That Jesus offers us eternal life is a REASONABLE POSSIBILITY, based on evidence, but not proof. (Is there another possibility, a better one?)
Good grief…back to last January. Wish, Wash, Rinse, Repeat…
LOL, again as has been pointed out to you a multitude of times, you have no idea if the writers of the Gospels were already devotees prior to writing them, that is just your wish.
No one said they were not "devotees." They were not
DIRECT DISCIPLES influenced by the personal charisma of the miracle-worker they wrote about. Almost everyone agrees that the gospel writers/editors in 70 or 80 or 90 AD were not direct disciples. Rather, they had stories or reports, oral and written, about those earlier events. Obviously they were believers or "devotees" or whatever term you wish. But not DIRECT disciples.
And of course Paul, who wrote about the resurrection, was not a direct disciple.
For all the other miracle legends for which there's evidence, i.e., mostly in modern times, we know that the miracle stories originated from the devotees of the guru, having direct contact with him and having been influenced by his charisma, usually over many years.
You cannot demand that we have people not connected with the prophet JS for evidence, as all you have is assumed people who may have known your demigod.
The writers almost surely were not in direct contact with him. The crowds who gathered around Jesus were surely not literate. It almost surely began with ORAL REPORTS ONLY.
Again, this is just your WISH, not reality. You and I have no idea the background of those that wrote the Gospels. It almost surely began with MADE UP BULLSHIT.
But the gospel writers frequently used reports from earlier, which they did not "make up" themselves. They believed the reports they had. Even if they did "make up" some parts, it's definite that they took much of it from something earlier which they thought was reliable.
You can speculate that all the earlier reports they used had been "made up" by someone earlier. But that leaves unanswered how they originated. There are no other examples in the literature, before modern times, of miracle stories (fictional, but believed to be true) which were circulating so early after the reputed events and published in multiple documents. So there is no precedent which can explain it.
See how easy it is to say something completely unsubstantiated?
It cannot be proved what happened. Like much of our history cannot be completely substantiated, but we make reasonable guesses about what happened.
Paul admits he never met your demigod. I'd be quite content with comparing outside sources for both your demigod and for JS and his miracle, as you have none.
You're saying there are "outside sources" for the JS miracles? That's not clear. So far I think the most comprehensive presentation of the JS miracles is
http://en.fairmormon.org/Joseph_Smith/Healings_and_miracles which seems to have only sources which were his direct disciples. What is an example of a source who was not one of his direct disciples?
I’m not trying to defend JS, so I don’t have to support JS against your silly MHORC (Mythical Hero Official Requirements Checklist). I’m comparing nothing against nothing. STRIKE
Translation: We know that all the JS miracle stories originated from his direct disciples only, just taking those accounts at face value.
But by contrast, the gospel accounts make it clear that most of the Jesus healing stories originated from bystanders or the ones healed, who were not his disciples. To reject this, you have to assume that the gospel writers made up this element in the accounts in order to deceive readers into believing that the stories originated from these non-disciples. You may assume this deceptive intent on the part of these writers/editors, but reason does not require us to assume something like that.
Rather, one might reasonably assume that the later writers/editors presented the stories as they received them. In many cases it is clear that these later writers relied on the earlier reports and did not "make up" the content, even if there were other cases where they did "make up" content.
In all four gospels we see examples of the healing miracle stories originating and being circulated by onlookers or by the one healed, who were not direct disciples of Jesus. Also there are cases where critics of Jesus are offended at his healings and accuse him of being in league with demons, and this also contributes to the circulation of the stories. This obviously is not PROOF of how they originated, but it cannot be automatically dismissed. It is some evidence about the origin of the stories.
But all the evidence is that the Joseph Smith miracle stories originated from his direct disciples only.
It is not difficult. Just spend 10% of the time, you do regurgitating the 739th variant of your vacuous claims, to googling the information. And you would find out that 1895 is simply a later publishing of 7 volumes, not the oldest copy of said documents. We actually have the LDS 1839-1843 originals available online as images.
The original manuscript was written between June 1839–24 Aug. 1843, which is available via scanned images here:
http://josephsmithpapers.org/paperS...56-volume-a-1-23-december-1805-30-august-1834
You need to dig out from those accounts the best example of a Joseph Smith miracle story and post it here. You don't want to do this because you know those accounts are laughable in comparison to the Jesus miracles in the gospel accounts. If you claim they are equally credible, then post one or two of them.
