reply to atrib, #69
It IS NECESSARY to invent some explanation for the Jesus Resurrection, which so far has not been explained.
The existence of the story has a simple explanation that has been pointed out to you in multiple older threads; you are just not willing to accept the explanation because of your bias.
My "bias" is that a legitimate explanation has to be based on facts, not on prejudice which ignores facts about the reported event, or story, and falls back on a dogmatic premise that no unusual event can ever happen regardless of the evidence. We have written accounts which say this happened, just as we have written accounts about other reported events in history. An "explanation" which requires us to dismiss all historical events we don't like (it's "made up"), and all the evidence and facts about it, does not explain anything.
The best explanation for the existence of the Jesus resurrection story is that it is made up.
That's all? That can also explain the unusual moon-landing story, which also might not really have happened if you ignore all the evidence and insist that nothing unusual can ever happen, because prior to 1969 all moon-landing stories were "made up." You have to go beyond just saying the story was "made up" -- you have to distinguish this story you say is "made up" from others which were not "made up." There are many dubious and "fantastic" stories, and yet some of them are not "made up."
What about the story of Herodotus that a man thrown overboard into the sea was rescued by a dolphin which carried him to dry land? or the story that a horse gave birth to a rabbit? Both of these might be true stories as well as fiction. (There are documented cases of dolphin rescues, and the rabbit story might really be a case of a deformed offspring having the appearance of a rabbit.) Not every unusual reported event was necessarily "made up." You can't dismiss every unusual story with the simplistic outburst
"Aaaaaaa, they just made up shit!"
It is MANY, MANY, MANY orders of magnitude more likely to be the right explanation than any explanation that involves the intervention of a supernatural entity from outside the universe for which no evidence exists.
There's also "no evidence" that it does not exist, also no evidence about what is or is not "outside the universe" or if anything "supernatural" does or does not exist.
A "supernatural entity from outside the universe" is not in the written accounts of the Jesus Resurrection -- such interpretations are not a basic part of the events described in the accounts.
That the reported event was "made up" is less likely than the explanation that the event did happen, as reported, regardless whether it was "supernatural" or "outside the universe" and regardless what caused it, or how. It's perfectly reasonable, and common, that something happens which is not explained. That sources near to the event say it happened, and no other sources contradict this, is evidence that it happened. Especially if there are 5 such sources. If there were only 2 such sources, it would be less credible. And yet having even 2 sources adds to the credibility, in comparison to the many cases of only one source.
(Though there is some quoting from Mark by Mt and Lk, these are not dependent on Mark for their report that the resurrection happened, because this event was something they derived from
many sources, not only one. So our number of written sources for the Resurrection is 5 (or more), not any less.)
One doesn't need to do a formal Bayesian analysis to reach this conclusion. There are mountains of evidence to demonstrate that people make up stories about supernatural entities and . . .
But they "make up" far more stories about
natural entities. So does that mean all stories about natural entities are "made up"?
. . . and events that allegedly break the laws of nature all the fucking time, and . . .
Yes, but much more often about events which do NOT break the laws of nature. So then should we conclude that ALL stories of events which do not break the laws of nature are "made up" stories, since most "made up" stories are about events which do NOT "break the laws of nature"?
Just because some stories about this or that are "made up" does not mean ALL stories about this or that are "made up." You have to take each story that is told and examine it to judge if it's "made up" or not. You can't just condemn all stories as "made up" simply because you know some are "made up." Just because someone lied somewhere doesn't mean everyone everywhere is lying all the time.
Tell us what you know about the events in the 1st century to indicate that this particular reported event must have been "made up." Not ALL reported 1st-century events are "made up" stories. How do you distinguish the "made up" events from the ones not "made up"? It's not with your metaphysical "supernatural entities" and "laws of nature" theories.
For a very unusual reported event we're entitled to be more skeptical, which means we look closer at the evidence -- not just dismiss it with a thoughtless "they just made up shit!" retort. So we consider how many sources there are and whether they fit any pattern. So, how many sources are there in this case, and what is being claimed which fits a pattern of other stories which we know to be "made up"? Give us those facts, in order to make your case that these stories must be "made up," similar to others which were debunked. But to only say the story is unusual does not make the case that it was "made up."
These accounts reporting the Jesus resurrection or the miracle healing acts don't use "break the laws of nature" or "supernatural entities" language. This language is someone's interpretation and is not in those accounts. Or, in some cases the account uses language which obviously reflects the mindset of those reporting it, or of the witnesses -- these interpretations might reflect their superstitions rather than a straightforward description of what happened. That doesn't mean they "made up" the story. Rather, it means we distinguish between what actually happened or was observed vs. the interpretation of it by the observers or those reporting it. So, instead of getting hung up on someone's interpretation, we need to consider what they actually saw.
