120 Reasons to Reject Christianity

[Keith&Co.]

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

Drunken Bar Bet motive...
"Why don't you believe it's rational to accept Mithras as your savior?"
"Dude, anyone could do what he did. I bet, if i put on the first-aid gloves and time-shot to Rome, people would be worshiping ME! Same number of temples, same number of sects, same religious wars of love..."
"Well, Rome, yeah, that's where everyone's at."
"Okay, okay, i'll bet i could go to the middle of nowhere on the edge of the Roman Empire and basic-heal my way to godhood."
"No, someone would notice you can only 'heal' people when your solar powered gloves could get sunshine...."
"Put your starcredits where your mouth is!"

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Was Jesus remiss for not condemning every naughty act committed by Yahweh? (Rehash of "Reason #5")

(5) The Evil Nature of God ["Reason #5 for Rejecting Christianity"]

Christians have consistently ignored the Old Testament portrayal of God’s murderous behavior.

It is "ignored," so to speak, because the Bible stories provide some lessons which matter, despite the blood and gore. Obsessing on the blood and gore is a distraction from the main point.

Often they claim that the New Testament overrides and replaces the Old Testament, based on the idea that Jesus supplied mankind with a new covenant.

No, they don't say that the NT overrides or replaces the OT.

But what cannot be denied is that Jesus himself was a student of the Old Testament, firmly believed in it, and warned that it was not to be ignored or discarded. Therefore, Christians must concede that God performed the evil deeds that are documented in the Bible.

No, they don't have to concede this any more than a non-believer has to concede it. The "evil deeds" are not the point. They are not what the Bible stories are about.

Otherwise Jesus would have corrected the scriptures and explained that God the Father (or he himself?) did not commit those atrocities.

No, we don't know what Jesus "would have corrected" or "explained" or what he would have said about the atrocities. The atrocities are not the subject matter of those scriptures. Attention directed to them is a distraction.

To repeat, according to Christians, Jesus was God, and he was physically on the earth teaching from the Old Testament. If the scriptures were wrong in their portrayal of God, Jesus would have emphatically proclaimed this fact to his followers and whoever else would listen.

No, this would have been a distraction. Those bloody stories were not an important issue to deal with. We don't know what Jesus would have "proclaimed" about this, or that he would have proclaimed anything about it. What seems important to you today is not what was important back then.

Those readers and listeners did not need the "portrayal of God" to be updated. Focusing on this was not their concern. They didn't need answers about whether God did this or not. There was no need for Jesus to explain something to them that they did not need to have explained.

The following is taken from http://dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.com/2010/04/drunk-with-blood-gods-killings-in-bible.html, listing 158 killing events for which God was either directly or indirectly responsible. The complete list is shown below for effect, but one in particular deserves a focused look, I Samuel 15:3:

“Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.”

Awww, even the poor donkeys!

There is no evidence that Jesus denounced this scripture . . .

There was no need to denounce it. His listeners did not need any such denunciation. Or any explanation why God would order something like this. Or any sermon about whether it was right or wrong.

There was no need to denounce it. His listeners did not need any such denunciation. Or any explanation why God would order something like this. Or any sermon about whether it was right or wrong.

Oooh, swing and a miss.

Everything in scripture is important, something we're supposed to learn from. At least, that's what scripture says.

Romans 15:4
For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope.

If God did it, and made sure it was recorded in scripture, without adding verbiage that makes it clear that it was wrong, or that it would be wrong for mortals to perform, or even 'I must caution the reader not to try this at home,' and the story is just there as something that happened, then the obvious lesson is that it's not a bad thing to do.

No, the "lesson" is not something about this "it" you're obsessing on here -- that it was a good or bad thing to do. The act of killing all the people and their animals (even the donkeys!) is not what the scripture is about. The rightness of wrongness of this act, i.e., ordering them to kill everyone, is not the point of this scripture, or this Bible story. There was no need to raise the question of whether this was right or wrong, or a good or bad thing to do.

At the very least, god's leaving it up to mortals to draw their only conclusions.

It doesn't matter what conclusions one draws about this, or if one draws any conclusions about it.

You're in no position to say if it is or isn't wrong, . . .

Yes I am. I say it was wrong to kill the innocent donkeys. Why can't I make that judgment? If I had been there I would have tried to stop them from killing the donkeys. Regardless whether Jesus ever said anything about it. I'm entitled to say it's wrong and to try to prevent it. I don't have to first find a Jesus quote to establish that it was right or wrong.

One can believe in Christ without first having to find a NT Jesus quote to authorize every belief one has about what is right or wrong.

And you cannot call it unimportant . . .

