120 Reasons to Reject Christianity

[James Brown]

But the lie remains. And it is the biggest one in the world.

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Atheos again.

 

[bilby]

Okay, first off I'll admit that calling anything "The Biggest Lie" is a bit of a difficult proposition to support. It depends on how you define "biggest," and to a certain extent how you define "lie." Is it a lie if the person telling it really believes it?

I don't think that the belief of supporters would be a disqualifier.

I tell a fabridated tale about how one of my fingers was partially amputated and it's believed by people from several of my former commands and my current coworkers, who tell the story to others in the belief that my sister really did bite it off.

I think the evaluation of a lie, though, would have to depend on how much evidence you have to ignore to maintain a belief in it.
None of my coworkers have access to my sister or to the medical records of that day in ER. They have the evidence of my amputation and that's it. The story i tell doesn't contradict anything they have.

But look at Lumpy's efforts here. he knows fuck all about other religions but he'll support Christainity with claims like 'it's the only religion that...' When other religions are shown to qualify, he doesn't improve his claim, he just works to dismiss or marginalize the evidence that Christainity isn't unique. Or he attacks the individual offering the evidence.

So even if he believes what he says to be true, he's got to work at maintaining that belief despite counter evidence to what he believes.

Same with creationists, they have to postulate scientist conspiracies and conflate evolution with atheism, socialism, anti-theism or Satan.

And for anything that's possibly in contention for 'biggest lie' tends to have a smaller inventory of evidence that needs to be disbelieved. Like conspiracy theories need to marginalize the expert opinions in one or two professions, or the official government findinds of one or two investigations.

Various flavors of Christains work hard to ignore actual history, actual science, comparative religion, human nature, math (1+1+1=1), vocabulary (slave means 'butler'), and so on.

Ah yes, but he uses a LOT of words. Posts that could easily be summarised in a few lines stretch on for pages. Surely if your lie is supported by huge volumes of text, that renders it at least partly true. Right?

I wonder if he is paid by the word - his posts read like the unabridged text of Fenimore Cooper's Last of the Mohicans, where he never uses one word, if two hundred would suffice.

 

[funinspace]

Ah yes, but he uses a LOT of words. Posts that could easily be summarised in a few lines stretch on for pages. Surely if your lie is supported by huge volumes of text, that renders it at least partly true. Right?

I wonder if he is paid by the word - his posts read like the unabridged text of Fenimore Cooper's Last of the Mohicans, where he never uses one word, if two hundred would suffice.

And you could have said that with half the words you did

 

[bilby]

Ah yes, but he uses a LOT of words. Posts that could easily be summarised in a few lines stretch on for pages. Surely if your lie is supported by huge volumes of text, that renders it at least partly true. Right?

I wonder if he is paid by the word - his posts read like the unabridged text of Fenimore Cooper's Last of the Mohicans, where he never uses one word, if two hundred would suffice.

And you could have said that with half the words you did

So?

 

[Keith&Co.]

It is a reasonable hope, considering the power that Christ showed and the evidence of this power.

This would seem to be the cut-down, streamlined thrust of your theory, isn't it? Jesus showed that he could do wonders, which means we have reason to believe he was the christ.
But what about Matthew 24:24?

For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.

Whoever wrote Matthew warns us that signs and wonders are not sufficient to differentiate between the real christ and false ones.
How do you, then, choose Jesus as the real christ?

What happens to your argument if man +miracles =! Christ?

 

[funinspace]

And you could have said that with half the words you did

So?

Humor gone flat....

 

[Keith&Co.]

So?

Humor gone flat....

It's your accent.
Maybe if you were trying to express humour, he'd get it.

 

[bilby]

So?

Humor gone flat....

Perhaps you could count the words in my response to your response, and see if that elicits a chuckle...

 

[funinspace]

Humor gone flat....

Perhaps you could count the words in my response to your response, and see if that elicits a chuckle...

?

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

The Christ miracle stories are true, historical events based on evidence -- the others are mostly fiction.

Do you likewise believe in everything L Ron Hubbard and Joseph Smith claim about their "miracles," just out of curiosity?

There are "miracle" stories throughout all religions. Most of them clearly are based on a tradition of belief in miracles going back centuries, usually back to those of Jesus. They are even patterned upon those original events in the "gospel" accounts.

[A better answer would have been: No, I don't "likewise believe in everything" someone claims about "miracles" or anything else.]

There are "miracle" stories throughout all religions. Most of them clearly are based on a tradition of belief in miracles going back centuries, usually back to those of Jesus. They are even patterned upon those original events in the "gospel" accounts.

no, they go back way BEFORE your "Jesus". His gospels are patterned on earlier "miracles."

No they aren't. I know that's the popular mythology, but you can't give examples of the alleged earlier miracles.

Obviously there were miracle stories going far back, but there are not healing events recorded in earlier history that are similar to those in the gospel accounts.

The vast majority of earlier miracle stories are about "gods" which are not historical persons and do not perform their acts as historical events at a particular time and place.

The earlier healing stories are about people praying at temples or before statues of a healing god, not before an historical person. There are virtually no recorded events of an historical person at a particular place healing someone. The prayers are to invisible "gods" which had been worshiped for many centuries and had a longtime reputation as healing gods.

There is the rare exception. One is the story of the Shunammite woman's son healed by Elisha (2 Kings 4). There are virtually no other healing stories of this kind prior to Jesus. Just people praying at temples and statues to invisible gods like Asclepius. None of the healing acts in the New Testament are this kind.

But virtually all the healing stories since Jesus have been patterned on the Jesus healing acts. Joseph Smith, e.g., claimed everything he did was in the name of Jesus. Virtually all the faith healers have practiced in the name of Jesus. They hold rallies to which the sick people come, or to which they are brought, just as they were brought to Jesus. But we do not see any such events in the earlier miracle stores, from Greek/Roman or Hindu or Chinese mythology, in which the sick are brought or crowds flock to a reputed healer.


The Example of Krishna

There are modern reputed healers of other religions, like Hinduism, and there are claims that Krishna did healings at least 1000 years prior to Jesus, but almost never are the citations given and the texts of the original stories provided. Some healing stories are there, but there is no comparison to those of Jesus in the gospels. Typically there is a long rash of magic and monster stories that have virtually no connection to reality. The miracle stories in the Krishna legends greatly outnumber anything in the Bible.

Yet there is nothing in the Krishna stories that resemble the healing stories in the gospel accounts. Krishna might be the one most comparable to Jesus Christ, and yet when we ask for the details, the citations from the Gita or other scriptures, we find nothing similar to the case of Jesus.

Here is a book that claims everything about Jesus was copied from the Krishna legends. https://books.google.com.mx/books?i...#v=onepage&q=krishna healing miracles&f=false

It's true that there are some symbols in common, mostly relating to the birth in Bethlehem -- the virgin birth is emphasized -- and the Jesus symbols are said to resemble the Krishna birth stories, and yet there's hardly any actual quotes from the sources for us to read the Krishna stories and compare them. There could be some coincidental resemblance, but those who make these claims typically do not provide the original text of the Krishna stories for us to make the comparison.

