From: cnc405@bnr.ca (Charles Board)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc
Subject: Re: I'm God.
Date: 7 Oct 92 20:55:03 GMT
Organization: Bell-Northern Research

In article <70319@hydra.gatech.EDU>, rpitts@emperor.gatech.edu (Richard Pitts) writes:
|> In article <ksand-061092184223@wintermute.apple.com> ksand@apple.com (Kent Sandvik) writes:
|> |In article <WIGGINS.92Oct6141351@lilac.cs.odu.edu>,
|> |wiggins@lilac.cs.odu.edu (Samuel E Wiggins) wrote:
|> |> 
|> |> I think the Romans and Jews didn't write of his miracles, etc. because they
|> |> were predisposed not to believe he did them, weren't they?  For one thing,
|> |> I doubt too many Romans knew Jesus except by hearsay, and probably blew off
|> |> what they heard. And the Jews, many of whom had the opportunity to see Jesus,
|> |> didn't want this guy upsetting *their* religion and rivaling them.  It's no
|> |> surprise not to see much about him except from those who believed him.  Yet,
|> |> he *is* mentioned by Roman and Jewish historians.  Even the Roman Emperor
|> |> heard about him.  So, I assert that his affect on people was incredible, and
|> |> news about him spread like wildfire.  But why?  Either he actually did do
|> |> miracles or he was an excellent magician/con-man/cult leader.
|> |
|> |You know, if there was a white bearded man that rose people from the dead,
|> |at least National Inquirer and a couple of TV shows would report it 
|> |immediately. Such events are real news! As there are no such stuff
|> |mentioned in the Roman and Jewish scriptures, it's clear that we didn't
|> 
|> The communication age is more recent than the time of Christ.  I do
|> believe if it had happened to day, the Inquirer and such would have
|> been there.
|> 
|> |have any such happenings. And that Christians wanted to make the man
|> |bigger than what he really was in order to justify their faith in the
|> |cult leader. This happens daily, remember all the miracles the old
|> 
|> Here you assume that what they say is false and so you make your claim.
|> If it is not false or if you didn't presuppose that it was false, 
|> then why couldn't the people be explaining what they saw and knew?

  They COULD but there is no EXTERNAL evidence that they DID. Reasonable people
are skeptical of extraordinary claims until the claims are backed up with
extraordinary evidence. When you pass a supermarket counter do YOU accept as
true the claim that Elvis had a UFO baby? Of course not - until you've got sufficient
credible evidence. The existence of Herod is not an extraordinary claim. The existence
of a man named Jesus is not an extraordinary claim. The existence of a man named Jesus
who was God,born of a virgin,rose from the dead,etc. IS such an extraordinary claim.
Anyone who believes such a claim without sufficient credible evidence is as foolish 
(or insane) as the Elvis believer. Presupposing falsehood is the only sane way to
approach this kind of claim! And presupposing falsehood does not mean ruling out 
the possible truth of a claim. 
  The key question is: Is the evidence for the existence of such a Jesus a)sufficient
and b)credible?  
   The answer to "a" depends on what you allow as evidence. You (judging by a previous
posting on "Pilate's Letters") seem to feel that documents written 7-800 years after
the fact count as evidence. I don't. The fact is that there are no external* (non-Christian)
records of Jesus' existence until Josephus which is app. 60 years after his supposed death.
And THIS reference is nearly unanimnously believed by scholars to be a spurious passage
added long afterwards by a zealous Christian. [ASIDE: Note that this absence of external
reports can be considered positive evidence for the claim that Jesus DIDN'T exist IF there
is reason to believe that there would have been records. We do have such reason.]
So we're left with the writings of the Christians (Pauline letters,canonical gospels, 
& non-canonical works). I will admit that the sheer quantity of these records IS sufficient 
if they are credible (and if we don't have reason to believe that they were derived from
common sources..but most scholars believe they were). The question is "Are they credible?".
The answer is no. Their accounts contain:
   a) numerous contradictions with each other
   b) numerous contradictions with available external evidence about the area in that time
   and c) an obvious "paper trail" of myth in the making [The earliest writings (the Pauline
letters) show virtually no specific knowledge of his life, the earliest gospel knows nothing
about a virgin birth or resureection, later gospels developed independently DO know about 
such events but tell very different (and irreconcilable) stories about them]. If a half
dozen people were to tell you (asd living eyewitnesses mind you) such contradictory stories
claiming that *I* had died and been resurrected you wouldn't believe it. So why should we
believe it because some (unknown & almost certainly not eyewitnesses) people wrote it down
2000 years ago? 
|> 
|> |Sci-Fi writer by the name of Ron Hubbard did to his followers. History
|> |repeats itself. As for an excellent and famous cult leader, there were
|> |many other Messiah wannabes that were recorded, Jesus was one of the
|> |many trouble makers Romans had to deal with.
|>  
|> Again, Jesus rose from the grave and never died again.  Name another
|> that never died again, even it you claim they rose from the dead - many
|> rose from the dead at the hand of Jesus and at his resurrection, but
|> Jesus stands above them all - he ascended into heaven - he is alive and
|> with the Father today.

You just love those circular arguments don't you Richard. We know that Jesus existed
because he rose from the dead, but the only evidence in both cases is the same?
|> 
|> |> Like anything, it's easy to blow off what you haven't seen for yourself.
|> |
|> |True, it's also easy to blow things out of proportions if you haven't
|> |been on the scene.
|> 
|> It is easy to say things are false, when you presuppose they could not have
|> happened.  John and Peter both walked with Jesus and wrote of His life.
|> Peter confirms the transfiguration of Jesus of which Matthew and Luke write.
|>  
|> |> BTW, in the gospels, there are different geneologies given.  One comment I
|> |> read says that the one gives the ancestral line through Mary and the other
|> |> through Joseph.  Another I read says that "begot" may not mean "the father
|> |> of" but "an ancestor of" -- big difference, meaning both are right but give
|> |> different ancestors (whoever the writer thought important to mention).
|> |
|> |Evidence, man, evidence about this statement that the geneologies are
|> |different due to Mary and Joseph. At least the Gospels won't say that,
|> |or what.
|> 
|> Evidence - Luke says that Jesus was "the son of Joseph, SO IT WAS THOUGHT."
|> He didn't say Jesus was Joseph's son.  Luke starts with Jesus and goes
|> backwards - each of the names could be seen to be an ancestor of Jesus
|> and not of Joseph.  Matthew starts at Adam and says that the names were
|> begat (which I believe means father or direct ancestor) the next name.
|> Matthew ends with Joseph, as the end of the line, who was the husband of
|> Mary, who begat Jesus.  Note Mary begat Jesus and Joseph was her husband
|> but not Jesus' father.  (The NIV puts it Joseph the husband of Mary, to
|> whom was born Jesus.)

Read it again Richard. Both clearly state (even in the NIV) that the lineage was through 
Joseph. I don't have my Bible handy but I'll be glad to post the whole passage tomorrow. 
And, if I recall correctly (I may be thinking of another passage), the "SO IT WAS THOUGHT" 
portion doesn't appear in the earliest manuscripts .
|> 
|> For Christ and His Kingdom,
|> Richard Pitts
|> -- 
|> rpitts@cerl.gatech.edu       |    
|> Atlanta, GA                --|-- 
|>                         -|-  |  -|-
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