LOL…this has been presented to you several times on this thread, I’m not going to bother linking it yet again when you go for the LALALALAL I CAN’T HEAR YOU AS IT DOESN’T FIT MY MHORC. Get a clue, FUCK your made up MHORC!
The reason you won't dig out a credible JS miracle story is that all of them are pathetic, and you know they are -- you tried and could not find one that had any credibility. That's why the only ones you presented were stories where it didn't even say it was JS who performed the miracle.
You could have presented some Wilford Woodruf stories, but those are just too silly -- you probably checked them and were just too embarrassed to post them here. And you know that he was a direct devotee of Smith, who had been strongly impacted by the Prophet's charisma. So you dug out something else, not realizing that one of them came from Joseph Smith himself (you need to check more closely), which obviously is not reliable as evidence for his own miracle claims.
So it isn't that you're "not going to bother linking it" again, but rather, you've tried to present an example and could not find one that was convincing or that has credibility. All you can find is stories about a devotee praying for another devotee, who recovered and claimed that God made it happen.
For purposes of comparison, here is the first miracle story in Mark, chapter one, about Jesus curing a demoniac:
23 And immediately there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit; 24 and he cried out, "What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God." 25 But Jesus rebuked him, saying, "Be silent, and come out of him!" 26 And the unclean spirit, convulsing him and crying with a loud voice, came out of him. 27 And they were all amazed, so that they questioned among themselves, saying, "What is this? A new teaching! With authority he commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him." 28 And at once his fame spread everywhere throughout all the surrounding region of Galilee.
This is far from being the most appealing of the Jesus miracle stories. But it's taken as the first one in the series, taking Mark as probably the most original version. There are better examples, of healing leprosy or blindness etc., but this healing of a mentally-disturbed victim suffices to indicate clearly the miracle act, and to show that outsiders, or non-disciples, saw it and apparently reported it. It doesn't say this explicitly, but how else did "his fame spread everywhere" so quickly? There were only 4 disciples with him at this point.
Now, why can't you offer us a Joseph Smith miracle story, showing clearly that he is the one who performed the act, healing someone of a physical affliction, with witnesses present, including some who were not his disciples? and also the one healed was not a disciple of JS? Why can't you find one example of this?
Obviously we have nothing directly from the Jesus events reporting it to us, at that early date, just as there is virtually nothing from the ancient world reported directly by someone present at the event. But at least we have later writers who report what happened according to their sources, who were not direct disciples. Do we have at least this kind of report from the record of Joseph Smith? i.e., reports either contemporary or a few decades later, other than from his direct disciples, saying he performed a miracle act?
It appears not. No one believed these claims other than direct disciples who had been under the spell of Smith's charisma over several years.
Anecdotes like these are very common among many religions. People within the church saying brother so-and-so healed someone, or they prayed and sister so-and-so recovered, and so on -- and meetings or a faith healing rally etc. These are all worshipers within the church family supporting each other and re-assuring each other that God is taking care of them, and so on.
All this is inspired from their belief in the Bible accounts, the Jesus miracles, which is a centuries-old tradition that inspires them and leads to these stories.
These are not analogous to the Jesus healing events, which came not from any religious tradition or anecdotes of the disciples, which kind are discounted by everyone who isn't a member of the religious group in question.
Sure they are analogous. The Jesus cult was constructed within the confines of the Roman Empire with Yahweh, Mithras, and Osiris floating around, with their followers with healing claims.
No, there are no healing miracle events within this environment, other than the following:
from Jewish scripture containing hundreds of miracles, 3 healings by Elisha and Elijah: 1 Kings 17:22, 2 Kings 4:34, 2 Kings 5:14); ……
LOL…try again.
http://www.voiceofhealing.info/02history/oldtestament.html
There are twelve occurrences of individual healings and three corporate healings recorded in the Old Testament.
(This proves you are trying sincerely to find examples to offer and will report anything, and that your "not going to bother" rhetoric is not the explanation why you can't come up with anything.)
