There is evidence which makes the Jesus miracle stories more credible than the other miracle legends.
There are many miracle claims from religious worshipers who prayed and claimed a victim recovered. Who can say whether any of these might be credible? from thousands of various sects or cults or denominations? There is nothing here unique to Joseph Smith. The same could be said of thousands of preachers who have followers in their congregation who make such claims about the power of prayer. Nothing makes JS stand out from those thousands of others.
The same cannot be said of the Jesus miracle stories. There is not one other person from that period, or anytime prior to modern publishing, who stands out as a healer, for whom the accounts were published near to the time he lived, in multiple documents. And no other case of an alleged miracle-worker who was someone of NO STATUS or recognition or notoriety during his lifetime. He does not fit the normal mythologizing pattern that JS and all the others fit.
Lumpenproletariat once again demonstrates this penchant for blinding himself to the facts in his eagerness to draw a circle around his favorite myth.
Of
course the amount of written data we have about stories from the time period in question are rare.
I.e., the "time period" being from the beginning of writing, maybe around 2000 BC up to about 1500 AD. Longer than a 3000-year "time period" during which there is only one "miracle legend" for which there is a written record, published widely in multiple documents originating within decades of the alleged events. Even though there were surely thousands of such miracle legends during the period. A few dozen get some brief mention in the written record enough that we know they existed.
The absence of such a record for miracle legends suggests that conditions made it impossible for fictional miracle heroes to gain such recognition, because the scarcity of writers and writing resources made it uneconomical, since the miracle claims were generally not taken seriously enough that educated persons would record or copy the accounts.
That does not mean human nature completely changed. The very stuff you describe in the first paragraph was going on constantly then as well. Call them soothsayers, witches, sorcerers, magi, shaman, wizards, enchanters, magicians or necromancers.
But none of these were taken seriously enough for anyone to record the alleged miracle events and copy and publish them for future generations. There is only one case of this, which sticks out conspicuously from all the others. Why was this one case the only one taken seriously?
There is no such thing as "normal mythologizing" as opposed to "mythologizing." This is a term you either made up or borrowed from some other apologist specially to begin the process of creating the sharpshooter fallacy that is the foundation of your arguments (not the only fallacy).
"normal" = the standard known examples of it. ALL the known cases. We can describe the pattern(s) which they all follow. And the Jesus case does not fit the pattern, and yet these mythologizing patterns or features of all the miracle legends are necessary to explain how the fiction stories got started and spread widely among thousands/millions of followers, usually over many generations or centuries.
People can and do make up stories overnight.
But not miracle stories which were believed and circulated and recorded and published in multiple documents. No one took them seriously enough. Over centuries a very few myths did grow and become popular, but only after the centuries of storytelling.
Of course any individual could make up stories overnight. But 99.99% of those died without ever being recorded for future generations. Because virtually no one believed them. The extreme successful cases won a few followers, and then it died with them. The rare mention of this or that obscure case in the record is the exception.
It does not take centuries to do so.
Yes it required centuries for the stories to become published, in the rare case where the legend caught on and spread to a large population, i.e., the pagan mythical heroes. It did "take centuries to do so."
Through the Dark Ages you might find 1 or 2 saints as exceptions to this "centuries rule" -- these of course were Christ worshipers who fell back on the established Jesus miracle tradition which their followers already believed in. These were charismatic prophets/preachers who had a long career inspiring their followers, which also explains how they became mythologized possibly even during their lifetimes. But their case is not analogous to that of Jesus, who popped up suddenly with no earlier miracle legend to fall back on as a model.
The stories of Jesus were engendered in a culture rife with miracle-working prophets; the gods of ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome also were purported to have special powers . . .
But all those myths required centuries to evolve and find a way into the written record.
. . . and this story would be in competition against those stories to capture the imagination of followers.
But why is this the only story which succeeded in winning followers serious enough to write it down and publish multiple accounts of it? in only a few decades? Why did no other cult choose to be "in competition" against those earlier Egyptian-Greek-Roman legends? Only the Christ-believers knew how to compete? All the others were dummies?
This insane argument that the Jesus myths are more credible than the Joseph Smith myths is absurd. Somehow we're supposed to buy your lame story that since we don't know for sure how the Jesus myths came into existence they're more credible than the Joseph Smith miracle stories that were propagated by direct disciples or Smith himself?
If we just take both the Joseph Smith and the Jesus miracle stories at face value, from the accounts that exist, it's obvious that the ones who first spread the Jesus stories were mostly non-disciples. The accounts imply this clearly, and say it explicitly in a few cases. Whereas all the JS stories began from his direct disciples only, if we just go by the stories themselves, i.e., what they say about the origin of each story.
As if that weren't bad enough you also argue that Smith telling his disciples about such things undermines their credibility.
We cannot take JS as a credible source for the story. Why are so many of the stories dependent on the Prophet himself? We need a source other than JS or his direct disciples in order to take the accounts seriously. They are not credible if they originate from these only.
But then you make a typical apologetic U turn when convenient and argue that events Jesus told his disciples about (because none of his disciples could have been there according to the story line) are credible.