But the Jesus birth symbols are not important. What is important is the healing miracles, and there is nothing in the stories of Krishna or other "gods" prior to Jesus that resembles the healing events in the gospel accounts. The truth of these accounts is not changed by the fact that Christian beliefs might have taken on some symbols, like the virgin birth, shared in common with earlier hero figures, including real historical persons. E.g., the fact that Alexander the Great and Pythagoras became reputed as virgin-born does not detract from their historicity.

Christianity may have borrowed from some of the "pagan" symbols (e.g., the birth date of December 25, at the winter solstice, which is not taken seriously by most Christians), but the basic elements of the Christ event, the miracle healings, do not resemble anything earlier, other than the obvious reality that people wanted miracle cures. But the earlier wish for something is no evidence that later accounts of a healer are fiction.

Likewise the resurrection of Christ, though there are possibly some symbols about it that were borrowed from earlier mythology, is not somehow refuted simply because it fulfills a wish people have for an escape from death. The "3 days" might be a borrowed symbol and fictional, but not the overall account of the empty tomb and the appearances.

This book, Suns of God -- Krishna, Buddha, and Christ Unveiled, by Acharya S, "author of the Christ Conspiracy," gives lots of quotes and paraphrases from the Hindu scriptures, but it gives no quotes showing any similarity to the Jesus miracle healings. There are virtually no quotes about any healings, and what little is quoted shows no similarity to the Jesus healing accounts.

When you read of similarities between Jesus and earlier deities or heroes, you need to ask for the exact reference in the earlier literature that tells of these earlier miracle cases. Check for yourself to see if the symbol or legend in that earlier account really does resemble the Jesus acts in the gospel accounts. Usually those making these claims do not offer this information, because the accounts are very dissimilar and give no reason to claim that the Jesus events are based on those earlier examples.

In the gospel accounts, Jesus is in a normal environment, surrounded by ordinary people and other familiar objects, not monsters everywhere and crazy magic events popping up again and again. One of the Krishna miracles is of a giant female monster disguised as a normal mother offering her nipple which is poisoned, and Krishna jumps on her and sucks it and drains the life out of her, and she becomes revealed as a monster and falls down dead in a colossal crash that shakes the ground for miles around.

Acharya S relates at least one Krishna healing miracle which is a little less bizarre than this, but nothing like in the gospel accounts where people come to Jesus to be healed. There are no stories of Krishna coming to town and the sick coming out or being brought to him to be healed.


Where are the earlier miracle-workers to be found? Give the sources for them.

If you're sure there are earlier miracle stories which are similar to that of Jesus in the gospels, go and find them and give the citation and quote them. It's popular to say that there were previous miracle-workers like Jesus, but you can never get those claiming this to give examples and cite the texts from which the stories are taken.

The real question is: Why do so many people obsess on claiming that there were previous miracle-workers, before Jesus, who did the same things he reportedly did? Why do they keep claiming this and yet cannot cite one ancient text telling us of these alleged miracle-workers?

If there is something similar to the Jesus miracles prior to him, then GIVE AN EXAMPLE. GIVE THE SOURCE. When is the source dated? And when did the alleged miracles happen? and where? This kind of information is ALWAYS lacking from those who make these claims. The best they offer are accounts of someone praying before a lifeless statue.

But all the healing stories SINCE Jesus are patterned after those in the gospel accounts. Most of the "faith healers," whether legitimate or fraudulent, attribute their power to Jesus and are performing the acts in his name.

However, the explanation that makes most sense is that they are copy-cat stories and not real events. In some cases a person recovered and everyone attributed it to the praying or meditation or whatever. But the person probably would have recovered anyway.

You contradict yourself. And then make my point. YES, they would have recovered anyway AND that spawns copycat stories LIKE the one about Jesus.

No, there are no earlier healing stories which the Jesus miracle acts could have been copied from, i.e., nothing there from which the Jesus reports could have spawned. If there are, why can't you name them or quote them or cite the accounts of them?

But we have the gospel accounts to quote from as the source from which thousands of miracle claims have been spawned since the 1st century, such as the Apollonius of Tyana stories. And all the Christian "faith-healer" stories. Including Joseph Smith. And stories of the saints. And Hindu testimonials over many centuries, including the recent Sai Baba healing testimonies, which resemble Jesus in the gospels more than they resemble Krishna.

And some of these "faith-healer" stories may be true, Christian and non-Christian. But most are probably fictitious and just "copy-cat" stories based on the Jesus healings in the NT.

It is obvious that the Jesus miracle events did set off an explosion of miracle stories which has continued to the present day.

A small number of the later reported miracle stories are probably true. If there's really enough evidence, why not admit that it really happened?

Because it's not believable.

Only because you begin with the dogmatic premise that there can be no miracle events. There is no basis for this dogma. This dogma that there can be no miracle events is based on faith only, not evidence. The evidence is that miracles have happened but are rare, or the power to perform such acts is rare, not that they can never happen or that there can be no such power.

Why must you cling tenaciously to a religious dogma that insists that no miracle event can ever happen? despite the evidence?

Ain't seen no evidence. Neither have you.

The gospel accounts are evidence that Jesus performed miracle acts. Obviously we today have not seen those acts, because they happened 2000 years ago, but we have the evidence that they happened. So you do have the evidence.

And there is other evidence also, because "miracle" power has been demonstrated in some other cases than that of Jesus.

The power of a savant to perform complex math calculations in seconds for which a mathematician requires several minutes (without a computer) is an example of power that is super-human, or super-normal. There is no scientific explanation as to how a savant is able to perform such acts that normal humans cannot do.

Also e.g. the power of a savant to perform complex piano music on a traditional keyboard without ever having been instructed and without ever practicing is an act which defies scientific explanation and is a super-human or super-normal act. The specific ability to transpose a complex piano piece INTO ANY KEY on a traditional keyboard, without electronic programming, is amazing and contrary to common sense and common experience and has to be put into the category of a super-human power, similar to the power to heal.

There is no more explanation for this kind of ability or power or talent than there is for the ability to heal, such as that depicted in the accounts of the Jesus acts. This kind of unusual power, or ability, which is absolutely unavailable to 99.999% of humans, does exist, because it has been witnessed many times and is verifiable and repeatable and has been published and publicized in many media outlets.


Historical Evidence of Healing Ability

There is historical evidence that Rasputin the mad monk did heal a child with an apparent blood disease. History books generally concede the apparent healing of this child by Rasputin. It cannot be explained how he did it, but the evidence is there, and the only reason to reject this evidence is the dogmatic prejudice that such events cannot happen.

Historians are reluctant to admit that it really happened, but they admit that the historical accounts show that Rasputin's non-medical healings appeared to have taken place, whatever the explanation. Efforts have been made to explain it or debunk the claim, but no explanation has been found. It was witnessed by doctors who had been unable to heal the child. On the History Channel it was said that Rasputin really did appear to have this unexplainable power.

The only serious effort so far to debunk the Rasputin miracle events is the claim that the child did not really suffer from hemophilia, as commonly believed, but from some other non-terminal condition. This explanation is not widely accepted, and yet, even if it's true, it does not change the fact that the child suffered from a condition that only Rasputin could cure and which the medical doctors could not.