No, there are
only three healing stories in the Old Testament. The others you're talking about are
- cases where first the victim was struck down by Yahweh, and then was revived or healed of the wound which Yahweh first inflicted; and
- cases of a woman who had trouble becoming pregnant, and God "healed" her by making her become pregnant. There are many such pagan "healing" stories, but it is bone-headed to say that a woman not being pregnant is sick and needing to be "healed."
If you take the trouble to check out each of those alleged healings, you will see that there are only 3 cases where the victim had a real illness or affliction and was healed by the prophet, and where the victim(s) had not been struck down originally by Yahweh to cause the affliction. E.g., Yahweh sends a plague, killing thousands, and then stops the plague, and this is a "healing"? -- come off it! That's no healing! Jesus didn't have to first send a scourge to kill or maim people in order to then do a healing act.
Perhaps 1 or 2 other examples in the list are more marginal, but in each case it's not clear that any specific healing act took place to cause the recovery.
What we're looking for are cases where someone with a normal affliction becomes cured, like the Jesus stories, or like the ones who prayed to a statue of a pagan deity and claimed to have recovered. These worshipers at pagan statues or temples are the only other serious cases of healing stories outside the three Elijah/Elisha stories.
Of course these pagan worshipers were members of a longstanding centuries-old religious tradition centered around ancient deities. Praying at a statue has no resemblance to anything in the Jesus healing events.
But meanwhile, the JS miracle claims are obvious copycat stories taken directly out of the gospel accounts.
JS was constructing his new religion to compete with Christianity, . . .
With the existing Christian denominations, yes. But entirely based on the earlier Christian scriptures and Christ belief.
. . . just as Paul and his chipmunks were constructing their new religion to compete with Judaism.
Sort of. Maybe there's an analogy of Paul to Joseph Smith. But no analogy to JS can explain where the Jesus miracle healing stories came from.
Wish, Wash, Rinse, Repeat…you keep telling yourself that. Again, I don’t need to play within your silly and fabricated MHORC.
So you concede the point that we cannot explain the spread of the Jesus miracle legend by a comparison to Joseph Smith, all of whose reputed miracles were done in the name of Jesus and are copycat stories based on the Jesus miracle stories. So we can explain the origin of the JS miracle stories, but not those of Jesus, which appear suddenly in history with no explanation or precedent leading up to them.
Not amazingly, both groups most probably felt compelled to make their god-system competitive with the older one(s).
Again, a comparison of JS to Paul might make some sense in explaining how they proceeded to win more followers and spread their message. However, Paul did not originate the Jesus legend, but only created his own version of the Christ belief which already existed.
The proper comparison is that of Joseph Smith to Jesus, as both are reputed miracle-workers.
Wish, Wash, Rinse, Repeat…you keep telling yourself that.
What? they are not reputed miracle-workers?
Again, I don’t need to play within your silly and fabricated MHORC. But quite funny on the “proper comparison" attempt…
Maybe you lost track. What we're doing is trying to explain where the Jesus miracle stories came from. The claim is that they were "made up" just as the Joseph Smith stories were, by analogy. But this analogy obviously is a bad one.
Instead you need a miracle-worker earlier in history, before modern publishing, for a good example. And there is none that even comes close.
But also the JS analogy is poor because he obviously borrowed heavily from the earlier centuries-old Jesus miracle legend, in whose name all the JS reputed miracle acts were done, and without whom he could never have won any followers.
Rather, the Jesus accounts are of people who came from outside the circle of his disciples and were healed and then left to tell others what had happened.
WTF? The Gospel accounts come from the circle of believers within this new Christ cult. There are NO outside accounts.
But the stories did not originate from the direct disciples of Jesus, …
Wish, Wash, Rinse, Repeat… You again are conflating the counter argument. I haven’t stated that the Gospels/stories came from direct disciples.
OK, then you're agreeing that the Jesus case is different than all the others (i.e., than those of modern times, where there is evidence closer to the alleged events), where all the miracle claims clearly originate from the direct disciples only, who were influenced directly by the guru's charisma, unlike the Jesus miracle stories.
I have stated that the Gopsels/stories could have easily come from devotees of the cult.
But not likely his DIRECT disciples in 30 AD.
We don't know for sure the origin of them. Obviously the gospel accounts were written/edited/compiled by believers. But where they got their input we don't know. There is good reason to believe that most of it came from earlier sources they had and was not "made up" by the writers/editors in 70 or 80 or 90 AD, even if some of the content was "made up" by them. Most of it was not.
