120 Reasons to Reject Christianity

[atrib]

Well to be fair, Lumpenproletariat doesn't owe me $100,000. The $100,000 is merely a test of his willingness to abide by the criteria by which he argues that extraordinary claims do not require extraordinary evidence, only corroboration by at least multiple sources. Putting one's money where one's mouth is, so to speak.

So far we have quite an array of multiple sources backing up this claim. Three of them are named (Myself, atrib and jonJ) and a vast number of them were the anonymous crowds at the town in which I healed, the many people who saw me floating in the air on the way back home, the many anonymous homies of jonJ and atrib's unnamed co-worker as well as the anonymous source that informed the co-worker. That's a pretty hefty cloud of witnesses.

I'd also like to point out that I still don't believe in miracles. Everything that happened is perfectly natural, it's just that I have a mutation (like the X-Men) that allows me to heal blindness and levitate. It is certainly an extraordinary mutation and as far as I know I'm the only person in the world that has it, but it's just a mutation, not a miracle. The processes by which my ability to (re)generate missing optic nerve tissue and levitate are completely consistent with all laws of physics and biology. No god required.

Since the only thing necessary for Lumpenproletariat to believe I have these extraordinary powers is that more than one person has attested that I do, I fully expect him to agree that no further corroboration is necessary. He is dead certain that I can heal blindness with a touch and levitate in the air, floating over great distances. He does not have to see it for himself or see any extraordinary evidence.

And since multiple sources heard the aged woman claim to have seen a vision of Jesus challenge his servant Lumpenproletariat to give me $100,000 as a test of his faith, that claim is unimpeachably validated as well. Personally I don't believe in such things as visions or prophecy, and I think she made it up. But I heard her say it as did other people. It's up to Lumpenproletariat at this point to demonstrate that he stands behind his argument or explain what more would be necessary for him to accept these extraordinary claims.

I am willing to bet good money that Lumpy will not respond to this post in a meaningful way (or at all). It is clear that your claims of miracle healing and levitation are supported by multiple witnesses, including several sources who post in these forums. Their testimony is backed up by the testimony of multiple anonymous sources, which, according to Lumpy, are to be trusted even more than the sworn testimony of named witnesses. If Lumpy sincerely believes what he has been saying in this thread, he should be convinced that his God has indeed commanded him to pay you the sum of $100,000. If Lumpy does not pay you, it would be strong evidence that Lumpy either does not believe his own assertions, or perhaps that Lumpy does not believe in his God. Lumpy, you can easily clear up this matter by sending Atheos $100,000 to show us you are sincere.

 

[Atheos]

And, repeating my original point, you probably cannot name another person in history, prior to 1500 AD, whose public life was so short and who is mentioned even once in the historical record. How did this person of no status and with no long career come to be placed into the historical record? Can you name another person of so little recognition at the time of his death who is mentioned even once anywhere in the historical record?

Oh and I forgot to mention earlier, you still haven't placed this "Jesus" figure in the historical record. You've only placed stories about him in the historical record, which few would argue against. Stories about Odysseus, Horus, Hercules, Romulus and King Arthur are also part of the historical record, yet there is no reason to believe any of them had to exist for their stories to be told either.

 

[Barbarian]

Lumpen, you aren't in the habit of answering my posts, but I had time today, so:

Josephus is one source of the established history record, and he mentions "Jesus, who was called Christ" (Antiquities 20.9.1), and so this historical Jesus "Christ" person is part of the established history record.

Please explain how come Josephus writes three to four pages about every minor robber group who held some noname village for a week until the Romans came and fucked them up, but he manages a single paragraph only about the miraculous claim that this Jesus - out of a long list of Jesuses discussed in his book - was possibly not even a man, but the Messiah, whom he, Josephus, a Jew to the end, waited for all his life. Josephus would have written a whole book about the guy, if the Testimonium Flavianum was his work and not some later interpolation.

Josephus doesn't say he WAS the "Christ," but that he was called Christ, meaning someone believed he was the Jewish Messiah.

That's not true. I went and checked; the text says (pardon my non-transliteration) "ho christos outos en" "the anointed he was" i.e. he was the Christ. Whence this claim about 'called'?

Also Tacitus puts the Jew "Christus" or "Chrestus" into the historical record, saying that he was executed by order of Pontius Pilate (Annals 14.15),

He is not a contemporary and in any case only reports about the existence and beliefs of Christians but not about their miraculous claims, who by that time - Tacitus' time of writing, that is, not by the time of the Chrestian riots in Rome, much less in the alleged time of Jesus - obviously believed in the same fairy tales you do. That does not mean they were right to believe so, decades after the alleged events.

So if you throw Christ out of the historical record, there is much other established history you also have to throw out.

