Prove a "Judeo" Religion

Allow me to try to further clarify my beliefs. They are irrelevant to the debate, but I do not want my opponent to have the wrong idea. The definition of a Deism according to Dictionary.com is "The belief that God has created the universe but remains apart from it and permits his creation to administer itself through natural laws." I emphasize the first half of that statement. In my eyes, there is no evidence for God, but no evidence against God. As a result, I have a hope and belief that there is some kind of supernatural being, BUT I do not believe that this being has at all intervened in the universe since the Big Bang. I would say that Deist describes my position more accurately than virtually any other term, perhaps except for "agnostic". "First of all I just wanted to say that I had all of these links I wanted to add to support my claims. For some reason I forgot to include them at the end. But that will be the last time I make that mistake." Not worries, sources just make the debate easier to conduct. "TheRussian claims 'Our modern society may find certain behaviors to be immoral such as cannibalism...such behaviors were condoned in various societies before our time.' This does nothing to disprove that morality is objective, it just proves that people are evil." This seems to be an absurd claim for several reasons. First off, it suggests that a person that doesn't follow Biblical values is "evil", even if the person was raised all their life in a different culture all their life and don't know any different. Secondly, this statement suggests that billions of people lived and died in an "evil lifestyle" just because they were raised in a particular society that supported particular values. If a child is raised to believe that the color red is bad, and every person around them thinks that red is bad, how can the child be blamed for also being convinced that red is, in fact, an "evil" color? What exactly makes our moral codes superior to those of other societies or people in the past? Now, my opponent may say that the reason is because it is the moral code presented in the Bible. But the Bible is not unique in its moral teachings, the other two "Judeo" religions are very similar. http://chinese-school.netfirms.com... "If morality were purely subjective, you could not say that cannibalism was wrong for a fact. You could only say that it was wrong in your opinion which would be meaningless considering your opinion does not create an ethical standard in which people have to follow." I completely agree with that statement. I don't think anyone can say that cannibalism or anything else I mentioned is wrong for a FACT. The point I'm trying to make is that people in societies with these other moral codes cannot be condemned for following their society's moral principles, even if they are different from our own. Personally, yes, I think cannibalism is wrong. However you can't blame a person for following the moral beliefs that their parents and entire society holds. "You can still believe in these theories and be a Christian." I disagree. If we are talking about a literal interpretation of the Bible, then there is no debate, you CANNOT believe in both theories and be a Christian. As for a metaphorical interpretation, I suppose one could believe in the Big Bang theory and be a Christian but not the Theory of Evolution. This is because if the Theory of Evolution is true, then there was no Adam and Eve as the "first humans" in perfect form, which means there was no original sin, which means there is essentially no point of Jesus dying on the cross and so the entire Christian faith crumples. Because of this, the Theory of Evolution alone can virtually counter all of the Christian faith and I would actually be more than willing to debate the validity of the Theory of Evolution. Speaking of Evolution, I'd like to ask why my opponent doesn't accept the Theory of Evolution? What flaws are present in the theory that causes my opponent to deny it? "This statement my opponent made bothered me 'Also, the Bible cannot be used for proof of Jesus' ...These writings from the people who knew Jesus were eventually complied into one source for the benefit of the church. But you can't just throw out eyewitness testimonies just because you already assume Christianity to be false." But who were these people? Why is there virtually no confirmation of the Biblical events from other sources? If there was truly a "God on Earth", there would be much more evidence, much more documentation and the Christian faith would spread like wild-fire. However, the faith spread very very slowly. By the year 312 AD (250 years after Jesus' crucifixion), only an estimated 5% of the Roman Empire was Christian. There such a huge lack of evidence for something so huge as a son of God on Earth, which arouses significant doubt. http://ehrmanblog.org... "I assume you believe that Hitler was a real person and you weren't alive for his existence." But there is more evidence for his existence than Jesus. There isn't just one book compiled by his closest political followers. There are many documents, books (some written by Hitler himself such as Mein Kampf) and clear consequences of his actions that prove his existence. Despite Jesus being an alleged "miracle worker", there is very little evidence for this. "How am I supposed to prove anything to you if you don't accept what any person of the time period says?" I do not find the Bible to a reliable historical source, particularly for reasons mentioned below. The only other "person of the time period" that my opponent brings up as evidence is Josephus. Josephus supposedly makes a short reference to Jesus, and this statement is regarded by many to be solid proof of his existence. However, this small piece of writing has been thoroughly refuted and determined to be forged by the church and inserted into Josephus' writing. Dr. Gordon Stein wrote: "...the vast majority of scholars since the early 1800s have said that this quotation is not by Josephus, but rather is a later Christian insertion in his works. In other words, it is a forgery, rejected by scholars." There were many other historians in Josephus' time, and he was the only one that made mention of a historical figure named Jesus. http://www.truthbeknown.com... "My opponent says "The rest of the third paragraph of Part 2 of my opponent's argument is using the Bible as proof and can be disregarded." This is just not true...you cannot disregard eye witness testimonies merely because you assume that Christianity is false." I am disregarding the Bible as a credible historical source by itself because of certain incongruities within it. Noah's flood, for example, is described in the Bible, but there is no real evidence for the flood (outside the Bible) and I'd be willing to argue that the story of Noah's flood would simply be impossible even if the flood itself did somehow occur. There are so many logistic problems with the idea of hundreds of thousands of animals on a wooden ship at sea for a year. a) If the flood covered all dry land, there would have to be water above Mt. Everest. At this altitude, how would all the animals not die from freezing and low oxygen levels? b) How were the animals be fed? How were their wastes removed? c) How were microorganisms gathered to be saved on the ship? d) Even if a ship of the necessary size was to be built, how did it not break at sea? Large wooden ships built in the 18th and 19th century by professional shipbuilders broke at sea because of the way the ship twists and bends. https://skeptoid.com... e) It should be noted that the story of Noah's ark is strikingly similar to the Epic of Gilgamesh, written long before. http://www.icr.org... Also, The Gospels contain many errors and contradictions. For example, the writers John and Luke have different reports for Jesus' last words. The last words of the Son of God on Earth seem pretty important, how did they miss this? The Gospels also have geographical mistakes, for example when in Mark 7:31 it is written that "Then Jesus left the vicinity of Tyre and went through Sidon, down to the Sea of Galilee...". If one is to take a look at the map I provided in the third link below, one can easily see that Sidon is north of Tyre, while the Sea of Galilee is south of both cities. Mark wrote down precisely the wrong directions as one can't get to the Sea of Galilee THROUGH Sidon from Tyre. It seems that the Bible is not a reliable historical document. https://www.biblegateway.com... https://www.biblegateway.com... http://www.bible.ca... It seems that at this point, the argument is really about the reliability of the Bible as a historical document as well as Jesus' existence (reliability of Josephus' reference to Jesus). I curiously await my opponent's response.