Why don't Theist's admit that there's no evidence for God?

[1robin]

I don't deny that the US played the largest role in winning World War II... I wouldn't try to assign a percentage to their contribution, though. Certain people might say you were making a claim based on nothing and request a source of some kind that states 80% of the work was done by the US, and then dismiss it and ask you to provide a source again. But you wouldn't know anyone like that, would you?

Of course the 80% was a general figure. I never suspected anyone would think that a figure of this type could ever be known even with every fact there is on hand. I have no idea what that last part meant. I have many tendencies and some debating flaws but I do not recognize what you stated as one of them, if that was what you were suggesting.

 

[nash8]

I am referring to earliest fragment/copy of the book of John, not the original copy. Remember, you asked about the earliest copies. And yes, the consensus is that John was the last Gospel to be written.

So when do you say that the originals were written, and also when the earliest whole copies that we have were written?

Well, why do you not find the reasons plausible? Norman Geisler offered responses to the genealogy dilemma in his book “When Critics Ask”.

I've read many of the arguments: tracing through Mary's genealogy as opposed to Josephs, along with the historical context of why one would be preferable to the other according to Jewish customs and practices, that the geanologies offer a "spaced out" version were recognizable names are used to promote brevity, and many others. I would agree that there are a lot of plausible answers, but haven't seen a real consensus on why they are different. Since I will probably never read Geislers book, what are his responses to the genalogy dilemma?

I applaud you for giving me your opinion on the matter.

It's not my just my opinion, they're have been gnostic sects of Christianity since the beginning, and they have been generally supressed by the mainstream church since the beginning. Iranaeus even speaks out about the "heretical" teachings of the gnostics, and from wiki, even goes as far as to say that all "heretics" are gnostics in some way.

Gnosticism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Esoteric Christianity - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Saint Thomas Christians - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I mean hell; if that is the case you can throw the concept of history right out the window. When you talk about having motives and adding and subtracting what suits one’s needs, if that is the case then you would have to question history in general and everything you/we “think” is true may be a fabrication from people who had ulterior motives. If you use the same standards that you use to judge the history of Christianity and applied it to everything else in history, how can you trust anything?

LOL, I pretty much do. I don't think that not questioning everything you/we know about history is a good practice. I think in order to deem anything relevant from history other than the occurence of a "non-emotional" event it is a must that we do so. Look for example, at Christopher Columbus, we have a day that honors him as the founder of America, yet there has been lot's of new evidence that suggests he treated native peoples horribly.
Columbus Controversy — History.com Articles, Video, Pictures and Facts

Or if you wan't to even go more towards the actual account of events of the "discovering" of America, look into the evidence that the Norse has fairly permanent establishments on the mainland of America far before Columbus ever arrived.
Norse colonization of the Americas - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

History is written by the winner, and more often than not they are going to try to make themselves look good in doing so. As far as the account of an event goes, I tend to trust those more, I most definitely believed Christopher Columbus landed on an island that we would consider the "Americas", but any farther than that is nothing but speculation. I don't neccesarily believe we should have a day honoring him, and I definitely don't believe he "discovered" America.

So in short, no, I don't trust most historical evidence as most of the historical evidence was written by European, and Romans before that, and I don't doubt for one second that either one of these groups would hesitate for a second to leave out and/or add in details that I would personally deem important just to make themselves look better.

This is especially true concerning Christianity in both Rome and Europe. Considering both of this "countries" have a documented history of oppressing specific groups of people that opposed their particular view of what Christianity is.

I am still trying to figure out would that have to do with him stating who wrote the Gospesls?

For example, if Iranaeus knew that a Christian of a gnostic sect was the person that originally composed at least one of the gospels of the Bible. It would not be likely that Iranaeus would credit a gnostic with original composition of the Bible, or at the least, even if he did credit the correct person he would not have recognized them as a "gnostic", that of which would change, at the least, a part of the fundamental meaning of Christianity.

 

[nash8]

But as I said before, these differences are minor and it wouldn’t affect doctrine. That is why all of the “good” bibles will alert the readers at the bottom of the page of the different variations, but none of these variations affect any central doctrine.