Yes, all miracles are to be thrown out of any decent "historical record". Miracles don't happen.

And, repeating my original point, you probably cannot name another person in history, prior to 1500 AD, whose public life was so short and who is mentioned even once in the historical record. How did this person of no status and with no long career come to be placed into the historical record? Can you name another person of so little recognition at the time of his death who is mentioned even once anywhere in the historical record?

That's circular logic. Before establishing the historicity of Jesus you are not allowed to claim anything about him, including that he was little known or recognized. Besides, the Jews were going strong with the Humble Servant idea by that time; there's your reason for making up such a messiah.

This fact (evidence) about the historical Christ person is highly irregular, or "extraordinary," and thus the explanation, or the actual events leading to his being included in the historical record, are also probably extraordinary or highly irregular.

Extraordinary (evidence) in this context means extremely strong, not extremely irregular.

Two other NT figures named by Josephus are the church leader James and John the Baptist, both of whom had long careers. If people then were looking for someone to mythologize into a miracle-working Messiah, either of these two would have been far more likely choices.

The story of John the Baptist is indeed an alternative version of the tale of Jesus. Born after miraculous events, preaching the Kingdom of God, killed by a local ruler. The "alternative Christianity" which stood behind John the Baptist and not Jesus is still extant and is called Mandaeism.

It's OK to set a high standard of corroboration before establishing such events as known fact into the history books, but that doesn't mean they did not happen. There is enough doubt so that they are put into the unknown category. Many events have to go into the unknown category, but that doesn't mean they didn't happen.

No, miracles aren't put into the unknown category except by propagandists. Miracles don't happen.

"Faith" is required for much of our knowledge of history. Without any "faith" at all, there could be virtually no known history, because you could not accept any evidence as reliable. Some "faith" is required in order to accept any "evidence" as a reliable guide to the facts. Whether it's documents, or archaeological finds, it requires "faith" in those documents/finds, or "faith" in those who discovered them, in order to derive the facts from them.

You are equivocating. Faith in the reliability of a historical account is not the same as religious faith breaking one's mental abilities to the point of believing in the possibility of miracles.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Did Jesus Christ begin as a fiction rather than a real historical person?

You mean a source that confirms events in the gospel accounts and has no connection to any Christian belief about the events?

The best examples of this are:

a mention of Christ by Suetonius writing about 122 AD, who mistook Christ to be a Roman who was causing disturbances among the Jews in Rome during the reign of Claudius;

a mention of Christ by Tacitus, writing about 115 AD, referring to the execution of Christ and naming Pontius Pilate as giving the order;

a mention of Christians by Pliny the younger in a letter to Trajan, about 112 AD, concerning what to do with them and about executing some of them;

mention in Josephus of the execution of John the Baptist, which agrees with the gospels in general, but not in some details;

mention in Josephus of Jesus "who was called Christ," and naming him as the brother of James. [Antiquities 20.9.1]

[Some of the participants here keep confusing the above AUTHENTIC quote from Josephus with the interpolation in Antiquities 18.3.3 -- You have to distinguish these. There are TWO Christ quotes in Josephus, not only the famous controversial quote. The less celebrated 20.9 quote is genuine.]

Probably a reason there are so few references is that Jesus was active publicly for less than 3 years, very likely even less than one year. Virtually all "famous" characters in history had to be doing something for a much longer time than this in order to gain a mention in mainline history documents.

How many other characters in history are mentioned even once in the established history record whose public life was this short?

How many of these “other characters” are you claiming to be The one and only God?

Obviously none.

Are you saying that the reason the Christ person is found in the historical record is that someone claimed he was God, or fabricated him as being the one true god, and he got placed into the record because of this claim?

This cannot happen, because it requires more than a claim that some fictional person is the true god in order for this fictional entity to then gain a place in the record as having been a real person in history.

If this could explain how Jesus Christ became transformed from a fiction into a historical person, then we would have hundreds of these "one true god" figures in the historical record, as miracle-working historical persons attested to by multiple documents, such as the case of Jesus. In fact, there'd likely be thousands of them.

By this process, anyone could create a fictional character, claim he was "the only god," and get that fictional character transformed into a historical person in the record. It is not true that a fictional character can be distorted into a reputed real historical person this way.

This did not happen in the case of any of the pagan "gods." None of them was created as a fictional entity which then became transformed into a historical person. Or, in the case of Zoroaster and Gautama, etc., these were ACTUAL historical persons who then became transformed or mythologized into gods or super-heroes. But we have no examples of someone who was really a fiction to begin with and was then placed into history as a real historical person.

Give an example if you think there is such a case.

There are theories about the possibility of this, but no one can name a clear case of this ever happening.

Your purported God sure has a funny way of revealing itself, and seems to let the humans do most of his talking for him, BS and all.

