We now come to my brief overview of what I feel are some of Michael Heiser’s more significant arguments in his book, The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible. To make sure everything stays in its larger context, these are the main points discussed in the previous posts:
- The serpent in Genesis 3 is really a divine guardian cherub who rebels against YHWH by enticing Adam and Eve to sin in order to attain divine knowledge. For that rebellion, the serpent/guardian cherub is cast down, and YHWH declares war between the serpent and his offspring and between the woman and her offspring. Therefore, to simplify, we can say Genesis 3 is about the rebellion and fall of this guardian cherub and the sin of Adam and Eve.
- The sons of Elohim in Genesis 6:1-4 are other divine beings who have sex with women and produce semi-divine/part-human giants called the Nephilim. This is put forth as the what lay at the heart of the corruption of humanity that precipitated the flood. Therefore, we can say Genesis 6:1-4 is about further rebellion of more divine beings and further sin and corruption of the human race.
- After humanity’s further rebellion at the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11, YHWH confuses their languages and disperses them into various nations. Deuteronomy 32:8-9 describes this dispersal as YHWH’s punishment for humanity’s continued rebellion against him. Therefore, to simplify, since humanity rebelled against the true God, YHWH put them under the authority of lesser divine beings—presumably under the rebellious “sons of Elohim.”
- And thus, the basic worldview lens derived from all this is that the God’s creation is currently under the lordship and authority of the rebellious divine beings described in Genesis 1-11. Nevertheless, all this is temporary, for God has promised that He is going to work through the woman’s offspring within humanity to eventually defeat these rebellious divine beings.
- Finally, Heiser points out that when we come to the Exodus and Conquest narratives, we are told that the Anakim live in Canaan (along with other related groups like the Rephaim), and that they are the descendants (i.e. offspring) of the Nephilim. In Deuteronomy 3:1-11, King Og of Bashan, the last of the Rephaim, is described as a giant. Later on in I Samuel, we encounter Goliath, and throughout I/II Samuel, we find that David and his men kill five giants, who are Anakim. All of this reflects the view that the conquest of Canaan is seen, not simply as Israelites defeating Canaanites, but ultimately about YHWH, through the Israelites, beginning to push back those offspring of those rebellions sons of Elohim from Genesis 6:1-4. As I said in my last post, if we read this as the writer using Genesis 6:1-4 as the “mythological lens” through which we are to interpret the Israelites’ taking of Canaan as a part of YHWH’s larger plan, all this fits and makes sense. But I do not think we are to interpret this as claims that Og, or Goliath, or those people known as the Anakim were the literal offspring of actual divine beings having sex with women.
With all that now established, we now turn in this post to Jesus and the Gospels.
Jesus’ Casting out of Demons
To get right to the point, even though we are all familiar with the fact that in the Gospels, Jesus is known for healing people of their illnesses and for casting out demons, most people don’t quite understand the significance of those actions. Interestingly enough, Heiser points out that Jesus’ casting out of the demon from the man in the synagogue in Mark 1:21-28, is the first instance in the entire Bible in which demons/unclean spirits are cast out.
Couple this with what we find in the Beelzebub controversy in Mark 3:20-35, we should give a really big cue as to what Jesus is doing. In the Beelzebub controversy, the scribes accuse Jesus of casting out demons by the power of Beelzebub (i.e. Satan, the “chief demon,” if you will). Jesus responds by essentially saying that is stupid. Casting out demons by the power of Beelzebub would be destroying Beelzebub’s own kingdom. No, Jesus was casting out demons by the power of God, and he thus was binding the power of Beelzebub.
Put all that together, as Heiser correctly points out, the underlying message of the Gospels that informs us just what Jesus and his ministry was all about is this: God is making good on the promise He made all the way back in Genesis 3. Satan and his demons may have been in charge of God’s creation for awhile, but God is now invading to take back what is rightfully His. Jesus’ ministry is the beginning of God’s invasion, of God’s own “storming the beaches of Normandy.” The Kingdom of God has invaded enemy-occupied territory, and Jesus, the rightful ruler, is putting his enemies to flight.
Given that, Heiser argues that when Jesus sends out the seventy disciples in Luke 10, it is a direct allusion to the seventy nations listed in Genesis 10 that were dispossessed after Babel. Therefore, when they return with joy at their success, Jesus declares that he saw Satan falling like lightning from heaven (Luke 10:18). Translation? Jesus is “sending out his own army,” if you will, and Satan, that rebellious guardian cherub of Genesis 3, is being defeated.