The psychic Edgar Cayce had an uncanny ability to diagnose illnesses and prescribe effective cures (but not to cure them directly). This is similar to miracle healing, in being non-medical and baffling the experts. The History Channel reported this about Edgar Cayce, also noting some of his "misses" in prophesying the future. But that he had an unusual ability to diagnose illness and prescribe new treatments is an historical fact, with the only drawback being that some historians just reject any miracle acts per se, despite the evidence. So the evidence shows that it happened, but this evidence might be rejected in favor of the dogmatic prejudice that says such a thing just can't happen, despite the evidence that it did.

The History Channel always gives the other side, debunking paranormal claims, including UFOs, etc., and usually does not give a firm conclusion one way or the other but leaves these questions open, as being uncertain. (The History Channel may be guilty of sensationalizing, but not distorting the facts about the "paranormal" claims.) But in the case of Rasputin performing cures on the sick child, and on Edgar Cayce having the ability to diagnose illness, it is stated as fact that these cases were documented and appeared to be true, according to the evidence, in defiance of the general notion that such psychic abilities are impossible.

You've seen stories and you bought 'em, hook, line & sinker.

I believe the historical record. I don't buy hook, line, & sinker the dogma that miracle events can never happen despite the evidence of the historical record. One can reject this dogma and leave open the possibility of miracle events while at the same time being skeptical and disbelieving such claims until there is evidence for them.

To cling tenaciously to the dogma that there can never be a miracle event, or miracle power, goes contrary to the evidence of history and also to the current fact of the unexplainable power of savants to perform super-human acts that defy mainline science.

But only select stories.

Only those for which there is evidence. For miracle events we need more than only one source, and we need a source reasonably close to the actual events, and we need a case which cannot easily be explained as a product of mythologizing.

We need to consider what other explanation there could be than that of an actual miracle, or that the event really happened. If no such explanation can be found, then the best explanation is that the event really did happen. But if it can be easily explained without a miracle having happened -- a "natural" explanation -- then we should choose that "natural" explanation and not believe the miracle claim.

Others, with equal evidence you call made-up copycat versions of mistaken miracles.

No, if there's good evidence, then it's probably true. Give particular examples. We have to look at each case individually. Not all "miracle" stories are made-up copycat versions. But many or most are.

Jesus is not the only case in history of someone doing a miracle act. However, I think it's clear that he had vastly more power than e.g. Rasputin, who had limited power to heal only one child. Every miracle claim has to be judged individually.

Why not just say that in the few cases where there is credible evidence and no other explanation is possible, then that miracle event probably did happen?

I mean, reading those golden plates through his hat was pretty awesome, don't you think?

There are some Joseph Smith healing miracle stories which would do for a better analogy, don't y' think? What is the obsession with the golden plates?

They are one of the more hilarious.

And what point is served by choosing a more hilarious example? Are you offering Joseph Smith as nothing but a joke to poke fun at and nothing more?

And if those followers believe THAT without thinking or checking, what else did they swallow?

This is an ad hominem argument. You have to judge the belief on its merit, not by poking fun at the believers or showing some flaw in them.

And it's not true that because they were uncritical in a certain belief, their other beliefs are more suspect. You still have to explain WHY they "swallow" it, or why they "swallow" anything at all. It's not true that these people or other kinds of believers just "swallow" anything for no reason. You can keep pontificating forever that you and the Jesus-debunker mythicist crusaders are the only rational people alive, but it's not true that everyone who doesn't share your dogmatic premise is an irrational idiot.

Yes, they might have believed something uncritically. But why? You have to address that. If you don't, you can't claim to have explained anything or have a correct understanding of it. If some of them became naive and started believing something uncritically, there has to be something earlier that induced them into this belief system which then gave rise to the mythologizing. E.g., maybe there were other acts of Joesph Smith that were more credible and which gave them reason to believe, and then subsequently they began to believe other claims in an UNcritical manner.

So if you use the case of Joseph Smith to prove your point, you have to take the most serious example of a miracle he reportedly did, because this one is the most likely to be true and could make the point that there have been other cases of miracle-workers as credible as the Jesus case. But by taking an example that's only good for laughs and poking fun at, you're admitting in effect that there are no serious examples you can offer, because there are no serious examples of any miracle-worker as credible as the Jesus case.

Proper evidence requires that you identify the source, the written document, and quote it, and identify about when it was written and when the reported event happened. No respondent on this message board yet has done this for the case of Joseph Smith, though several have cited him as a miracle-worker comparable to Jesus. The inability of these claimants to give proper evidence is further indication of the desperate obsession they have with trying to debunk the Jesus miracles and claim they are not unique or of higher evidential standard than other miracle claims.

The golden plates are so ridiculous, so ludicrous that it is pure comedy gold (pardon the pun) and must not be squandered.

So you're basically admitting that there are no serious examples you can offer of a miracle-worker that is comparable to the Jesus case. And when you offer Joseph Smith as an example, you're really just horsing around, because you're sure this is not a serious example. Your case is not based on comparing different reported miracle claims, but on a simple primary unquestioned premise that all such claims are fictitious and ludicrous and not worth considering.

But it's not easy to explain the sudden rash of reported miracle events which suddenly appeared in 30 AD or the years following, whenever these accounts appeared.

You're the only one who thinks that was sudden, novel or unprecedented.

What is the precedent? No one has shown any.

And you're saying there were no additional miracle stories beginning around 100 AD and thereafter? You're saying the Apollonius of Tyana stories do not exist? You're saying the Apocryphal Gospels do not exist? You're saying these did not start appearing in the 2nd and 3rd centuries? You're saying the stories of Simon Magus do not appear in the writings of the early church "fathers" in the 2nd and 3rd centuries?

Obviously these new miracle legends did start popping up in the 2nd century onward. But not prior to 50 AD. Why? Why this sudden new appearance of miracle stories? "Sudden" here means we have these new miracle claims appearing after 100 AD, whereas this was not happening prior to 50 AD. How is this not a "sudden" happening? Nothing from 200-300 AD up until 50 AD, at which point the Jesus reports are becoming noticeable and being recorded. Then it accelerates on a large scale from 100 AD onward.

Where are there new miracle legends or new miracle-workers appearing in the literature PRIOR to 30 AD (200 BC - 30 AD) which are comparable to these which begin appearing after 50 AD?

The evidence shows otherwise . . .

What evidence? You're not giving any. No one else is giving any. Where are the new miracle legends appearing from 200 BC up to the time of the new Jesus miracle stories around 30 - 50 AD?

Why do Jesus-debunkers here keep huffing-and-puffing about "the evidence" but never give any? Why do they keep saying we have all these parallel miracle-workers prior to Jesus but never give the examples and the sources? "Where's the BEEF?"

. . . and it's awesomely funny watching you deny the pre-Jesus history of tales of preachers, prophets, miracle workers and children of god(dess)(es).

What's funnier is how the debunker-mythicists, such as those posting here, continue to give no examples and no documentation of these previous miracle-workers. Why won't you quote from the sources which tell of their miracle acts? When did they live? Where? Where did they heal people? Where are the stories of people coming to them to be healed? It's comical how you keep insisting dogmatically, as an article of faith, that there were many of these miracle-working healers, and yet you continue to not give any examples.

All you name are non-historical entities, like Horus or Asclepius or Mithras etc., healers not existing at a particular time or place, for which all we have are statues, and fail to quote from any document about them. Why don't you cite the documents that tell us of their acts? of the people who came to them to be healed?