Whether 2 of the writers/story tellers were actually followers of the purported Jesus is an unknown.
Probably the gospel writers/editors were not direct followers. But probably there is some connection to direct followers, or sources going back to Jesus at around 30 AD. There's no "PROOF," but we can reasonably guess on the connection to the earlier events, just as much of the historical events is guesswork.
What you haven’t shown, and can’t show, is any evidence that these stories came from interested bystanders.
The gospel accounts clearly imply (and state explicitly in 2 or 3 cases) that onlookers spread the stories/reports, from the beginning, plus also some of the ones healed spread the stories. This is evidence, but not proof. We can't demand certainty for many/most historical events.
"History is mostly guessing -- the rest is prejudice." -- Will Durant
There are at least two reasons why the Jesus miracle stories likely did not originate (as fictions) from his direct disciples:
1. The stories themselves, in the synoptic gospels, imply several times that the ones who first began spreading the stories were the onlookers, also the one healed in some cases, and these were never his direct disciples. It's very clear that the direct disciples, an "inner circle" of believers close to him, is a very small group compared to the "multitude" of onlookers or visitors present. And it is usually the latter who go out and tell the stories. In 1 or 2 cases the account says this explicitly, that it was non-disciples who spread the word. In most of the accounts it is implied that it was non-disciples, but not stated explicitly.
2. This does not apply to every miracle story, particularly not to the calming of the storm. But it applies to most of the healing stories.
Wish, Wash, Rinse, . . .
It's fun refuting you because you keep reminding me of one of my favorite popular tunes from the 1950s --
The Portuguese Washerwoman -- you would probably like it, since you're so obsessed with washing and rinsing.
Repeat. Again, you haven’t provided any evidence but your wish that it is so.
The gospel accounts are evidence -- just not PROOF. For most historical events we have evidence, but usually not proof, or total certainty. The evidence, from the written accounts, is sufficient for reasonable belief.
Well you seem to think that the miracle stories "clearly" come from these curious onlookers. If the stories actually were "clearly" sourced from these curious onlookers, instead of "assumed by you" to have come from them, then they would clearly be independent sources. However, it has become clear that you have formed a rather unique and custom definition of the word "clear".
One thing "clear" is that the content in the gospel accounts came mostly from earlier sources and not from the gospel writers/editors in 70 or 80 or 90 AD. Some elements about the miracle stories could not have originated later but must have come from their sources.
Obviously there's no overwhelming evidence that the miracle stories originated from those onlookers or non-disciples in 30 AD. But the gospel accounts say clearly that some rumors or reports originated from such non-disciples and were circulated by them. You have to assume the later writers "made up" this element in the accounts. You can assume this, but there is no compelling reason requiring us to make that assumption.
2. The public ministry of Jesus was too short for him to have become mythologized (in fictional accounts) in such a short time, and such mythologizing, or legend-building, is part of the pattern of miracle-worker cults, where the guru enjoys a long career, usually decades, in which he influences his direct disciples with his charisma and also amasses a wide reputation which brings him widespread publicity and notoriety.
Again, I don’t need to play within your silly and fabricated MHORC. The purported short time of public ministry comes only from the story tellers.
Almost everyone agrees that the public ministry of Jesus was short -- 3 years or less. The gospel accounts are the source for this. But there's no reason to assume the later writers/editors tried to fabricate this.
The John gospel suggests possibly longer than 3 years, but John is the least reliable for accuracy of the details.
Albert Schweitzer says "His public ministry may be counted in weeks." But he seems to calculate the time span at 8-9 months, from the summer of the first year to Easter the following year.
https://archive.org/stream/mysteryofkingdom00schw#page/252/mode/2up/search/253 (If this link doesn't work, it's from his
Mystery of the Kingdom of God, p. 253.)
Anyway, cults can spring up fast.
But prior to modern times they did not get miracle stories circulated and published in multiple documents in less than 100 years. There's no other example of that. There's not even a close second for this. Which suggests that it was normally very difficult or impossible for an instant miracle legend to pop up and get published in such a short time.
We need something from someone other than Joseph Smith himself. And we need something originating from someone other than his direct disciples.
