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What Real Evidence Exists for The Resurrection?
- Thread starter godnotgod
- Start date
Copernicus
Industrial Strength Linguist
Strangely, I think that we can all agree with you. That is as real as it gets. And it is why we say that there is no real evidence.
godnotgod
Thou art That
This is exactly what happened, even doubly so, when the early Church fathers were confronted with the almost identical doctrines of Christianity that were found in the earlier religion of Mithraism:
"There were so many similarities between Christianity and Mithraism that early Church Fathers such as Tertullian and Justin Martyr claimed that Satan had, in anticipation of the coming of Jesus Christ, created a false religion that shared many of the same rituals, traditions and beliefs in Christianity, concerning not only practices in worship but indentical traditions usually accredited to Jesus Christ such as the resurrection so that people would be tricked into believing that all Christianity was a plagarism of prior pagan beliefs.:biglaugh: As absurd as this explanation is, it serves to show that Mithraism was not a plagarism of Christianity but was there prior to Christianity.
Also, it is erroneously claimed that there were never any written records of Mithraism but the reality is that most of the evidence of Mithraism [like that of the Gnostics] was destroyed by the Christians including not only monuments and many other artifacts but many books by ancient authors, such as Eubulus, who had written many volumes on the history of Mithraism!"
MITHRA
Gee! You don't really think such upright fellows such as the Church elders would actually LIE fer Jesus now, do you? Nah!:yes:
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godnotgod
Thou art That
The Silence of the Infinite is deafening.
Don't you hear it?
Shhhhhhhh.....Listen.....really, really Listen....
It is the sound without sound.
It is beyond mere words.
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
No, you come off it. Most of the people who study this issue are not Christian, yet they all agree that Jesus existed. Beyond that, there is of course little consensus, but there is CERTAINLY consensus that the Christian movement had a founder, Jesus of Nazareth, who was executed under Pontius Pilate and who was rumoured to have risen again from the dead. The only people who disagree with this are outsiders to the specific era or simply crackpots. Sorry to burst your bubble, there.
godnotgod
Thou art That
OK. So there is not much real evidence for the Resurrection; second and third hand hearsay, and one distant St. Paul with his '500' eyewitnesses (nice round number he picked, BTW). Christians keep telling us it is a matter of faith. Now, if we were just talking about which hand has the M&M peanut, I would'nt bat an eyelash. Not much to lose there. But you want me to have faith without evidence, without question, in some pie in the sky wild haired notion that some man, and only ONE man, not only died and was brought back to life, but that he also miraculously ascended, body and soul, up into some Heavenly Paradise in the Sky?
Oh, I get it. If I do not believe it, then the whole Christian religion falls flat on its face, because Jesus would be just like all those other saviors who came and went and are now rotting in their graves. I see. So it is all about ME. I am the one who decides via of faith alone. You know. I am getting the hang of it. Shortly, I will have talked myself right into completely deluding myself completely.
Has anyone here seen the Invisible Pink Unicorn? I hear she is quite lovely.
Oh, I get it. If I do not believe it, then the whole Christian religion falls flat on its face, because Jesus would be just like all those other saviors who came and went and are now rotting in their graves. I see. So it is all about ME. I am the one who decides via of faith alone. You know. I am getting the hang of it. Shortly, I will have talked myself right into completely deluding myself completely.
Has anyone here seen the Invisible Pink Unicorn? I hear she is quite lovely.
godnotgod
Thou art That
I think you mean 'wiseacre' rather than crackpot.
crack·pot : one given to eccentric or lunatic notions
Poppycock - Anglicized form of the Dutch pappekak,[1] which literally means soft dung or diarrhea (from Dutch pap pap + kak dung) - is an interjection meaning "nonsense" or "balderdash".
An example of a crackpot might be a someone who is given to eccentric or lunatic notions, such as the belief, without evidence, that people resurrect themselves from the dead, which would amount to so much poppycock.
When such crackpots go around spewing forth poppycock as if it were true, especially under the color of Biblical Authority (Ahem!), sane people begin to question their doctrines. In so doing, these sane people appear as wiseacres to the crackpots. This inevitably results in such horrible incidents such as crackpots calling kettles 'Black'.
