
Because people don't come back alive after being dead for days, as a rule. It's a one way trip. Any claim of some miracle explanation for a phenomenon that violates everything we know about how the world works is going to have automatically very low plausibility.
Apologes said: #10
We know that people don't rise from the dead on their own, true, but here we are talking about God raising someone from the dead. This isn't going against how the world works as its not the laws of nature that are raising the dead but an act of God. On what basis would you assign a low plausibility to God choosing to raise Jesus from the dead a priori?
paarsurrey said: #421
Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah rising from the physical dead is against Sign of Jonah, I (therefore) must say (Jesus did not resurrect at all), as I understand?
Right?

paarsurrey said: #430
Jonah did not die in the belly of the fish so Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah could not and did not die on the Cross or in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, please, right?

paarsurrey said: #449
Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah pegged the Sign of Jonah to be shown to the Jews and the Jews knew as per Book of Jonah that (1) Jonah entered the belly of fish alive, (2)remained alive in the belly of the fish and (3)came out alive from the belly of the fish, so if the Sign was for the Jews then Yeshua had to remain alive and he did remain alive (1) on the Cross, (2) in the tomb where he was laid and (3) afterwards as he was seen by many, please, right?

paarsurrey adds:#476
Since Jonah was a truthful prophet of G-d so applying the same criteria Jesus/Yeshua- the Israelite Messiah was also a truthful prophet, please, right?

• paarsurrey#540
• There are many clues in the Gospels itself that Yeshua- the truthful truthful Messiah did not die on the Cross in the firs place so there is no question of his being resurrected from the dead, please, right?

1. Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah prayed in the garden of Gethsemane most fervently to G-d (whom he used to call God-the-Father) that his life may be saved:

Matthew 36-40
36 Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane; and he said to his disciples, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” 37 He took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and agitated. 38 Then he said to them, “I am deeply grieved, even to death; remain here, and stay awake with me.” 39 And going a little farther, he threw himself on the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I want but what you want.” 40

So G-d willed and accepted Yeshua's prayer to the astonishment of Pauline-Christianity people and saved the life of Yeshua against all the odds, please, right?

First Clue in the Gospels :“My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me "

• #776

So, G-d made it possible to let the cup pass from him. Yeshua's prayer was accepted by G-d.
Right?

Regards

And Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah did not die on the Cross/Pole and G-d willed and made it possible to save Yeshua's life like G-d made it possible for Jonah against all odds, right?

Regards

 

[shunyadragon]

Historical Case for the Resurrection of Jesus​

Left Coast said: #8
Because people don't come back alive after being dead for days, as a rule. It's a one way trip. Any claim of some miracle explanation for a phenomenon that violates everything we know about how the world works is going to have automatically very low plausibility.
Apologes said: #10
We know that people don't rise from the dead on their own, true, but here we are talking about God raising someone from the dead. This isn't going against how the world works as its not the laws of nature that are raising the dead but an act of God. On what basis would you assign a low plausibility to God choosing to raise Jesus from the dead a priori?
paarsurrey said: #421
Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah rising from the physical dead is against Sign of Jonah, I (therefore) must say (Jesus did not resurrect at all), as I understand?
Right?

paarsurrey said: #430
Jonah did not die in the belly of the fish so Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah could not and did not die on the Cross or in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, please, right?

paarsurrey said: #449
Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah pegged the Sign of Jonah to be shown to the Jews and the Jews knew as per Book of Jonah that (1) Jonah entered the belly of fish alive, (2)remained alive in the belly of the fish and (3)came out alive from the belly of the fish, so if the Sign was for the Jews then Yeshua had to remain alive and he did remain alive (1) on the Cross, (2) in the tomb where he was laid and (3) afterwards as he was seen by many, please, right?

paarsurrey adds:#476
Since Jonah was a truthful prophet of G-d so applying the same criteria Jesus/Yeshua- the Israelite Messiah was also a truthful prophet, please, right?

• paarsurrey#540
• There are many clues in the Gospels itself that Yeshua- the truthful truthful Messiah did not die on the Cross in the firs place so there is no question of his being resurrected from the dead, please, right?

1. Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah prayed in the garden of Gethsemane most fervently to G-d (whom he used to call God-the-Father) that his life may be saved:

Matthew 36-40
36 Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane; and he said to his disciples, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” 37 He took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and agitated. 38 Then he said to them, “I am deeply grieved, even to death; remain here, and stay awake with me.” 39 And going a little farther, he threw himself on the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I want but what you want.” 40

So G-d willed and accepted Yeshua's prayer to the astonishment of Pauline-Christianity people and saved the life of Yeshua against all the odds, please, right?

And Jesus/Yeshua- the truthful Israelite Messiah did not die on the Cross/Pole and G-d willed and made it possible to save Yeshua's life like G-d made it possible for Jonah against all odds, right?

Regards

This is the Islamic belief based on the Quran.

 

[Brian2]

This is yet another claim.
Can you just answer the question please?

How do you distinguish the supposed detectable manifestation of an existing god vs a non-existing god?

As I said, there are different ways that God does it and it takes faith to see the way God is revealing Himself to you.
This revelation can be counterfeited by other spirits however, so it leaves the way open to that problem.
But I believe that God protects us from that if we are wanting to listen to Him.

IOW, you need to believe the dragon is real before asking the question if it is real. So you need to operate from an assumed conclusion which opens the door to confirmation bias.

"detectable manifestation". It seems you have no clue what that means.

God is invisible and detectable through faith if God reveals Himself to you.
So stay open to that call from God.

Again, it's finite into the past. T = 0 means that it's not infinite into the past.
Whatever happened, happened at T = 0.
And I indeed don't know what happened.
Neither do you. Nobody does. It's unknown.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
That is what I know through faith.

That's not speculation.
Space and time are an integral part of the universe. It's what makes up the universe.
Space-time IS the universe.
It makes zero sense to say that removing the universe doesn't remove space and time.

The universe IS space and time.

But that doesn't tell me why this universe comprises all of space and time.

Nothing eliminates the existence of undetectable things.
Nothing eliminates the possibility of an existing undetectable dragon following me.
Nothing eliminates the possibility of undetectable unicorns, graviton fairies, gods, etc.

Potential unfalsifiable, undetectable entities are INFINITE in number. They are only limited by your imagination.
This is why I say that only claims of falsifiable things with detectable manifestation matter.

The rest is useless and meaningles and indistinguishable from things that don't exist.

But I just told you that God is detectable and how that happens.

We haven't even properly looked for it.
But we CAN look for it in principle because such life is falsifiable with detectable manifestation.
We can not look for gods who are unfalsifiable with no detectable manifestation. Not even only in principle.
So no, it really is not on the same order.

How is the question of whether there is life elsewhere in the universe falsifiable except by looking everywhere in the universe?
I already told you about detecting God. But of course you go back to your skeptic position that says that only science can find God if God exists, and if science cannot find God then God does not exist.

Because it can't be found by definition. Just like my undetectable dragon.
Just like non-existent things.
You can look under every rock in the universe, behind every planet, inside any atom, beyond any stars, for a bazillion years and you will come up empty, because the undetectable and the non-existent look exactly alike.

Because God is a Spirit and we cannot see Him.
But your undetectable dragon has left no evidence of it's existence,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, unlike God.

You mean: people who engage in self-brainwashing and confirmation bias. Who paint the bullseye around the arrow. Who pretend to have the answers before even asking the questions. Who start from an assumed conclusion.

The undetectable and the non existent look exactly alike.
You have assumed your conclusion and ignore any suggestion that God might exist and is just not detectable by science.

The alternative being to look under non-existing rocks?

The alternative being to try a different approach.

 

[Brian2]

Reasoning is nullified by the addition of even a drop of faith. Think of the addition problem. Imagine thousands of simple additions (2+3=5, 4+7=11, etc.) with just one faith-based belief:

• "If somewhere in the Bible I were to find a passage that said 2 + 2 = 5, I wouldn't question what I am reading in the Bible. I would believe it, accept it as true, and do my best to work it out and understand it."- Pastor Peter laRuffa

And at that point, he derails the reason express and can no longer generate a correct sum. Is that what you mean by faith being reasonable?

I would question the text and it's meaning in it's contextual setting.

