Christianity Concluded

I'm glad this debate has settled down a bit. I have a couple of responses. For the reader's sake I will order them as I did last round. My opponent's original 8 contentions: 1. "The New Testament tears the OT to pieces" - My first response is that this SUPPORTS my argument Christianity is original. My second is that it doesn't do what my opponent claims (and this still supports my stance), rather it fulfills things the Old Testament will say will happen later. 2. "King David wrote Psalms" - Except that this one is written from God's perspective. It's not from David's as would be expected from a prayer. Ask any Jew: today this psalm is regarded as prophecy by them. Your argument ignores the other 7 scripture verses I cited. Besides which this dodges the argument altogether: the point is that the Old Testament does not prophecy the messiah would be accepted by all Jews, like my opponent asserts. 3. Sorry, the way you wrote it is still illogical. What you mean to say is that one particular passage in Genesis listed on one of my sources is not in your subjective opinion a prophecy? That's different. I have four responses. One, there are 364 other prophecies there, and you still haven't found an unfulfilled prophecy even if you're right. Two, if it's not a prophecy that doesn't make Jesus any less prophecy-fulfilling. Third, yes it is a prophecy. It clearly states that a messiah will come, which Jesus did. That fits your definition of prophecy neatly. Fourth, when I said "he wasn't prophesised in genesis," I was paraphrasing you, not making an original point. 4. a) No, it might not prove godliness, but IT IS STILL A FULFILLED PROPHECY - if Jesus had come riding on a horse or a giant ant, there would be no claim to messiah-hood. b) Doesn't matter if it's really true or not. The point is in the book called the Bible, Jesus fulfills all the prophecies. I have also shown that the Bible is a reliable source. Taken together this renders your point null. c) Isaiah 53 - you said you'd come back to this one. I AM STILL WAITING... ): d) Yes but being Elvis is cool, being Jesus gets you executed. The lack of Roman witnesses is more based on a lack of Romans than anything else. And two guards standing directly outside of your tomb 24/7 IS very substantial even by today's standards. Actually there were a troop of guards patrolling the perimeter of the graveyard as well. Grave robbery was very common back then, and the Romans knew to take utmost precaution to guard against it. Also cf my response to (b) e) Cf my response to point (1) f) The prophecy is not "blood relation," but rather "of the line." That includes people adopted into the line. The Jews back then had a much wider view of lineage. One could be of a different family but the same family line. Seeing as I did overlook Isiah 2:1-3, I will respond to that here: note that this is one of the most contentious verses in the whole Bible. It does not make clear whether it refers to the first or the second coming of the messiah. However, on a strictly logical level, it seems likely that it refers to the second coming. This is because if Jerusalem is already the capital of the world and everyone is already worshiping God in all his glory, there seems little point in a second coming. So it must be the alternative. So it was not a prophecy about the first coming. 5. a) Festival similarities - none of which are actually in the Bible so I don't think they form a part of the core Christian ideology. Besides which "Astral religions" is not a single religion, which makes it impossible to list 10 points because the religions were so diverse. Indeed the book of Jeremiah mocks these sorts of rituals with their Christmas trees and so forth. Which is why you never see a Christmas tree in the Vatican. (: b) The old monotheism controls masses argument. I find this very funny. Actually Christianity didn't control very many people at all. It seems unlikely Peter and Paul had ruling empires in mind when they worked out the finer details of Jesus' theology. Meanwhile all the polytheistic religions were happily building pyramids and huge temples without any public dissent. Clearly the masses were being controlled well enough already. There is no inherent weakness in polytheism. If my opponent wants to continue this line of reasoning, he must bring a reputable source to back it up. c) Krishna's story is very different from Jesus because, for instance, he was not crucified, and neither did he die for the forgiveness of sins. Artistic similarities do not amount to theological similarities. Just a quick footnote here that my opponent seems to have dropped almost all of his analysis from his last round under this point. 6. Well, Jesus did tell some fish to jump into a net - I think that's close enough to fishing. "Why did no writer other than Jesus close friends family and followers say anything of the resurrection?" - the answer is pretty obvious. If you cared about Jesus, you were designated a follower. Therefore you were killed. Only his closest followers were so dedicated as to speak of him in public. That is why. As to Horus v Jesus, let me cite my own counter-sources: http://stupidevilbastard.com...... , http://www.kingdavid8.com...... and http://ezinearticles.com...... . All three are excellent and I suggest voters read them. At this point my opponent says he will not entertain my analysis any more. Sorry, you can't do that. Either ask for more clarification or respond. Otherwise the points are dropped by you. They are all things that you brought up and I had an onus to respond to. I have no intention of dropping your lack of an alternative resurrection-hypothesis or your false historical-credibility analysis. Anyway, on my own four points: 1) "The question is whether its true to its tradition and based off of real facts and truly monotheistic." > WHOA!!!! IT IS!!?? Let's just rewind a bit to the topic: "Original belief or hoax influenced by prior belief?" Monotheism and tradition don't even play in to that. They are red herrings. As to "real facts" mentioned by my opponent, that's not in the topic either. To qualify as a non-hoax, there must be good reasons to believe in it. Again, I have shown such good reasons. 2) False "religion" and "belief" are also very different things. I admit the argument is weak, but that in itself doesn't refute it. And no, I'm not some super-genius 18-year-old who is already a practicing lawyer. Especially not a practicing lawyer still at university. 3) Christianity had temples, overtook surrounding factions, is well documented by it's followers, and the opposition wrote about how they feared the Christian sect (Nero to the rescue!). Perfect match for Genghis it would appear. Romans did not have a bible book, they had a letter addressed to them that was included in the bible. And it wasn't even the pagan Romans! This has absolutely everything to do with the subject - we have more historical evidence for Jesus than anybody else, including the mermaids you incite me to mention. 4) Actually I cite not just the 4 direct eyewitnesses, but also the eye-witnesses referred to in their writings. This numbers to about 570, if we include the 500 from 1 Corinthians. Otherwise 70. I'm not only going on 6-8 prophecies, I'm going on hundreds of them, all of them fulfilled. You asked me to focus on just a few so I did, but your answers were unsatisfactory. Thanks. Amen.