What "events" do you mean? Jesus is not the source for the miracle stories.
The sworn testimony of the three witnesses in Mormon history is most certainly false witness, but it is also most definitely sworn testimony. And while it doesn't involve parlor tricks it does include an angel and the voice of God talking directly to the witnesses. According to this sworn testimony God told them that the plates had been translated by his power.
The story itself contains many magical elements. This silly argument that one type of magic element (healing a disease) is more impressive than god-assisted language translation puts you at odds with whoever wrote I Corinthians chapters 12-14. There the writer specifically lists 9 different categories of "gifts" that allegedly evince God's power. Healing people is only one of these, and is put on par with "translation of tongues."
It's not on par with "tongues" regardless what Paul said. And you're distorting Paul on this. But regardless, Paul is wrong if he says that babbling in incoherent tongues is equal to performing a healing act. (Which he does not say.)
Paul also plays down the speaking in tongues -- in fact, almost everything he says about this is some form of telling his readers to put up with it almost like a necessary evil that some people are caught up in. The tongues-speaking was a common phenomenon in many pagan cults also, and these people who had converted just brought this with them from their former religious tradition.
The entire twelfth chapter is an argument that each of these gifts are equally important and none should be looked down on as second rate.
No it is not such an argument. It doesn't say they're "equally important" or any such thing.
Most of these "gifts" have nothing to do with any special superhuman power, such as healing physical affliction (without medical training) is. And raising the dead. Paul is not addressing miracle acts here. So it's not relevant to our point about Jesus demonstrating unique superhuman power.
There are stories that show Joseph Smith performing translation miracles that we do not have stories about Jesus performing. There are stories about Jesus controlling weather that we do not see Joseph Smith perform. Big whoop. Stories. That's all we have on either side of this silly debate, and the stories are equally silly.
Are they "equally silly"? Why don't you post a Joseph Smith miracle story here, as I have posted Jesus miracle healing stories several times. What's "silly" about a person being healed of leprosy or of bleeding or blindness etc.? Here's the example I like to use, about the bleeding woman (Mark ch. 5):
25 And there was a woman who had had a flow of blood for twelve years, 26 and who had suffered much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was no better but rather grew worse. 27 She had heard the reports about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment. 28 For she said, "If I touch even his garments, I shall be made well." 29 And immediately the hemorrhage ceased; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.
What's "silly" about this? Why don't you post a Joseph Smith miracle story for comparison to this account. You're wrong that they are "equally silly." One difference (if you're able to find one of the JS healing stories), is that the victim reportedly healed by JS was always one of his direct disciples who had been under his influence for years. Whereas the woman in this story had heard of Jesus but was not a disciple of his. Her act here was based only on reports she had heard about him.
So put a Joseph Smith miracle story next to this one and compare them. Let's read them side by side. It's not true that they are "equally silly."
Millions of people today accept the Joseph Smith bullshit for the same reason millions of people way back when accepted the Jesus bullshit.
That's not a conclusion based on any facts we know of the two cases. Rather, it's just your premise about ALL reported miracle stories, regardless of any facts about the individual cases. You merely superimpose this premise onto any miracle stories, regardless of the facts about individual examples of miracle claims.
Someone convinced them it was true. The miracle of marketing is the only one in play here.
And you have been convinced also. You obviously rely on certain Jesus-debunker-mythicist gurus to convince you, like Richard Carrier, which you and others here have fallen back on as an authority which has convinced you. Including the "marketing" and promoting and selling books. You could dismiss any claim about anything, even claims about the earth being round, by saying people believed it only because "someone convinced them it was true."
A platitude like this is no explanation or any rationale to dismiss a claim someone makes about what happened.
Appeals to popularity, sharpshooter fallacies, totally lame arguments that are laughable.
These are the same "arguments" for believing ANYTHING in the historical record. The gospel accounts are part of the historical record, which is the basis for ALL beliefs about what happened in history. The Jesus miracle reports are no more "laughable" than a very large part of our standard knowledge of history, based upon "popularity" and "sharpshooter" reasoning from the limited accounts we have, by comparing them and comparing the credibility of one claim to another.
Your basic argument is that ALL the historical record is "laughable."
That's all you have. Lots of people believe it, sure.
That's what most of our historical record is based upon. The wider distribution of the accounts, recorded because people believed it, because there were a greater number of reports, near to the time of the alleged events.
Lots of people believe Joseph Smith and Mohammad are prophets too.
Only the direct followers of Joseph Smith, influenced by his charisma for years, believed that he did any miracles. And there are no miracles of Mohammad, other than from Mohammad himself as the source, except after about 200 years during which the mythologizing took place.
Lots of people are wrong.
How do we know who is wrong or what claims are wrong?
In your case, the only rationale you have is the dogmatic premise that no miracle event can ever happen, and so all such claims must
ipso facto be false. Other than this, you offer no reason why the Jesus miracle claims must be false.
It is not necessary for everyone to subscribe to this dogmatic premise of yours. It's not required by science or logic that we impose this premise.