Caesarea Philippi and Bashan
By far, though, the most interesting observations Heiser makes are those that focus on Peter’s confession at Caesarea Philippi and Jesus’ transfiguration. In short, the setting of both these events is hugely significant. As the map shows, Caesarea Philippi was located north of Galilee, near Mount Hermon, in the region of Bashan. That area was known as the place of the serpent and, in Jesus’ day, was the center for the worship of Pan and had a temple to the incarnate Augustus Caesar.
Back during the time of Joshua, though, we are told in Deuteronomy 3:1-13 that that region of Bashan was ruled by King Og, the last of the Rephaim. In fact, Bashan was called the land of the Rephaim. Furthermore, Deuteronomy 3:10 says that he reigned over the city of Edrei, and Joshua 12:4-5 say that Og was the king of Bashan who lived in Ashtaroth and Edrei (both which were considered gateways to the underworld) and who ruled over Mount Hermon. What all this shows is that the region of Bashan and Mount Hermon was long associated with the land of the offspring of the Nephilim and the gateway to the underworld/hell.
And that is the location where two of the most significant events in Gospels take place (aside from, of course, the crucifixion and resurrection!). First, Jesus takes his disciples to Caesarea Philippi, and after he asks them who people say he is, he then asks them who they say he is. Peter says, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God” (Matthew 16:16). In response, Jesus says, “You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not stand against it” (16:18).
The significance of the setting cannot be minimized: Jesus is taking the fight directly to the symbolic stronghold of Satan’s kingdom. So, when he says, “Upon this rock, I will build my church,” that phrase is filled with meaning, referring to both to Peter’s confession and Mount Hermon. As Heiser says, “Gates are defensive structures, not offensive weapons. The Kingdom of God is the aggressor. Jesus begins at ground zero in the cosmic geography of both testaments to announce the great reversal. It is the gates of hell that are under assault—and they will not hold up against the Church. Hell will one day be Satan’s tomb” (285).
And that’s not all. In Matthew 17 we are told that Jesus then took Peter, James, and John up a “high mountain,” and there he is transfigured before him. They are given a glimpse of him in his glory. Heiser argues that, contrary to the traditional view that identifies this high mountain with Mount Tabor (which is in southern Galilee, near Nazareth), this high mountain should be understood to be Mount Hermon, which would make more sense, given the fact that in Matthew 16 they are at Caesarea Philippi. The identification of this high mountain as Mount Hermon also makes more sense, given the significance of what Jesus has just said in Matthew 16, about how the gates of hell would not be able stand against him and his church. Heiser puts it this way, as Jesus saying, “I’m putting the hostile powers of the unseen world on notice. I’ve come to earth to take back what is mine” (286).
Or, if we want to give a more recent analogy, we can think of Jesus’ casting out of demons as Baker Mayfield at Oklahoma just defeating Ohio State, and therefore, Jesus’ going up Mount Hermon and being transfigured before Peter, James, and John as Mayfield planting the Oklahoma flag right on the “O” in the middle of Ohio State’s field. It is quite the statement: “I just beat you I’m planting my flag in your home field, and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it!”
I have to say, I kind of like seeing Peter’s confession and the transfiguration that way.
Conclusion
Bashan plays a further role in a few other Old Testament passages, but the apostle Paul alludes to them, so that will have to wait until my next post.
All that said, I think Heiser is on target when he emphasizes the symbolic significance of Bashan and Mount Hermon, and all that impacts our understanding of Jesus’ ministry and his casting out of demons in general, and specifically of his response to Peter’s confession in Caesarea Philippi and his subsequent transfiguration on Mount Hermon. All of his fits into the larger supernatural worldview lens that is laid out in Genesis 1-11.
If one didn’t know otherwise this would read like a review of a fantasy novel, and in truth, when one considers all the fantastical elements involved fantasy underpins these tales, especially as this is how Heiser wants us to understand how the biblical writers thought about such things as gods – to them they were real.
These days, of course, we know there are no such thing as demons, outside of a Hollywood context, and the over the top tale of exodus and conquest are merely part of the historical foundation myth.
Heiser’s own explanation on his short intro video covers this ground succinctly.