Much of the truth we know comes to us through communication from other humans. Maybe most of it. The truth about Christ is in this category. It is incorrect to judge that this form of receiving truth is either the right or the wrong form. We can't say that a proposed truth must be received by this method or that, and that if it comes through the "wrong" medium then it has to be rejected.

Maybe this "funny way" of acquiring truth is precisely the way the "one true God" would reveal him-/itself if he/it does in fact exist. How are we supposed to know what is the proper way for such an entity to reveal him/itself?

Instead of trying to judge how a self-respecting "one true God" would reveal him/itself, it is better to just look at what we know has happened, or apparently happened, and try to draw any conclusions from it, without pretending to judge that things should not have happened that way but rather should have happened some other way.

From the evidence, we can conclude that the Christ person, the historical Jesus, had power to perform miracle healing acts. And we can try to reason from that reality to whatever conclusions follow. But what is the point of saying that he should not have done those acts or should not have chosen this method of presenting himself? or should not have left it to humans to tell others about him?

It makes sense to say you don't believe it, and give your reasons why it's not true, or could not be true. But it doesn't make sense to suggest that if he did these things, then he made some mistake, or that he misbehaved, or "revealed" himself by a wrong or "funny" method. How can you know what is the right behavior or what is the right method for him to follow?

Seems like it prefers to play hide-and-seek more than anything else.

What do you have against "hide-and-seek"?

Some truth is elusive. Or "Truth" -- with a capital "T" -- maybe the truth that presents to us the possibility of eternal life is partly elusive.

But there's still the plain or simple part. Jesus showed us his power, in the healing miracles. With such power (including resurrection) he could put us into Heaven, to say it simply. That's not really hide-and-seek, because what he did was in plain sight and was straightforward.

But there's also the elusive element. We can't say that this elusive element is either right or wrong. Some truth is elusive, and yet it might still be important. Not all truth has to be as direct and plain as 2 + 2 = 4.

It's better to consider the evidence or the logic and not judge that a particular truth must be right or wrong because of the hide-and-seek element, or of being indirect or elusive. This indirectness or elusiveness could be essential in some way. It's neither right nor wrong.

The "faith" that Jesus spoke of included normal understanding based on evidence, and a simple understanding or grasping the straightforward truth, and also an understanding that includes normal doubting. All this is included in his pronouncement to those he healed: "Your faith saved you."

You can complain that there's some "hide-and-seek" here, but that's what a lot of life is about. And truth.

 

[Keith&Co.]

The less celebrated 20.9 quote is genuine.

And a reason to believe this is......?
I mean, you assert a whole bunch of shit with no real credibility that you know what you're talking about. Why would we accept this claim? What evidence can you provide for the claim?

And more to the point, does Josephus talking about Christ put the Christ in the historical record or does it put Christains who talk about Christ in the historical record?

 

[Keith&Co.]

Seems like it prefers to play hide-and-seek more than anything else.

Some truth is elusive. Or "Truth" -- with a capital "T" -- maybe the truth that presents to us the possibility of eternal life is partly elusive.

But that kinda spoils your thesis.
You keep maintaining that the belief in Jesus and his offer of eternal life is rational. That the evidence of the healing miracles is solid enough to rationally conclude that he really had superpowers and after a few logical leaps, the 'possibility of etnernal life' becomes a rational thing to believe.
Now, you're trying to ALSO make it a matter of faith, that's not a rational conclusion supported by evidence.
And both times, you're claiming moral superiority and sneering down at your critics.

You're quite convincingly christain, Lumpy, but your arguments are a little slippery.

 

[Keith&Co.]

But there's still the plain or simple part. Jesus showed us his power, in the healing miracles. With such power (including resurrection) he could put us into Heaven, to say it simply.

It's not so simple, Lumpy.
Healing a physical body, even post-mortem, is not evidence of souls.
Without evidence of souls, there's no evidence of an afterlife.
There's no evidence of Heaven in the healing miracle, and even if there was, the healing is not proof that we have souls that will be able to reach Heaven.

I mean, think about it. RIGHT NOW paramedics have the tech and the knowledge to resurrect people, under certain conditions; back to life after physical death. This is not evidence that they can make a non-physical matrix to allow those people's personalities to persist after the body fails, or that the matrix is compatible with Heaven, or that the life-raising technician has any pull with Heaven's doorman. The medical personnel might be Jewish, or Islamic, or Hindu, or Shinto.

I mean, atheist paramedics have the power to bring people back to life. This doesn't validate their belief that there is no afterlife....

 

[Atheos]

[Some of the participants here keep confusing the above AUTHENTIC quote from Josephus with the interpolation in Antiquities 18.3.3 -- You have to distinguish these. There are TWO Christ quotes in Josephus, not only the famous controversial quote. The less celebrated 20.9 quote is genuine.]