Even if you have ONLY ONE document -- unlike for Jesus, for whom we have at least 4 sources -- at least give us that one source. Quote from it, or refer us to it so we can look it up and read about this reputed miracle-worker or healer you say existed prior to Jesus.

What little there is goes way back 1000 years or more, mostly about non-historical or non-physical gods, like Mithras or Asclepius -- no persons in history at a particular place and time and documented in any writings near to the period.

As to the statues and temples at which people prayed, you could argue that the statue really healed them, based on the anecdotes as evidence. However, these can easily be explained just as the anecdotes of victims healed by a "faith-healer" today. I.e., only the "hits" are recorded, while the "misses" are conveniently ignored.

This accumulation of anecdotes, and counting only the "hits" and not the "misses," is a result of mythologizing over many decades or generations or centuries in which the healer's alleged power becomes amplified. In the case of today's "faith-healer," the mythologizing results from a fascination with his charisma, which impacts the devotees over a long time period. It is not possible for such a healer to create his myth in only a short time. And when he passes from history, his charisma and myth die with him. Or, in a few cases, maybe he does score an unusual number of "hits" which help to establish his myth. (There's nothing here to say there could be no "miracle" power in any of these anecdotal cases -- in some cases a reputed "healer" might have some psychic power to induce a cure in some limited form.)


Why is Jesus the MODEL which all the other reputed healers are compared to?

There are claims that Krishna healed lepers. And yet none of them gives a source for this. Can someone find it? I search " 'Krishna' and 'heal' and 'lepers' " and I get the same claims that he healed lepers but no quote from the Hindu scripture relating the story. All I get is more claims that Krishna did everything that Jesus did, but still no one ever gives the citation.

You can't give any evidence of a demand for new miracle stories leading up to the time of Jesus, into the 1st century AD. We see no indication that new legends were being created in this time to meet some increasing demand. All reported miracles of this period are only of people praying at the statues and temples of "gods" whose legend evolved from more than 1000 years earlier and for which the anecdotes record the "hits" and not the "misses."

We see no indication of a need for a new miracle worker leading up to 30 AD. We see nothing in the way of a demand that the new Jesus miracle legend was to fulfill, thus no explanation how the new Jesus cult got started.

It's funny to check all the things that Christians have believed over the ages and seen how the actual evidence disproves them. And then watch them say, "yeah, well that was a product of ignorance. But this one, this one! is obviously a reliable story!"

Remember the whole global flood thing? And the 6000 years thing? . . . And Saint George and the dragon thing? (How come they don't have miracle stories like that anymore? That would be so epic today, you know?) The shroud of Turin? . . .

. . . they've been shown to be wrong, spectacularly wrong, time and again, . . .

Who's the "they"? Nothing you list above was believed by all Christians. And these and similar myths are believed by non-Christians as much as by Christians.

Even if Christians typically did believe in some myths like the above, that proves nothing. Those beliefs arose as an extension of more basic beliefs they had which were based on the evidence we have from the gospel accounts.

Are there not many legends about George Washington and Abraham Lincoln and other heroes? Don't these derive from earlier "legends" which were actually true? Didn't these legendary heroes originate as actual historic figures who had some good qualities which won for them a favorable reputation? So pointing out the later fictional legends does not debunk the original historic figure who did have heroic qualities.

And if the later added myths became spectacular, this only reflects a greater degree of impact from the original Jesus figure who must have had spectacular qualities that led to this higher degree of mythologizing that followed. So you prove nothing by pointing out some "spectacular" myths that evolved later, like St. George.

Even the exaggeration of Old Testament myths is explained by this, because it shows how believers wanted to tie their Christ figure into the earlier tradition and make him a product of Hebrew prophecy, and so they exaggerated the earlier traditions and insisted on the literal 6000 years and the literal worldwide flood. Even though these may be fictional, these exaggerations are explained by the zeal of believers to connect Jesus into those ancient traditions, to make him the culmination of a long process -- "divine history" -- going far back into prehistory.

Which forces us to ask: Where did this zeal come from? What is the original hero figure from whom this mythologizing process began? Why is the time span between him and the mythologizers so short? and the degree of mythologizing and exaggerating so pronounced?

. . . so everything they claim bears questioning.

Everything anyone claims bears questioning.

And when the miracle acts of Jesus are questioned, there continues to be evidence that these took place, even if some other beliefs of Christians are discredited. That certain beliefs are false does not falsify all the others. Those which hold up under critical reasoning are still likely to be true.

The power Christ demonstrated in his healing acts is what explains the emergence of the other beliefs that are less credible. His power had a strong impact on people such that it prompted them to desire more and to find theological and symbolical avenues to express their interpretation of it. His impact on them caused them to ask questions which there were no answers to, and so people were driven to invent answers rather than just admit ignorance.

There has to be something that gives rise initially to the mythologizing that takes place. Otherwise how do you explain the later myths that you say "the actual evidence disproves"? Where did these myths come from? it is not true that people just start spinning new myths out of the blue. It's true that debunkers like to imagine this happens, pretending that the believers are just gullible fools who start believing new myths for no reason whatever, but you cannot give any example where this happens and a new myth takes hold and attracts ever-increasing believers, without there being anything special to begin with, something real, out of which the later mythologizing expands into the fictional myths.

So, what is the original genuine part from which the later mythologizing of Jesus began? There had to be something other than fictional legend initially to get it started.

Even Elvis Presley and Michael Jackson have become virtual myths or cult heroes, and isn't there a real historic person behind each of these myths, and someone unusual or noteworthy? There has to be something real to begin with. If devotees believe there is a special cosmic Magic or Power from them, doesn't this come from something original that was real and had an impact?

No sacred cows, question all of it.

You can begin by questioning your sacred-cow dogma that there were other reported miracle-workers prior to Jesus who also performed similar healing acts, as historical persons, and for whom we have credible evidence.

You can prove that this is not just a sacred-cow dogma by giving an example of such a legendary miracle-worker. You can't claim something existed but then fail to give a single example of it.

Are you capable of considering the possibility that your Jesus-debunking indoctrinators might have been wrong? Not so far.

That's how we got from flat earth to oblate spheroid earth. The good stuff came of out refusal to believe without checking.

Then why aren't you checking on those claims of all these prior miracle-workers like Jesus and for whom there is credible evidence? You believe those Jesus-debunking claims uncritically without checking to find an example, but instead just laugh at anyone who suggests they might be false. Just like some flat-earth true believers laughed at anyone who said the earth was spheroid.

So do some "checking" into those claims you were told about Horus or Perseus or Krishna or Mithras. Find the documents that tell of their miracle acts and read them for yourself before you claim that they did all the same things Jesus did and upon which the Jesus accounts are based. Don't just "believe without checking."

Find the text where it says people came to them to be healed of their afflictions. When and where did these reputed historical persons perform their miracle acts? (No, praying at a man-made statue of a "god" that had been worshiped for 2000 years is not the same thing.)

What's wrong with being critical and rejecting those beliefs that have been discredited by evidence while at the same time continuing to believe what is still credible, or keeping an open mind about those which have not been discredited? No one has proved that all miracle stories have to be false. There are many weird events which have not been explained by the current known science.