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Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
Agreed
When such crackpots go around spewing forth poppycock as if it were true, especially under the color of Biblical Authority (Ahem!), sane people begin to question their doctrines. In so doing, these sane people appear as wiseacres to the crackpots. This inevitably results in such horrible incidents such as crackpots calling kettles 'Black'.
Agreed.
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
Mockery is the resort of a fool.
Copernicus
Industrial Strength Linguist
Nonsense. Who would even be more interested in the historicity of Christ than Christians? In the English speaking world and Europe, Christianity is by far the dominant religion, and most of the historians that we are talking about are either English speakers or those who come from a Christian culture and publish (or are translated into) English. I am, however, willing to be convinced otherwise. All you have to do is provide us with the evidence that has convinced you otherwise.
There is no such consensus, because there is no consensus that Jesus existed. The fact is that the existence of Jesus is more in question now than it ever has been in the past. That is due in so small part to the fact that Christians can no longer control the dissemination of information on this subject. And it is also true that your argument here is a combination of two fallacies--appeal to authority and appeal to popularity. You know better than that, but you've got nothing better to offer in support of the historicity of Jesus.
Oh, don't worry about that. You haven't presented anything yet that could bust a bubble. Your argument rests on fallacious reasoning, and you know it. Otherwise, you would offer us something more than the tired old argument that Jesus must have really existed because you believe that there is a consensus of opinion among historians that he existed. The question is not whether the claim is backed by the preponderance of believers in it, but whether it is backed by the preponderance of evidence. And it is convincing evidence in favor of the claim that has been absent from your posts.
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
Whenever you decide to stop living in a fantasy, let me know and we can talk.
Copernicus
Industrial Strength Linguist
godnotgod
Thou art That
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
You mock him as a fool and get hoisted by your own petard in the process.
Who's mocking whom? I'm losing track.....:areyoucra
godnotgod
Thou art That
My question is not so much whether the Resurrection was a real event or not, but why Christians find it so important a doctrine to have faith in that it was. If it were proved that the Resurrection never occurred, would that make any difference in the faith that the Christian would hold that Jesus was and is the messiah, and that his blood sacrifice on the cross had the redeeming power that it is touted to have? I was raised a Christian, and our exposure to the doctrine told us that it was not the Resurrection, but the Crucifixion that was the seminal event by which the Gates of Paradise were reopened that Adam and Eve had closed via Original Sin. So it would seem that, had the Resurrection never occurred, it would not matter in terms of the amount of faith one would have that Jesus was who he said he was. After all, is'nt faith what it is all about? What is the use of the Resurrection as 'proof', when faith is sufficient? The Resurrection is an embellishment, then, that only serves to detract from faith, rather than add to it, since it begs the question of historical authenticity.
Copernicus
Industrial Strength Linguist
footprints
Well-Known Member
Anything is in the realm of probability.
However if they did, they were either really bad learners or very initiative. They have a different meditation technique to Buddhism, and if I do say myself, after putting both to the test, find the Australian aboriginal technique a whole lot better.
George Campbell
Member
The first thing we humans should do is put things in perspective. Primitive mankind was ignorant. His developing imagination and lack of language skills brought about most of the myths and fables about which much was written.
Here's an example of ordinary life nearly 1600 years after bible times:
Bodily functions were performed anywhere/anytime! The British royal court posted a warning (1589):
"Let no one, whoever, he may be, before,
at, or after meals, Early or late, foul the
staircases, corridors; or closets with Urine
or other filth."
Here's an example of ordinary life nearly 1600 years after bible times:
Bodily functions were performed anywhere/anytime! The British royal court posted a warning (1589):
"Let no one, whoever, he may be, before,
at, or after meals, Early or late, foul the
staircases, corridors; or closets with Urine
or other filth."
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
Wow, the Christian just can't win, can she? If she has proof (in the form of resurrection) she doesn't have faith. If she doesn't have proof she's irrational.
George Campbell
Member
There is no proof of resurrection. It's impossible!
Death is when no remnants of life remain and nobody has ever returned. NOBODY!
Death is when no remnants of life remain and nobody has ever returned. NOBODY!