First of all, thanks for writing a bit more concisely so that someone has a hope of actually reading your arguments and responding to them. You are correct that there are two references to the Jesus character in the antiquities, one of which has obviously been doctored a bit and the other which may well be completely authentic. This does not negate the fact that Antiquities was written long after it has been established that Christians were going about teaching that their Jesus was the messiah. Josephus puts "People talking about Jesus and claiming he was the messiah/christ in the historical record." Josephus does not put Jesus into the historical record, and Josephus certainly does not put a miracle-working Jesus into the historical record.

Are you saying that the reason the Christ person is found in the historical record is that someone claimed he was God, or fabricated him as being the one true god, and he got placed into the record because of this claim?

First of all, I can't speak for everyone else, but for myself I can say that I am definitely not saying that "The reason the Christ person is found in the historical record is ... anything." The Christ person is not found in the historical record. Stories about the Christ person are found in the historical record. Huge difference. As to the "reason" these stories exist it is extremely unlikely that there is only one reason. It is far more likely that many factors played a part in their development, just as many factors played a part in the development of the Hindu, Chinese, Roman, Greek, Assyrian and Egyptian myths that came before these stories, and many factors influenced Mohammad, Joseph Smith, Marshall Applewhite, L. Ron Hubbard and others to make up their stories in more modern times. We do know that no matter how outlandish a story is it can be sold. The Jesus story wasn't even that outlandish by the standards of the day with more sons of Jupiter and sons of Zeus running around than you could shake a stick at.

This cannot happen, because it requires more than a claim that some fictional person is the true god in order for this fictional entity to then gain a place in the record as having been a real person in history.

I'd like to see how you substantiate that such a requirement exists. People make up crazy claims all the time and folks buy them. The ability to sell a crazy claim is an effect of how good a salesman the seller is.  J. Z. Knight claims to be channeling Ramtha, a 30,000 year old warrior, and makes millions from people who believe her.

If this could explain how Jesus Christ became transformed from a fiction into a historical person, then we would have hundreds of these "one true god" figures in the historical record, as miracle-working historical persons attested to by multiple documents, such as the case of Jesus. In fact, there'd likely be thousands of them.

Not necessarily. Not everyone believes in a god, and certainly there are many variants of god-based religions out there that are not associated with the Judaeo/Christian/Muslim traditions making tidy profits for the purveyors of such hokey. Ironically it would take no miracle for the Jesus story to be the complete work of fabrication. But it would take massive miracles on a wholesale basis for the claims you make about this character to be true. All available evidence is consistent with the theory that no historical Jesus ever existed. I don't necessarily subscribe to the belief that there never was an itinerant preacher named Jesus, and it is even possible that this Jesus character used magic tricks to wow his audiences. But the historical record doesn't even corroborate that claim. All we have is this:

• Circa 50 A.D. Paul began claiming he was channeling a Jesus character
• Circa 60 A.D. People were claiming Jesus had been "tempted in all points like human beings are"
• Circa 75 A.D. People were claiming that Jesus had lived in recent history and was crucified by Pilate roughly 40-45 years earlier.
• Circa 90 A.D. Josephus reports that people are claiming Jesus was the messiah
• Circa 110 A.D. Tacitus (very possibly simply reporting what he heard on the streets from Christians) says Jesus was executed by Pilate.

Much of the truth we know comes to us through communication from other humans. Maybe most of it. The truth about Christ is in this category. It is incorrect to judge that this form of receiving truth is either the right or the wrong form. We can't say that a proposed truth must be received by this method or that, and that if it comes through the "wrong" medium then it has to be rejected.

But as much of the untruth we know today comes to us through communication from other humans. That's why a rational person learns not to believe everything he reads or hears. A liar can be extremely convincing but the lie remains.

Momma walks into the kitchen to find the cookie jar has been moved from a high shelf down to the counter and 5 kids eating cookies without permission. She asks "Who got the cookie jar down?" Billy says, "A magic fairy appeared, flew up to the cookie jar and got it down, then told us all to have some cookies. She then disappeared." All the other kids quickly agree with Billy.

All the witnesses are telling pretty much the same story but it doesn't add up. Momma has never seen a fairy but there are many other more plausible explanations for how the cookie jar got down, not the least of which is that one of the kids climbed up on the counter and fetched it.

It is not unreasonable to apply the same healthy skepticism to the thousands upon thousands of claims made by religious people about miracles. From the  Hindu Milk Miracle to the  Miracles of Joseph Smith to the hundreds of faith healers currently active today to the thousands of  Alien Abduction stories to Muslim claims about Mohammad being able to eat poison food, multiply a small mound of dates into enough to sell to pay a considerable debt, or cause a palm tree to start crying, religious people and non-religious alike make incredible claims and you reject many of them for the same reasons I reject your claims that Jesus performed all these miracles. Stories are cheap. Evidence, especially evidence that would rise to the level necessary to eliminate every possibility other than an actual miracle occurred, is non-existent.

