We have more evidence for the Jesus miracles than for any other case. Who dictates how much evidence God must provide to us?
Christians often argue that their god / Jesus is a well-evidenced truth. Yet when pressed with the task of producing the evidence they find themselves quickly backed into a corner with nothing but ancient anonymous stories of unknown origin as their only asset.
It's evidence. We have to take the evidence we have.
Much of the evidence of history is of unknown origin. Even if an author's name is provided, that usually doesn't mean much, for documents 2000 years old.
Though much of the ancient stories might be fiction, the part about the Jesus events, especially the miracles, is supported by evidence. Most of the Bible events come from one source/author only. But the Jesus miracles are provided in 4 (5) separate sources, so this is a much greater quantity of evidence and has to be taken more seriously.
Also, these sources are much closer in time to the alleged events than any other sources are that we might compare these to. So also for this reason the reported Jesus events have to be given a higher degree of credibility than the other stories/legends.
Even for normal events, like mainline history, the amount of evidence is generally LESS than what we have for the Jesus events in the gospels.
The fact that so many millions of people believe fervently that these stories are true embolden the believers, but millions of believers do not a truth make.
It's the higher degree of evidence which increases the probability and credibility.
Millions of believers only make it easier to accept an untruth.
But the reason there are, or rather WERE so many believers is the higher degree of evidence. It's this evidence mainly which makes it easier to believe the accounts.
It's not that there have been millions of believers in
recent centuries -- rather, the large number of believers in the FIRST CENTURY is something to take into account as part of the evidence for believing. So many believers in the reports that early adds to the evidence.
No matter how widespread a belief is it can (and often is) still wrong. There was a time when it was universally believed that the sun revolved around the earth.
That's not analogous to belief about historical events which people witnessed (or were said to have witnessed).
The simple fact of the matter is that if there was a god with unlimited power and knowledge at his disposal, and it wanted people to believe it existed, it would require absolutely no effort on the part of that god to interact in a real and tangible way with every individual on this planet every day.
You're demanding that this god interact in a certain way different than he has already. Why should he have to do that? How do we know what God should or should not do in communicating to humans?
You are starting out with a dogma about what God has to do. Whereas the Christ believer starts out by asking if we can see anything in the world where God may have tried to make contact with us. And there is evidence that he contacted us, or tried to make contact, in the events 2000 years ago. So this is something for those looking for evidence, in the facts of the world, rather than beginning with a premise about what God has to do in order to meet our demand.
I know my wife and my dogs exist because they are a part of my everyday life. A god like this wouldn't have to skitter off into some . . .
We don't know what a "god like this wouldn't" or would have to do. We can only observe the real world to see if any "god" -- "like this" or like that or whatever -- has actually done something to make contact with us.
In the Christ event of 2000 years ago we have evidence that some "god" has tried to make contact with us. It's not unreasonable to say this evidence is not enough to convince you, but it's unreasonable to say this was an improper way for him to make contact with us. We don't know enough about him to know if this is what "a god like this" would or wouldn't do. In many ways it's perfectly reasonable that "a god" would do something like this, giving us a demonstration of his power, leaving the evidence for us, and asking us to believe.
But no one can say exactly how "a god like this" should contact us and how much evidence we're entitled to be given and so on. We can only look for whatever possible evidence is out there.
. . . dark corner letting people drift aimlessly, unimpressed by the ancient and anonymous documents that form the only vestiges of evidence of any interaction this god has had with . . .
We should pay attention to any evidence, such as the ancient documents. That they are "anonymous" means nothing. Just because a name is attached to a document does not make it more credible.
Paying attention to the documents is using our mind, and maybe "a god like this" wants us to use our mind. Is it wrong for "a god" to want us to use our mind? to exercise our reason and look for evidence?
. . . this planet in thousands of years.
Thousands of years is a short time.
So why doesn't this god interact in this manner?
You mean not require us to use our minds? You mean interact with us in a manner that is subhuman, such that even an ape or a squirrel could also interact with God at that level? Maybe "this god" wants to interact with us on a higher level than that.
The free will defense is often thrown up at this point by way of rationalization. "God doesn't work like this because it would interfere with our free will."
Yet the bible is fraught with examples of god interacting with people who still exercised their free will. Hell, the genesis creation myth has god walking daily in the garden with Adam and Eve and they still exercised their free will. The entire nation of Israel supposedly saw god wreak havoc on the Egyptian empire with those 10 plagues, saw god part the waters so they could walk through on dry ground, heard the booming voice of god coming down from the mountain warning nobody but Moses to approach, yet within 40 days they were building golden calves and ... exercising free will. This is truly a rationalization that completely ignores the very sources upon which the rationalization is built.
Whether those earlier events really happened or not, today the best evidence we have of God trying to make contact with us is that of the Jesus acts recorded in the gospel accounts. These events (or
alleged events) are not disproved by reference to those earlier traditions. Those earlier accounts are not any kind of evidence that the Jesus events somehow did not really happen, and are not evidence that God is supposed to contact us today by sending plagues or by parting the waters and other such acts.
Those stories might be fiction, but even if they're true, it does not follow that somehow the Jesus events must be fiction. Or whatever you're trying to prove by them.
The real difference with the Jesus events is simply that for these we have real evidence, unlike for other miracle traditions, such as the pagan legends, and virtually all the other religious myths or miracle legends.