Therefore, if the overriding aim is to show that the bible is primarily a collection of tales built upon analogy and symbolism with limited factual historical content then I suppose one could say he has succeeded.
The Bible is primarily conveying history, but doing so by creative story-telling and through the lens of the truly “foundational mythology” in Genesis 1-11. As I have said in my posts, it is history interpreted against that backdrop laid out in Genesis 1-11.
As it stands, Heiser’s focus is not on proving the history in the Bible.
And allow me to provide one example to show where you consistently go wrong: The movie that came out in 2006, “300”–about King Leonidas battling the Persians at the Battle of Thermopylae. In the movie, Xerxes and many of the Persia warriors are portrayed as semi-divine with supernatural powers. But we realize that is creative license in the movie. What you consistently do with the Bible would be the equivalent of you seeing “300,” seeing those supernatural elements in the movie, and then declaring that all of it is fantasy, and that King Leonidas, Xerxes, and the Battle of Thermopylae are all myth and not history at all.
I enjoyed the movie.
And through this example, you have, inadvertently identified what the bible primarily is: primarily historical fiction. A series f tales told against a historical background featuring several historical characters and locations all +played out through the lens of bronze age authors who fully believed in gods, demons, angels etc.
There is categorically no evidence for the foundational tales – Creation (Adam and Eve) Babel, Noah and his flood, Captivity Exodus and Conquest . Neither is there any evidence whatsoever of the divine miracle working character Jesus of Nazareth as portrayed in the gospels, and this includes burial and resurrection.
You have just illustrated the very problem I just said you have. Thank you.
The problem, Joel, is that you believe the foundational tales …. or at least some (most?) of them …. to have historical veracity based solely on belief, or faith if you prefer.
That you are prepared to consider the bible is authority enough without any evidence is demeaning and should be beneath you. Unfortunately this is how indoctrination or the absence of critical thinking works, and is evident among followers of all religions.
No, I believe there was a historical Jesus, a historical kingdom of Israel in the OT, and historical David, a historical time of the Judges, and historical events we know label the Conquest and Exodus, based on my knowledge of history and my understanding of how to read these ancient texts.
I can distinguish between the creative imagery and the history it is helping to interpret, just like I can acknowledge the fantastic elements of “300” and not deny that the Battle of Thermopylae was a historical event.
There may well have been an historical Jesus, Tacitus seems to think so and also Josephus.
But the miracle working divine character …. no, there is no evidence.
Neither is there any veracity of the tale of Captivity, Exodus and Conquest as reflected in the bible, and you have yet to produce a scrap of evidence for any of the above; and I have asked you to do so on numerous occasions.
So I am at a loss to understand your claim of your ”… knowledge of history.”
But as mentioned in previous discussions I am very interested, and more than willing to read any scholar or for preference archaeologist, that you have read who has evidence of the history you mention, and specifically the Exodus tale.
I have absolutely no doubt you are able to identify creative imagery , you have always come across as intelligent, however, the lines tend to blur when it comes to your belief in the authority of the biblical text. This is where your critical thinking skills take a back seat to your faith.
Yes, there was a historical Jesus who led a messianic movement, had disciples, and was crucified by Pilate in Jerusalem during Passover AD 33, shortly after with his disciples claimed he had been resurrected. And yes, even the Jews of the time who were against him acknowledged that he had the reputation of being a healer and an exorcist.
Yes, but a claim is just a claim. There is no evidence that these post crucifiction things things happened.
And of course even you know that exorcism is nonsense.
But it is your historical knowledge claim that I am really interested in,specifically concerning Exodus. What evidence do you have?
Like I said, I’ll do a book analysis of Provan over the summer.
I look forward to it. However, there is nothing in Heiser’s book – or rather your review and the short video I watched to suggests there is any factual basis for the foundational bronze age myths we have discussed.
And a book review doesn’t not help my request for your claim of historical knowledge.
I am sure you have other sources or another basis other than Provan’s book, yes?
What made you believe that the tales in the bible were factual/historical?
1. Hesier’s book isn’t addressing that topic.
2. Provan’s arguments regarding how to read/understand ancient texts and how to assess archeological findings.
I understand what Heiser’s book addresses. The primary mythological aspects the writers believed were real, such as gods, angels and demons and how we should recognise that such notions of exorcising demons were not literal occurrences. You obviously don’t believe in such nonsense as demons or exorcism as no rational person today would.
