Jesus is NOT a figure of myth; he lived and was executed, really the only 2 things secular history can verify.
I'm all eyes and ears. Please post your secular authorities: (Preferably no counterfeit lines inserted into old texts)
How the TRINITY covers up the murder of Jehovah
by Terry 146 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Terry
God can be just what Jesus showed Him to be. I am a Christian. To me, this means that I follow Christ - his teaching and his example, and hopefully, his voice. He is the truth, to me. And through his teachings, I read the bible. If something does not mesh with the things and love and mercy that Jesus showed us, then there is something wrong with that something, and not with God - or I simply do not understand it properly. (nothing wrong with still searching to understand things, I think you'll agree) So I'm not picking and choosing. I'm simply following Christ.
You follow Christ. Where did you "meet" Christ? In person? No. Did you hear a voice? I doubt it. Did you hear somebody else say there was such a person. Undoubtedly. Did you read it in a book? Sure.
Did it sound great? Yep.
So, you defend it with all your might.
When something "does not mesh with the things of love and mercy that Jesus 'showed us'---------What does Tammy do?
Truth can have no contradictions.
Contradiction is a red flag.
Intellectualy honesty tells Jeffrey Dahmer's mom that a good boy doesn't eat people. Should she simply not believe it?
You have the very same book that gives you Jesus telling you God drowned old ladies, children, pregnant women and little bunny rabbits.
How does that square with your "things of love and mercy"?
It DOESN'T---so you ignore it.
The writer---the HUMAN writer who gave us the Flood Story couldn't think of a way (nor did he care to) for Almighty God to destroy the wicked without using an analog method like rain. A real genius would have said, "Almighty God snapped his fingers and all the bad people dropped dead...but, no animals were harmed in this episode!"
God tells a man (a prophet, no less) to lie down on his side and lay seige to a brick. Tammy believes this story.
God turned Lot's wife into a pillar of salt because she turned around and looked at a city. Tammy believes this story.
Angels screwed women and produced GIANTS! Tammy believes this story.
A serpent and an ass spoke to people. Tammy believes these stories.
When the ark of the covenant was about to tip over and fall a nice fellow named Uzzah stopped it with his hand. God struck him dead. But, when the Philistines capture the same ark--they simply got lose bowels. Tammy believes this story.
You have to abandon your mind to these things to have belief and faith and hope and trust in them.
Once you commit to utter puerile nonsense the defending of them becomes automatic.
But, you lose your rational mind and your soul in so doing and become the host of a kind of virus.
Tammy---come back to Earth. We need you here. Bring your mind with you, please. I'm sure you are a wonderful person and the world
needs thinking people who are wonderful who can talk sanity to the others.
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Pistoff
I am on the road, but Josephus (I know, disputed) references a Jesus; there is at least one other; I am talking living, and executed.
I am not saying it is the Jesus christians claim, but a man named Jesus.
Very few peer reviewed scholars deny the existence of Jesus, but also very few credit him with all of what the NT says he says and did.
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Terry
I am on the road, but Josephus (I know, disputed) references a Jesus; there is at least one other; I am talking living, and executed.
I am not saying it is the Jesus christians claim, but a man named Jesus.
Very few peer reviewed scholars deny the existence of Jesus, but also very few credit him with all of what the NT says he says and did.
Tacitus, Lucian and Josephus
http://www.rationalresponders.com/a_silence_that_screams_no_contemporary_historical_accounts_for_jesus Key points to be made:
Common historical citations for Jesus are bandied about uncritically on many websites.
These claims fall to pieces upon examination.
The Flaws:
1) None are contemporary accounts
2) Some are frauds (The Testimonium)
3) Some only reference christians, and not 'jesus the christ'
4) Several only reference religions leaders, or folks like 'chrestus' and not Jesus the christ.
5) Many reference events that clearly come after the purported time of jesus. (I.e. like making referneces to Nero)And so on....
Other key points to deal with
"We have more evidence for "jesus' than we do for Caesar/Socrates/Alexander"
Basic flaws to cover:
1) Supernaturalism: Claims for Socrates, et. al. are naturalistic, not supernatural claims.
2) Provenance: Even though we do not have original sources, we have provenance for these claims back to the times of these people.