If an all-powerful god existed who had himself sacrificed to himself so he could get over his codependent issues over how we behave, and if that god wanted us to actually be confident that this ridiculous turn of events occurred, then that god could have ensured that adequate artifacts in the historical record would forever mark the event in a manner that would be impossible for humans do replicate.
We have evidence which is essentially the same as for other historical events. Although the degree of this evidence left to us is less than we have for some major historical events, still it is greater than we have for many other historical events which we routinely accept.
To have accounts from 30-70 years after the events allegedly happened, and 4 (5) sources rather than only one, is a higher quantity of evidence than we have for most historical events (from that far back in history), so what has been provided to us is actually MORE than the normal amount of evidence we need.
With only this qualification: in this case there are alleged miracle events, so we need more evidence than the usual amount. Which we have, but you can always complain that it's still not enough. And that's a judgment call -- there is no hard rule dictated by the experts as to how much extra evidence is required in order to believe a miracle claim. No one has the authority to dictate to us how much extra evidence is required.
Something simple, like a self-levitating playback device that cannot be approached because of an impenetrable 100 foot force field, yet constantly replays the scenes of him being scourged, crucified, placed in a tomb and triumphantly resurrecting after 3 days and nights (or was it only 1 day and 2 nights?)
But we don't have evidence like that for other historical events. Why should the evidence for God's intervention in history be greater than that for normal historical events? Maybe the "rule" here is that it should be the normal amount rather than so much extra evidence as you're demanding here.
Yet this is all we have. Anonymous stories written during extremely superstitious and ignorant times by unknown people who . . .
There you go again, making up stories. These were NOT "extremely superstitious and ignorant times" by comparison to any other time prior to 1000 AD or so. By any measure, the first century was less superstitious than anything from 100 AD to 1500 AD or so, and no more superstitious than any earlier times.
Fewer miracle stories were being fabricated during 100 BC - 100 AD than AFTER 100 AD. And also fewer than from 1000 BC - 100 BC. So the years in question were relatively LESS superstitious than other times.
And again, that the stories are "anonymous" means nothing. You make this complaint over and over, and yet you've never given any reason why "anonymous" stories are less credible. That all you can do is just keep repeating this pointless objection suggests that you have trouble finding legitimate reasons to reject the accounts.
. . . by unknown people who never claim to have seen any of the stuff they're writing about.
But again you're demanding evidence way beyond what is normally required for historical events more than 1000 years ago. Virtually none of our sources for the ancient events are from writers who saw the events they wrote about.
Stories that could easily have been authored by ordinary human beings. Stories that sound exactly like older stories that were, in fact, authored by ordinary human beings.
Of course they were written by ordinary humans. Who says the writers of the gospel accounts or the Paul epistles were not ordinary human beings?
OK, perhaps there was "divine inspiration" involved, but we don't need that claim in order to believe the Jesus events reported in those accounts. Rather, one might doubt, or disbelieve some parts, but the Jesus miracle acts are simply in the category of events for which we have normal evidence, like for normal historical events, and so no "divine inspiration" is needed in order to believe these accounts. They can be from normal humans writing what they believed happened, just like any other source for historical events which we believe.
Sure is a pitiful legacy for a god with such limitless power.
What's "pitiful"? that "ordinary human beings" authored the accounts? Why shouldn't "a god with such limitless power" use ordinary human beings to author the accounts of what happened? What is "pitiful" about using "ordinary human beings"?
This would be the perfect set-up if the whole thing were authored by human beings for nefarious purposes of gaining wealth, power and influence by deceiving vast throngs of people into believing them.
If that's such a perfect scheme to gain wealth and power, why is there only one case of it happening in history? Why didn't any others than the Christ-believers promulgate such a scam to gain power and wealth?
To keep it simple, let's say before about 1500. (It's easy to cite modern scams in publishing and the media and the Internet.)
But going back a few centuries, why is there no other case of such a widespread scam where miracle hoaxes were promoted in multiple documents, published near to the time of the alleged events, and copied and passed on to future generations? Why has there been only one such successful scam throughout history, from the earliest period of writing up to the age of mass printing?
So the tactic is simple: Get as many gullible people to believe as you can by telling them these ridiculous stories, then attempt to convince the skeptical that the stories must be true because so many people believe them.
But if it's so simple, there should be hundreds of other such scams historically, going back to 1000 or 2000 BC and up to modern times. And yet we have only one. It can't be "simple" if only one such scam ever took place and succeeded in deceiving the masses. What has prevented all the others?
We've been through the examples. I.e., the supposed parallels, all the other Jesus-like miracle legends, etc., so we needn't rehash them all.
The miracles of Krishna (and other Hindu deities) don't fit, because all those accounts did not appear until at least 1000 years after the alleged events. Likewise all the Greek-Roman deities and hero figures.
Similarly the other alleged miracle-workers of the 1st century -- Simon Magus, Apollonius of Tyana, Hanina ben Dosa -- no accounts for these until at least 100 years after the alleged events.
Miracles of Mohammed not until 200 years after the alleged events. The best you can come up with in his case is his own account of the moon splitting apart.
And so on. There are no other cases of a scam miracle legend being foisted onto the masses which succeeded. Possibly there are a very few cases for which there is ONE SOURCE ONLY.
If a scam works, as obviously the Jesus legend did (assuming the miracles never really happened), then the same trickery should work just as well for other promoters/manipulators and we should have easily hundreds of other successful miracle scam cults/religions which achieved similar wide acceptance, and not only centuries later, but less than 100 years from when the alleged events happened.