They aren't credible.

I gave you examples that are credible. There are the historically-documented cases, such as Rasputin (the best example I know of, but there are probably others), and also Edgar Cayce, and this is based on historical evidence that can only be rejected based on the unproven dogma that there can be no medical knowledge or cure other than that based on conventional medical science.

And the case of the savants is also credible, because these are currently verifiable and well-published, and these are examples of super-human knowledge or ability that defies conventional science and common experience. They are proven cases, even though such ability is impossible for virtually everyone other than a tiny minority who are called "savants."

We thus have clear and proven examples, verified by current reports and also by past historical documentation, that events have happened which defy the conventional standard science. Some are repeatable, others not because they are past historical events. Science cannot explain these events or persons with these powers, but it has to admit that they exist because of the witnessed events.

They aren't worth [dis]proving because they are so ridiculous that they aren't even credible. You don't run around spending time [dis]proving false all the stupid ridiculous things you hear.

Then your judgment has to be that you don't know, not that all such claims are false.

These examples and others are proven to be true, or probably true. I am giving some of the best examples I know of to show that events do happen that science cannot explain, or which go contrary to common experience and lie outside standard science.

It's fine to say we don't know, and maybe it's true or maybe not. But to dogmatically rule it out is not scientific. The true scientist can only say we don't know, and if the event is a proven fact that science cannot explain, then the scientist has to admit that there are some events that science cannot explain, or which go contrary to current science as we know it.

True science does not rule out these events as "stupid" or "ridiculous" but simply treats them skeptically, and when the event is proven to be true, the scientists then have to admit the reality of some events that they cannot explain or which run contrary to their current stage of knowledge. It cannot deny the truth of events that are known and witnessed as true.

Like Santa. You don't "prove" santa is just a story, you can be fairly certain before opening an inquiry because it is hilarious on its face.

No one needs this Santa inquiry. However, it must be possible to do the inquiry, and the result would be that Santa is fiction. If there is a controversy over whether something is fact or fiction, then you're not entitled to claim one way or the other unless you do the inquiry and give the evidence for your side.

Your claim that there were other reported historical miracle-workers prior to Jesus cannot be based on a dogma or your being "fairly certain before opening an inquiry because it is hilarious." If you're not willing to do the inquiry and provide the examples for consideration, then your being "fairly certain" is obviously based on prejudice and pseudo-science, not on reason.

There is no basis for insisting dogmatically that every reported event which cannot be explained by current science must ipso facto not have happened. On the contrary, what remains is to find the eventual explanation of how it happened, but not necessarily that it did not happen.

Unless it is patently ridiculous, . . .

The Jesus miracle healing stories are not "patently ridiculous." The only problem with them is that they conflict with your dogmatic premise that miracle events must be fictitious despite the evidence.

. . . and then you don't waste your time.

I.e., you can't investigate everything. But then also you can't proclaim every such event as false or as fiction. If the evidence says it happened, then you accept that and admit that this is something science cannot explain. You don't insist dogmatically that it could not have happened because your Jesus-debunking crusade forces you to dogmatically reject every such event as fiction regardless of the evidence. Past debunkings don't disprove all the claims that are not investigated. Not all past cases investigated were debunked.

Christians believe a lot of shit that is obviously not true. It's funny to watch them claim to have "good reasons to believe" on any other thing. Time to man-up and go with scientific evidence.

There is no scientific evidence to prove that miracle events such as the healing events described in the N.T. cannot happen.

There's plenty to show they aren't miracles.

You mean the healing events did take place but they were not "miracles"? What is the point in quibbling over the meaning of a word? If you admit that Jesus actually did these acts but that they were not truly "miracles," then it's only semantics.

It doesn't matter whether you call them "miracles" or something else. If he did these healing acts, then he had super-human power. Such acts cannot be performed by normal humans. It's this power that's important, not the meaning of the word "miracle."

. . . and nothing to suggest that the more ridiculous ones have a credible source.

We have at least 4 sources for the miracles of Jesus. At least 5, counting Paul as a source for the resurrection event. There is nothing about these sources that makes them non-credible. Unless you take it as a dogmatic premise that all miracle reports must be false or fictitious, based on your prejudice against them, which prejudice cannot be questioned but taken on faith.



Accounts of the "dead" returning to life (one more long can of worms to go):

Remember when that African guy that everyone thought was dead woke up in the morgue 3 days later? And that was in this century! So were they mistaken, or is he another Jesus?

Did he also raise the dead or perform healings?

And that particular "resurrection miracle" has happened many times. So cute to imagine that he is actually a deity instead of people being mistaken about his death. (Google man wakes up in morgue to see 187,000 hits on this topic with scores, if not hundreds, of "Jesus Miracles". Or read Why waking up in a morgue isn’t quite as unusual as you’d think)

These events ["dead" bodies waking up at the morgue] might actually help to strengthen the possibility of the Jesus resurrection. They don't really prove or disprove anything.

They disprove that it is a "miracle" when people think a person is dead and they aren't.

Do these cases, i.e., this waking up at the morgue phenomenon, which we're saying is real or reliably documented, have anything to say about the historicity of Jesus or about the Jesus miracles, like the resurrection or the raising-the-dead accounts?

There are 2 possibilities:

Wake-up scenario 1: The "dead" bodies were not really dead, but were really alive and only appeared to be dead, and

Wake-up scenario 2: The "dead" bodies really were dead, and then they came back to life.

Both of these explanations are possible, but scenario 1 is considered more likely. In either case, what is there here that would undermine the historicity of Jesus and the accounts of his miracles and resurrection? We'll entertain mainly scenario 1 here, but you can't rule out #2, i.e., that the "waking" one really was dead, not just in appearance, but truly and fully dead, and then simply came back to life. No one has disproved this possibility.

You probably think those "wake ups" were people who did not really die. But why are you so sure of that? How do you know they weren't really dead? How do you know they didn't actually die and then return to life?

I conclude that the state they were in does not preclude awakening because we have measurable cases on how it happens, physiologically. And that is a much more reasonable conclusion than, "!!!!! Miracle from a god!!!"

It doesn't matter what we call it, i.e., the semantics. All that matters is what actually happened.

And is your conclusion that the dead really were raised, or Jesus really did resurrect, but these are explained physiologically and were not really "miracles"? It sounds like you may be conceding quite a bit here, and then just saying it's no big deal, because there's a natural explanation. I.e., do you understand that with this argument, you are conceding that Jesus did rise from the dead? that the resurrection event in the gospels is true and that your only qualification is that there is a natural explanation for it?

Assuming the "waking" one is not really dead but is alive and appears dead, there are problems trying to make the resurrection of Jesus be such a case. These cases of someone actually rising up who was misdiagnosed as dead were cases of total surprise, where no one knew the person was really alive, and the body surprisingly rises up, to everyone's astonishment. There is no trickster making this happen, and there is no anticipation whatever that it would happen.

All these happenings are extremely rare and unpredictable. You're suggesting that something so rare and unpredictable, a one-in-a-million possibility, happened in the case of Jesus.


The resurrection of Jesus scenario

Virtually everyone who is pronounced dead is really dead. If Jesus was not really dead, then who knew it, and when? Since these "wake-up" cases are not known ahead of time, the hoax must have been hatched only after it was realized that he wasn't really dead. Who knew he wasn't really dead? Going into the event when he "died" (probably a violent incident), even he didn't know he would later be alive and only appear to be dead and then wake up.