And I agree, and that's why I hate it when people who oppose the Bible so much down it because it's steeped in so much dogma. In my opinion, they are falling victim to the dogma associated with "Christianity" that really has nothing to do with the message in the Bible, but more to do with the corruption of the message it represents. The Bible's core doctorines are love for others, compassion, morality, which I no doubt believe are exactly what Jesus taught, and it is easy to gain these understandings from reading the Bible, and I absolutely hate it when people attribute all of these horrible things to the Bible, especially when considering soley the NT.

More of the problem that I have, is that I believe that another core doctrine of Jesus teachings was totally left out. These are the teachings of meditation, gnosis, and basically all of the things that allowed Jesus to perform his "miracles", and my argument is that this aspect of Christianity has been oppressed since the very beginning, so all the points your arguing are correct. None of these aspects are included in the core doctrine of Christianity. What I am arguing is that the core doctrine of Christianity, is not the totallity of what Jesus taught, and parts of Jesus' core doctrine have been specifically oppressed by those in power since, essentially his death.

Ok but he specifically said “Christians”. And if they had very similar practices before the time of Jesus and it was nothing new, why would he mention it? I am trying to be as unbiased as I can on the matter, and when I read it doesn’t appear to me as if he is just merely mentioning something of the norm happening.

I'm saying the the Essene practices were very similar to Jesus' practices with his disciples. But Roman knowledge of the Essenes was sketchy at best, because they were for the most part a communal society with minimal contact with the outside world except for those who worked outside the community. And the Essenes were not of the "norm", the group around Judea atleast, was considered Jewish, but they're practices were far different for other Jews, and if Jesus carried any semblance of their teachings out into the public it would not be viewed as normal.

Well, if they were Christians, it is apparent that the verses were consistent with the doctrine of Christianity.

As I stated earlier, the outward appareances of Christianity would remain the same. It would be the inner workings of early christianity that would be totally different. The references to Jesus teaching certain disciples certain things, and specifically his personal conversations with Mary Magdelene that angered the other disciples.

He states that they WERE CHRISTIANS. Christians are followers of JESUS CHRIST, nash. All of this wild speculation you are giving me is completely unwarranted.

I agree, but the whole point of my argument is that modern Christianity doesn't include the totallity of what Jesus taught. Thus the doctrine of Christianity isn't complete, and a large portion of it is missing in modern Christianity due to oppression. The most outward doctrine is still there in tact, but the inner doctrines that I believe Jesus' taught have been totally neglected in my opinion. Unwarranted, no, there is, at the least, some evidence that supports my viewpoint, but as I said before the winners right history, and the winners version of history is not always totally accurate, especially when you consider emotional/moral attachments, and especially when you consider this within the context of one of, if not the most, emotionally/morally attached subjects in human history.

Um, nash…Paul was originally a persecutor of Christians. So if he had any motives, it would be to rid the earth of all Christians. It wasn’t until he saw Jesus that he coverted to Christianity. So there would be no reason for Paul to make a complete 360 turn if he didn’t have sufficient reasons for doing so.

Agreed, but after his conversion would not his motive be to spread the core message of Christianity to as many people as he could, even if that meant he might have to alter or even disregard portions of it to make it more accessible to more pople?

In essence, that is what true love is. High moral standards, and love for others

.

That is your idea of true love, mine however differs. True love might even be more confusing to discuss than the concept of God lol. Let's take our in depth debates one at a time here lol.

It seems as if you are basing your whole argument on the Gnostic part of Christianity lol. Is that the hold up?

Indeed, and the totallity of my point is: If like you say, that Christians are followers of Jesus' teachings, but that one or many of his core teachings are left out in modern Chrisitianity, then are you truly following Jesus' teachings? If it was written down in the Bible that Jesus believed in the importance of meditating, would you start meditating? If Jesus beleived in the ability of a human being to heal another human being with one's own, would you begin to practice this form of healing, if Jesus actually meant that if you follow my teachings you will live in paradise here on earth regardless of your external surroundings, rather than meaning, I died on the cross for your sins so you could have an blissful afterlife, would it change your interpretation of Christianity?