That certain odd stories are "made up" is not evidence that EVERY unusual story must have been "made up." Even if some are, others are not. Or some are partly "made up" but also partly factual, as a report of something real which did happen but to which something further was added.
E.g., in the case of the exorcism claims, in the Gospels, something real probably did happen, but something superstitious was added. There was no pattern in the ancient world of creating exorcism healing stories. Rather, there were rituals prescribed for casting out devils but no accounts reporting someone being treated and recovering, or being cured from demon-possession (or rather, from their mental illness). In fact there are almost no other reported cases of someone being healed (especially not in the period of 300 BC up to Jesus in the Gospels), to show any pattern of healing miracles which can explain how the Jesus miracles were "made up."
There is no explanation how the jarring exorcism stories would have been "made up" by someone and reported by different writers, in a culture where there was no precedent for such stories. It's more likely that something actually happened -- the best explanation is that mentally deranged persons had an experience of recovering from their condition (or seeming to recover). And there is no reason to insist that such an observed event had to be "supernatural" or would necessarily "break the laws of nature." Rather, it's just something that was witnessed by observers, whatever caused it -- one might suppose various explanations. They are reported in 3 separate accounts (or 4, if we include the so-called Q Source, which reports one such case) and there are no other ancient stories anywhere describing such events, so there was no pattern of such stories being invented by storytellers in the ancient culture. There are possible explanations, but that nothing at all happened is less likely than the explanation that something unusual did actually happen and was reported by observers.
. . . and zero evidence that dead people can rise up as zombies and . . .
No, actually there are documented cases of dead persons who rose back to life, or rather,
apparently dead people who later revived somehow. And it's only conjecture that they were never really dead at all -- the evidence does not confirm this conjecture in all cases. It is not determined scientifically where the line is drawn between real death and only apparent death from which the subject later revives. Revival of "dead" persons (or seemingly dead) is documented in several cases, in different forms, and no scientific explanation is generally agreed to by the experts or scientists.
So it's not true that there is "zero evidence." There are different reported cases, and we have evidence that in this one case -- Jesus in about 30 AD -- a man was killed and then returned to life a few days later. Maybe only 2 days or "the third day" or 3 days, etc. And in addition there are reported cases of someone reviving or being resuscitated after several hours (in not only the ancient literature, but also modern reliable sources), maybe even a full day after the reported death. So the evidence is that events like this have happened but are very rare, not that they can't ever happen.
There's nothing about science which says there can't be such unusual events which go contrary to the norm -- even singular cases. It depends on the evidence, not on your impulsive dogma that no such thing can ever happen. Maybe you can explain an exceptional case in some way -- i.e., that "dead" guy wasn't really dead but only appeared to be dead. But this doesn't explain every case. All we know is that there are cases of an apparently dead person who revived or rose back to life, and no explanation is scientifically established.
So you can't argue that a dead person can never return to life. This is not proved by science or by experience. What we know is that such a thing can happen, but it's very rare. Rare events can happen.
. . . and fly off into space under their own power.
The bodily ascension of Jesus into the sky is more doubtful, because there's basically only one source for this. It isn't necessary to make this part of the Jesus resurrection. Maybe it did happen or maybe not. This story may have been added later, after it had become widely recognized that Jesus did the healing miracles and came back from death. From that starting point it's easy to explain how further stories got added, once his reputation as a miracle-worker had been established. But it's impossible to explain how only he became mythologized into a miracle-worker and yet no one else was -- i.e., others like John the Baptist or James the Just and many others who were just as popular as Jesus and had as many followers.
The best explanation is that he did in fact perform healing miracle acts and returned to life after being killed, while none of the others did this. That answers why only Jesus became recognized as a miracle-worker. I.e., he's the only one who reportedly did such acts attested to in multiple written accounts.
Why do we have such a stream of miracles attributed to him, and only to him and to no one else? This cannot be explained without there being a major difference between him and the many other heroes and prophets and martyrs. And so far no one has explained what this major difference was, if it was not that he did in fact demonstrate miracle power which the others did not.
translation: shut your mind to the facts; ignore all the facts about any such reported events, and exclude every possibility other than the dogma that no such events can ever happen regardless of the evidence.
Yes, that's the best argument against the Jesus Resurrection. Ignore all the facts, of this and other reported individual cases, and just blurt out your
"Aaaaaaaaaaa, people just made up shit!" ideology with no consideration of any evidence such as we do consider for other reported historical events -- i.e., our reliance on the written accounts of the time which report to us the events and we make a reasonable guess what happened.
You're right that simplistic dogmas like "they just made up shit!" are easier to package in small bite-size morsels for popular consumption, requiring no facts other than just rote memorization of the sloganistic dogma.
"They just made up shit!" = Your one-step handy-dandy historical fact refuter, for any possible reported event you want not to have happened.