When he woke up later, perhaps in the tomb, and still alive, was he the only one who knew? Or did a small clique see it and the hoax began at that point? How do you piece together the events leading up to the ensuing hoax, with no one having any foreknowledge of it until after he surprisingly woke up and then realized he had been "killed" but wasn't really dead?

In the case of a foreknowledge scenario, the hoax resurrection planned in advance, there has to be an elaborate plan worked out, and precaution against the wrong persons examining the body, i.e., people believe it with little or no access to the "dead" person other than to those who are in on the hoax. And it surely requires a sophisticated medical knowledge of the body functions and how to create the illusion of death even though the person is really alive. Does this medical knowledge exist even today, let alone 2000 years ago? So can we agree that the appearance-of-death explanation could apply only if this happened totally by surprise? I.e., there was no advance knowledge by Jesus or anyone else. The unexpected "wake-up" happened, and then only did the intriguing "Passover Plot" scenario begin to take shape.

If this is what happened, then in all probability Jesus was mostly ordinary and no one special. Perhaps just a member of a ring of anti-Roman or anti-establishment dissidents. Is this scenario plausible? this clique of dissidents, one member of which gets killed in some violent incident, somehow finds their "dead" comrade alive, having awakened, healthy and normal, or he actually rises in their presence, perhaps at a little "funeral" event, causing a stir, and so they create a resurrection story for him and make him into the Jewish Messiah or King?

Do we assume it was his comrades (not "followers" or "disciples") who had possession of his body? This makes the scenario more likely. If it were his enemies, they would just kill him again, and this time finish the job.

Wouldn't we have to dismiss the crucifixion account as false? Because if this is the way he was "killed," it's hard to believe he would return to normal health and be able to do the appearances afterward. Nevertheless, you have to assume they fabricated the crucifixion account early, because Paul mentions the crucifixion. So the crucifixion story had to be well fixed in place by about 45 AD.

Why invent a crucifixion story rather than a story of a hero dying in battle? Dying in battle is a much more honorable and glorious way to die, for a hero, than by being crucified. So the crucifixion story just makes no sense. It alone makes this whole scenario virtually impossible.

There are many questions: Was the story of Jesus that followed, including the resurrection and all other miracles, created knowingly as a hoax by his comrades, or did it emerge spontaneously with no one conspiring or plotting to create this artificial story? We've eliminated the possibility of a hoax pre-planned prior to the "death" of the hero, but what about after? Could a plot have developed among the inner circle to create a new mythology, including miracle stories? Or did the new mythology evolve on its own, spontaneously, with no planning?

You have to assume Jesus was NOT a prominent figure before this resurrection event. He was no one special, but only one member of this group. The resurrection of their ordinary comrade startled them and they responded to it, spontaneously or otherwise, by creating the artificial story of him doing miracles and being the Jewish Messiah, or the Son of God, and then being crucified.

If you say instead that these claims about him were already circulating and that he had been prominent, even before the "death" event, then you're hypothesizing something extremely improbable, because these are now TWO one-in-a-million improbabilities being combined into one fantastic improbable event. Only a rare charismatic can be recognized as the Messiah, not an ordinary person, so to this extremely rare possibility you have to add the further extreme unlikelihood that he was "killed" and believed dead and yet rose up alive and was apparently healthy in the days following.

Also, you can't assume he was just a typical combatant "killed" on the battlefield and found alive later, because that was common. This had to be the uncommon type, who was checked and verified as "dead" by someone, and everyone believed definitely that he was dead. (People knew that unchecked "dead" bodies had a habit of not staying "dead" but waking up later.)

Part of this is credible: He could have risen and startled his comrades and caused a stir. And they could have believed it was a sign from God, or a miracle, and thought it proved something or verified their cause. But how did this ordinary person be transformed, within 20-25 years, into the Messiah and Son of God offering people eternal life? and in addition to this, into a miracle-worker, perhaps by a different group of believers than the Paul group, in about the same time frame, maybe 30 years later? By this time there were reports of him healing lepers, the blind, the deaf, the lame, and raising the dead (Mt 11:4-5, Lk 7:22).

What became of this resurrected comrade himself? Did his own comrades have to kill him in order to stop the crowds who came flocking to see him and touch him and be healed (only to discover that he was fake)? Did some of his comrades kill him and fabricate the story of the ascension to explain his departure?

Do you have to assume there was an inner circle of plotters who knew of the fraud and took whatever steps necessary to protect it from being discovered? while the rest of them were snookered and believed it? Or did ALL of them believe it and the story evolved spontaneously without any conspiracy? in which case they did NOT kill him? But if they didn't kill him, how did they keep the crowds away, who surely would have come seeking him? (Since the legend was emerging over a period of 10 years and longer, there was time for it to spread and for people to hear of it and come seeking him.)

If the legend just developed spontaneously, with no plot or scheme in mind, then nothing was fabricated, but rather, the myth-makers, or some of them, started imagining things, and started having memories of "miracles" that never really happened. And so the unplanned surprise "resurrection" sparked something new in their minds. Maybe the rumors and gossip were sporadic, with different people believing different claims, and little consistency. But still there had to be crowds of people coming to seek him out and hoping to be healed.

It's hard to see how this wake-up event would transform an ordinary person into the mythical miracle-worker. There has to be something noteworthy about him BEFORE he's "killed" and then comes back to life. We might assume he was killed in some high-profile incident, perhaps a riot or attack by police on protesters or violent dispute of some kind. But not that he was the leader of the riot or a messianic figure leading a revolt, because then it becomes too much coincidence that he just happens to rise up from the dead after being "killed" -- that's too rare.

These "wake-up" events happened, but only in some extremely rare cases, almost unheard-of, and it's just an ordinary person, not a high-profile public figure or controversial crusader of some kind, i.e., it's totally unpredictable or unexpected. If he was a high-profile figure and also rose up alive after being "killed" and pronounced dead, then he's a one-of-a-kind in history -- the odds against it are astronomical.

Yet if he was an ordinary person involved in some dissident cause and got "killed," how does he get transformed into the god-savior mythic hero just from this fluke event of being thought dead and then rising up alive? In a battlefield scenario there are doubtless vast numbers of slain combatants who are left for dead and discovered alive later -- this would be nothing startling. For this wake-up incident to be transformed into a miracle-from-on-high there had to be something more striking than just another rebel getting "killed" in the melee but then turning up alive later.

How does he get transformed from the low-profile ordinary person into the mythic miracle-working hero?

Maybe he got condemned to death first, so he became a kind of martyr. Maybe he was falsely accused of something, so he's an innocent person unjustly condemned. It has to be something that easily happened to ordinary people involved in some dispute, so the convergence of this with the unusual "wake-up" phenomenon is not too coincidental. This could add to the possibility of it, causing some interest in him before he's "killed," so he's noticed favorably, and then the "miracle" rising from the "dead" happens and shocks people. Conceivably there are ways to put together such a scenario.