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

Contrary to want you might think, I don't argue with you or anybody for the hell of it. I'm not going to suddenly switch my evaluation of the evidence because of you:

I’m not quite sure what I said to make you say this, so I will conclude that this is just your typical rhetoric.

If we accept the consensus view that Luke-Acts are by the same author, and further that Luke did travel in Paul's company, all that follows is he was alive then.

Agreed.

If Acts were a life of Paul, then we might be expecting an account of his death. But Acts neither records the death of Peter nor of Paul, the two central figures. About a 3rd of the entire book of Acts is speeches, not descriptions of historical events.

That is bogus. The book of Acts has a few speeches but the rest is filled with the narrative on how the Christian church was spread throughout Rome. It lists places, events, and even names. I don’t know how you get more historical than that.

Like many ancient historians, the author is less concerned with a person's life and more about using particular methods to encapsulate, articulate, and render more salient particular events. Lengthy speeches do this.

Well, it sure as heck mentions the trial of Paul, or at least the preliminaries.

In other words, Acts ends by describing what Paul had finished doing, so we know that his two years are over and done with, yet we are not told what happened next.

Your claim that we should expect to hear if Paul died holds true about any statement about Paul's activities when Acts was written. If Paul was alive at that point, why are we not told what he's up to? Why are we only told what he was doing and has finished doing, rather than what he is doing?

As I read verse 28-30 I can see your point. However, since Paul was alive at least IN the narrative, we can determine the time-frame of the narrative. So we are talking of a time period that is within 20 years of the Ressurection.

John's gospel itself gives us a competing view of its authorship:
"This is the disciple who is testifying to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony is true"

Who is "we"?

Well, it seems rather obvious that “this disciple” is John, and the “we” is the inclusion of the person that wrote verses 24-25 and the rest of Jesus’ followers, either another disciple or some church elder. The important thing is whoever wrote it is clearly vouching for the integrity of John.

The church father who said Matthew wrote a gospel was Papias. Papias also tells us that Mark used to write what Peter said about Jesus. The only reason we know this is through quotes provided by Eusebius. This Eusebius calls him an idiot, and says he can't be trusted when it comes to traditions.

Say what?

Only Papias never says Mark wrote Peter's preaching. In fact, he deliberately contrasts what Mark did with what Matthew did. According to Papias' source, an unnamed "elder", Mark was wrote down some of the things he remembered Peter saying about Jesus without any order/narrative. It is for this reason, this unordered jotting down of memories, that Matthew arranged the sayings of Jesus in the Hebrew language (Matthaios men oun Hebraidi dialekto ta logia sunetexato).

Yeah, Ireaneus got his information from Papias, who was writing through another source, but you left out the fact that Ireaneus admitted that Papias did not directly know or follow the disciples, but he got his information from FRIENDS of the disciples. This is not surprising, considering the fact that they were in an oral culture at which writings had to be carefully preserved and passed down, or passed down through oral tradition.

Ireaneus or Papias, whoever you want to attribute it too, stated:

“Mark, having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately, though not in order, whatsoever he remembered of the things said or done by Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor followerd him, but afterward, as I said, he followed Peter, who adapted his teaching to the needs of his hearers, but with no intention of giving a connect account of the Lord’s discourses, so that Mark committed no error while he thus wrong some things as he remembered them, for he was careful of one thing, not to omit any of the things which he had heard, and not to state any of them falsely.”

So not only does our earliest account say that this Mark didn't write a narrative but jotted down some memories of what he had heard, but that it was because Mark didn't write a narrative (an ordered account) that Matthew did, and did so in Hebrew (or Aramaic).

So what??? The message is still clear, that Jesus was crucified and raised on the third day; that is the message. Focusing on the fact that it was “jotted down” (as you put it), is completely irrelevant. The fact of the matter is Mark got his “jotted down” information from a RELIABLE source in Peter. That is the thing that matters.

