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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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Obviously, the whole purpose of this thread is asking for the alternative. That is not the same thing as saying you can't reject Christ until you have an alternative.
Semantics. If you claim Jesus was real, and miracles happened as you have done in both cases, then it's for you to evidence those claims. No one is obliged to disprove them or offer any alternative. I know this is the purpose of your thread, which is why i pointed out that it is logically fallacious. You have in the space of two posts denied that purpose and then reiterated it, using semantics.
1) What objective evidence can you demonstrate that Jesus was an historical figure?
2) What objective evidence can you demonstrate for ANY supernatural claims in the bible or made by Christianity?
"I know this is the purpose of your thread."
Sheldon,
"Semantics. If you claim Jesus was real, and miracles happened as you have done in both cases, then it's for you to evidence those claims."
The purpose of the biblical miracles was to impress the local yokels and to show them that Yahweh was on the side of the Israelites.
As it says in Exodus 34:10 (NOG) = "Yahweh said, “I’m making my promise again. In front of all your people I will perform miracles that have never been done in any other nation in all the world. All the people around you will see how awesome these miracles are that I will perform for you."
Notice the thing about miracles. The farther you go back in time the more impressive they become.
Moses had a boatload of them. The plagues on the Egyptians, the parting of the Red Sea, manna from heaven, water from rocks, shoes and clothes that didn't wear out for over 40 years, etc.
Yeshua had some puny private miracles. He walked on water in the middle of the night. He turned water into wine. He cured a couple of guys who were blind or lame. He drove out some demons, etc. But he never did anything on a grand scale like Moses did. I wonder why? Maybe it's because miracles worked best when there was no one to dispute them. One of the coolest miracles imaginable would be if Yeshua was still wiggling on the cross after 2,000 years. That would be impressive.
John 6IX Breezy "I haven't argued that an alternative is required before you reject a claim."
Sun, 03/18/2018 - 09:26
John 6IX Breezy "Again, I'm not really interested in what you think is false, I'm interested in what you're replacing it with."
Unbelievable...
The keyword is require; that is the catalyst which turns a valid question into a fallacious one. I have not made it a requirement.
That was pretty slippery.
Attachments
Attach Image/Video?:
@John 61X Breezy
If you want to learn about Christian origins then may I suggest you seek out the relevant scholarly sources, of which some will hopefully be written for laymen. Why do you persist in asking us about Christian origins? Do we look like experts on that subject? If you think that Jesus is too central to have been invented, then at least read Robert Price, Wells and other scholars who have argued that he never existed. Perhaps you will find your answer there.
What do you mean why do I persist in asking about Christian origins, on a thread about Christian origins? If you don't have an answer because you're not an expert, why complain to me about it? Move along to a thread you do have expertise in.
Typical Breezy... a push poll. A question with a predetermined outcome! Not intellectually honest!
What exactly might that predetermined outcome even be?
It's a game Breezy. You always play games. You want someone to admit that they cannot disprove jesus existed. Then in your condescending manner will use that admission to push a pro-christian agenda. You have slicked the slippery slope. When people answer your silly question, you deny that they have, because you are waiting for that one answer that you have decided is the only answer that can answer your question. You can't stand the fact that there is no proof that the bible existed before 325ADE or the fact that the gospels were written by anonymous authors well after the described events. That there is no record of jesus anywhere but a bible that was compiled 3 centuries after the time that jesus supposedly lived. Constantine could have chosen any number of monotheist religions but he chose the one that gave him the best chance to consolidate his power. He chose christianity because in christianity kings and emperors are divine and speak for god, therefore, their authority cannot be questioned. He didn't have to consult the oracles, he no longer had to appease a pantheon of gods, he didn't have to obey traditions that restricted his authority. If Constantine had not chosen christianity the religion would have perished as it should have done along with the many myths of long ago. When Constantine was emperor his army was comprised of many nationalities and cultures who believed in many different gods. When Constantine made christianity the official religion he could get rid of conflicting and competing ideologies. As the earthly representative of god, he was the sole authority for all. therefore the Council of Nicea to make that happen.
At no point have I asked people to disprove Jesus existed or disprove anything; and I've simply reminded those that undertook such a task that they're not answering my question. What else am I supposed to say?
@mykcob4
What significance does the date 325 ADE have for you? Are you saying that the Bible was canonized at this time? That would be about right. The four Gospels, however, were the likely source which the Syrian Tatian attempted to harmonize around 170 AD. In about 180 AD Irenaeus defended the validity of the 4 Gospels. The Gospels, with the possible exception of John, were likely 1st century productions written decades after the presumed events. As you note, no one knows who wrote the Gospels. Church traditions later assigned the names.