I don't know whether it's important that they killed the donkeys. What I'm saying is that it's unimportant whether Jesus said anything about this or denounced the killing of these donkeys. I'm saying it's ludicrous to demand that Jesus should have denounced this story of the killings. There was no more need for him to denounce this than there was for John the Baptist or Hillel the Elder or Bar Kokhba or David Ben-Gurion or Karl Marx or Leonard Nimoy to denounce it.

. . . unless you want to dismiss even MORE verses of The Books that you're cherry picking your scipture from.

One is not "cherry picking" simply because one does not condemn a certain scripture or does not demand that someone else condemn it. Rather, you are cherry-picking to pounce on this scripture and demand that every public figure must address the killing of these innocent donkeys, like pro-lifers demanding that every politician must issue a policy statement either condemning or condoning abortion.

Including the part that says all Scripture is important.

Even if the killing of the innocent donkeys is important, it does not follow that Jesus should have issued a judgment on whether it was right or wrong to kill them. It might also be important that God sent SHE-bears to kill the 42 children who mocked Elisha (2 Kings 2:24), and yet this doesn't mean Jesus must explain the choice of the she-bears instead of he-bears to do the job.

Most arguments claiming that something was not mentioned that should have been mentioned are fallacious.

. . . and apparently it was in keeping with his concept of God the Father.

Not necessarily. It might have been contrary to his concept, and yet he still did not need to denounce this scripture. Why should he waste time denouncing all the scriptures that are offensive? These scriptures were not relevant to his program.

(Actually, we're only assuming he did not denounce such scriptures. For all we know, maybe he did denounce them, and those sayings of his were suppressed.)

There are many possible answers to this complaint against Christianity/the Bible/Judaism. One is that God did not really order this assault, but that the more militant Israelites used the Yahweh appeal in order to inspire the less militant ones to fight harder, because this was a nomadic tribe that did warfare against other tribes over territory, or over resources, and at that time tribes had to do this in order to survive, and the stronger ones prevailed and drove out or destroyed the weaker ones.

The historical evidence is not that the Israelites generally achieved this, but instead settled alongside the other tribes, in separate towns, and co-existed with them. But the more militant ones, especially some of the prophets, condemned this and demanded elimination of the pagans and taught that Yahweh would punish the Israelites for not destroying the competing tribes.

It is likely that if the Israelites had never fought the other tribes at all but instead tried to peacefully co-exist with them from the beginning, they would have been eliminated, partly through assimilation and partly through genocide against them.

Any person who worships a god who gave this order should have their head examined.

This is an ad hominem argument. An emotional outburst that those of the opposing belief "should have their head examined" cannot be given as a "reason" to reject something.

There's plenty of reason to doubt that God really ordered the attack and [to explain the event instead as just a reflection of] the tribal warfare environment of the period, and totally irrelevant to anything Jesus taught about.

Believing in Christ is not conditioned upon one's explaining every Bible verse that may contain some problem of interpretation or credibility. That you can find a Bible verse to pounce on and rip apart, even if you have a strong argument, does not constitute a "reason to reject Christianity."

 

[Keith&Co.]

Believing in Christ is not conditioned upon one's explaining every Bible verse that may contain some problem of interpretation or credibility. That you can find a Bible verse to pounce on and rip apart, even if you have a strong argument, does not constitute a "reason to reject Christianity."

Sure it is. Do i accept a mass murderer as a source of morality or do i try to find a superior idol to base my moral code upon...
It's fairly straightforward.
Jehovah's a dick, not worth my time, my tithe or my love.

 

[Keith&Co.]

You're in no position to say if it is or isn't wrong, . . .

Yes I am.

Let's try the full quote:

At the very least, god's leaving it up to mortals to draw their only conclusions. You're in no position to say if it is or isn't wrong, as your favorite skybuddy didn't make it clear.

You're not in a position to speak for your god, here, Lumpy.
You've shown that you have no great respect for scripture, and are willing to cherry pick what you want out of the litany.
You've shown that you just suck at logic, at christain history, at comparative religion, at reading for comprehension.
You can SAY whatever you want about any verse, including 'this isn't a real verse' or 'that didn't happen' or 'no one would accept this.'

We just have absolutely no reason to accept your stance or respect your opinions.
To be more accurate, we've plenty of reasons to think you're just making shit up as you go, and accepting your guidance on interpreting anything more complicated than 'that cloud looks like a fluffy bunny!' would be a mistake on our part.

 

[ideologyhunter]

The Bible is a primitive book.
Biblegod is a primitive god.
Jesus proclaimed faith in a primitive god with a primitive system of eternal damnation.
Western civ moved past slavery in the 19th C. and condemned genocide in the 20th. And science.......
Time for an update, Lumpenpro.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Who is responsible for killing the first born of Egypt during the ''passover?''

Assuming the story is literally true, that Moses went to the Pharaoh and warned him and the Pharoah refused to let the Israelites go, then it's the Pharaoh who is responsible. He was warned of the consequences and made the wrong choice. And Moses demonstrated to the Pharaoh the power from Yahweh to prove that those consequences would happen.

