I have attempted to discredit Christianity by hitting it at all angles, leaving it looking like a spike ball. Some of these points will not persuade all, but all will be persuaded by some.
http://www.kyroot.com
http://www.kyroot.com
You're back again!I have attempted to discredit Christianity by hitting it at all angles, leaving it looking like a spike ball. Some of these points will not persuade all, but all will be persuaded by some.
http://www.kyroot.com
I have attempted to discredit Christianity by hitting it at all angles, leaving it looking like a spike ball. Some of these points will not persuade all, but all will be persuaded by some.
http://www.kyroot.com
(1) Jesus Seminar
The Jesus Seminar was a collaborative effort of approximately 200 professionally-trained specialists in the field of religion tasked with the goal to cut through the myth and expose the historical Jesus. Membership was limited to scholars with advanced academic degrees (Ph.D. or equivalent) in religious studies or related disciplines from accredited universities worldwide and to published authors who were recognized authorities in the field of religion (by special invitation only). The task force convened on and off from 1985 to 2006.
http://www.westarinstitute.org/projects/the-jesus-seminar/
The principal finding was that the quotes and deeds of Jesus as written in the Gospels are mostly mythical. In fact, only 18% of the sayings and 16% of the deeds attributed to Jesus were thought to be authentic.
Other findings of the group included:
Jesus of Nazareth was born during the reign of Herod the Great.
His mother’s name was Mary, and he had a human father whose name may not have been Joseph.
Jesus was born in Nazareth, not in Bethlehem.
Jesus was an itinerant sage who shared meals with social outcasts.
Jesus practiced faith healing without the use of ancient medicine or magic, relieving afflictions we now consider psychosomatic.
He did not walk on water, feed the multitude with loaves and fishes, change water into wine or raise Lazarus from the dead.
Jesus was arrested in Jerusalem and crucified by the Romans.
He was executed as a public nuisance, not for claiming to be the Son of God.
The empty tomb is a fiction – Jesus was not raised bodily from the dead.
Belief in the resurrection is based on the visionary experiences of Paul, Peter and Mary Magdalene.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_Seminar
The significance of this effort is that it is the first time that Jesus’s life has been objectively analyzed by a team of highly qualified reviewers.
As such, it remains the best effort to date to ascertain the true historical Jesus, stripped of the myths that have been attached to him over the centuries.
Although many religious leaders objected to the findings, it must be acknowledged that the level of effort, the range of resources used, and the qualifications of the reviewers lend much weight to their conclusions.
The means of transport of santa claus cannot be explained by modern physics. It is evidence of great power that he posseses. Disproving that he travels all pver the world in one night would be a significant argument against belief in santa claus...The healings of Jesus cannot be explained by modern medical science. They are evidence of great power that he possessed. Disproving that he performed these acts would be a significant argument against Christian belief.
I have attempted to discredit Christianity by hitting it at all angles, leaving it looking like a spike ball. Some of these points will not persuade all, but all will be persuaded by some.
http://www.kyroot.com
(2) The Christian world versus the real world
The Bible speaks of a world that you can only experience by reading its books. Look for it not in your neighborhood, your city, your state, your country, or anywhere on planet Earth- it is a world gone with the wind, or much more likely, a world that never really existed.
The following quote is taken from John W. Loftus, at his website “Why I Am Not a Christian”:
The Bible is filled with superstitious beliefs that modern people rightly reject. It describes a world where a snake and a donkey communicated with human beings in a human language, where people could reach upward of 900 years old, where a woman instantaneously transformed into a pillar of salt, where a pillar of fire could lead people by night, and where the sun stopped moving across the sky or could even back up.
In this imaginary world an ax head could float on water, a star could point down to a specific home, people could instantly speak in unlearned foreign languages, and one’s shadow or handkerchief could heal people. It is a world where a flood can cover the whole earth, and a man can walk on water, calm a stormy sea, change water into wine, or be swallowed by a “great fish” and live to tell about it.