But why the healing miracles? Why would this martyred dissident become depicted as someone who does healings? Why not instead some great feats as a warrior, a brave caballero going up against dragons or giants and rescuing damsels in distress? or against villains like the Romans or the Saducees or "King Herod" or "the Pharoah" or "Ptolemy" or someone in power? or against Philistines or other enemies, as a warrior Son of David? What is the foundation for the healing stories?

It had to have been a violent death, in a dispute of some kind, in which he was "killed" -- not just that he died one day of a heart attack or an accident. This means he must have been connected with some controversial group. Maybe the Essenes, like John the Baptist who was killed. But where do the healings come from?


Did the ESSENES invent Jesus the Healer? If not, then who?

It's difficult to find a legitimate connection of the Essenes to miracle healings. It's only modern Essenes who make healing an essential element of the Essene practices. Even if some trace of it can be found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, it seems to be very minor, if it's there at all. No one quotes the Essene texts that mention healing, but modern Essene stalwarts claim it's there. The truth seems to be that there is nothing going on in this period just prior, 200 BC - 30 AD, that would give rise to any new healing myths. These healing stories, in the gospel accounts, seem to just pop up out of nowhere. There's no basis for them, or for believing that they emerged out of some healing story trend during this period.

This disconnect of the miracle healings of Jesus to anything developing in religion or mythology during this time is a major obstacle the Jesus-debunkers have been unable to deal with. They constantly say the Jesus miracles are all prefigured in the earlier mythology, and yet they fall flat on their faces providing any examples of such an earlier mythology of healings that in any way connects to the Jesus healings in the gospel accounts.

They continue to pound away on this theme, repeating frantically the claimed similarities to earlier myths, and yet they never NEVER give any examples of those earlier miracles and cite the texts which tell about them. Nothing of substance.

So, along with the unlikely crucifixion story, the sudden emergence of the healing stories clashes incompatibly with the whole scenario. A new mythic hero could possibly originate this way, by being "killed" and believed dead but then waking up and surprising everyone. But there is no way to fit the healing stories into this scenario. You have to assume these were fabricated AFTER the "waking up" event, as a result of this, and not that the resurrected one had this reputation before being "killed," or any other remarkable feature.

So it's hard to see how such a "Passover Plot" theory patterned after our reports of a "dead" person waking up at the morgue could explain the Jesus resurrection. And even less likely can they explain the accounts of him raising someone from the dead. The "dead" rising events, that are documented for us, are too rare to be used this way to explain a rising-from-the-dead event such as in the gospels.


Jesus raising the dead scenario

The reports of Jesus raising someone from the dead do not fit scenario 1 above and cannot be explained this way, because the accounts of Jesus raising the dead have to be assumed as normal cases of someone dying and not the extremely rare case of someone who was mistakenly thought to be dead.

It's not plausible that Jesus might have exercised some cleverness at recognizing that this person was really alive and not dead, and so was able to awaken the body from the apparent dead state. To explain the event this way, you'd have to assume that in these cases the body was really alive and only appeared to be dead, which is extremely rare. How can you assume such a thing for the accounts of Jesus raising the dead?

Why should such a very rare condition just happen to be the case here, just when Jesus is about to raise up the "dead" body? In these cases, or at least two of them, he had no advance knowledge of the dead person. We have to assume the deceased in these cases were normal, i.e., were really dead, not just appearing to be so.

The deceased, or "deceased" ones here were certainly not killed on the battlefield or any other scenario of many dead bodies where some might only appear dead but are really alive. In all the cases of Jesus raising the dead, the deceased was well checked in advance to make sure the person was really dead. For any of them to be really alive and only appear dead has to be ruled out as a one-in-a-million possibility.

I.e., certainly at least 99% of the cases of "dead" persons were cases where the "deceased" really was dead and not just appearing to be so. And so we must assume that was the case here, in these raising-the-dead events. That "dead" person really was dead, in all likelihood. The odds are heavily against it being otherwise.

How can you believe that in just precisely the cases where Jesus is about to display his power, just by coincidence -- just by a stroke of luck -- this one happens to not be really dead, but only sleeping and only appearing to be dead? How likely is that coincidence? It's virtually a zero possibility, and add to this that we have three total cases of this. The chance that in all three cases Jesus was lucky and got a "dead" person who was not really dead? Even for one case alone it's virtually unthinkable, let alone for three. The odds against it are greater than the odds against Don Larson striking out 27 Dodgers in a row. On 81 pitches.

How do you decide a god is behind it? Where's your "proof"?
(hint: ain't none.)

This assumes that the event in question, the rising from the dead, really happened. And the only question is: How do we know God did it? Maybe it was the Devil?

This kind of question concedes so much to the believer that the answer to it hardly matters. If you can grant that Jesus did raise the dead, and resurrected from the dead himself, such as the gospel accounts describe, then it hardly matters what explanation you give to it. This is granting so much power to Jesus, that the details of his power -- what's behind it -- don't really make any difference.

If you grant that Jesus resurrected from the dead and raised people from the dead, then you're a believer. It adds nothing to say, "OK it really happened, but still it wasn't God that made it happen!"

That Christ had this power is what matters, and how great this power really was, or is. Theologizing about the source of this power does not matter.

So you're better off to just deny that any of it happened, not to grant that maybe he did raise the dead or maybe he really rose from the dead but that there's a "natural" explanation for it, or that it doesn't matter because still it wasn't God that did it.

 

[Keith&Co.]

How do you decide a god is behind it? Where's your "proof"?
(hint: ain't none.)

This assumes that the event in question, the rising from the dead, really happened.

Well, at least for the purpose of discussion. That's not quite accepting that you've proven your event really happened.
But if it did, how do you then connect it to the God of the Jews?

And the only question is: How do we know God did it? Maybe it was the Devil?

I love how you're the one who gets to decide what questions can be asked.

This kind of question concedes so much to the believer that the answer to it hardly matters.

Oh, bullshit. You've never seen people argue if Kirk or Picard were the better captain, with all pariticipants KNOWING that both are fictional characters?
You've never seen anyone wonder why certain events didn't convince Scully that XXX were real, if ONLY within the parameters of the fiction?

If you can grant that Jesus did raise the dead,

Asking you to connect the putative event to your putative skybeast is not accepting that it happened. Just wondering how you get from 'raised a dead guy' to 'therefore eternal salvation.'

and resurrected from the dead himself, such as the gospel accounts describe, then it hardly matters what explanation you give to it.

Actually, that's kind of crucial, isn't it?
YOu base your entire 'it's rational to be christain' claim on somehow being able to show that Jesus' miracles happened, and that means he was the Christ, and that means believing in him leads to a life in Heaven, or at least it's rational to do so.'
You haven't connected those dots, yet.

You claim the miracles are phenomenological, not theological, then draw theological conclusions.
No wonder people are asking you to explain yourself.

This is granting so much power to Jesus,

No, it's not.

that the details of his power -- what's behind it -- don't really make any difference.

That'sthe only different that mattes. It's why you're not saying it's rational to be muslim, or hindu, or worship Zeus, Odin, or the IPU. Because you think there's this line connecting Jesus to God.

If you grant that Jesus resurrected from the dead

Haven't granted that... Just playing along with your myth, here.

and raised people from the dead, then you're a believer.

Or a cri

It adds nothing to say, "OK it really happened, but still it wasn't God that made it happen!"