1) This never happened as far as we know. Usually, a manuscript was copied either in the same language or into another, but very rarely can we trace more than manuscript families when dealing with other languages.

All of that is irrelevant considering the fact that, as I mentioned before, the earliest manuscript we have is the book of John, which dates back to A.D. 100 TO A.D 150. This is at the very least within 100 years of the original copy itself. The closer you get to the original source, the less likely you will have misconstrued accounts.

The literature on this topic is vast. Thousands upon thousands of books and papers going back a century and more. I cannot cover the evidence in a post, because just listing the evidence would be meaningless without context, and supplying context would mean writing a book.

That may be true, but as I said, even on the dates that you give, that can still be within the lifetime of the disciples, so no harm is being done.

Your entire basis is simply that after assuming that you know who wrote the gospels, they could have lived long enough to write later.

Who is assuming? I am going by what the early church fathers say, and they were more close to the event, both in terms of time and location, that you or I.

A central issue for dating the synoptics is that it is impossible for them to be independent. There are too many lines that are too similar for this (for details, learn Greek).

Are you talking similar in terms of similarity in narrative? If that is the case, then why wouldn’t they be similar?

So first you'd have to solve the synoptic problem, as accepting the consensus would mean that Matthew (who knew Jesus) used what Mark (who didn't know Jesus) had written. If you'd been a disciple of Jesus, and wrote an account of Jesus' sayings and deeds, would you rely on a text by someone who didn't even know the guy?

First off, it isn’t as if he used Mark for the hell of it. Mark is a reliable source based on his association with PETER. Peter was one of the “big three” of Jesus..one of Jesus’ right hand men, so Mark was a very reliable source. Maybe Peter knew some things that Matthew didn’t know, being closer to Jesus and all. Second, the book of Matthew is longer than the book of Mark, so there is only so much “relying on” to go around if that is the case.

The same why I know that when the author of Luke states that it was in Antioch that Christians were first called Christians, I know that the original word was not Greek but Latin.

Point? Relevance?

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

So when do you say that the originals were written, and also when the earliest whole copies that we have were written?

I think all Gospels were written before A.D. 70. I don't know when were the earliest of the whole copies written, that is something to look in to.

I've read many of the arguments: tracing through Mary's genealogy as opposed to Josephs, along with the historical context of why one would be preferable to the other according to Jewish customs and practices, that the geanologies offer a "spaced out" version were recognizable names are used to promote brevity, and many others. I would agree that there are a lot of plausible answers, but haven't seen a real consensus on why they are different. Since I will probably never read Geislers book, what are his responses to the genalogy dilemma?

Geisler's book is a good one. It is basically a book responding to alleged contradictions and tough questions that one may have (particularly a critic) in the bible, book by book and giving a plausible answer. It addresses the geneology dilema, although I don't have the book handy at this time to give you his response to it. The book is at home somewhere. I will have to ask the wife where it is because she is very detailed like that.

 

[ChristineES]

Reading the last few posts, I think I should add that although there is no historical evidence of Jesus outside the Gospels, but there is record of Paul according to a class I took in World History.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

Reading the last few posts, I think I should add that although there is no historical evidence of Jesus outside the Gospels, but there is record of Paul according to a class I took in World History.

There is evidence of Jesus outside the Gospels.

 

[I.S.L.A.M617]

I think all Gospels were written before A.D. 70. I don't know when were the earliest of the whole copies written, that is something to look in to.

And the vast majority of Biblical scholars (aka people who know what they're talking about) disagree with you completely.

 

[I.S.L.A.M617]

It lists places, events, and even names. I don’t know how you get more historical than that.

So does Spiderman. It ACTUALLY takes place in New York and names names... Is Spiderman history?

 

[ChristineES]

There is evidence of Jesus outside the Gospels.

I am a Christian and I believe Jesus existed but outside of the Gospels, including those not included (Gnostic Gospels, infancy Gospels, etc) in our Bibles there is no real evidence; otherwise people would believe in at least a historical Jesus.