If we are not feeling well and go to a doctor or hospital they don’t ask or test to see if you are possessed by a demon, for goodness’ sake!
Provan is a scholar not an archaeologist.
I am interested in your claim of knowing history and how you came to the conclusion that Exodus was history.
Arkhenaten, even the most skeptical NT scholars don’t question Jesus’ historical existence. You might as well argue for a flat earth as to argue that Jesus didn’t actually exist (the skeptics’ favorite go-to scholar since Rudolph Bultmann, Bart Ehrman, wrote a book, *Did Jesus Exist?,* setting forth all of the evidence for Jesus’ historical existence). But you seem willing to concede that point.
Wel, most skeptical NT scholars don’t question that Jesus was some kind of wonder-worker. Certainly his enemies in aniquity didn’t, they simply attributed his miracles to demonic power or sorcery.
If you’ve read much of Dr. Anderson’s blogs you’ll notice that he rather forcefully argues *against* a literal interpretation of Geneis 1-11 (so did many early church fathers). He actualy wrote a book about it called *The Heresy of Ham.* Genesis 1-11 uses ANE poetry and figurative imagery to convey spiritual/religious truths. But just because *parts* of the Bible are very obviously using ancient poetry to convey their message doesn’t mean all of it is poetry, or even historical fiction. Certainly not the NT. As NT Wright correctly affirms, the gospels in particular resonate as documents written by people intimately familiar with first c. 2nd Temple Palestinian Judaism. They certainly couldn’t have been written by Greek or Romaun pagans.
The Bible clues you in as to whether a text is meant as metaphor, allegory, poetry, apocalyptic or history; you just have to pay attention to the context of a particular text.
So Dr. Anderson doesn’t interpret the “foundational tales” as literal history. Neither did/do lots of Christians both ancient and modern (including me). The gospels are different however. Their authors–knowing full well how audacious their claims sound, then and now–nevertheless insist that they’re recording actual space-time historical events. Forva multitude of intellectual reasons I believe they *were* recording actual history.
Pax.
Lee.
Arkhenaten, sometimes they DO check to see if you’re demon-possessed. The Catholic Church will only allow an exorcism to be done after a person has been examined by a clinical psychologist and no psychological (many ordained priests are alsob clinical psychologists@-science and faith have never been antithetical) explanation can explain the aberrant behavior. Because there are some things clinical psychology cannot diagnose or address. Likle evil. The only explanation for certain cases is demonic possession.
My late grandmother’s housekeeper was exorcised about twenty years ago. I probably wouldn’t have believed it myself if my grandmother and mother had not been there to personally witness it and if my grandmother hadn’t also personally participated in the actual exorcism itself. Neither are/were credulous, gullible people, prone to just believe anything (my grandmother was a retired legal secretary). The only credible explantation for this woman’s behavior was demonic possession. Psychiatry and psychology couln’t help this woman, but an exorcism did, as incredible as thay may sound.5v
You’ll likely say that I have no proof for my story and you’re right, but some things in life defy logic and rational explanation, thus can’t be tidily explained away and wrapped up in a neat little bow by science. For example, science can’t explain the existence of consciousness, how inaminate matter became conscious, thinking, rational, moral/ethical, self-aware matter (and at least one atheistic philosopher, Thomas Nagel, has admitted as much and actually written a book on the subject). Science has limits. If demons do exist in anything close to the traditional Judaeo-Christian depiction, they exist outside the normal realm of space-time, which science simply cannot address. The ancients weren’t stupid, after all; they knew the difference between being mentally ill and possessed.
No, not all scholars and I can name a half dozen just off the top of my head.
But I was not suggesting he was a myth so why bring it up, Lee?
The only independent (non biblical) claims we have for the Jesus crucified by Pilate is from Josephus and Tacitus.
There is no evidence for the character as described in the bible – the divine , miracle-working, walking on water. buried in a tomb and raised from the dead individual known as Jesus Christ.
What enemies? Nothing in the bible regarding this character and how those who may have related/interacted with him during his supposed ministry can be corroborated so it would seem pointless to try and use this as any sort of evidence.
I never said or suggested that, Joel claimed the foundational tales are literal, but he believes there is ( a degree of) historical veracity for, say, Captivity, Exodus and Conquest.