The bible is an ancient collection of writings, comprised of 66 separate books, written over approximately 1,600 years, by at least 40 distinct authors. The Old Testament contains 39 books written from approximately 1500 to 400 BC, and the New Testament contains 27 books written from approximately 40 to 90 AD.
The bible was a complete act of revisionism itself.
Prove that every passage of the bible is 100% accurate. Until then, I will maintain my position that the bible was written by people with an agenda, not to dutiful record the actual truth.
David Killens,
"The bible is an ancient collection of writings, comprised of 66 separate books, written over approximately 1,600 years, by at least 40 distinct authors."
The Bible actually has 80 books. The version with 66 books is the "Readers Digest" version that was formatted in the 1880s.
The master copies for the Bible were written in the 690s by a committee of story tellers, writers, and artists stationed in England. The Bible didn't exist before they wrote it.
@Diotrephes
The traditional Catholic Bible and the Greek Orthodox Bible both have a larger canon, but I have never heard of the Protestant Bible as having 80 books! Are we to believe that whole teams of serious scholars have been fooled into using a "Reader's Digest" canon? I'd like to know where you are getting this stuff! The King James Bible was written centuries before the date you give.
Greensnake,
"The traditional Catholic Bible and the Greek Orthodox Bible both have a larger canon, but I have never heard of the Protestant Bible as having 80 books!"
You are making a classic mistake in thinking you know something when in reality you don't.
When do you think the Protestant Bible came into existence? Based on your comment do you think the creator of the Protestant branch, Martin Luther, wrote it? If so you are 100% wrong. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luther_Bible
So if Luther didn't write it who did?
Do you think King James did it? If so you are 100% wrong again. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_James_Version
The 14 Apocrypha books were DELETED from the Bible in the early 1880s. The Protestant Bible has only existed for about 132 years! The powers that be wanted to publish a new Bible version to enrich themselves but they wanted to cut costs. So led by two English guys, Westcott & Hort, they simply deleted the Apocrypha. Up to that time all Bible versions had the Apocrypha as a third section. The Protestants went along with them but the Catholics told them to shove it and kept the original Bible.
I've included a lot of links that will give you a good understanding of the issue if you really want to understand it. I really hope that you will take time to eventually read all of the links. There are countless others that you can discover on your own. You can spend a month reading about Westcott & Hort.
1. https://www.gotquestions.org/Westcott-and-Hort.html
2. https://www.jesus-is-lord.com/hort.htm
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westcott-Hort
4. http://rockingodshouse.com/why-were-14-books-apocrypha-removed-from-the-...
5. http://greatsite.com/ancient-rare-bibles-books/bibles/ifb1001/
"The King James Bible is the most printed book in the history of the world. Any so-called “1611” King James Version you buy today at the local Christian Bookstore is absolutely NOT the 1611. .. it is the 1769 Baskerville Birmingham revision, even though it admits that nowhere, and may even say “1611” in the front… it’s just not true. Prepare to be shocked! The spellings have been revised, and some words changed, in almost every printing done since 1769, and fourteen entire books plus extra prefatory features have been removed from almost every printing done since 1885! "
6. http://greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/index.html
"Up until the 1880’s every Protestant Bible (not just Catholic Bibles) had 80 books, not 66! The inter-testamental books written hundreds of years before Christ called “The Apocrypha” were part of virtually every printing of the Tyndale-Matthews Bible, the Great Bible, the Bishops Bible, the Protestant Geneva Bible, and the King James Bible until their removal in the 1880’s! The original 1611 King James contained the Apocrypha, and King James threatened anyone who dared to print the Bible without the Apocrypha with heavy fines and a year in jail. Only for the last 120 years has the Protestant Church rejected these books, and removed them from their Bibles. This has left most modern-day Christians believing the popular myth that there is something “Roman Catholic” about the Apocrypha. There is, however, no truth in that myth, and no widely-accepted reason for the removal of the Apocrypha in the 1880’s has ever been officially issued by a mainline Protestant denomination."
These NYTimes articles are in PDF format so you might have to scroll down the page to start reading the first column.
7. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1875/12/30/82421826.pdf
8. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1879/05/18/80753578.pdf
9. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1878/01/28/80672619.pdf
10. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1878/09/23/86541137.pdf
11.https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1880/10/24/103610891.pdf
Every time we recall a memory we make a new memory of that memory recall. That is why eyewitness testimony is so weak. Fossils, fingerprints, and photographs are so much more valuable.
This is one of the silliest threads I have encountered.
