Hold on. You are not going to get away with blaming me for all the "gish gallop". You were the one that jumped all over everything in every direction. My duty was to respond.
Again, every single element of the mythology can be "best" explained (or, certainly better explained) by any of the following that do not rely upon magic being real:
With an opening like that you want me to consider you serious?
Fallacy of poisoning the well, because my case has nothing to do with magic. Your counter is also straw man of the supernatural. Magic is natural not supernatural.
Thus this..................
*sigh* . You're hanging your hat on the presumption that magic is "reasonable." That's simply unsupportable all on its own, so you've already self-defeated long before the gish gallop.
.......... remains a fallacy. You simply repeated yourself. You make no case just simply assume. Simply repeating your self does not mean your assumption is true. I had a duty to respond to your assumption there, hence the gish gallop was of your creation.
and now this from 234 where you quote me............
And now I'll do it again. First, your "four historical facts" are not facts. They are assertions from mythological stories, the origin of which we do not know and the original authorship we do not know.
The simple undefended assumption behind your assertion infers that the authorship of the NT is somehow crucial to determining them to be credible historical sources for the life of Jesus.
No, it does not so we can skip all of that pointless straw to....
Your denial about authorship cannot be denied. The evidence is right there in your own gish gallop.
And
You keep repeating the same ole gish gallop. Even again later in this post. And you could not handle the counter-argument I provided to challenge your reasoning so you simply labeled it a straw. Be fair.
So I did my part addressing your reasoning.
So....
Until you address what I presented there, your reasoning regarding authorship diminishing the facts of the NT, doesn't even scratch the surface my case.
Remember you brought that up not I. You forced me to address it. Again.
2. The cave was allegedly found to be open and NOT empty; a young man was allegedly found sitting inside of it who told the visitors that Jesus (aka, "the body") had gone ahead of them to Galilee and that they should tell the disciples and go see him (which sure as shit implies that they "produced a body" and that it was the same Jesus/body that was placed into the cave in the first place).
...2. based on your uncommon interpretation/speculation and it reasons from only one source.
"Uncommon" is not a thing and the fact that it comes from "one source" is not a counter-argument. If you're going to make an appeal to authority, then it is "common" among biblical scholars to note that Mark is the original source of the story and that later authors have simply taken his story, repeated it but then made their own embellishments. Iow, they made shit up, but even if they did not--and we had any evidence at all that could possibly confirm such an assertion--it STILL is not a counter-argument. Mark's version was the first one and it contradicts later versions.
You don't get to pick and choose which one you're going to go with, nor is it allowable to conflate all of them into one, where you simply dismiss the fact that the cave is not empty and there is a young man sitting in it. Those are either facts or fictions. Which is it? Fact that the cave was open and a young man was sitting inside or fiction?
First note my original counter was only 13 words long you added all the gish gallop that I have to respond to........so parsed.....
"Uncommon" is not a thing and the fact that it comes from "one source" is not a counter-argument.
Of course it is. It is clearly fallacious reasoning. It is clearly cherry picking on your part to ignore all other sources to advance your uncommon interpretation. How is that not clear? Now before you once again baldly assert that only Mark counts and all other sources are embellishment, you would need to establish that as sound reasoning. That is only your assumption and not fact.
So again I did not raise this fallacious reasoning against my case ....you did. I had the responsibility to respond. So the gish gallop here again was of your own creation.
like here again................
If you're going to make an appeal to authority, then it is "common" among biblical scholars to note that Mark is the original source of the story and that later authors have simply taken his story, repeated it but then made their own embellishments.
I'm not appealing to an authority, just more sources than you are. I fully acknowledge your concern of embellishment and agree it exists, just not here as you simply assume. Historians have procedures to weed out the embellishment. Consider the selection of the canon, the embellished "other" gospels were not included. You are assuming that since embellishment exists you can therefore conclude everything you don't like is an embellishment when it comes to the NT. That is clearly unreasonable. You need to make a specific case for that here regarding this context. Otherwise you are reasoning guilt by association.
Mark's version was the first one and it contradicts later versions.
Again this is you adding 2 more counters to the gish gallop. My responsibility is to respond.