This world is populated by demons that can wreak havoc on Earth and make people very sick. It is a world of idol worship, where human and animal sacrifices please God. Visions, inspired dreams, prophetic utterances, miracle workers, magicians, diviners, and sorcerers also populate this world. It is a world where God lived in the sky (Heaven), and the dead “lived” on in the dark recesses of the Earth (Sheol).
This is a strange world when compared to our world, but Christians believe that this world was real in the past. My contention is not that ancient people were stupid, but that they were very superstitious. As Christopher Hitchens puts it: “One must state it plainly. Religion comes from the period of human prehistory where nobody had the smallest idea what was going on. It comes from the bawling and fearful infancy of our species, and is a babyish attempt to meet our inescapable demand for knowledge.”
http://infidels.org/library/modern/john_loftus/christianity.html#sci1
The Christian world is also one that was created in 6 days with Earth at its center, a world where Neanderthals, Homo erectus, and Homo habilis have no place in history, where dead people rose out of their graves, walked about the city and conversed with the living, a place where demons could enter pigs and cause them to run off a cliff . . .
. . . and drown themselves, where two bears can maul and kill 42 children, a place where a woman can conceive and deliver while remaining a virgin, . . .
. . . where the act of sending dead people to a place of eternal torture can be seen as a just punishment for living an ordinary human life, . . .
. . . a place where angels interact with the local citizenry and make important proclamations, . . .
. . . where slavery is held up as an honorable ‘enterprise,’ where women are a form of property, and where rebellious children, adulterers, and homosexuals are considered so evil that they deserve to be stoned to death.
And finally it is a world where God feels that he must kill his own son because he can find no other way to forgive people of their sins.
Yes, this seems like a very strange world to anyone alive today.
It should take only a few moments of reflection to understand, to grasp, to figure this whole thing out, that the god of Christianity is to adults as Santa Claus is to children -- an imaginary friend.
The means of transport of santa claus cannot be explained by modern physics. It is evidence of great power that he posseses. Disproving that he travels all over the world in one night would be a significant argument against belief in santa claus...The healings of Jesus cannot be explained by modern medical science. They are evidence of great power that he possessed. Disproving that he performed these acts would be a significant argument against Christian belief.
do you realize how naive you really are?
The means of transport of santa claus cannot be explained by modern physics. It is evidence of great power that he posseses. Disproving that he travels all over the world in one night would be a significant argument against belief in santa claus...
do you realize how naive you really are?
False analogy.
It can be disproved that any physical visible being such as santa claus travels all over the world in one night and visits every household. There's abundant evidence to disprove it, leaving aside the matter of inconceivability (mathematically/spacially/physically). The absence of serious sightings disproves it empirically. (You already know this.)
But there is no evidence to discredit the miracle acts accounts of Christ recorded in the N.T. All you have is just the dogmatic premise that any such thing has to be impossible.
Also, the santa claus narrative can easily be explained, as to the popular mythology element. But the Christ miracle healing acts cannot be explained similarly. These are best explained as originating from actual events that occurred at a particular time and place and were retold by witnesses.
False analogy.
It can be disproved that any physical visible being such as santa claus travels all over the world in one night and visits every household. There's abundant evidence to disprove it, leaving aside the matter of inconceivability (mathematically/spacially/physically). The absence of serious sightings disproves it empirically. (You already know this.)
But there is no evidence to discredit the miracle acts accounts of Christ recorded in the N.T. All you have is just the dogmatic premise that any such thing has to be impossible.
Also, the santa claus narrative can easily be explained, as to the popular mythology element. But the Christ miracle healing acts cannot be explained similarly. These are best explained as originating from actual events that occurred at a particular time and place and were retold by witnesses.