 

[Brian2]

This is how the faith-based thinker thinks, not the critical thinker. The critical thinker draws sound conclusions from evidence by applying accepted rules of inference (avoiding fallacious thought). What you described is how the faith-based thinker perverts that process, begins with a presumption believed by faith, and then tries to fit the evidence to it after the fact.

I expect that a true global flood would have left no human survivors but Noah and his family to tell the tale.

You presume a global flood when the Bible does not tell us that.

That's a feature of the method, not a flaw. The method is intended to identify false, unfalsifiable, and insufficiently supported claims and prevent their entry onto one's personal map of reality, where only demonstrably correct ideas belong and deserve to be called knowledge. The Gospels shouldn't be believed just because they were written. We need more before believing, or should.

But that feature is what you said at the top (the one I did not answer) is not how the critical thinker thinks.
You are saying that it is OK to presume (by faith) that the God and supernatural in the Bible are not true and then to make the Bible and when it was written and by whom, fit that presumption.

One results from the other. You seem to know which is which. You seem to understand that the resulting gap is not causing the hand to open, but that it is the other way around.

If the opening of the hand caused the gap then the opening of the hand is the cause. It's really a simple concept. What caused something is the cause.

 

[Brian2]

Science doesn't require faith.
In fact, the opposite... "faith" is not allowed in science.

In a religious forum we are speaking faith and then skeptics come here and say that faith is rubbish and want to speak science and don't realise that their world view has as much faith as a religious persons world view.

 

[Brian2]

You should come out more.

All followers of all religions use the exact same arguments as you do, to come to mutually exclusive conclusions.

It's all mere bias and assumed conclusions.

It's the nature of "faith". There is no position that can not be held on "faith".
On "faith", you can believe ANYTHING.

This is why, as @Subduction Zone just said, "faith" is not a pathway to truth.
If anything, faith is a pathway to end up with wrong beliefs.

Yes people believe all sorts of things, even that scientology is true and even that science is a pathway to find the truth.

 

[Brian2]

It has everything to do with it as you claims that science is believed "on faith".

It is not.

I claim that your world view is believed on faith.
I claim that science is neutral about God.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Atheistic science is with a materialist, atheist bias.

And how in your opinion does that affect the science itself?
For example, what do you think is currently unsolved or wrong in science as a direct result of the so-called "materialist, atheist bias"?

Ken ham and his pseudo-science would be an example of theistic science.

And this, as per your own acknowledgement, "pseudo-science" achieves better results as opposed to the science with "materialist, atheist bias"?

There should just be science in its sphere and spirituality in its realm.

What does that mean?
Take physics for example, or any other scientific field... how should it in your opinion be done differently?
What does it mean, in practice, specifically, to add a "spirituality in its realm"?

How does that change E = mc²?
How does that impact the theory of relativity? Big bang theory? Germ theory of desease?

See, it's one thing to make these vague claims... it's quite another to actually explain how science would change AND demonstrate how it would in fact achieve better results..............

Because if when adding "spirituality to its realm", it doesn't actually achieve better results, then what is the point of it?

"A mechanistic philosophy of life and the universe cannot be scientific because science recognizes and deals only with materials and facts. Philosophy is inevitably superscientific. Man is a material fact of nature, but his life is a phenomenon which transcends the material levels of nature in that it exhibits the control attributes of mind and the creative qualities of spirit." UB

I don't care what your book says.
Explain to me how science would be better (which is to say: achieve better results) when we remove the supposed "materialist, atheist bias" and add "spirituality to its realm".

If you can't answer this question, then what is your actual point?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I claim that your world view is believed on faith.

You can make claims till you are blue in the face and it wouldn't make a difference unless you can actually support those claims.
What do I believe on "faith" in your opinion?

I claim that science is neutral about God.

Did I ever claim something else?
Science is also neutral about undetectable cookie monsters.

 

[shunyadragon]

In a religious forum we are speaking faith and then skeptics come here and say that faith is rubbish and want to speak science and don't realise that their world view has as much faith as a religious persons world view.

This religious forum is based on dialogue and debate among a diversity of religious and philosophical views, and NOT just believers in faith, God(s), or whatever.

Even though I do not agree with those that believe in the various forms of atheism they have good arguments that are not adequately responded to by believers in ancient tribal religions. Retreating to the fortress of simply 'faith' is not an adequate coherent response.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

You know it is sad to see that you are not willing to admit even a trivial but mistake

There is no mistake. You keep claiming it's a mistake. I keep correcting you.
I can't help it that you insist on being so stubborn.