Thus (1) regarding your assumption that Mark is the first source.........No I gave you a pre-Gospel source that supported my four facts (premises). More on that below.
Now regarding (2)......... Mark's differences with the other Gospels. Are all differences necessarily contradictions? That is an assumption you want to be true. Make a case that all differences between Mark and the other Gospels are contradictions. You have not presented anything other than your blind belief on this point. I have repeatedly redressed your assumption and it remains wanting. It is common for eyewitness accounts to disagree on some points of the case, even major ones.
Consider............
A man standing at a bank counter quietly robbing the bank with a note to the teller. A follow co-worker next to the teller and the teller as well, report the robber had a gun in a holster inside his coat that he show to the teller. The co-worker could even identify the make and model because he enjoyed target shooting. The teller reports the gun as well but could not name the gun. The person in line behind the robber reports there was no gun. But could also report that the man left the bank carrying a briefcase that the teller placed a lot of money in. The guard near the door saw the man with no gun carrying a briefcase walk out the door and a short distance down the street. When the alarm sounded the guard then saw the man with the briefcase starting sprinting about ten yards further down the street where he jump into a car driven by a women. A female bystander on the sidewalk that was knocked by the fleeing bank robber saw that there were two adults in the car when the bank robber jumped into the backseat. The teller and co-worker reported the robber left the scene on foot. All report the man was wearing a sports coat over jeans and had short red hair and was in the bank at 2pm.
Now the next lady in line was the one to first to provide testimony. Does that mean the testimony of the guard about the car being driven by a women as an embellishment? Does that mean the other adult in the car did not exist because it was automatically and embellishment? Does that mean there was no gun (angel) yet another embellishment? Does the fact that the woman and guards testimony of no gun infer there was no gun because they contradicted the tellers and co-workers testimony? Or does it mean there testimony needs to be completely disregarded because they did not report the gun?
Oh and my faves....Because none of eyewitnesses actually authored a written account of the robbery we....
then can assume there weren't any eyewitnesses
and......
can also assume the event did not occur because all testimonial accounts were not written by the eyewitnesses themselves therefore they must be absolute hearsay?
Further does it infer that reporters who interviewed the witnesses and wrote about the robbery produced unreliable (hearsay) accounts because they didn't actually witness any of the events themselves?
See?
That is what your absurd reasoning is concluding.
By all means show me I'm wrong.
So ....have I demonstrated to you or not that............
Not all differences in witness testimony indicate contradiction or embellishment.
and...
Just because the witness themselves did not offer a written account does not mean the accounts we have are heresy. See you are really reasoning by quilt of association. You cannot assume universal embellishment or hearsay based on quilt by association. You have to be specific to my case.
Again it was my duty to respond to your gish gallop.
You don't get to pick and choose which one you're going to go with,
OH YES I DO. It is my case. I'm building a case on evidence (the four facts in the case) and reasoning (abductive). You do not get to choose that for me. You do get to challenge my evidence or reasoning with evidence and reasoning of your own.
BUT the fact you are missing is that your challenge is not automatically considered reasonable by default. I'm overtly challenging the reasoning you are bringing against my case. Now what you do to fix or defend your reasoning is up to you. But so far your reasoning brings no real challenge to my evidence or reasoning. Keep in mind my case for the resurrection was four simple facts and one simple explanation. Your challenges have created the gish gallop.
nor is it allowable to conflate all of them into one,
Not the case at all. I'm just using more evidence than you. And you have failed to reasonably throw my additional evidence out of court.
where you simply dismiss the fact that the cave is not empty and there is a young man sitting in it. Those are either facts or fictions. Which is it? Fact that the cave was open and a young man was sitting inside or fiction?
Again this is a point you continue to bring up not I. Why should I dismiss the empty tomb when you have yet to give us sufficient reason to do so? You presented that Mark claims the tomb was empty. I have properly challenged you that Mark is not the only source. You then countered that the other accounts are embellishments. I rightfully asked you to make that case. You have yet to do so.
and.....
here is yet another line of reasoning I did not mention earlier because I was trying to be brief.
So.............try it this way......