But that's not what anyone's saying.
We're asking YOU to fill in the blanks.

That Christ had this power is what matters, and how great this power really was, or is. Theologizing about the source of this power does not matter.

Sure it mattes, that's all you've been doing since your first post. Jesus+miracles=Christains not crazy.

So you're better off to just deny that any of it happened,

You might be better off actually learning to read, rather than spinning off in random directions as a response to someone's postings....

And you still have to deal with Matthew 24:24?

For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.

The Books says, showing signs and wonders isn't enough to prove that your'e the REAL Christ.
Your whole participation in this thread is a bit of a non-starter, Lumpy.

Nice effort, though, way to keep plugging along, even if your effort is ultimately futile without any actual evidence.

 

[Atheos]

Holy crap, what a tedious post. Nobody has to provide you with a bunch of links to texts, ancient cuneiform symbols, inscribed pots and building ruins you're not going to read in order to debunk your claims that somehow the miracles of Jesus were historical events and the miracle claims of other gods, god-men, prophets, etc., before and after were not. Google Hesoid's Theogony for a 7th century B.C. document. That's a start. You continue to try to draw a circle around your favorite god-myth that excludes other similar myths and completely ignore the obvious and overwhelming evidence against your case.

The facts of the matter are simple and do not require 45 minutes to read.

• There is no evidence that a Jesus of any notoriety lived in the years 5 B.C. - 33 A.D., in or around Jerusalem. None. There is plenty of archaeological evidence about mundane crap that happened during that time period and in that area, exactly where one would expect to find evidence of extraordinary events.
• The first writings about the Jesus character appear around 50-55 A.D. and only have him as a heavenly voice talking to Paul.
• The first writings about a Jesus who lived on earth appear around 65 A.D. and only have him as a person who had lived at some time on earth but do not specify a time or place.
• The first writings about a Jesus who lived at a particular time on earth appeared around 75 A.D. and have him living dying over 40 years earlier and living in a land 1500 miles away.
• GMatt and GLuke borrow heavily on GMark. Their differences are best explained by regional divergence in a developing myth propagated via oral tradition over time.
• People believe ridiculous stories all the time (snopes.com). In pre-technology times when it was nearly impossible for the average person to check for himself whether a fantastic story was true, things like this were commonly believed.
• People believe stories told by charismatic story tellers (Jim Jones, Marshall Applewhite, David Koresh). All it would take is one really good story teller to sell the Jesus myth in Rome and produce a pocket of believers.
• Joseph Smith and J.T. Knight. 'Nuff said.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Why invent a crucifixion story rather than a story of a hero dying in battle? Dying in battle is a much more honorable and glorious way to die, for a hero, than by being crucified.

So, why do you assume you know the motives of the person or persons who may have created this myth? I mean, clearly, you're inventing this as a strawman, so you can claim that the story doesn't fit their motives...but the fact remains that if you don't know who wrote down (or created) the story, or what their purpose was, or when they wrote it, it's impossible to talk about their motives in writing the story and the elements they did or did not include.

Arguments like this, Lumpy, are going to make hair grow on your palms...

 

[Atheos]

What makes me laugh is how it's "all or nothing" with Lumpenproletariat. At least it's all or nothing when it comes to things he's all or nothing about, but not all or nothing when it comes to things he's not all or nothing about.

He's happy to jettison the troublesome birth narratives and other elements that don't make sense. But then he hangs stolidly onto the miracle narratives, which make the least sense of all.

The single most plausible explanation for the whole thing is as follows:

• Small-time itinerant cult leader gathers a few followers, speaks out against the establishment and gets his ass crucified for his efforts.
• His fanatical followers refuse to believe he's really gone. They continue to spread his message and promise he's going to return, creating small pockets of believers for several decades.
• A really charismatic dude named Paul gets hold of the story and appropriates it for his own gain. Jesus is a slain leader whose spirit is talking to Paul from Heaven and (through Paul) is telling his followers what to do next. Paul invents a story of his persecution of Christians followed by the dramatic moment Jesus subverted all his free will by forcing him to start working for him or suffer being blind the rest of his life. The original godfather offer he couldn't refuse...
• Over several more decades the line between things that did happen and things that are made up get more blurred. Jesus takes on the traits of known hero gods such as Asclepius, Bacchus, Poseidon, Perseus, etc. This helps make him appeal more to the Greek / Roman audience.

In other words the crucifixion did not have to be mythical in order for the mythical elements to be mythical. There are millions of permutations that explain the development of this story in a rational manner consistent with all the evidence. There is no rational permutation that explains the development of this story that includes a man walking unassisted on storm-tossed water, healing blindness, restoring amputated and withered appendages, raising dead people to life and floating off unassisted into the sky.

If we're going to jettison stuff that is absurd let's really jettison the stuff that's absurd and then see what we have left.

 

[Barbarian]

Lumpen, a word to the wise: don't post screeds that are taller than you in the expectation that people will read them instead of filing them under the category of tl;dr. We have seen all colors of apologetes here, and there's really little chance you come up with something new, so we aren't really motivated to read your huge wall of text all the way through. Mostly you can just name your argument and we'll tell you why it is wrong. Also, you seem to give away an increasingly sharp vibe of presuppositionalism; if that's your end-game, just tell us now.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Also, you seem to give away an increasingly sharp vibe of presuppositionalism; if that's your end-game, just tell us now.

END game?
He's already said that the easiest way to evaluate the gospel account is to assume that it's true and then go from there.
There's no telling why real historians don't do this, or why it only seems to apply to the gospel, and ony those parts of the gospel that Lumpy isn't willing to toss to the curb, but there you go.



-----------




Does anyone remember when Lumpy pretended that he was agnostic?
Yeah, me neither.

 

[atrib]

Lumpy,

Here are some facts for you to consider:

1. Jesus is not a historical character. Jesus is a fictional character described in the Bible. Outside of the Bible, there is no evidence, contemporary or otherwise, of the existence of Jesus.

2. The stories of the Bible cannot be corroborated. They appear to have originated from the writings of a single or a small handful of anonymous individuals who did not witness the events described in the Bible. There is no evidence to suggest that the stories of the Bible, particularly those that describe supernatural acts or events, are true.

If you want to dispute these facts, you need to provide evidence that demonstrates these to be wrong. You have been asked to do so many times in this thread, but you keep ignoring such requests. This speaks volumes about your intentions.

 

[James Brown]

A new one for the list:

1. If I was going to invent a mythological story, I would do it in a certain way.
2. The story I'm trying to convince you of was not written in that certain way.
3. Therefore God exists.

 

[Keith&Co.]

A new one for the list:

1. If I was going to invent a mythological story, I would do it in a certain way.
2. The story I'm trying to convince you of was not written in that certain way.
3. Therefore God exists.

Argument by fanfic failure?

 

[Draconis]

Another explanation for the alleged healing miracles: JC was a time traveller from the future (or an alien?), bringing currently undreamt of technologies (perhaps embedded in his hands?) which would seem miraculous to those people 2000 years ago. They'd seem pretty much miraculous now. You really don't have to be a son of a God to do what seems miraculous: quite possibly when you're a 4 year old, a card trick seems like a minor miracle - being as you've never seen it before.

Why would the time traveller do this? Well why would anyone do card tricks? Or create a universe.