 

[1robin]

Reading the last few posts, I think I should add that although there is no historical evidence of Jesus outside the Gospels, but there is record of Paul according to a class I took in World History.

There is much historical evidence for Christ beyond the Bible. In fact there is many more times as much as in it. Christ is the most textually attested figure in ancient history but it does not stop there.

 

[1robin]

So does Spiderman. It ACTUALLY takes place in New York and names names... Is Spiderman history?

In what universe are the exact same methods used to establish the reliability of testimony for all of law and academics for well over a thousand years only a fallacy for Christ? I swear you guys all get trained at the same incompetent seminars or something. Christ is the most textually attested human in ancient history of any kind.

 

[1robin]

I am a Christian and I believe Jesus existed but outside of the Gospels, including those not included (Gnostic Gospels, infancy Gospels, etc) in our Bibles there is no real evidence; otherwise people would believe in at least a historical Jesus.

They do. The majority of NT scholars on either side agree on several facts.

1. Christ came on the historical scene with an unprecedented sense of divine authority.
2. He was killed by the Romans through crucifixion.
3. His tomb was found empty.

You can't quite get a messiah from that but you can easily get a historical Jesus.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

I am a Christian and I believe Jesus existed but outside of the Gospels, including those not included (Gnostic Gospels, infancy Gospels, etc) in our Bibles there is no real evidence; otherwise people would believe in at least a historical Jesus.

First, the other gospels aren't really gospels. Without getting into the nuances of the debate on gospel genre, what we call the gospels were intended to be a form of historiography that is most similar (probably) to ancient biographies. The so-called "gnostic gospels" that actually resemble the canonical gospels are use the canonical gospels and their form in order to parody them, invert them, and to re-create them according to particular Christologies, Cosmologies, and relations with the orthodox view (I don't follow Koester et al. here in the idea that things were more or less equal between gnostics and what Ehrman called proto-orthodoxy; it seems too unlikely that the kind of Neoplatonism, mysticism, & emphasis on specialized, secret knowledge would enamor many people).

Second, among historians of the ancient world you can count on one hand the number who don't believe Jesus existed. You can even read non-biblical historians from those who specialize in the history of antiquity like Michael Grant to more general historians like Donald Akenson. There are, I believe, currently only two people (Robert M. Price and Richard Carrier) who are specialists in a field related to historical Jesus studies and who do not believe we have sufficient evidence to conclude Jesus existed. Richard Carrier, who's degree is in ancient history, has gone around for years now claiming that historians should use one and only one method that can be applied to any and all of history: his inaccurate version of Bayes' Theorem (BT). The only time he actually wrote something about ancient history because he had to (to get his PhD), he had already been preaching BT for 5 years. Did he use it? No. Why? Because it works great when you are not addressing other specialists, but fails utterly when you are, and dissertations are approved by committees of specialists.

 

[1robin]

First, the other gospels aren't really gospels. Without getting into the nuances of the debate on gospel genre, what we call the gospels were intended to be a form of historiography that is most similar (probably) to ancient biographies. The so-called "gnostic gospels" that actually resemble the canonical gospels are use the canonical gospels and their form in order to parody them, invert them, and to re-create them according to particular Christologies, Cosmologies, and relations with the orthodox view (I don't follow Koester et al. here in the idea that things were more or less equal between gnostics and what Ehrman called proto-orthodoxy; it seems too unlikely that the kind of Neoplatonism, mysticism, & emphasis on specialized, secret knowledge would enamor many people).

Second, among historians of the ancient world you can count on one hand the number who don't believe Jesus existed. You can even read non-biblical historians from those who specialize in the history of antiquity like Michael Grant to more general historians like Donald Akenson. There are, I believe, currently only two people (Robert M. Price and Richard Carrier) who are specialists in a field related to historical Jesus studies and who do not believe we have sufficient evidence to conclude Jesus existed. Richard Carrier, who's degree is in ancient history, has gone around for years now claiming that historians should use one and only one method that can be applied to any and all of history: his inaccurate version of Bayes' Theorem (BT). The only time he actually wrote something about ancient history because he had to (to get his PhD), he had already been preaching BT for 5 years. Did he use it? No. Why? Because it works great when you are not addressing other specialists, but fails utterly when you are, and dissertations are approved by committees of specialists.