But if the event never really happened, then no one is responsible, because no one was killed.

Nor would a court of law absolve someone for ordering the killing of other people.

It would absolve God, or Christ, or Allah, or Whoever if an accused person claimed he did his crime by order of God or Christ or Allah etc. Even if he cited a scripture as evidence that God ordered him to do it.

You can't blame God for killings that were done in his/her name, even if a Bible verse or Koran verse seems to have God ordering the killings.

If a God orders or encourages His worshipers to kill the 'enemy' that God is just as guilty of the act as those who carried it out, and being the instigator, most probably more so.

We don't know if "God" ordered them to kill someone. But if he did, then yes, he's "guilty" of those killings just as Presidents Roosevelt and Truman were "guilty" of killing Germans and Japanese.

 

[Atheos]

Just as the Flood myth and the Exodus myth would have left indelible marks in the historical record that are notably absent, even so the Jesus myth, had it happened as described, would have left indelible marks in the historical record that are every bit as notably absent.

Unquestioning faith causes many people to accept all of these as accurate depictions of actual historic events. Evidence demonstrates that all of them are largely fictitious. The Flood myth may have its roots in some actual flood just as the Exodus and Jesus myths may have had their roots in actual events. But in each sense the rational thing to do is assume the absurd details were fabrications.

The problem with the Jesus myth, however, is that once you jettison the absurd stuff you aren't really left with much. Itinerant preacher gathers a cult following, speaks out against the establishment, pisses off the wrong people, gets Jimmy Hoffa'd. Fanatical followers refuse to accept he's gone, keep promising themselves he'll be back, start embellishing the story. Someone comes along who can galvanize the followers by claiming he's channeling their long-lost leader and makes it big.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Believing in Christ is based on reason, or evidence.

No, only if 3rd and 4th and 5th choices are prohibited. Pascal never prohibited additional choices.

This is so telling: your view of how the world works is so utterly naive. It is like you think that the existence of a world view makes [it] more true.

No, what I'm saying is that Pascal knew there are many different religious and philosophical beliefs. And he thought his was true. He posed his question to non-believers or atheists, without bothering about all the diverse religious or philosophical alternatives to his Christian belief.

This was not a flaw. He addressed his challenge to non-believers who might consider Christian belief as a possibility, i.e., perhaps his brand of Christianity. But that doesn't mean he was oblivious to all the other alternative beliefs.

He could have expanded his question to take into account hundreds of other belief systems and then claimed his belief was the most reasonable of them all. But that was more complicated than he intended to do.

That the existence of more "choices" have any bearing on whether some other "choice" is true or not.

No, just that one might reasonably try to take into account all the possible choices, or as many as possible, before claiming that one's belief is correct and the others are not as good. Or before claiming one's belief is correct even though there might be others that contradict it and are being ignored.

Very simply: I think believing in Christ offers the possibility of connecting to a/the source of eternal life, because of the power he demonstrated in his healing acts, i.e., the evidence Jesus provided. And if there are other beliefs that contradict this, then I should consider them, as long as I have the time. So far no participant here seems to be offering those alternative beliefs, though many are suggesting that they exist but are not presenting them.

You apparently believe Christianity just because a description of it exists.

No, there has to be more than just a "description." There has to be reasons or evidence for believing.

That is so fucked up.

Perhaps believing with no reason or evidence is "fucked up." But it's not "fucked up" to believe when there is reason or evidence for one's belief.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Assuming the story is literally true, that Moses went to the Pharaoh and warned him and the Pharoah refused to let the Israelites go, then it's the Pharaoh who is responsible. He was warned of the consequences and made the wrong choice.

You might want to reread the story.
Pharaoh was all set to let the Jews go, when God hardened his heart. So he had no actual choice, he was manipulated by your asshole deity, so said deity would have a reason to show off his miracle powers.
That makes God precisely at fault.
And a bit of an asshat.

But if the event never really happened, then no one is responsible, because no one was killed.

Happened or not, it's still a story with a clear villain, and that's the heart-hardening asshat.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Very simply: I think believing in Christ offers the possibility of connecting to a/the source of eternal life, because of the power he demonstrated in his healing acts, i.e., the evidence Jesus provided.

But that's not rational. You haven't shown how a healing of a physical body proves a soul, or salvation, or that Jesus is necessary for salvation, or that he's able to provide salvation.
And you ignore the biblical warning that merely performing miracle healings isn't enough to identify the true Christ.

And if there are other beliefs that contradict this, then I should consider them, as long as I have the time.

Like, the scripture that tells you Jesus did not qualify as the messiah? That his miracles aren't enough to identify the messiah? That stories in a book aren't sufficient to count as 'evidence?'
No.
You've got plenty of time to consider these, but you're way too far up your own ass to do so.