I have attempted to discredit Christianity by hitting it at all angles, leaving it looking like a spike ball. Some of these points will not persuade all, but all will be persuaded by some.
http://www.kyroot.com
(3) Hell
Christianity’s invention of Hell is a gift to anyone seeking truth because it decisively reveals the man-made nature of the faith. Hell is not discussed in the Old Testament, but that didn’t stop Jesus from announcing it many times in the Gospels, mostly in a very threatening tone. He made sure to let us know that most people will be sentenced there to suffer unending physical pain. Here are three of the forty-five Gospel scriptures where Jesus mentions Hell:
Matthew 5:28, 29:
“But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.”
Matthew 13:41, 42..
“The Son of Man will send forth His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all stumbling blocks, and those who commit lawlessness, and will throw them into the furnace of fire; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
Mark 9:45, 46…
“And if thy foot offend thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter halt into life, than having two feet to be cast into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched: Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.”
A belief in Hell is unavoidable if one is to believe in Jesus.
If Hell doesn’t exist, then why would God have allowed it to be so prominently addressed in the Bible?
This point cannot be overstated. If God is as most Christians claim, all-knowing, all-seeing, and all-powerful, then he would not have allowed a concept so ultimate and absolute as Hell to be documented in the most important scriptures of the faith (the Gospels) if it was not a factual place of post-life punishment.
This elicits an unsettling comparison. Hitler dispatched Jews to the concentration camps and gas chambers for no reason other than their ethnic identity. This was a temporal punishment; it sometimes lasted only a few days. God, on the other hand, is prepared to send good, well-accomplished, and generous people to a place of everlasting punishment and torture for the ‘crime’ of not believing in something for which no credible evidence exists.
The god of the Bible is, in effect, worse than Hitler.
This brings up another interesting point. Christians claim that the Bible is the backbone of the United States Constitution. The Eighth Amendment to the Constitution states that “cruel and unusual punishments [shall not be] inflicted”. It should be obvious that placing a person in Hell is both cruel and unusual. Consequently, Christianity violates the United States Constitution.
Any person possessing critical thinking skills can understand that a magnificently powerful god would have no incentive, interest, or even the slightest inclination to inflict pain and suffering on dead people.
Hell makes no sense . . .
. . . and it represents an ill-fated and entirely avoidable error in the foundation of Christianity.
False analogy.
It can be disproved that any physical visible being such as santa claus travels all over the world in one night and visits every household. There's abundant evidence to disprove it, leaving aside the matter of inconceivability (mathematically/spacially/physically). The absence of serious sightings disproves it empirically. (You already know this.)
But there is no evidence to discredit the miracle acts accounts of Christ recorded in the N.T. All you have is just the dogmatic premise that any such thing has to be impossible.
Also, the santa claus narrative can easily be explained, as to the popular mythology element. But the Christ miracle healing acts cannot be explained similarly. These are best explained as originating from actual events that occurred at a particular time and place and were retold by witnesses.
I thought you were going to explain how belief in Santa Claus is different from Christianity.
It has occurred to you that the New Testament accounts of miracles might, might I say, be totally made up?
I am not saying that I know I am correct, just that, based on those 122 points, I feel it is more likely that the core theology of Christianity is based on myth . . .
. . . and that Jesus was a human who died and will not return.
Do you want me to post your rebuttals on my website?
But there is historical evidence from documents at the time that Jesus performed the miracle acts. There were witnesses present.
Obviously the only argument has to be that Hell does not exist and that Christ was wrong to teach something that is false. If it does exist, then what is the argument? He was only teaching the truth. He can't be wrong if he teaches the truth, can he? You expect him to teach only what feels good and not mention something that is bad even though it is true?
Who?But there is historical evidence from documents at the time that Jesus performed the miracle acts. There were witnesses present.
Just out of curiosity, do you have any reference that says this is the way historical scholars evaluate ancient documents? Assume that they all record historical events, and go from there?It has occurred to you that the New Testament accounts of miracles might, might I say, be totally made up?
That's a possibility. But it's easier to explain the existence of these accounts if we assume the events really happened.
Your "historical evidence" consists of a single text seemingly claiming this.But there is historical evidence from documents at the time that Jesus performed the miracle acts. There were witnesses present.
There are a lot of texts describing how people has witnessed santa claus.