We already agreed that me buying dog food would be evidence that I have a Dog (and evidence for other hypothesis)

I agreed to no such thing. It is no more evidence of you having a dog then it is of you liking to eat dogfood yourself or you planning on poisoning it to kill your neighbour's dog.

I also explained to you that you NOT buying dogfood likewise wouldn't mean that you do NOT have a dog.
They hypothesis of you owning a dog does NOT predict that you then would buy dogfood.
It's perfectly possible to feed your dog something other then pre-packaged dogfood bought at the store.

So as evidence for the idea that you won a dog, it is entirely useless. At best, as explained multiple times, it is a datapoint that is consistent with the idea.
But it doesn't mean you have a dog and you not buying dogfood doesn't disprove that you have a dog.

My definition was clear that evidence are those things that match the testable predictions of the idea.
The idea of you owning a dog does not predict that you would buy dogfood. Because that would mean that you NOT buying dogfood would DISPROVE the idea. And it doesn't.

So it is USELESS as evidence for the idea.

This is the last time that I explain it.

So your definition of evidence is wrong, predictions and observations don’t have to be exclusive for one hypothesis in order to call them “evidence”.

This is not a big of deal, this is just semantics, the problem is your unwillingness to admit a mistake,

No. See above.

 

[SkepticThinker]

that is the reason, why I will ingore things that are unrelated to the OP…………………. all you did was change the defection of hearsay “unverified” was not part of your original definition. And I don’t want another semantic game

I haven't changed the definition of anything. These are not eyewitness accounts we are talking about. They are stories that were passed down orally for some time, and then written down by anonymous writers decades later.

I have no idea why you think this is unrelated to the claims in your OP. How did you come to those conclusions then? Based on what? You came to those conclusions based on these stories from the Bible, correct?. But you don't think it's important to know whether those stories are verifiable accounts or just based on "I heard it from a guy who heard it from a guy that 500 people saw something?"

the OP is expecting you to provide an alternative hypothesis, develop it, and explain why is it better than the resurrection………….if you are not going to do that, then why are you even participating in this thread?


But just for your own reflection………… why would Paul rely on “unverified rumors” if he knew Petter, James, and atleast some of the aposoles and some of the 500s?

I mean he knew people form that list of………. Why would he rely on a random rumor, if he could have asked Peter directly about his experience?


My challenge was

This is what you had said to me:
"This is a testable and falsifiable claim; all you have to do is provide an example of an event reported by Paul and Mark that is not accepted by most historians. You won’t find any, (except for those events that have theological implications)"

My response was to list:

A person was resurrected from the dead.
"The 500" witnessed the resurrection of a dead person.
Heaven being torn open and a spirit descending from it and a voice coming out of it
Jesus driving out demons from people

Now you say:

1 find a claim that is in 2 or more sources from the NT (say Paul and Mark, or John and L, or Q and Paul ETC.)

2 That has no “magic” nor miracles, nor anything that has theological implications

3 that is not accepted by the majority of historians (or relevant scholars)

Cool, so we can completely dismiss the resurrection claims.

 

[SkepticThinker]

that is the reason, why I will ingore things that are unrelated to the OP…………………. all you did was change the defection of hearsay “unverified” was not part of your original definition. And I don’t want another semantic game

the OP is expecting you to provide an alternative hypothesis, develop it, and explain why is it better than the resurrection………….if you are not going to do that, then why are you even participating in this thread?

But just for your own reflection………… why would Paul rely on “unverified rumors” if he knew Petter, James, and atleast some of the aposoles and some of the 500s?

I mean he knew people form that list of………. Why would he rely on a random rumor, if he could have asked Peter directly about his experience?

People believe things they've heard all the time. No big mystery there.

IF he did all of those things, and IF it was all recorded and IF and IF .and ..... perhaps we'd have more information. But we don't, so we can "IF" all day long, but it's not going to give us any answers.

We don't have access to "the 500." We have no idea what they experienced whatsoever.

My challenge was

1 find a claim that is in 2 or more sources from the NT (say Paul and Mark, or John and L, or Q and Paul ETC.)