ROTFLMAO So straight from the horse's mouth isn't any good, but anonymous gospels written by people within the Christ cult is good?
If the stories originated from direct disciples only, the credibility is much lower. You can't figure that out? You can't understand how the direct disciples, directly impacted by the guru's charisma, are less credible in their claims about the guru's miracle power?
Yeah, I can figure out that cult followers are heavily biased.
But they don't make up miracle stories, or imagine a miracle happened, unless they were directly influenced by the guru, by his charisma, usually over many years. This is where the miracle stories always originate.
Your problem is that you can’t actually show that your cult’s claims are any different, you just wish it was so.
So you think the Jesus miracle stories originated from his direct disciples? in 30 AD?
A believer would include that as a possibility, or probability, along with reports from the non-disciples. But I think most
NON-believers reject the miracle stories as a
later invention, from 30 or 40 or 50 years later. In which case they obviously did not originate from his direct disciples. Isn't that what you think?
Don't you believe the miracle stories originated decades later and didn't exist at the beginning, in 30 AD? If so, then you're agreeing that they did not originate from the original disciples, the DIRECT disciples.
Additionally, anonymous isn’t necessarily better than known devotees IMPOV, especially when the anonymous writers could quite easily also be devotees. You can’t figure that out?
No doubt the "anonymous" writers were believers, BUT NOT DIRECT disciples inspired by the miracle-worker's charisma/personality, which is what inspires most miracle claims (if not all). So these writers are better sources than known devotees who were the guru's DIRECT DISCIPLES driven by his charisma. As long as we can reasonably assume those writers had some close contact with original witnesses/disciples and/or reports close to them.
What is another example, before modern publishing, where multiple sources reported the same alleged miracle event(s) within 30-70 years? or published fictional miracle stories for a recent miracle hero? There's an obvious pattern of such fiction stories originating from the direct disciples of a guru, also from a detached story-teller more than a century later, but not from writers inventing the stories a few decades later. The explanation is more credible if it fits a general pattern we can see happening in other examples. (I know -- St. Genevieve could be a rare exception. But there's ONLY ONE SOURCE in that one uniquely rare case (almost certainly a wacko).)
The problem is the very poor analogy of taking an example from the 19th century, when publishing is widespread, to compare it to the much different example from the 1st century AD, when virtually nothing was written or copied or published.
So you need to come up with a more appropriate comparison. You can't claim you've explained the Jesus miracle stories by making this comparison to a case where the conditions are so much different.
Actually, it is a great comparison, you just don’t like it.
But it leaves unanswered why there was ONLY ONE successful miracle legend (i.e., only one which became published in less than 100 years) from the origin of writing up to about 1500 or 1600 or 1700 AD. (Or -- (since you might dig out 1 or 2 others) the only one for which there is more than only one source.) Also the only one in which the miracle person was someone of no recognition or status.
If you could find just one other case, over that 2000-3000-year period, so this one would not stick out so conspicuously, that would be a much better comparison. It would be better because then you could claim such a phenomenon is not so unusual, and it can be explained in the same way this other one is explained. But there is no other example you can offer for comparison. Other than from modern times, where it's very easy to explain how the multiple sources are created, as everything is published in modern times, but virtually nothing was published 1000 or 2000 years ago, before the arrival of mass printing.
And I don’t need to come up with anything as I find your MHORC to be silly BS, and humans have created thousands of gods with special features.
Millions. But in this case the "special feature" is one which excludes any normal explanation how the miracle stories got started, because normal mythologizing is ruled out. These features of a widely-known charismatic celebrity figure with a long public career are the factors which explain how miracle legends originate and spread.
By offering for comparisons only examples which contain the normal features which easily explain the mythologizing, you are in effect admitting that this one case stands out as the only one for which we have no explanation how it got started. And you're right -- you don't need to come up with such an explanation. You can just accept that we have one case in history which cannot be explained, and there are many things which cannot be explained.
In one case [Joseph Smith] we know who wrote the documents, . . .
Again, there is nothing inferior about "anonymous" documents. This is a phony criterion contrived here only for rejecting the gospel accounts as a source, when this is never used in other cases to reject a document as a source.