Repeated requests for him to offer evidence or at least a link to an archaeologist who has evidence that will support his assertion have always fallen on deaf ears, eventually resulting in Joel deleting the entire thread.
Good for you! Having serious convictions is often a good sign. Also, having the intellectual integrity and willingness to review and possibly change said convictions when evidence contrary to such firmly held beliefs is presented is a sign of emotional maturity.
And to this end, I will offer you the same opportunity as I have repeatedly offered Joel -please present any evidence you have to support the ”multitude of intellectual reasons” you have for your belief/s.
Regards
Ark.
1. I believe Jesus is referred to in the Talmud–that he was a magician and miracle worker who led Jews astray.
2. I delete comments and thread when things devolve into childishness and petulance. When I say I am planning to address the historical questions about the Exodus/Conquest and you continue to pester about how I’m a “coward” for not addressing it right on the spot for you, that gets deleted.
There is no universal scholarly acceptance that the mentions in the Talmud refer to the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth.
Of course, one is entitled to believe whatever one likes.
The historical questions / points of view regarding Exodus /Conquest are of little or no consequence unless you can support any assertions with archaeological evidence.
To date you have not even had the courtesy to refer me to even one archaeologist who has evidence support your continual claims of historical veracity, which in no way would detract from the content of any particular post. And I question why is this?
Unfortunately, I cannot help if you become petulant and childish. This is part of your make up and maybe you need to take a deep breath or two before you become so overly emotional?
Just a thought.
1. There is hardly UNIVERSAL scholarly consensus about anything in history. lol
2. Let me put it this way, I’ve gotten private messages where people, to put it kindly, have expressed how much they haven’t been impressed with the tone of your comments. I’m doing you a favor by erasing some of what you say.
I really don’t mind what people say of me, to be honest. However, most people I come into contact with or am friends with say nothing but nice things.
That some (most?) of your visitors are unwilling to write how unimpressed they are on the relevant posts suggests a presuppositional christian mindset that is also afraid to tackle certain issues head on.
Considering the length of time and detail you obviously put into your posts I would have thought you would be at least a little grateful that I even bother to read your blog and take the time to comment and interact.
It’s not as if you have to allocate large chunks of your day to answer all the myriad of commentators who regularly visit your spot.
Let’s be honest, if it weren’t for my visits most of the time you would be writing in a vacuum.
So in essence, all you are doing is removing comments that call into question your presuppositional worldview that might otherwise leave the reader (if they pass by) wondering why you simply don’t provide a straightforward answer to a straightforward question.
Did they? And have you evidence to support this claim?
After reading your arguments with these gentlemen, it seems to me your position can be summed up thusly:
“There is no historical record, archeological find, or other evidence to confirm the the accuracy and historicity of the Biblical texts, and since the Bible is a religious document containing reference to fantastical supernatural beings and events (things that are now known for a fact to be mere fictions), the Bible cannot be considered documentation of actual history of any kind. Therefore, it is to be considered a collection of ancient myths and legends only.“
Is this a fair and accurate summary of your position, sir?
@Wiley.
Certainly, there is no evidence for the foundational claims of the Judeo/ Christian religion. At best, much of the biblical texts can be described as geopolitical myth, or if you prefer an ancient version of historical fiction.
However, if you believe you have evidence contrary to this please, feel free to present it. I am always open to changing my perspective in this regard and welcome any such evidence you care to offer.
Not having been knighted, no need for the ”sir”. Ark will do nicely, thanks.
Regards.
Putting aside the purported lack of historical records and archeological finds, how do you know from reading the texts themselves that that they are geopolitical myth or “historical fiction”? And are we talking about the Old or New Testament here, or both? The Bible is not really one book but a collection of books after all, and even if you believe the narrative portions are mythical it contains several other genres: psalms, proverbs, letters, prophecy, etc.
This leads me to my second question: what is your theory for why the Bible was written in the first place? Was it originally intended as fiction by its authors? Even if you don’t believe the Exodus happened, there are millions of Jews and Christians in the world today who believe it did. How did that come about? And when?
If you are suggesting there is archaeological evidence to support the biblical tales then for goodness’ sake, please stop equivocating and present this evidence.
Aside from the fact we know JK Rowling states she writes fiction, how would you know that a Harry Potter story is not factual? What examples from the book would inform you that you were not reading non fiction?
To specifics of your reply.