 

[James Brown]

I found this article enlightening:

While the appeal to the text of Josephus is often made in the attempt to secure the place of Jesus as a figure in history, the text of Josephus itself is far too insecure to carry the burden assigned to it.

I agree with the author of the article. A couple of dubious mentions by a Jewish historian is no smoking gun. Josephus was writing a history of Jewish concerns for Roman leadership. He would likely be reluctant to mention an active and militant movement (Christianity) which acknowledges another King.

But despite all that, Josephus' mentions would still work if Jesus was merely a human preacher, executed by the state for political reasons, and who was then mythologized by his followers into divinity.

 

[James Brown]

But we have no examples of someone who was really a fiction to begin with and was then placed into history as a real historical person.

I can think of several personages that some people, rightly or wrongly, believe to be historical:

Beowulf
Ulysses
King Arthur
Robin Hood
William Tell
John Henry
John Frum
Paul Bunyan
Robinson Crusoe
Davy Jones


Scholarship may have proven or strongly argued that all of these characters were in fact fictional. But as the skeptics on this board can well attest, scholarship and critical thinking rarely budges a true believer.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Josephus was writing a history of Jewish concerns for Roman leadership. He would likely be reluctant to mention an active and militant movement (Christianity) which acknowledges another King.

And with Josephus' main desire being to please the Roman leadership, even if both references to Jesus were added later, the Christ mythicist still can't point to Josephus' silence as conclusive. Someone could be standing there with objective accounts of Jesus' life, trial, death and resurrection, and Josephus would be disinclinded to include it.

In other words, Lumpy, while appealing to Josephus doesn't really help you establish Jesus' historicity (he's not an eyewitness and the referrals are sketchy and they could easily be explained by the existence of Christains, not Christ), dropping him from your list doesn't hurt you, either.

 

[Atheos]

But we have no examples of someone who was really a fiction to begin with and was then placed into history as a real historical person.

I can think of several personages that some people, rightly or wrongly, believe to be historical:

Beowulf
Ulysses
King Arthur
Robin Hood
William Tell
John Henry
John Frum
Paul Bunyan
Robinson Crusoe
Davy Jones


Scholarship may have proven or strongly argued that all of these characters were in fact fictional. But as the skeptics on this board can well attest, scholarship and critical thinking rarely budges a true believer.

This is an accurate refutation of Lumpenproletarit's claim. Yet he has been presented with this evidence numerous times and continues to make the same baseless assertion. The last time around his rationalization (if I recall correctly) was that none of these were around the same time frame as the stories allege Jesus existed. He has yet to establish that people living in that period were immune to mythology and/or confusing legend with history.

Lumpenproletariat's entire argument truly does boil down to "It's more likely that a man walked on storm-tossed water and levitated off into the sky than it is that someone could have made up these stories and others believed them."

 

[funinspace]

How many of these “other characters” are you claiming to be The one and only God?

Obviously none.

Are you saying that the reason the Christ person is found in the historical record is that someone claimed he was God, or fabricated him as being the one true god, and he got placed into the record because of this claim? <snipped further “historical record noise”>

I’m not saying that “the Christ person is found in the historical record”. That is your false mantra.

Your purported God sure has a funny way of revealing itself, and seems to let the humans do most of his talking for him, BS and all.

Much of the truth we know comes to us through communication from other humans. Maybe most of it. The truth about Christ is in this category. It is incorrect to judge that this form of receiving truth is either the right or the wrong form. We can't say that a proposed truth must be received by this method or that, and that if it comes through the "wrong" medium then it has to be rejected.

Maybe this "funny way" of acquiring truth is precisely the way the "one true God" would reveal him-/itself if he/it does in fact exist. How are we supposed to know what is the proper way for such an entity to reveal him/itself?

Instead of trying to judge how a self-respecting "one true God" would reveal him/itself, it is better to just look at what we know has happened, or apparently happened, and try to draw any conclusions from it, without pretending to judge that things should not have happened that way but rather should have happened some other way.

Me thinketh that you are projecting more than a tad too much. I am not scoffing at any particular god only for how it reveals itself, but for a host of logical/rational reasons. More on this later…

From the evidence, we can conclude that the Christ person, the historical Jesus, had power to perform miracle healing acts. And we can try to reason from that reality to whatever conclusions follow. But what is the point of saying that he should not have done those acts or should not have chosen this method of presenting himself? or should not have left it to humans to tell others about him?