 

[Keith&Co.]

who can galvanize the followers by claiming he's channeling their long-lost leader and makes it big.

HEY!
That was an NCIS plot! Season 3, Episode 19: Iced. So, Ceasar Bernal was Paul.... Makes sense.

 

[James Brown]

Exodus 4:21 - "The Lord said to Moses, “When you go back to Egypt see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders which I have put in your power; but I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go."

Ex. 7:3 - "But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart that I may multiply My signs and My wonders in the land of Egypt."

Ex. 7:13 - "Yet Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them, as the Lord had said."

Ex. 7:22 - "But the magicians of Egypt didthe same with their secret arts; and Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them, as the Lord had said."

Ex 8:15 - "But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and did not listen to them, as the Lord had said."

Ex 8:19 - "Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God.” But Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them, as the Lord had said."

Ex 8:32 - "But Pharaoh hardened his heart this time also, and he did not let the people go."

Ex 9:7 - "Pharaoh sent, and behold, there was not even one of the livestock of Israel dead. But the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not let the people go."

Ex. 9:12 - "And the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he did not listen to them, just as the Lord had spoken to Moses."

Ex 9:32 - "But when Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunder had ceased, he sinned again and hardened his heart, he and his servants."

Ex 10:1 - "Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the heart of his servants, that I may perform these signs of Mine among them..."

Ex 10:20 - "But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he did not let the sons of Israel go."

Ex 10:27 - "But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he was not willing to let them go."

Ex 11:10 - "Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharaoh; yet the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he did not let the sons of Israel go out of his land."

Ex 14:4 - "Thus I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will chase after them; and I will be honored through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord.”

Ex 14:8 - "The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and he chased after the sons of Israel as the sons of Israel were going out boldly."

Ex 14:17 - "As for Me, behold, I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them; and I will be honored through Pharaoh and all his army, through his chariots and his horsemen."


That's seventeen mentions of Pharaoh's hardening of the heart. Apologists like to gloss over the numerous accounts of Jehovah countering Pharaoh's free will by pointing to the three instances where it's told that Pharaoh hardened his own heart. But that still leaves ten passages where Jehovah hardens Pharaoh's heart and four passages where the passive voice is used ("Pharaoh's heart was hardened.") Given the numbers, I add the four passive voice passages to the ten passages of Jehovah acting on Pharaoh. After all, if I told you that my friend was killed, your first thought probably wouldn't be that he committed suicide.

And of course, there's plenty of explanation why God hardened Pharaoh's heart (and those of other Egyptians.) The more dead Egyptians there are, the more glory other people will bestow on Jehovah. He said the same thing in the Book of Joshua, 11:20 - "For it was of the Lord to harden their hearts, to meet Israel in battle in order that he might utterly destroy them, that they might receive no mercy, but that he might destroy them, just as the Lord had commanded Moses."

No one should read these passages in Exodus and call Jehovah 'good.' When the Egyptian army had chased the Israelites to the water's edge, Jehovah separated the two groups of people while Moses parted the waters. Once the Israelites crossed on dry land, Jehovah could have kept the Egyptians back until the waters returned and the Israelites were safe on the other side. Instead, he let the Egyptians begin crossing, and at exactly the right moment, he released the walls of water, needlessly drowning the army.

It seems rather clear to me. The Israelites didn't worship Jehovah because he was good. They worshiped him because they thought him powerful, and they wanted to keep in his favor.

 

[Atheos]

Perhaps believing with no reason or evidence is "fucked up." But it's not "fucked up" to believe when there is reason or evidence for one's belief.

You titled this post "Belief in Christ is based on reason, or evidence." Yet you never actually provided any reason or evidence. All you provided was a vague discussion in defense of Pascal's Wager while acknowledging that it has a major hole inasmuch as it is a black and white argument in the context of a universe of various hues. This renders the wager totally useless.

Your only reason / evidence was as follows:

Very simply: I think believing in Christ offers the possibility of connecting to a/the source of eternal life, because of the power he demonstrated in his healing acts, i.e., the evidence Jesus provided. And if there are other beliefs that contradict this, then I should consider them, as long as I have the time. So far no participant here seems to be offering those alternative beliefs, though many are suggesting that they exist but are not presenting them.

But there is no evidence that eternal life exists and plenty of evidence that it cannot. There is no evidence that Jesus performed healing acts other than anonymous stories written decades later and 1500 miles away from where the alleged events took place. There is absolutely no evidence of actual people living in the area at the time making any fuss at all about some notable miracle worker. I've seen Ernest Angley heal people on TV and know it's total bullshit even though thousands of people believe in Ernest Angley's power. Even if Jesus had existed (which is still very much in doubt) and there were actual credible people claiming he had performed miracles (which there aren't) the rational thing to do is to assume he was just another fake. The modern world as well as history is rife with fake miracle workers. Not once has one actually passed muster of rigorous documentation by adversarial and well educated investigation.