You assertion of the tomb not being empty is unreasonably dismissing the expected context of "the empty tomb." Because when I assert that the tomb was empty. I saying so in regards to the very reasonable context of the expected corpse of Jesus not being there. I fully confess the wrappings of Jesus were still in the tomb but would still reasonably claim the tomb was empty in regards to Jesus' body.
next..........
To the regards of a young man? or Angel. The greater evidence suggests Mark simply did not identify the young man as an angel. The Bible is replete with evidence that angels oft keep there identify hidden. So it is not out of the ordinary at all in this context. Just because Mark did not specify that the young man was an angel does not infer he was not. Revisit our quiet bank robber just because the teller could not specify the type of gun (being) does not mean there was no gun (angel). The co-worker could identify the gun (being) and a specific type of gun (angle). Does that mean Mark's source did not see angel?
3. We are then told by other later anonymous third parties that the disciples believed they saw the risen Jesus
...3. an assertion not only without evidence but in spite of the evidence to the contrary.
How is anything I wrote in 3 an "assertion" let alone "without evidence"?
"LATER" Ignores Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, which predates the Gospels.......so that counters your "later" gish gallop. It was distinctly Paul thus that counters your "anonymous" gish gallop. The"without evidence" was in context to your ongoing undefended reasoning that Mark is the only unembellished account. And hidden in your reference to third parties is an assumed distance from the facts that is not there with Paul and Luke. They spoke with the eyewitnesses within a short period of time following the events. Saul (Paul) was persecuting them for these four facts you are laboring to deny. Paul died in around 30 years after the resurrection around 65. Think about that......He quoted Luke as scripture which has the source of Mark predating it.
Mark is typically dated to around 70 CE; Matthew and Luke to around 85–90 respectively, and John to around 100.
"Typical" does not make your case. It just means you are assuming again.
Now your dating of the Gospels is not gospel, that is something you WILL have to support. I would caution any jury to beware of reasoning that begins and ends with "typically" with nothing else in between.
Caution........
Don’t just give me the historians believe. Tell me why they believe it to be around 70. I think you be surprised with the weak reasoning for this date. For I can easily present a more reasonable case that they are earlier. And of course we can then let the jury decide. BE FAIR give us the reasoning for those dates.
Even if we assume it took between forty and eighty years for each respective "disciple" to finally write down their eyewitness accounts,
Not assuming that at all. Most were dead by then. BE FAIR give us the reasoning for those dates.
we have no evidence confirming who any of those authors actually were, reliable evidence proving that their stories have not only been altered by subsequent copyists,
I've repeatedly redressed your authorship reasoning (gish gallop) and provided reliable evidence supporting those facts. And will support it again below when we get back to Paul. No sir, I gave you and the jury evidence and reasoning to the contrary of your unsupported and undefended assumption. Simply repeating your assumption does not make it true. I carefully explained this last time to you and you didn’t get it. So you dismissed it as straw. That was the part where I provided the historians evidence and reasoning that Paul was reciting a early pre-Gospel creed.
And you come back here after ignoring that evidence and claim there is no evidence. I can live with that. Remember as I stated before. The purpose of an argument is to leverage the economy of reason to your account. Overtly broadcasting that there is no evidence in the face of the evidence I provided represses your economy.
and events (like the "temptation" in the desert by the devil) that no eyewitness could have possibly eyewitnessed.
Jesus was there and told his disciples. Again you have the author/witness relationship thing all messed up. You are not making sense.
If I start our saying that I witnessed a car crash and then include in my account the private thoughts of the victims as they were going through the crash you can immediately discount my claim that I was an eyewitness as I would have zero way to know anyone's private thoughts.
Not necessarily. Especially if you knew the people involved. If the people survived the crash and told you of their experience and you included their experience as part of event when you retold it, then why I should doubt it? Now in the case of the NT temptation event. Is it at all unreasonable to reason that Jesus told all of his disciples what occurred. And if it actually didn’t occur like that wouldn’t be reasonable to assume at least one of them have denounced it as a lie.... by now?
Again you brought that up.
Now to your Erhman quote...again you added this to the gish gallop not I. Again my duty is to respond.....
