The Qur'an does not give an accurate picture of the Historical Jesus

Con: The Bible The Bible cannot be accepted as a source without extra-biblical verification of its claims. The bible contains both scientific absurdities (such as the order of creation [1], an absurd cure for leprosy [2], or Jesus claiming that stars can fall from heaven [3]), and historical inaccuracies (such as Herod"s slaughter of the innocents, and the lack of a census throughout the Roman Empire [4]). Of course some will say that these "alleged" inaccuracies are simply the result of misunderstood parables, symbolism, or poetic writing; if this is the case, there is no way to determine what is actually true, and we need to look for external verification anyway. Also, the Gospels, which are the main accounts of Jesus" earthly life, are known to have been written at least decades after Jesus" alleged death [5], by anonymous authors [6], who borrowed heavily from previous writings [5][7][8]. Also, it is likely that none of the authors ever met Jesus [9][10][11][12]. This makes their accounts no more than hearsay, again requiring extra-biblical verific Pro Response: Con, tell me if I am wrong, but it seems like this debate is hinged on whether or not the Bible can be deemed a reliable source for the life of Jesus. I find it curious how you reference the Old Testament (written by completely different writers, I might add) in this part of the debate considering that the debate should be focused on the New Testament, which is where the Gospels are located. The credibility of the Old Testament does not impact the reliability of the Gospels given the fact that the writers were different, and they were written independently of each other. You referenced the Order of Creation, however not all Christians believe that Genesis was meant to be a scientific book. I am one of them. Fundamentalism didn"t come about until the 19th century. There were various Christian Thinkers from before then who realized that Genesis was never meant to be interpreted that way. They came to that conclusion due to the obvious poetic language, allegory, etc. Now, you may say that that makes none of the Bible to be reliably true. However, thats wrong. Through analyzing the context, language, along with other factors we can know what parts of the Bible are symbolism and what parts aren"t. When we read through Exodus and Numbers we know that the author was writing these things as Historical Events, when we read through Ezekiel or Isaiah we know the author is prophesying and not being literal with his predictions. I don"t know what part of the Bible you"re referencing when it comes to Leprosy, however I still don"t see how it matters when it comes to proving if the Gospels are reliable. Here is the verse with the stars: 24"But in those days, after that tribulation, THE SUN WILL BE DARKENED AND THE MOON WILL NOT GIVE ITS LIGHT, 25AND THE STARS WILL BE FALLING from heaven, and the powers that are in the heavens will be shaken. 26"Then they will see THE SON OF MAN COMING IN CLOUDS with great power and glory." Source: http://biblehub.com... This is obviously symbolism. In fact, it screams symbolism. Jesus is referencing an earlier scripture: Isaiah 13:10 "The stars of heaven and their constellations will not show their light. The rising sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light. " Both verses are symbolic. Once again, I don"t think any of this matters concerning if the Gospel"s are Historically Reliable and paint an accurate picture of what Jesus said and did. This debate is getting off topic. It is meant to prove that the Qur"an doesn"t paint an accurate picture of the Historical Jesus (which is the Biblical Jesus) and thus contradicts itself. You"re correct in that the Gospels were written decades after Christ"s death. Around 30-60 years to be precise. However, they are not the only books in the New Testament that reference Jesus. We also have the letters of Paul which were written only 15-20 years after Christ"s death, we also have the book of Acts. (The only Historically proven book in the Bible). Also, fun fact. There have been several times that Scholars have found parts of Acts that they believed to be flawed, such as names, places, etc. However, later on a Historical dig would turn up evidence proving Acts right and the Historians wrong. Sources: https://www.blueletterbible.org... http://www.reasonablefaith.org... History has shown that it takes two generations for legends, embellishments, etc to start taking hold. However, what we have here is a unique situation. The Gospels are written within the same generation that witnessed Jesus"s life and death, if there was any inaccuracies someone would have came forward and corrected it. Many of these Gospel writers did go from person to person and interviewed them (mainly in the case of Luke) and got their information from those people, some of those people being disciples, relatives, etc. Given that the Jew"s were an oral society and placed emphasis on memorization we can be sure that we got an accurate picture of Jesus"s words, and that if there was any embellishments it came much later after the generation that witnessed Jesus passed on (We see this in the case of the Aporcryphal Gospels which claim to tell the story of Jesus"s childhood). I believe by now I have proven that the Gospel"s are historically reliable. More so in the case of Luke, who was the same writer of Act"s. We can expect the same amount of minute research that went into the Book of Acts in the case of the Gospel of Luke given that they both were written by the same person. You referenced the Qur"anic Jesus. However, the main issue is what the Qur"an says about Jesus. It says that Jesus only claimed to be a Prophet and nothing else. However, that"s clearly false. The debate should really focus on that point. Whether or not Jesus claimed to be God, rather than some Eschatological Prophet. Conclusion: Con didn"t really refute my points, rather he ripped verses out of different books in the Old Testament in order to try to disprove the reliability of the Gospels in the New Testament. I have proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the Gospels are historically reliable in their description of Jesus and who he claimed to be.