If you choose to believe it, fine. But in the real world your "evidence" is awful.

 

[bilby]

Exodus 4:21 - "The Lord said to Moses, “When you go back to Egypt see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders which I have put in your power; but I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go."

Ex. 7:3 - "But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart that I may multiply My signs and My wonders in the land of Egypt."

Ex. 7:13 - "Yet Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them, as the Lord had said."

Ex. 7:22 - "But the magicians of Egypt didthe same with their secret arts; and Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them, as the Lord had said."

Ex 8:15 - "But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and did not listen to them, as the Lord had said."

Ex 8:19 - "Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God.” But Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them, as the Lord had said."

Ex 8:32 - "But Pharaoh hardened his heart this time also, and he did not let the people go."

Ex 9:7 - "Pharaoh sent, and behold, there was not even one of the livestock of Israel dead. But the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not let the people go."

Ex. 9:12 - "And the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he did not listen to them, just as the Lord had spoken to Moses."

Ex 9:32 - "But when Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunder had ceased, he sinned again and hardened his heart, he and his servants."

Ex 10:1 - "Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the heart of his servants, that I may perform these signs of Mine among them..."

Ex 10:20 - "But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he did not let the sons of Israel go."

Ex 10:27 - "But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he was not willing to let them go."

Ex 11:10 - "Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharaoh; yet the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he did not let the sons of Israel go out of his land."

Ex 14:4 - "Thus I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will chase after them; and I will be honored through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord.”

Ex 14:8 - "The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and he chased after the sons of Israel as the sons of Israel were going out boldly."

Ex 14:17 - "As for Me, behold, I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them; and I will be honored through Pharaoh and all his army, through his chariots and his horsemen."


That's seventeen mentions of Pharaoh's hardening of the heart. Apologists like to gloss over the numerous accounts of Jehovah countering Pharaoh's free will by pointing to the three instances where it's told that Pharaoh hardened his own heart. But that still leaves ten passages where Jehovah hardens Pharaoh's heart and four passages where the passive voice is used ("Pharaoh's heart was hardened.") Given the numbers, I add the four passive voice passages to the ten passages of Jehovah acting on Pharaoh. After all, if I told you that my friend was killed, your first thought probably wouldn't be that he committed suicide.

And of course, there's plenty of explanation why God hardened Pharaoh's heart (and those of other Egyptians.) The more dead Egyptians there are, the more glory other people will bestow on Jehovah. He said the same thing in the Book of Joshua, 11:20 - "For it was of the Lord to harden their hearts, to meet Israel in battle in order that he might utterly destroy them, that they might receive no mercy, but that he might destroy them, just as the Lord had commanded Moses."

No one should read these passages in Exodus and call Jehovah 'good.' When the Egyptian army had chased the Israelites to the water's edge, Jehovah separated the two groups of people while Moses parted the waters. Once the Israelites crossed on dry land, Jehovah could have kept the Egyptians back until the waters returned and the Israelites were safe on the other side. Instead, he let the Egyptians begin crossing, and at exactly the right moment, he released the walls of water, needlessly drowning the army.

It seems rather clear to me. The Israelites didn't worship Jehovah because he was good. They worshiped him because they thought him powerful, and they wanted to keep in his favor.

Yup; Jehova, as described in the Bible, is like Tony Soprano - everyone is expected to treat him with deference and respect, and to do what he commands; not because he loves them, or because they love him, but because he will not hesitate to torture and/or kill you and your family, if he feels slighted in any way.

Also, like Tony Soprano, he is a fictional character.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Reason #8: Miracles allegedly borrowed from alleged (but never quoted) earlier miracle legends

(8) Borrowed Miraculous Elements

Most of the miracles discussed in the Gospels were common elements of pre-Christian pagan religions including:

miraculous foretelling of a deity
virgin birth
a guiding star
a nativity visit by royalty
the baby god threatened by a jealous ruler
manifesting extraordinary wisdom in childhood
turning water into wine
walking on water
enabling the lame to walk
healing the sick
raising up dead persons
restoring sight to the blind
allaying storms on the sea
casting out devils
communion with a holy meal representing the god’s body
being put to death
the sun becoming dark after the death
rising from the dead
talking to disciples after resurrecting
ascension into heaven
providing salvation for mankind.
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/biblianazar/esp_biblianazar_33.htm

As usual, never is any text quoted from the ancient writings about any of these miracles that are alleged to have been the forerunners to the miracles of Christ in the gospels.

This argument cannot be taken seriously until those who present it cite at least some of the texts or the sources for the ancient miracle accounts.