That was very well stated.

 

[ChristineES]

First, the other gospels aren't really gospels. Without getting into the nuances of the debate on gospel genre, what we call the gospels were intended to be a form of historiography that is most similar (probably) to ancient biographies. The so-called "gnostic gospels" that actually resemble the canonical gospels are use the canonical gospels and their form in order to parody them, invert them, and to re-create them according to particular Christologies, Cosmologies, and relations with the orthodox view (I don't follow Koester et al. here in the idea that things were more or less equal between gnostics and what Ehrman called proto-orthodoxy; it seems too unlikely that the kind of Neoplatonism, mysticism, & emphasis on specialized, secret knowledge would enamor many people).

Second, among historians of the ancient world you can count on one hand the number who don't believe Jesus existed. You can even read non-biblical historians from those who specialize in the history of antiquity like Michael Grant to more general historians like Donald Akenson. There are, I believe, currently only two people (Robert M. Price and Richard Carrier) who are specialists in a field related to historical Jesus studies and who do not believe we have sufficient evidence to conclude Jesus existed. Richard Carrier, who's degree is in ancient history, has gone around for years now claiming that historians should use one and only one method that can be applied to any and all of history: his inaccurate version of Bayes' Theorem (BT). The only time he actually wrote something about ancient history because he had to (to get his PhD), he had already been preaching BT for 5 years. Did he use it? No. Why? Because it works great when you are not addressing other specialists, but fails utterly when you are, and dissertations are approved by committees of specialists.

No, they're not really Gospels, but that is what they are named. The Gospel of Philip, The Gospel of Thomas, The Gospel of Bartholomew, The infancy Gospels, and a whole bunch more. I've read them and they are quite different than the canonized Gospels. They've also discovered a Gospel credited to Peter that only had a bit that was readable (ants got to the rest) and it was about Pilate. I read the Elaine Pagels book about the Gospel of Mary Magdalene. The teachings are wholly different. I'd go on but this isn't really what this thread is about.

 

[1robin]

No, they're not really Gospels, but that is what they are named. The Gospel of Philip, The Gospel of Thomas, The Gospel of Bartholomew, The infancy Gospels, and a whole bunch more. I've read them and they are quite different than the canonized Gospels. They've also discovered a Gospel credited to Peter that only had a bit that was readable (ants got to the rest) and it was about Pilate. I read the Elaine Pagels book about the Gospel of Mary Magdalene. The teachings are wholly different. I'd go on but this isn't really what this thread is about.

Those Gospels are interesting but I was not meaning these very unreliable gnostic and heretical fragmentary things. I meant the very well known historical authors like Tacitus, Pliny and the like. There are over 40 extra biblical historical sources that are not from sources like the mysterious documents you mention. They do not all mention Christ personally but even those mention the explosion of Christianity which is hard to explain without a Christ. One even recorded the darkness miracle during the crucifixion.

 

[ChristineES]

Those Gospels are interesting but I was not meaning these very unreliable gnostic and heretical fragmentary things. I meant the very well known historical authors like Tacitus, Pliny and the like. There are over 40 extra biblical historical sources that are not from sources like the mysterious documents you mention. They do not all mention Christ personally but even those mention the explosion of Christianity which is hard to explain without a Christ. One even recorded the darkness miracle during the crucifixion.

Why don't you PM me with the sources of these, I'd like to look into them. I don't want to continue this here, it is getting off-topic.

 

[1robin]

Why don't you PM me with the sources of these, I'd like to look into them. I don't want to continue this here, it is getting off-topic.

I will try. I can give you a few from another post but the rest will have to be looked up and it will take time. PM soon.

 

[I.S.L.A.M617]

Christ is the most textually attested human in ancient history of any kind.

Prove it.