What’s this “we” shit, have a mouse in your pocket? There is no historical Jesus outside the theological rantings of the true believers of this new cult. They claimed-wrote many decades after his purported death, that Jesus “had power to perform miracle healing acts”. But yeah, there are Jesus followers in the historical record.

It makes sense to say you don't believe it, and give your reasons why it's not true, or could not be true. But it doesn't make sense to suggest that if he did these things, then he made some mistake, or that he misbehaved, or "revealed" himself by a wrong or "funny" method. How can you know what is the right behavior or what is the right method for him to follow?

I never claimed the purported Jesus performed real miracles. I don’t believe in any of the broad Christian theological claims, made by the many differing sects, due to a large set of reasons. Here is a short synopsis of my reasoning.

*The Jewish faith is built upon mounds and mounds of BS and purported violence.
- There was never anything even close to the Noah Deluge fable
- The Tower of Babel fable...is well babel BS
- Moshe and his Exodus fable is at least 99.9% BS
- The whole conquering of Canaan is largely made up
- There was never any day the Earth stood still for Joshua
- The sun wasn’t set back 10 degrees for Hezekiah
- Lots of stupid and/or barbaric Laws

* The NT doesn’t get it much better
- I find it fascinating that the later the Gospel was written, the more fantastic the story unfolds. And, but for Mark, all were most probably written after the sacking of Jerusalem.
- The purported Jesus believes in his Jewish roots, thereby adopting all the above BS
- The virgin birth narrative is built upon a poor reading of the Tanakh
- The whole birthing narrative between Luke and Matthew is a jumbled and conflicting mess
- The Gospel writers can’t even falsify a proper House of David lineage
- The Gospel writers turned the Pilot into a pansy Roman officer, yet Rome recalled him for brutality
- The Trinity construct is a convoluted/nonsensical mess
- Later Christians didn't like the ending of Mark so they conspired to commit forgery and added a more pleasing ending
- Scholars know of at least one instance where a Gospel verse was adjusted, to make the trinity more definitive
- Even Later Christians didn’t like that Josephus left the Jesus-god out of his writings, so they forged in a cute paragraph
- There is ZERO written about Jesus from anyone that was his contemporary* and had a chance to meet him, outside of the True Believers hell bent of creating a new religion.
- Considering all the Jesus-miracles claimed, one would think he would have gotten a serious and large following within Israel. Yet that is where the new religion seemed to fair the poorest, instead growing in distant Egypt, Asia Minor, Greece and Rome.

*contemporary – look up in dictionary if one is unsure of its real meaning

Then there are many weird verses like this:
Matthew 5:17-19 "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven,". Paul argues directly against this several times in order to make sure Gentiles can be brought into the fold while ignoring the law.

It is the totality of these things, and many other more minor details, that I find not logical nor rational. From looking at the whole picture, I find little to be compelling, and much repulsive, within broadly defined Christian theology. I find the whole “I want to live forever” fantasy to be an odd reason to suspend otherwise rational conclusions, just in the hopes that religion X will reincarnate me after I die. Add in the propensity for people to delude themselves into believing all sorts of shit, religious (LDS) or otherwise (UFOs), and it is not surprising that humanity has put tens of thousands of gods upon pedestals.

Seems like it prefers to play hide-and-seek more than anything else.

What do you have against "hide-and-seek"?

Some truth is elusive. Or "Truth" -- with a capital "T" -- maybe the truth that presents to us the possibility of eternal life is partly elusive.

But there's still the plain or simple part. Jesus showed us his power, in the healing miracles. With such power (including resurrection) he could put us into Heaven, to say it simply. That's not really hide-and-seek, because what he did was in plain sight and was straightforward.

Except of course we don’t have any plain or simple Jesus part, as it came later from anonymous writers, written decades after purported events, and humanity has only been able to find nearly whole copies from 2-3 centuries later, depending on the book. Your idea of not “hide-n-seek” is closer to Bill’s “I didn’t have sex with that woman”, as evidently he thought blow jobs didn’t count. A god not playing hide-n-seek, might have nudged Pontius Pilate, to write back to Rome commenting on having to execute a crazy Jew who claimed to be their King; and then god could have protected it within the Roman archives. A god not playing hide-n-seek, could have inspired one of the first dozen disciples to sit down and write a Gospel in the 30’s, within a few years of God’s death/resurrection. God could have nudged them to send copies outward, to initiate a historical record.

Hide-n-seek is fine as an intentional game among people. Hide-n-seek pisses me off when someone/company plays it to avoid dealing with a product problem. Hide-n-seek would really suck, if I got this while trying to buy a house. And if a purported god thinks Hide-n-seek is reasonable, when it is putting death on the line, well….fuck it/him/her.