The reason they never give these sources is obvious: when those writings are quoted so we can compare those accounts or those miracle claims to those of the gospel accounts, it becomes obvious that the similarities are poor and that most of those in the gospel accounts have virtually no relation to the earlier alleged miracle claims.

In some cases there might be enough similarity that it could not be only coincidental. But until those making this argument actually produce the quotes and show the comparison, this whole argument can be dismissed.

For most of the miracles cited above, there is no strong similarity.

But further, even if there are certain similarities, it proves virtually nothing. The important question is whether the miracle event really happened, not whether a miracle event in the gospel accounts might resemble some earlier alleged miracle. Did the event really happen or not? That's what really matters.

For the Jesus healing miracles we have evidence, because we have written accounts of them within a relatively short time after the actual events, and we have at least 4 accounts, not only one. This is far greater evidence than for any of the earlier alleged miracles.

There is a big difference between miracle claims for which there is evidence and claims for which there is no evidence. Of course you can argue from the dogmatic premise that no miracle claims can ever be true, regardless of the evidence. But there is no need for a rational person or skeptic to accept this dogmatic premise. That premise itself is only an article of faith which a reasonable person can reject.

The truth is that very few of the miracles discussed in the Bible are unique to Christianity.

The miracle healing acts of Jesus are unique. There is no historical person in all the earlier traditions or legends who travels to different towns and heals people wherever he goes and to whom the sick are brought in large numbers to be healed.

It may be that some of the other miracle events in the gospels are similar to earlier legends. And it isn't even necessary that ALL the Jesus miracles have to be literally true in order for the basic belief in Christ to be true. In fact, the existence of some of those added miracle stories, like the virgin birth, can best be explained by the fact that he did have power such as that of the healing accounts, and that because of this great power there then developed some mythologizing that would explain some other claims about him that might not really be true.

Some earlier historical figures are said to have been virgin-born, or had an unusual birth. But these were real people and all of them were famous or distinguished as real people. So you have to explain how Jesus was distinguished so that he would similarly be mythologized as they were.

But if he did no miracles at all, how was he distinguished? And how do you explain why these claims or legends became attached to him and how he became mythologized into a god? I.e., in such a short period of time. Over several generations or centuries it could be explained as normal mythologizing, but not over a period of only 50 years or less.

This is a strong piece of evidence that Christianity is a man-made, cobbled, and fundamentally plagiarized faith.

No, that some elements may have been borrowed from earlier legends is evidence that the historical Christ person must have had unique power to be able to attract all this mythologizing, because humans do not mythologize a person unless he was highly unusual or unique in some way. To explain the mythologizing phenomenon you have to find that part which distinguished the one being mythologized, i.e., the part which brought him the initial recognition.

And you have to show how the legendary hero, who started as a normal human who was distinguished or recognized in the normal sense, evolved into something superhuman.

In the case of Jesus this is made very difficult, because the time between the actual events and the later written accounts is so short. This prevents the normal mythologizing process from having enough time. There are virtually no other cases of a historical person becoming mythologized in such a short time period. The only few exceptions are cases where the person in question was someone who had political power or at least was of high public recognition or widespread repute. Jesus was not such a widely-recognized public figure in 30 AD (unless you assume he was a highly-reputed miracle-worker).

Of course some elements of "Christianity" may have been borrowed or "cobbled" from earlier symbols or traditions, but this only indicates that the original Christ person to whom these elements were added had to be someone noteworthy enough to attract such attention that people would want to mythologize him in this manner. And yet what could it have been that attracted this attention if it was not the power he demonstrated in his miracle healing acts? Without this it is impossible to explain how this new "legend" with the additional borrowed elements got started.

 

[Juma]

For the Jesus healing miracles we have evidence, because we have written accounts of them within a relatively short time after the actual events, and we have at least 4 accounts, not only one.

-The accounts were written at least about 40 years after the event.
-The accounts are all versions of a single account so there is not 4 but 1 account.
-Written accounts is not evidence of anything other than the existence of the text itself.

Thus there is no evidence

This is far greater evidence than for any of the earlier alleged miracles.

there is no need for any evidence for the earlier miracles. Only descriptions and artifacts of the belief in them.

 

[Keith&Co.]

But further, even if there are certain similarities, it proves virtually nothing. The important question is whether the miracle event really happened, not whether a miracle event in the gospel accounts might resemble some earlier alleged miracle. Did the event really happen or not? That's what really matters.

For the Jesus healing miracles we have evidence, because we have written accounts of them within a relatively short time after the actual events, and we have at least 4 accounts, not only one. This is far greater evidence than for any of the earlier alleged miracles.

So, you're still pretending that undated, anonymous accounts work as evidence, because there's something that prevents people from lying unless it's over hundreds of years.

You don't have the actual dates of 'the actual events', if they ever really happened, you can't fix the dates the accounts were written, so even if there was a limit to how much fabrication could be inserted in a tale for a given time, you can't establishe the distance between those events to compare it to your mythical fabrication limit.

