Why aren't the gospel accounts reliable as evidence for the reported events?
Some Bible miracle stories don't meet the proper rigid standard. Partly for lack of eye witnesses, and some other reasons too. But the Jesus healing stories meet a high standard.
Really? Then you will have no problem in pointing us to solid evidence from a source other than the Bible.
Really? Then you will have no problem in pointing us to solid evidence from a source other than the Bible.
The fact that these sources were assembled into one collection 200 years later does not change the fact that they are multiple sources. There are multiple authors/writers coming from different backgrounds and each having a different interpretation.
Since it's appropriate to rely on one source only for normal events, why isn't it appropriate in the case of "miracle" stories to rely on 2 or 3 or 4 sources?
You are clearly incapable of determining what is or is not a source, and what is or is not independent. If there were 2, 3 or 4 INDEPENDENT stories of Jesus's miracles, then they might be worth further investigation . . .
Though they are collections of earlier accounts of the events, that does not change the fact that they are separate "independent" accounts. The fact that there is overlapping of the sources they use does not mean these collections are not independent.
Of course. That something builds on the same information doesn't mean that they are dependent...
Yeah right...
But then, in this sense, "independent" is not good. What is important is if the accounts are credible, or truthful. But an "independent" account,
in the extreme sense you're now demanding, would be one where the author fabricates his own account without any regard for the truth. Whereas an author who is trying to report to us what really happened would rely on earlier accounts as much as possible. I.e., he would be "dependent" on earlier sources.
So in the extreme sense of an "independent" source where the author fabricates his own story "independent" of the truth or the recorded or remembered facts that happened earlier -- in that sense you're right, the "gospel" accounts are not "independent" -- nor should we demand such independence. . . .
Some "dependence" on earlier sources is beneficial in terms of credibility. This reliance means that the compilers are basing their document mainly on earlier accounts from those who were closer to the actual events. This increases the document's reliability.
However, these collections, the "gospel" accounts, are independent from each other in the proper less extreme sense. Some use of Mark by Mt and Lk does not change the fact that each compiler or redactor produced his own total account independently of the others, in that there was no collaboration between them, and each one was free to introduce something further if it was important.
What kind of "independence" do you demand from these writers, or from these "gospel" accounts, that would make them more credible than they are in this form that we have them?
'Now' demanding? Hilarious.
Yes, demanding that we rely on sources or writers who refused to use any earlier sources for their own report. Why are you finding fault with any source that uses earlier sources, i.e., "demanding" that we use sources that reject any previous source? Why are you insisting that a report is invalid or illegitimate or unreliable if it relies partly on earlier sources? The gospel accounts are legitimate sources for information about what happened, just as other sources are legitimate. And that they relied on earlier sources does not undermine their reliability.
How does it undermine their reliability? So Matthew and Luke relied on the Q document -- so how does that undermine their reliability? You can say this makes them less "independent," but how is this dependence a bad thing? How does it undermine their reliability?
Why should we require sources that are independent of any earlier sources? Why can't these 2 gospel sources be just as reliable even though they have this reliance on an earlier report? How does this reliance or "dependence" make them less reliable or less credible?
You're trying to use parts of The Books in order to establish the historical accuracy of The Books.
By "The Books" you mean the Bible? Don't you understand that in the 1st century (and 2nd century) there was no such thing as "the Bible" or "The Books," but that the books in question, the gospel accounts, were separate documents? The 4 gospels were not the same book, or part of the same book, but were separate documents. These were separate sources, not all the same source. They were put together later into the one collection (the "Bible" or "New Testament"), but when they were first written they were separate documents, and thus separate sources.
That we have these 4 sources makes the overall account of the Jesus person more credible than if we had only one. This should not be difficult to figure out.
To be an "independent" source, it would be something where a known author was a contemporary of the events in question.
You're free to define "independent" that way if you wish. But there is nothing wrong with a source that is some generations separated from the events. We routinely rely on such sources, even on a source that is the one and only source for the events, and we accept this one source and believe the events reported, even though it's the only source and is 100 years or more separated from the events.
And a source doesn't have to be from a "known author" in order to be reliable or credible. There are varying degrees of credibility based on many factors, and whether an author is "known" is subjective, because often very little is really known other than maybe the name and approximately when or where he lived. You can't claim to "know" someone simply from knowing so little about him.
The Dead Sea Scrolls are reliable "independent" sources generally, and yet hardly anything is "known" about their authors. We don't have to know much or anything at all about the author in order to use the document as a guide to determine what happened.
Where it could be established that his source of Jesus stories was not an existing collection of Jesus stories.
What's wrong with relying on existing "stories"? Any historian who writes about something that happened 100 years earlier has to rely on existing "stories," doesn't he? What is he relying on if not earlier accounts or earlier records? or earlier oral reports, which are existing stories?