There is no contemporary evidence for a jesus figure at all. None. There were several "prophets' and 'wizards' running around the near and Middle East in the 1st Century. We know because on or two of them scored a mention in contemporary Roman writings. A Jesus didn't. Not one. Nada. Zilch. Nothing.
The evidence is that the synoptic gospels were all copied from Mark, which was a cobbled together string of stories from other sources. The authors are all anonymous.
Paul was a charlatan and a con man. He hi jacked the religion of Christianity to suit his own motives. Many of his 'letters' are not even by him as many scholars assert.
I have absolutely no interest in replacing the jesus myth with anything else as it will be supposition at this time. We know what we know and don't know what we do not know.
On the balance of probability, the jesus myth is just that.
*There are plenty of books on early christianity which indubitably did exist in many different forms following different traditions. Undoubtedly it was commandeered by Mr and Mrs Constantine and made the Roman State religion with the God Emporer at its head. Undoubtedly the competing religions (Mithra, appollo, gyptian, etc) and competing " heresies" were destroyed, their liturgies and temples looted and wrecked. Their adherents murdered, These are historical facts.
We do not need a replacement history.
That Breezy has laid one of his careful and arrogant ill concealed 'traps' to get someone, anyone , to play his fool game is obvious to blind Freddy. In fact it warrants an inserted passage in Flavius Josephus all of its own.
(EDIT: * This para added to make the answer to the OP clear)
"This is one of the silliest threads I have encountered."
Sillier than Breezy's "do you atheists doubt your doubts about the existence of deities" thread? That was his apotheosis of silliness for me. Well, so far anyway, he may yet surprise us with something even more silly.
Clearly if no one can demonstrate objective evidence for Jesus then no one need offer any explanation for why people choose to believe he existed. Likewise if no one can demonstrate any objective evidence for a deity, no one is obliged to explain how everything exists without their sky fairy and it's creation myth.
As usual Breezy is using argumentum ad ignorantiam to try and reverse the burden of proof, and sulking when people show they're smart enough not to fall for it.
@ Sheldon
"do you atheists doubt your doubts about the existence of deities"
Ok that was particularly dumbass but this one in it's sheer effrontery does come a close second.
@Old man shouts...
Maybe we should rewrite that first line to give Mr. Breezy a better perspective on what he is asking us.
"Do we doubt our doubts about the existence of the Easter Bunny?"
Well, gee! I'll have to think about that one.
@John 61X Breezy: It leaves an informational gap.
So what? Informational gaps are all over the place. There are huge gaps in the histories of Britain, Japan, Native American nations, and many other peoples. People bridge these gaps with legends and creation myths. Christianity falls into that category. Christians consider themselves mainstream and have historically claimed special status for their legends, often through violence. I put the New Testament in the same category as the Iliad, Odyssey, Beowulf, and other ancient fiction.
"So what"—the killer of conversations; the butcher of curiosity; and the extinguisher of intrigue. I don't think there is a person on earth that can, by reason, cure indifference.
@John 61X Breezy;
Let me rephrase then. You used the term "informational gap". What exactly does that mean, and why is it an issue in relation to the history of Christianity?
So if there's one thing we know without a shadow of a doubt is that Christianity exists, and its adherents constitute a significant amount of the word's population. Let's label these facts as E.
The history of the religion, as viewed by Christians, follows a straightforward timeline. So let's say that timeline is A, B, C, D, E. In that narrative, A and B might represent Jesus' ministry, and the apostles missionary/evangelistic work.
So now, if the claim is made that both Jesus and the disciples are fabrication, we are left with the following gap: __, __, C, D, E. That's the informational gap, its the question of how Christianity originated, and how is dispersed, once the traditional view is displaced.
@John 61X Breezy: we are left with the following gap: __, __, C, D, E.
That gap has always existed. It's been plastered over with faith on the part of true believers and deceit on the part of theologians.
@ Breezy
You are making unfounded claims again. No one has said "fabrication" or lies.
What I have said, is "no credible evidence" none at all. Not a skerrick, whiff or tot. Your attempt to draw people into arguing an untenable "what if" position is ridiculous.
Try presenting credible evidence for your "traditional" claims.
We know, if we use your tortuous equation as an example, that Christianity exists, lets call it Z. We know that Christianity was adopted by Constantine the God Emperor and his wife, lets call that 'y" everything else is 'x' as there is no credible evidence.
so y + (time)x belief = Z , 'x' remains unproved.
Much more accurate than your kindergarten model.
If you can't properly evidence A and B, then no one but you and other christians have to worry that your beliefs have a gap that no one can explain.
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