So you're just preaching your made-up-shit again, Lumpy.

 

[Atheos]

Lupenproletariat, you can keep making these baseless assertions for as long as you have energy to do so. It won't make them true. We're just going to keep shooting 'em down.

Assertion # 1: The miracle stories of Jesus were not very similar to miracle stories of gods told well before.

Facts: Nearly every miracle claim about Jesus is similar to claims that had been circulated via oral tradition (and written in the Theogeny of Hesoid circa 700 B.C.) for hundreds of years before the Jesus story ever surfaced. Justin Martyr, an early christian apologist drove the nail in that coffin circa A.D. 140-170 when he clearly wrote:

When we say that Jesus Christ was produced without sexual union, was crucified and died, and rose again, and ascended to heaven, we propound nothing new or different from what you believe regarding those whom you call the sons of Jupiter.

To apologize for the blatant similarities between the Jesus myth and those myths of previous gods he suggested that the devil arranged for these imitation stories to surface centuries earlier in order to undermine the efficacy of the Jesus story. You cannot deny these facts and they make it clear that in the time frame in which these stories surfaced people recognized these problems and attempted to deal with them.

Assertion # 2: The 4 gospels are independent witnesses.

Facts: The 4 canonical gospels are neither witnesses nor are they independent. They are anonymous stories that bear the marks of having been collected from storytelling. None of them claim to be told by witnesses. None of them claim to have been written by people who even talked to witnesses. None of them can be demonstrated to exist any earlier than 80 years after the time period which they describe. Generous datings place the earliest one no earlier than 40 years removed from the events they allege happened, but separated 1500 miles from the location of the alleged events. Dozens of such variant stories appeared over several decades. Some of them place the Jesus character as far back in history as the Maccabean era, which his death occurring around 150 B.C. The Gospel of Peter has Jesus death attributed to Herod, meaning he died somewhere around 5 B.C. It's as if these stories were just floating around all over the historical context looking for a place to lite. The four gospels commonly accepted as canonical were chosen during the council of Nicea in 325 A.D., by powerful and influential people. They were forced upon those who dissented by whatever means necessary including killing "heretics" who accepted one of the other gospels.

Assertion # 3: Anonymous written testimony about extraordinary events is reliable and should be trusted.

Facts: :laughing-smiley-014

Assertion # 4: Since the stories of Jesus were written they are more reliable than the stories of Perseus.

Facts: Since the stories of Gone With the Wind were published on printing presses they are more reliable than the stories of Jesus, which were only hand-written. Do you see what I did there? I used the exact same criteria you did to make a non-sequitur argument. The medium used to disseminate the story has nothing to do with whether the story is true. Roman advances in transportation infrastructure along the most sophisticated postal system the world had seen to date (other than the Chinese) had provided a niche wherein writing materials became considerably more accessible. There are zero epistles in the Old Testament. All but 3 books in the New Testament are epistles. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why the shift in method occurred. A myth is a myth whether spoken orally, handwritten on parchment, pounded out on a printing press, etched in a microfiche or stored on a computer hard drive.

Assertion # 5: The miracle healing acts of Jesus are unique. There is no historical person in all the earlier traditions or legends who travels to different towns and heals people wherever he goes and to whom the sick are brought in large numbers to be healed.

Facts: There is nothing unique about the healing acts of Jesus. From Justin Martyr, 1st Apology, #56

If we declare that he was born of a virgin, you should consider this something in common with Perseus. When we say that he healed the lame, the paralytic, and those born blind, and raised the dead, we seem to be talking about things like those said to have been done by Asclepius

Traveling from town to town or having people come to him for healing do not make the miracle acts unique. It might make the story about the miracle acts unique, but how the f*** do you purpose Asclepius was to have done wrought these miracles in his stories? If he didn't make house calls and he didn't have people come to him then WTF? What a lame thing to try to lock on to while grasping at straws to defend your favorite fairy tale.

Assertion # 6: It may be that some of the other miracle events in the gospels are similar to earlier legends. And it isn't even necessary that ALL the Jesus miracles have to be literally true in order for the basic belief in Christ to be true. In fact, the existence of some of those added miracle stories, like the virgin birth, can best be explained by the fact that he did have power such as that of the healing accounts, and that because of this great power there then developed some mythologizing that would explain some other claims about him that might not really be true.

Facts: Your "best" explantion is atrocious. The best explanation is that since the Jesus myth already looked so much like the epic hero god myths of old they might as well add the virgin birth, infancy menace and journey to a far away land plot devices as well.

Assertion # 7: Some earlier historical figures are said to have been virgin-born, or had an unusual birth. But these were real people and all of them were famous or distinguished as real people. So you have to explain how Jesus was distinguished so that he would similarly be mythologized as they were.