3) There are 24,000 copies of the bible from time period X.
I will also cite Rook's excellent analysis of the claims for Tactitus, et al.
They are on this site, and also here:
http://www.atheistnetwork.com/viewtopic.php?p=38862&sid=c0d3cb2c4ea30da8a8641964cd8ea922#38862
Tacitus (ca. 56 – ca. 117)
Tacitus is remembered first and foremost as Rome's greatest historian. His two surviving works: Annals and The Histories form a near continuous narrative from the death of Augustus in 14 CE to the death of Domitian in 96.
Interestingly, I cannot report on the silence of Tacitus concerning Jesus, because the very years of the purported existence of Jesus 30, 31, are suspiciously missing from his work(!)
Richard Carrier writes:
"...we are enormously lucky to have Tacitus--only two unrelated Christian monasteries had any interest in preserving his Annals, for example, and neither of them preserved the whole thing, but each less than half of it, and by shear luck alone, they each preserved a different half. And yet we still have large gaps in it. One of those gaps is the removal of the years 29, 30, and 31 (precisely, the latter part of 29, all of 30, and the earlier part of 31), which is probably the deliberate excision of Christian scribes who were embarrassed by the lack of any mention of Jesus or Gospel events in those years (the years Jesus' ministry, death, and resurrection were widely believed at the time to have occurred). There is otherwise no known explanation for why those three years were removed. The other large gap is the material between the two halves that neither institution preserved. And yet another is the end of the second half, which scribes also chose not to preserve (or lost through negligent care of the manuscript, etc.)."
Ironically, Christians often cite Tacitus as historical evidence for Jesus.
This is the passage cited:
But neither the aid of man, nor the liberality of the prince, nor the propitiations of the gods succeeded in destroying the belief that the fire had been purposely lit. In order to put an end to this rumor, therefore, Nero laid the blame on and visited with severe punishment those men, hateful for their crimes, whom the people called Christians. He from whom the name was derived, Christus, was put to death by the procurator Pontius Pilate in the reign of Tiberius. But the pernicious superstition, checked for a moment, broke out again, not only in Judea, the native land of the monstrosity, but also in Rome, to which all conceivable horrors and abominations flow from every side, and find supporters. First, therefore, those were arrested who openly confessed; then, on their information, a great number, who were not so much convicted of the fire as of hatred of the human race. Ridicule was passed on them as they died; so that, clothed in skins of beasts, they were torn to pieces by dogs, or crucified, or committed to the flames, and when the sun had gone down they were burned to light up the night. Nero had lent his garden for this spectacle, and gave games in the Circus, mixing with the people in the dress of a charioteer or standing in the chariot. Hence there was a strong sympathy for them, though they might have been guilty enough to deserve the severest punishment, on the ground that they were sacrificed, not to the general good, but to the cruelty of one man." (Annals XV, 44)
However, there are serious problems with using this passage as independent corroboration of Jesus:
Jeffery Jay Lowder states:
"There is no good reason to believe that Tacitus conducted independent research concerning the historicity of Jesus. The context of the reference was simply to explain the origin of the term "Christians," which was in turn made in the context of documenting Nero's vices..."
It is not just 'Christ-mythicists' who deny that Tacitus provides independent confirmation of the historicity of Jesus; indeed, there are numerous Christian scholars who do the same! For example, France writes, Annals XV.44 "cannot carry alone the weight of the role of 'independent testimony' with which it has often been invested." E.P. Sanders notes, "Roman sources that mention [Jesus] are all dependent on Christian reports." And William Lane Craig states that Tacitus' statement is "no doubt dependent on Christian tradition."
- Jeffery Jay Lowder, "Evidence" for Jesus, Is It Reliable?