The term Synoptic Problem is a technical term for a specific issue, namely why Matthew, Mark, and Luke have so many similarities – in which stories they tell, the sequence in which they tell them, and the words with which they tell them (verbatim, word-for-word agreements in places!) – and yet also have so many differences. If there were not extensive similarities, there would be no “problem.” But how does one explain these similarities (and these differences)? The answer that has been around for a very long time indeed is that the similarities are there because these books utilize some of the same sources (they, or two of them, are copying) and the differences are there because the authors have altered the sources they have used.
Easy to disagree with. The similarities mostly occur because they were reporting about the same event. The dissimilarities are because they each had some different addition sources as well. There were many witnesses of these events, from different perspectives and vantage points. So to simply assume corruption of one source has occurred really has no merit at all. Also assumed in there is that all the differences were contradictions. Well that is an obvious bad assumption as well.
Still Bart…..
I then collect four papers, at random, and tell everyone that we are going to do a synoptic comparison. And I read, one by one, each paper, asking everyone else if anyone has a *single sentence* that is just like one of the four. The four are always completely different. And no one – ever, in my 30 years of teaching – has a sentence (or even four or five words in sequence) the same as any of the four.
But notice. He does not point out that the difference are contradictions. So where is the problem? Seriously I could read a dozen different sports articles about the super bowl the day after and not find one sentence exactly the same. But I'm reasonably confident I got facts about the event.
More Bart…………
But then I ask, what if I didn’t do this exercise today, but I waited forty, fifty, or sixty years, and I didn’t ask you, but I asked four people each of whom knew someone who had a cousin whose wife was next door neighbors with someone whose brother once knew someone in the class to write what happened that day – and they had entire sentences that were exactly alike, word for word?
Seriously flawed reasoning. The significance of the event in view makes all the difference. Do you doubt that someone bent on recording the truth of 911 could not do so now almost twenty years later? The witnesses are still here, some are gone but many remain. If four different reporters did just that. Could they each reasonably have some of the same sources and some different sources accounting for the similarities and differences? And would a difference automatically conspire to a contradiction. Sorry that simply another one of Bart’s many blunders.
In the context please keep in mind I only chose four simple facts, nothing miraculous or outrageous.
Now back to you……….
So you need to tell us which it is; facts that contradict each other and therefore only ONE is the correct or most accurate one, or fiction and someone made shit up.
It is a fallacious false dilemma. You are the one assuming these difference are contradictions. I have directly redressed your assumption. Now it's your turn to show me where my reasoning about that your contradictions is wrong. Even by way of example I provided a robbery case where key differences in the accounting of the events don't necessitate contradiction. It is clearly your duty to make your case here an not just simply assume it. I and the jury await your response.
Which is it? Which version is the historically accurate version of verifiable facts? You don't get to claim they are ALL factual.
The facts are the facts. What you are obviously getting mixed up is your interpretation of the facts being in contradiction to one another.
You can't both have a young man and no young man. Or two angels at the same time as there are no angels.
See that is your assumption and once again here is my redress of your assumption............
Sure you can. It totally depends on the report you are reading. One report only spoke of the one angel for some reason, that in no way logically infers there was only one.
Again by way of a more modern angelic ex...............
Facts LAA 8 NYY 0. One reporter reports Mike Trout’s three home runs won the game. And he might have been the only angel mentioned in the report. But why would we need conclude that he was the only angle there. After all who was pitching?
Another reporter might not have mentioned any angels at all and energetically opined on and on about poor pitching and coaching of the Yankees.
Now each report reported the score LAA 8 and NYY 0.
Do we know who won and who lost?
Seriously you are so caught up in this assumption that differences are always contradictions.
The curious issue here is you have yet to present such a difference that would necessitates a serious doubt of the reported account. Meaning you have not given any such difference that is a contradiction. You simply assume all differences are contradictions. I have again and again redressed your reasoning here. End the gish gallop and reason it though. You have no case on that point here.
4. No one knows what the disciples actually thought, of course, since we do not have a single piece of papyrus that can be definitively tied to any particular OG disciple.
...4. faulty reasoning. Assumes authorship is the only means to your conclusion.
So, you are seriously arguing that there is another means to find out what someone thought from two thousand years ago aside from verifiable first person authorship? I'd ask you to present such an idiotic argument, but I'm tired of addressing idiotic arguments.