Facts: Does it hurt to be wrong all of the time, or do you just get used to it? There is no physical evidence that Perseus, Bacchus, Asclepius or Mercury actually existed. They could easily be completely fabricated from whole cloth. In nearly every instance, however, the virgin-born god-child started off in humble beginnings and made a name for himself by doing wonderful works. I find it amusing that on the one hand you present your Jesus character as someone who was very famous because of all the miracles and healings, and then almost as quickly try to paint him as someone who was not famous. It's the dance of the desperate, trying to tiptoe over the obvious and glaring flaws in your argument and try to land delicately on the least little straw of hope you can.

Assertion # 8: But if he did no miracles at all, how was he distinguished? And how do you explain why these claims or legends became attached to him and how he became mythologized into a god? I.e., in such a short period of time. Over several generations or centuries it could be explained as normal mythologizing, but not over a period of only 50 years or less.

Facts: This question has been answered dozens of times before. Continuing to ask the question as if it has not been answered adequately is tedious and makes us feel like you're not bothering to read the responses. Several possibilities are obvious and considerably more likely than "Jesus actually did heal blind people, walk on water and levitate off into the sky." The simplest answer is that he, like many, was a fraud who deceived people into believing he could heal people. Like Ernest Angley, John Edwards, Joseph Smith, he was an actual person but a fraud. Another equally likely explanation is that he never did anything like this and the legends grew more fantastic through retelling. Another equally likely explanation is that he never existed and was always a fictional character who was inserted into a historical setting like Rhett Butler. And yes, mythologizing can take place in hours. It does not take 50 years. That is about as lame an argument as I've ever seen.

 

[Atheos]

I'd like to take another bite at the latest post and address this little gem:

But further, even if there are certain similarities, it proves virtually nothing. The important question is whether the miracle event really happened, not whether a miracle event in the gospel accounts might resemble some earlier alleged miracle. Did the event really happen or not? That's what really matters.

For the Jesus healing miracles we have evidence, because we have written accounts of them within a relatively short time after the actual events, and we have at least 4 accounts, not only one. This is far greater evidence than for any of the earlier alleged miracles.

No. We do not have "evidence" for any of these miracles. A story about miracles, written anonymously, 1500 miles away and no less than 4 decades removed from their supposed happenings is not evidence. Copycat variants of that original story appearing roughly 10, 20 and 30 years later is not corroboration. You have no evidence that anything in the gospels was based on an actual character who lived in and around Jerusalem circa 5 B.C. - 33 A.D. That means that even if the argument you present rose to the level of being "extraordinary evidence" (which it is not) it would still be a false argument because it employs circular reasoning.

Miracles are by definition extraordinary events. I can show you an unending string of people who cannot walk on the surface of a placid swimming pool. You cannot show me a single person who can accomplish this feat under circumstances where, say, Penn Gillette and Teller can observe the process and ensure no trickery is performed. For anyone to claim that a man walked on storm-tossed water unassisted is an extraordinary claim. The evidence necessary to substantiate this one claim alone would have to be extraordinary and unimpeachable. We know of many ways such a feat could be done through trickery. An anonymous tale of unknown origin is not even noteworthy, let alone extraordinary. Adding more miracles to that same tale does not nullify the need for extraordinary evidence. If anything it increases it.

We've been over this before. We have actual signed and named witnesses to the miracles of Joseph Smith which include healing various diseases including paralysis and blindness, casting out demons and raising dead people back to life. These witnesses can often be traced to within days or hours of the events in question and still yet rational people know that they're all bullshit. You've been caught out on your woeful ignorance on this subject before and attempted to gloss over it with various rationalizations. The evidence for Joseph Smith being a great miracle worker is of far greater quality than the "evidence" (if one is generous enough to call it that) of Jesus's miracles. Add to that the fact that we have independent corroboration of Joseph Smith's actual existence as a historical individual, including birth records, arrest records, death records, warrants, financial transactions, actual homes in which he was documented to live, newspaper articles and a considerable number of artifacts known to be his personal effects. For your Jesus character there is not one piece of such evidence even though untold money and man-hours have been spent attempting to dig up even so much as a single contemporary etching of graffiti about him. Nothing. There is absolutely nothing about the historical record that would be any different had the entire Jesus story been invented from whole cloth.

I will, however, give you credit for saying one true thing in your post:

The important question is whether the miracle event really happened

And the answer is it did not.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Hey, at least he's backed down a bit.

He HAD been claiming that the Jesus miracles were unique.
When that claim was beaten bloody, he's moved to: But further, even if there are certain similarities, it proves virtually nothing.

So, being unique proved something.
Being nothing like unique, the opposite of his previous evidence, does not mean the opposite of his previous claim based on that evidence. It's just something that's nothing.