Just because a document has a name attached to it does not mean it's more reliable. There are many problems with identifying the source and the author's credibility for the documents generally, even if there is a name attached. That name being attached does not resolve the problems, and the anonymity is at worst a very minor problem.
You can't name any document rejected as a historical source just because it's "anonymous."
You seem to like to pick at each point, as if it exists in a vacuum. I don’t reject a document
just because it’s anonymous. There is a large weave that I am looking at, and you are sniveling about one strand….
I'm sniveling about the others too, which is why this post is so long. Are you whining that this WALL OF TEXT is too short?
. . . in what years they were written, . . .
On this point you're just factually wrong. The gospel accounts and the Paul epistles are dated with equal accuracy to most other documents of the time. Very few can be precisely dated to within 20 years of when they were written.
Or again, you're contriving a guideline here for automatically excluding MOST documents prior to 1000, and thus MOST of our mainline history. It is very common to accept ancient documents as sources even though they cannot be dated precisely.
Sorry, but you are factually wrong. The point that is being discussed here are the Gospels, where people purportedly passed on stories about this Jesus guy they said they knew.
Yes, we're discussing the Gospels, but you cannot impose standards or requirements onto these documents that are not also demanded of other documents of the period. Your demand for the precise dating etc. would require us to reject MOST/ALL the sources for ancient history.
Paul’s documents are pretty accurately dated, but he never met Jesus by his own words. Mark is closer to having some accuracy, but still there are lots of assumption even there. I’m not trying to critique the Gospels against all other ancient writing, I’m comparing it to the reality we know of JS and the Mormons.
So then you reject almost ALL documents for ancient history? That's what we have to do if we reject all documents which cannot be dated and identified as easily as the 19th-century LDS documents can be. In effect you are dictating that ONLY MODERN documents can be trusted as sources for historical events.
In the other case, we can only assume that some of the writers knew their demigod, . . .
No, I think the general consensus is that the gospel writers and also Paul did not know Jesus directly, as most all sources for history back then did not know the historical figure they wrote about. Paul claimed some mystical contact with him, like others since then have claimed, but not the historical Jesus known by the direct disciples.
The assumption generally is that the later writers had information, from sources, oral reports, and even some written reports now lost, about the earlier events, going back to 30 AD. So the knowledge of Jesus was indirect, for the later gospel writers/editors. But most of their information, written and oral, likely originated from the earlier direct witnesses, including both direct disciples and non-disciples who were present.
Yes, that is the
assumption by Christian theologians….funny that is….
And you don't agree? So then you think the Gospel writers were right there in 30 AD witnessing the events themselves?
Or you're assuming there were NO events at all, and all of it was "made up" decades later? It can't be ruled out. But much more likely is that they relied on earlier sources, written and oral. This fits much better the pattern for ancient writings on the reported events. Even Homer tried his best to rely on the earlier tradition, to which he added fiction only out of necessity to fill in so much that wasn't known.
. . . but we really aren't positive as the first document came at least 3 decades after the end of the events, but the years are super fuzzy.
No more "fuzzy" than in the case of our mainline sources for normal historical events.
(The Paul epistles are separated by only 25 years or so.)
The dating of the epistles and gospel accounts is just as definite as for most other documents of the time which are accepted as sources for the events, i.e., the normal events which are routinely believed. It's normal for there to be doubts about the dating of documents which are sources for the period.
You are trying to defend The God, right?
No, I'm defending my belief. The phrase "reasons to reject Christianity" implies that Christ belief is irrational or contrary to reason. I'm not even trying to defend all of "Christianity," but I'm defending what I think is the basic "Christian" belief that Christ had/has power, as shown in his miracle acts, and that this gives us reasonable hope for the possibility of eternal life. That basic belief is all I'm defending.
"The God" entity has something to do with this, but I'm not "defending" him/her/it.
Not just an ordinary everyday normal god, right?
It doesn't matter whether the source for eternal life is "ordinary everyday normal" or something else.
Obviously I'm defending only this one belief and nothing else. I'm saying this Christ belief I've stated is reasonable, regardless of all the other beliefs, about ordinary gods or unordinary gods. If you know of some other "god" of any kind which offers us eternal life and has done something to show us this possibility, or of someone claiming this, then why don't you present that information here for consideration.
Maybe you need a better cleanup hitter….
Who do you recommend?