Don't we believe the Philostratus account of the life of Apollonius of Tyana? What was this based on if not existing "stories" or accounts from someone earlier? Much of the Tacitus accounts of Augustus and Tiberius comes only from Tacitus who wrote it nearly a century later and came from "existing stories" that Tacitus had access to. Why isn't it just as legitimate for the gospel writers to use "existing stories" for their information about Jesus as it was for Tacitus to rely on "existing stories" for his information about Tiberius?
Most of the historians we rely on did not witness the events they reported to us but got them from "existing stories" during their time.
And with the knowledge of who wrote the account and why he wrote it.
What's an example of an account that is rejected because we don't know the author's name or "why he wrote it"? Maybe it helps a little to have such information -- maybe -- but this is very subjective. This is not a basis for rejecting any document as unreliable. You might claim that having this information makes the document slightly more reliable.
Again, what document is rejected as totally unreliable because we don't know this about the author? Do we have to reject the Dead Sea Scrolls as totally unreliable because we don't have the author's name or know his motivation? And do we really know the motivations of every author we accept for historical information?
Whereas an author who is trying to report to us what really happened would rely on earlier accounts as much as possible. I.e., he would be "dependent" on earlier sources.
Yes. Which is why we ask for someone NOT working from earlier sources.
We ask for ALL sources, not ONLY "someone not working from earlier sources." We ask for all the sources we can get. We don't reject ANY sources. It would be irresponsible to toss out a source simply because it relied on an earlier source.
. . . why we ask for someone . . . NOT dependent on those earlier sources.
No, not exclusively. We want ALL the sources there are. If there is a source directly from the event in question, that's fine, and maybe preferable. But we welcome ALL the sources and use them for whatever we can get from them.
AND, sometimes a later source might be more reliable in some ways because that later author had more information than the earlier author who had direct contact with the event, because the later one sees a larger picture of the event, whereas the author who was right there sees the event from very close up and so sees a very limited part of it. So it's not true that the author right there at the event sees it more accurately in every respect. Rather, we have to take into account the difference and give more credibility to the close-up author for some details, but also give credibility to a later author who has a wider perspective on the event.
Pilate's reports to the Senate, or a traveling merchant's journal, or something else FROM THE TIME, not cobbled together later.
It's laughable to think that all such reports as these would be preserved. We are lucky to have what little we have. We should accept ALL the documents that we are lucky to have come down to us and not reject any, and we should glean every bit of information out of them that is possible, never tossing any of them out because they were "cobbled together" by a later writer who says something contrary to our theory about what he should have said.
The honest or credible writer would use the earlier accounts rather than disregard them.
No.... No one's asking for an independent account from 200 AD.
We want independent accounts from 30 AD.
Then you'll have to throw out 95% or more of what's in the history books. Start a bonfire and burn them all. 99%. 99.99%.
Some "dependence" on earlier sources is beneficial in terms of credibility.
So, all the US History books that repeated the story of George Washington and the Cherry Tree make the story more credible?
Yes, that made the story more credible even though the story could still be fictitious based on other evidence. But the extra sources supporting the story, in themselves, make it more credible than if there had been only one source reporting the story. With many sources reporting it, one should believe the story unless there is further evidence disproving it.
Even though it appears to have been invented shortly after GW's death?
Additional information like this might disprove the story despite the many sources reporting it. However, with many sources reporting it, the additional information has to be stronger -- in order to refute the story -- than if only one source had reported it.
You don't understand "history" or "credible" or "independent."
Then enlighten me -- give an example where extra sources reporting the same event do not add extra credibility to the event than if there is only one source reporting it. Or if your example is an event which is thoroughly refuted by strong evidence, show how all those extra sources reporting the event did not make it more difficult for the event to be refuted than it would have been if there had been only one source.
This reliance means that the compilers are basing their document mainly on earlier accounts from those who were closer to the actual events.
No, it means they were basing their documents on earlier accounts. It does NOT mean the early accounts were closer to actual events. It does not mean there WERE actual events.
But this could also be said of accounts that are reported directly from the alleged actual events. You could say that Caesar's Gallic War did not report actual events. Just because the alleged author is allegedly reporting alleged events he allegedly experienced himself does not mean there WERE actual events being experienced.
Basically your logic here is that just because an account exists is no proof that any actual event really ever took place. Even 100 accounts from alleged direct witnesses is no proof that any actual event really happened.
With this logic we could reject all reports of any past events.
This increases the document's reliability.
Wrong again.
Based on your premise that no accounts or reports of past events ever have any reliability, because all of them can be rejected as evidence that anything ever really happened.
But if we reject that premise and give some credibility to documents from the past that tell of past events, that they really happened, then we can also believe a document that reports a previous document. That previous document is itself a past event, and if it was reliable at that time as an indicator of past events, then it is also reliable to us, coming to us INdirectly through a later document that tells us about the earlier document.
The extra sources attesting to the same event, or even to the same earlier document, add some extra credibility to that earlier event, or that earlier document, than if there is only one source.