 

[atrib]

Jesus the miracle worker is NOT part of the historical record

Are you saying that the reason the Christ person is found in the historical record is that someone claimed he was God, or fabricated him as being the one true god, and he got placed into the record because of this claim?

You keep asserting that the Jesus character described in the Bible is part of the historical record. This is NOT true. There are NO historical records of anyone named Jesus performing miracles. Not one. There is not a single historical document that refers to a character named Jesus who walked on water, cured sick people, got resurrected after several days of being dead, or flying up into the sky. Prove me wrong. Produce a reference to a historical document that describes a character named Jesus doing the magical things that Jesus is alleged to have done in the Bible.

You would think that if Jesus actually existed and did all the magical things that the Bible alleges he did, the historical record would be full of references to eyewitness testimony from the people who had witbnessed these miracles. Yet there is not a single mention of such events every taking place. Not one. Clearly, the historians of the time had no knowledge, direct or otherwise, of any Jesus character who performed many miracles in front of many people. The testimony of the Bible is clearly fabricated and has no evidence to support it.

If this could explain how Jesus Christ became transformed from a fiction into a historical person, then we would have hundreds of these "one true god" figures in the historical record, as miracle-working historical persons attested to by multiple documents, such as the case of Jesus. In fact, there'd likely be thousands of them.

Again, you repeat the lie. There is no historical documentation of Jesus having performed miracles. Not one. The nature of this untruth has been pointed out to you multiple times in this thread, yet you keep repeating it. This does not speak well of your integrity.

This did not happen in the case of any of the pagan "gods." None of them was created as a fictional entity which then became transformed into a historical person. Or, in the case of Zoroaster and Gautama, etc., these were ACTUAL historical persons who then became transformed or mythologized into gods or super-heroes. But we have no examples of someone who was really a fiction to begin with and was then placed into history as a real historical person.

Jesus was not placed into history either. See above.

Much of the truth we know comes to us through communication from other humans. Maybe most of it. The truth about Christ is in this category.

Christ is very likely a fictional character. It is possible that the fictional character described in the Bible is based on an actual person, but there is no evidence to support the claim that he could perform miracles. That is the truth about Christ.

Maybe this "funny way" of acquiring truth is precisely the way the "one true God" would reveal him-/itself if he/it does in fact exist. How are we supposed to know what is the proper way for such an entity to reveal him/itself?

A supernatural entity that can perform miracles and create the universe and supposedly wants to save all of humanity from a Hell that it created could easily have found a way to clearly and unambiguously communicate its presence and its message to every human alive on the planet. The fact no such entity has ever revealed its presence or message to us is telling.

From the evidence, we can conclude that the Christ person, the historical Jesus, had power to perform miracle healing acts.

The evidence does not support this assertion.

It makes sense to say you don't believe it, and give your reasons why it's not true, or could not be true. But it doesn't make sense to suggest that if he did these things, then he made some mistake, or that he misbehaved, or "revealed" himself by a wrong or "funny" method. How can you know what is the right behavior or what is the right method for him to follow?

The right way would have been to reveal itself clearly and unambiguously to all humans on this planet.

But there's still the plain or simple part. Jesus showed us his power, in the healing miracles.

He did no such thing. The stories in the Bible are NOT supported by history. Simply repeating this lie will not magically make it true.

It's better to consider the evidence or the logic and not judge that a particular truth must be right or wrong because of the hide-and-seek element, or of being indirect or elusive. This indirectness or elusiveness could be essential in some way. It's neither right nor wrong.

So show us the fucking evidence already. You can't do that because there is none. Which is why you keep dancing around the subject and posting lots and lots of words which mean nothing.

 

[James Brown]

Can we settle on the definition of "the historical record" please? I've a feeling that some of us have different ideas of what that concept entails.

 

[Barbarian]

Lumpenproletariat's entire argument truly does boil down to "It's more likely that a man walked on storm-tossed water and levitated off into the sky than it is that someone could have made up these stories and others believed them."

I really, really like this summary.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Can we settle on the definition of "the historical record" please?

Lumpy's definition seems to be 'If I believe it really happened and you tell me it's not logical to believe that, then that's an ad hominem on your part.'

 

[Duke Leto]

But we have no examples of someone who was really a fiction to begin with and was then placed into history as a real historical person.

I can think of several personages that some people, rightly or wrongly, believe to be historical:

Beowulf
Ulysses
King Arthur
Robin Hood
William Tell
John Henry
John Frum
Paul Bunyan
Robinson Crusoe
Davy Jones


Scholarship may have proven or strongly argued that all of these characters were in fact fictional. But as the skeptics on this board can well attest, scholarship and critical thinking rarely budges a true believer.

Wait a minute, Davy Jones is was totally a real person!