Yes I'm seriously arguing that.
But not just someone ….the disciples. Paul tells us he went to Jerusalem to meet with Peter. Paul tells us on several occasions what Peter was thinking.
Do you realize that ALL of what we know about Alexander the Great and what he was thinking did not come from Alexander himself? So I really don’t see your point. Many great figures in history were not first person authors of their own lives. We get that from those who wrote about them. Note that is our earliest source on the life of Alexander comes from Plutrach almost 4 centuries later? And you are freaking out about 30 years.
Note right there, I did not assume I was correct. I directly responded to your assumption that you presented (gish gallop) by exposing an obvious flaw in your assumption. Now it is your turn to defend your assumption by showing me my error of reasoning? Or let it go. Maybe the jury will forget about it. Don't pile the gish gallop any higher.
So to counter your four points I offer............this pre-Gospel source..... Perhaps the most intriguing developments in NT scholarship is the recognition of the historical sources that form the foundation of the NT. For example the 4 line traditional creed about the core events of Jesus' death and resurrection recorded by Paul in his letter to the Corinthians.
You mean, Paul? The same source I "offered"? What is the basis of his information? You gave the clue yourself:
No you are still not understanding the full weight of the evidence here. It was not the same source. You offered Mark. Mark was not Paul’s source. This pre-dated Mark. I did not hint at Paul’s source. It’s been common knowledge for almost 2000 years. Paul’s source was directly from God. So…………
For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received
I'll spoil it for you. He claims he had a vision.
Yes a vision that had him teach the "confirmed" and "exact" same message the apostles were teaching if you researched it further. Paul confirmed his given message with Peter and other leaders in Jerusalem….at least twice. First time within three years of the cross. So within three years of the cross we have that creed which was already firmly in place. Examine the rest of the context. Paul began teaching. But he then went to Jerusalem and met with the leaders including Peter. Paul confirmed his message with Peter within the first three years of his teaching the message given to him. And he did it again 14 years later. Paul testifies that they added nothing to the message I provided in Corinthians.
Thus with those facts of Paul's message being confirmed, your assumption that because it was God sent and therefore unreliable is a pure genetic fallacy.
So you see everyone of concern here was on the same page, with the same message. And Paul died around 65. So again where is your problem with these early testimony and confirmation of those facts? The jury is waiting.
You are beginning to sound desperate…………
This is pointless. You're done and you know it.
Done?
No way.
You haven't even begun and you don't know it. I have (thus far) successfully supported my case against your poor assuming. You have offered nothing but several common assumptions (gish gallop) that were oh so easy to refute or rebut. Nothing new what so ever. Yet I had the duty to respond to every one of them.
And now you may quit in the middle of your gish gallop and demand......
It you want me to decimate any of your other points, by all means, post it on its own and not in this obvious gish gallop. Going through any more of your desperate nonsense is just tiring.
I gave you my concise case back at the beginning. You were the one that created this gish gallop when you aimlessly started firing away at my case with all or your wild speculation and faulty assumptions. It was my duty to address them ALL. I did not create this. And I'm not sorry at all if this got a little too hard for you to follow. I had an easy wealth of reasoning to combat your bankrupt assumptions with much more yet to spend. If you want to end the discussion, fine, but be mature about it and quietly rest your case without any further false blame and accusation.
Be Fair.
And one last thing to keep in mind..................
Also..... Do you understand the criterion of dissimilarity when it comes to multiple sources? Seriously do you?
Enough with the pathetic attempts at condescension. You are demonstrably at fault repeatedly. To whit:
That was a sincere question, because as I repeatedly pointed out, you were obviously so wrong on that point. But your complaint of inferring my insulting tone there was so classically hypocritical given the manner in which you began your last post.....
And it has been refuted again and again and again.
And now I'll do it again. First, your "four historical facts" are not facts. They are assertions from mythological stories, the origin of which we do not know and the original authorship we do not know.
So right out of the gate, you are wrong. Objectively, conclusively, irretrievably wrong. Those are NOT "facts."
Second, they are not even accurate. Once again, I will correct you:
Thank you.
now on to atrib..............