2 That has no “magic” nor miracles, nor anything that has theological implications

3 that is not accepted by the majority of historians (or relevant scholars)

What's the point of this?

 

[SkepticThinker]

Aren’t you tired of repeating the same type of mistakes over and over and over again? …………………. Do you honestly and sincerely think that you made a good argument or a good point?

But I´ll take your tacit addmtion that you agree on that most of the verifiable claims made in the gospels are true

It is a good point. You should address it.

 

[Subduction Zone]

But I just told you that God is detectable and how that happens.

I must have missed that. Probably because there is so much nonsense in your posts. How is God detectable?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

This is tedious and boring

It would stop being tedious and boring if you would move on from tedious and boring "arguments".

All those points have been addresses multiple times.

Idd

Lets stick to the OP

1 provide a hypothesis (explain and develope the hypothesis)

The OP offers a hypothesis. That is what we are discussing. I don't require a "counter" hypothesis to dismantle the one in the OP.

2 explain why is that hypothesis better than the resurection according to this criteria

Again, I don't require such a hypothesis.
Nevertheless, as stated multiple times, any hypothesis that doesn't involve "natural law was suspended" (like people made a mistake, people lied, people were delusional, people exaggerate / embellished,.....) would be a better explanation then an idea that DOES require natural law to be suspended.

Again, if you need to have that explained to you, then you have a bigger problems then mere stubbornness.

Explanatory scope - does the hypothesis account for all the data
- Explanatory power - how well does the hypothesis explain the data
- Plausibility - is the hypothesis compatible with or implied by facts that are generally accepted as known
- Less ad hoc - does the hypothesis go beyond what is known and makes unevidenced assumptions
- Illumination (a bonus criteria) - does the hypothesis shed light on other areas of inquiry

Let's say people were delusional (3 in 100 people experience psychosis at least once in their life)
That indeed accounts for all data, is plausible, has explanatory power, etc.

And again I am humoring you in your pathetic attempt at shifting the burden of proof.
I don't require ANY hypothesis.

It's clear what your fallacious end-game is here. You are trying to spin it so that if somebody can't give you an air-tight well-evidenced explanation for it being wrong, then that must mean it is right and therefor should be accepted as written.

But that is off course utter BS.
Claims fall and stand on their own merrit.
YOU make a claim, upto YOU to provide valid evidence for it.

And all you have a claims and hearsay. That by itself is enough to reject your claim.
I don't require an "alternative" explanation.

You failing to meet your burden of proof is all that is required to reject your bs.

Any comments unrelated to this will be ignored

Off course they will, as always.
It's what you do.
Make fallacious claims and requests and subsequently ignore when it is pointed out.

any Post that doesn’t even attempts to address these 2 points will be ignored

Yes, you've been doing that from the start.
The problem is that your two silly points are dishonest attempts at shifting your burden of proof.

I am pretty sure that the author of this thread (@Apologes ) had this intent when he wrote the OP

I don't care if the OP's intent was to shift the burden of proof also.

 

[Subduction Zone]

I haven't changed the definition of anything. These are not eyewitness accounts we are talking about. They are stories that were passed down orally for some time, and then written down by anonymous writers decades later.

I have no idea why you think this is unrelated to the claims in your OP. How did you come to those conclusions then? Based on what? You came to those conclusions based on these stories from the Bible, correct?. But you don't think it's important to know whether those stories are verifiable accounts or just based on "I heard it from a guy who heard it from a guy that 500 people saw something?"

This is what you had said to me:
"This is a testable and falsifiable claim; all you have to do is provide an example of an event reported by Paul and Mark that is not accepted by most historians. You won’t find any, (except for those events that have theological implications)"

My response was to list:

A person was resurrected from the dead.
"The 500" witnessed the resurrection of a dead person.
Heaven being torn open and a spirit descending from it and a voice coming out of it
Jesus driving out demons from people

Now you say:

Cool, so we can completely dismiss the resurrection claims.

@leroy does not seem to understand that the 500 was just a Canadian girlfriend claim of Paul's. Now he may not even understand the argument, even though it has been laid out for him. I have noticed that when he does not understand something that he never seems to ask questions so that he could learn. He just ignores the answer.