The Monkees were a fictional band that later became semi-real, though.

 

[Atheos]

Can we settle on the definition of "the historical record" please? I've a feeling that some of us have different ideas of what that concept entails.

I think a debate over the definition of "the historical record" might derail the thread but I do agree that there is a bit of equivocation going on in some arguments presented.

It's one thing to say that "Jesus" is part of the historical record. References to an individual named Jesus do, indeed, appear in the historical record. But references to a city named Atlantis also appear in the historical record. Most of what we know about Atlantis comes from Plato just like most of what we know about Jesus comes from Paul. There are actually tremendous parallels between Atlantis and Jesus, as neither can be demonstrated to have ever actually existed yet a great amount of effort has been expended in an effort to do just that thing. Atlantis, like the Jesus myth, includes mythological markers such as Poseidon's direct involvement in its construction, his siring of children from a mortal woman named Cleito who lived there and the claim that the eldest of these children was a demigod named Atlas after whom the Atlantic ocean was named.

Whether or not Plato actually invented the story of Atlantis is unknown. But it is evident that Plato used this story in order to make some political points. And it's quite possible that Paul, like Plato, discovered or fabricated the Jesus myth and exploited it for religious reasons to engender a fanatical cult following. "Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ." Nobody here has to be able to enumerate all the factors that make the difference between religious/cult movements that succeed and those that peter out. But there is ample evidence that it does happen, not the least of which is the Mormon movement which remains one of the fastest growing religious movements in the world.

So to complete the point I made earlier, It's one thing to say "Jesus" is part of the historical record. But it is another thing entirely different to suggest that the historical record supports the idea that Jesus performed actual miracles, resurrected from his own death and floated off into the sky. The historical record definitely does not support that.

 

[funinspace]

Can we settle on the definition of "the historical record" please? I've a feeling that some of us have different ideas of what that concept entails.

I think a debate over the definition of "the historical record" might derail the thread but I do agree that there is a bit of equivocation going on in some arguments presented.

It's one thing to say that "Jesus" is part of the historical record. References to an individual named Jesus do, indeed, appear in the historical record. But references to a city named Atlantis also appear in the historical record. Most of what we know about Atlantis comes from Plato just like most of what we know about Jesus comes from Paul. There are actually tremendous parallels between Atlantis and Jesus, as neither can be demonstrated to have ever actually existed yet a great amount of effort has been expended in an effort to do just that thing. Atlantis, like the Jesus myth, includes mythological markers such as Poseidon's direct involvement in its construction, his siring of children from a mortal woman named Cleito who lived there and the claim that the eldest of these children was a demigod named Atlas after whom the Atlantic ocean was named.

Whether or not Plato actually invented the story of Atlantis is unknown. But it is evident that Plato used this story in order to make some political points. And it's quite possible that Paul, like Plato, discovered or fabricated the Jesus myth and exploited it for religious reasons to engender a fanatical cult following. "Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ." Nobody here has to be able to enumerate all the factors that make the difference between religious/cult movements that succeed and those that peter out. But there is ample evidence that it does happen, not the least of which is the Mormon movement which remains one of the fastest growing religious movements in the world.

So to complete the point I made earlier, It's one thing to say "Jesus" is part of the historical record. But it is another thing entirely different to suggest that the historical record supports the idea that Jesus performed actual miracles, resurrected from his own death and floated off into the sky. The historical record definitely does not support that.

I guess when I was making my recent point, in response to Lumpy’s “Jesus historical record” drivel, my thoughts were around there not being any contemporary sources referencing this Jesus character. Having anonymous and purposeful religious building Gospels, written 30-90 years after the purported death of this Jesus character, hardly counts for much. Paul gets closer, but he only met people who should have known this Jesus Character, but didn’t meet Jesus himself and is very light on any details about this Jesus. All other references, from Josephus, Tacitus, et.al. are only evidence of the existence of followers of this new Jesus/Christ cult.

Sure, the Gospels and Paul’s letters are part of humanities overall vaguely labeled “historical record”, but like you pointed out so is Plato’s Atlantis. Tacitus’ is no more or less part of the “Jesus historical record”, than Lumpy’s current apologetic here. Similarly, the Book of Mormon is part of the “historical record”, but what does that mean? At least with the BoM, we know who wrote it, and we know down to the year when he wrote it. And he got 12 known dupes to sign off on the whole miraculous revelation BS. Though, only 28 percent of the original manuscript now survives. The printer's manuscripts still survive nearly 100% extant, from less than 20 years from the origination. Christianity has to wait nearly 3 centuries to make that claim for its copies, never mind the plus or minus decades on when they were written, nor the reality that only Paul’s letters have known authorship (ignoring that some of the Pauline letters are suspect) and agreed upon dating to within a decade.