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/jeff_lowder/jury/chap5.htmlSo it may simply be that Tacitus was relying on oral tradition, and not on any historical research for his reference to Jesus. Tacitus himself tells us about the vlaue of such traditions:
"...everything gets exaggerated is typical for any story" and "all the greatest events are obscure--while some people accept whatever they hear as beyond doubt, others twist the truth into its opposite, and both errors grow over subsequent generations" (Annals 3.44 & 3.19). (Cited via Carrier's article)
As weak as the Tacitus claim is, it remains a possibility that even this weak bit of apparent corroboration is a later interpolation. The problems with this claim are examined here:
http://www.atheistnetwork.com/viewtopic.php?p=38864&sid=eae887916e8679c9cd9fd7af5fc065e5#38864
Some of these problems are summarized by Gordon Stein:
"While we know from the way in which the above is written that Tacitus did not claim to have firsthand knowledge of the origins of Christianity, we can see that he is repeating a story which was then commonly believed, namely that the founder of Christianity, one Christus, had been put to death under Tiberius. There are a number of serious difficulties which must be answered before this passage can be accepted as genuine. There is no other historical proof that Nero persecuted the Christians at all. There certainly were not multitudes of Christians in Rome at that date (circa 60 A.D.). In fact, the term "Christian" was not in common use in the first century. We know Nero was indifferent to various religions in his city, and, since he almost definitely did not start the fire in Rome, he did not need any group to be his scapegoat. Tacitus does not use the name Jesus, and writes as if the reader would know the name Pontius Pilate, two things which show that Tacitus was not working from official records or writing for non-Christian audiences, both of which we would expect him to have done if the passage were genuine.
Perhaps most damning to the authenticity of this passage is the fact that it is present almost word-for-word in the Chronicle of Sulpicius Severus (died in 403 A.D.), where it is mixed in with obviously false tales. At the same time, it is highly unlikely that Sulpicius could have copied this passage from Tacitus, as none of his contemporaries mention the passage. This means that it was probably not in the Tacitus manuscripts at that date. It is much more likely, then, that copyists working in the Dark Ages from the only existing manuscript of the Chronicle, simply copied the passage from Sulpicius into the manuscript of Tacitus which they were reproducing."
- The Jesus of History: A Reply to Josh McDowell
Gordon Stein, Ph.D. http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/gordon_stein/jesus.shtmlSupporting Stein's claim is that, as with the Testimonium, there is no provenance for the passage: No early Christian writer uses Tacitus' passage in their apologetics, even when discussing Christian persecution by Nero:
* Tertullian (ca. 155–230)
* Lactantius (ca. 240 - ca. 320)
* Sulpicius Severus (c. 360 – 425)
* Eusebius (ca. 275 – 339)
* Augustine of Hippo (354 – 430)However, the key point here is that Tacitus did in fact write a thorough history of the purported times of Jesus and his ministry, and while this work is lost to us, Tacitus never makes any cross reference to it during his discussion of christians and Nero nor at any other point in his surviving works.
Those who know the good, do the good. - Socrates
http://www.rationalresponders.com/tacitus_lucian_and_josephus
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Pistoff
If something does not mesh with the things and love and mercy that Jesus showed us, then there is something wrong with that something, and not with God - or I simply do not understand it properly. (nothing wrong with still searching to understand things, I think you'll agree) So I'm not picking and choosing. I'm simply following Christ.
This illustrates my point about only arguing from a frame of belief; the attempt is made to fit square pegs into round holes.
The bible says Jesus will come back; he hasn't. So what to conclude? The witnesses conclude he is here, just invisible.
The evangelicals think he is still coming.
The reality is made to fit the frame of belief, instead of the other way around.
The Bible can't be wrong, Jesus must be the Christ.
If the facts don't align with that, "there is something wrong with that something."
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Terry
http://www.skepdic.com/cognitivedissonance.html
Can we really explain why Sylvia Browne or the members of the military junta in Myanmar can sleep at night (assuming they do!) by appealing to the "theory of cognitive dissonance"? There are people who know what they are doing is wrong and don't care. Even a simple case that is often brought up by the defenders of the theory of cognitive dissonance — the case of the smoker who continues his habit of smoking even though he knows smoking is unhealthy — doesn't measure up. What is so cognitively uncomfortable about knowing that smoking is unhealthy and doing it anyway?
One may try to change one or more of the beliefs, opinions, or behaviors involved in the dissonance;
One may try to acquire new information or beliefs that will increase the existing consonance and thus cause the total dissonance to be reduced; or,
One may try to forget or reduce the importance of those cognitions that are in a dissonant relationship (Festinger 1956: 25-26).
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Pistoff
Terry:
I guess nothing in that paste convinces me that there was not a man named Jesus who lived and was executed.
I am not invested in it, that is just my take.
From only a logical viewpoint, it makes more sense to me that Jesus was a real person whose life and sayings were mythologized after his death, based on the needs and views of those who did it, including Paul, than to say that he was a complete fabrication. Who would fabricate the entire story? He died! His ministry ended, his followers scattered.
More likely to me that his followers, shocked at his death and still gathering, were convinced by Paul, or maybe not, maybe Paul attracted a different crowd, that he was the Messiah, or Christus.
It fits the pattern of mythologizing surrounding most things in the ancient world, and even the modern.
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Terry
I guess nothing in that paste convinces me that there was not a man named Jesus who lived and was executed.
I am not invested in it, that is just my take.
From only a logical viewpoint, it makes more sense to me that Jesus was a real person whose life and sayings were mythologized after his death, based on the needs and views of those who did it, including Paul, than to say that he was a complete fabrication. Who would fabricate the entire story? He died! His ministry ended, his followers scattered.
More likely to me that his followers, shocked at his death and still gathering, were convinced by Paul, or maybe not, maybe Paul attracted a different crowd, that he was the Messiah, or Christus.
It fits the pattern of mythologizing surrounding most things in the ancient world, and even the modern.
I have no interest in convincing you either way.
I just find that people who DO believe pretend they do so for PROVEN reasons.
As you strip away the actual facts and illusory props of non-proof the only reason which remains is that nobody wants to start from scratch with a NEW world view. It is just too much of a burden and scary!
If you convinced a Muslim that Muhammed was a phoney what in the world would they do with their life and their family and friends???!!!
No, it is just asking too much that people give up strong belief. I never ask that.
I just like to hear them admit it out loud that it is WILLFUL self-deception.
That is pure intellectual honesty and a nice starting point for a new life of mental integrity.
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Pistoff
Sources later about why I think Jesus was a real person.
But:
It is unimportant to me to prove Jesus existed or didn't (not possible either, I think); it is enough to be able to see, and discuss, the fact that modern christianity is something the biblical Jesus would rebel against.
The biblical Jesus, even as described by gospels that are tainted by partisan community agendas, is absolutely at odds with a worldwide power structure that is so protective of it's existence that it allows the abuse that is common today.
I like what Crossan says about the time from Jesus' death to the establishment of Christianity as the religion of the empire: Jesus breaks bread with his friends before his death; by the time the religion is accepted, it is a high level conference between the emperor and the bishops only.
That tells me all I need to hear about christianity: it is a deeply entrenched power structure, not entirely corrupt, but nevertheless it is as resistant to change and reform as any other human institution.
It is not open to hearing anything that is not in alignment with the myth it has created about Jesus, or the apostles, or the second coming.
I am saying, Jesus would be apalled, and he would rebel against it.
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Pistoff
Yes, we can discuss the concept of God outside the OT/NT, but you really can't discuss the concept of the OT/NT God outside of the bible because it is unique to the bible.
My point, Psac, is that history of myth at the time of the writing of NT and OT sheds light onto the process of the changing idea of deity from the OT to the NT.
The change in worship to yahweh from el happened at the same time that el was replaced by baal in the overall area of the levant; that is informative about the process, that the israelites were not that different from the canaanites around them. They worshiped el, plain and simple, and as el was replaced among the canaanites, so too among the israelites.
The redactors of the OT paint their own picture of it; one of the JEPD sources presents the change as being that up to a certain time, god presented himself as el shaddai, but after Moses, he was yahweh.
Another of the JEPD sources would have us think that yahweh always was the god of abraham isaac and jacob.
BUT the history of the change from el to yahweh/baal helps us to see the OT tweaks the story more than a bit.
Investigation of the overall beliefs at the time of Jesus finds a complicated mixture of beliefs, even among jews, that were reflective of the world around the levant, including gnosticism, hellenism, etc, including immortality of the soul and life after death, not ever original israelite/jewish ideas.
So when we see yahweh abandoned in favor of a less brutal, less tribal god, it fits in with the overall changes in the surrounding world. The NT provides only ONE view, an imcomplete one, about the shift in how deity was viewed.
The OT and NT are best understood against the social/cultural backdrop of their final redation.