Old Testament.
The human genome project dispels any notion of an Adam and Eve as per the Genesis tale. And please don’t come back and simply say no, as I haven’t got the patience to explain the reason why. Go ask Collins if you disagree.
Paleontology, geology, including plate tectonics, and also the T.T.I to mention a few examples, dispel any notion of Noah his ark, his incestuous family and a global flood. Of course , if you are a member of the Ken Ham fan club nothing will make any difference to your worldview.
Kadesh Barnia is as good an example as any to dispel the notion of a biblical exodus involving a large population movement, let alone a massive one of over 2 million individuals. And if you have to ask why then I suggest you go back to your bible and do some serious critical thinking. And no, I am not being patronizing or condescending. But I am trying to encourage you to take a long hard look at evidence and ONLY evidence.
New Testament.
While there may well have been someone called Yeshu who was executed for sedition, there is no evidence for the central character of the New Testament.
I have no all encompassing theory as to why the bible was written.
Why are any books written?
I think you are confusing/mistaken what most Jewish people believe these days with what many (but not all) Christians believe regarding Exodus etc.
There are more secular Jews who accept the Exodus tale is just that – a tale than those who consider it to be historical fact, and certainly,not literal history.
Again, a little research will provide you with these details.
I could do the research for you as I don’t have the figures on hand and don’t really feel like ploughing through my bookmarks folders. Besides, it’ll give you something to do. If you feel like it that it is?
How did such belief come about? Why …through indoctrination, of course!
Passed on from one generation to the next. Until, that is, someone suggests things might not be as they seem.
However, until such a suggestion and the inevitable that follows, when no alternative presents itself,and the tale is repeated often enough so belief is encouraged and passed on.
And of course there is often the threat of punishment for not accepting – in Christianity’s case there is the threat of Hell and eternal damnation which is enough to scare the living daylights out of many a child!
After all, this is why you believe is it not?
Oh dear. I just typed out a detailed reply and it has disappeared into the ether.
Anyway … this is the gist ….
If you put aside all evidence to the contrary how would you know that a Harry Potter novel was not factual?
Seriously, are you suggesting that Adam and Eve and Noah and his flood are historical facts?
Both.
Most Jewish people these days do not consider the Exodus was a literal historical event.
A little research will tell you this.
Hi Arkenaten, here is a link for the archaeological evidence Conversation and evidence based not mythological basis for the Bible. It seems that in the west we tend to deny what we cannot explain to myths, or fork lore. That is your choice but I would suggest it is not based upon evidence as much as not wanting to believe in the evidence that is really there. It is like a police investigating a burglary where there are finger prints all over and they deny that there is a evidence for the crime. With all due respect you can not explain the empty tomb that the Bible by witness share. You can deny that they are witness (which you will) not because they are real witness but because you will call them bias witness, yet you have your bias. We are not going to change your mind, but remember we love you and see your need. We pray that you will allow the blinders to come off your mind.
https://youtu.be/ZqTjpCrsGFE
My understanding is that the “gates of hell” reference was to a well-known area near Caesarea Philippi where a boat load of pagan idols were kept in niches in a mountain and nearby was an cave that was thought to go to the “underworld”. For Jews, it was seen as especially pagan and idolatrous and “any good Jew” would simply avoid the area. Jesus does not fear being “contaminated” and even proclaims the ultimate victory.
https://www.thattheworldmayknow.com/gates-of-hell-article
So I think Heiser is straining too hard to find justifications for his ideas.
I don’t see how what you’re saying or what that post is saying is necessarily in conflict with what Heiser is saying. That area around Caesarea Philippi, including Mount Hermon, was considered to be the “gateway to the underworld.” Apparently, it had that reputation as far back as to the time of Joshua (i.e. King Og ruling in near Mount Hermon). So Jesus is “taking the fight” directly to the gates of hell. Both what he tells Peter and the subsequent transfiguration (presumably on Mount Hermon) drives home that point: Jesus is taking back what belongs to him, and there isn’t a thing Satan can do about it.
Arhkenaten, firstly I’d love to know which serious academic NT scholars are skeptical of Jesus’ actual historical existence, because no one I’ve ever heard of (and I’ve been reading NT studies for nearly 30 years) but the “Jesus mythers” like Richard Carrier and GA Wells make such claims and they aren’t actually serious academic scholars. So could you please tell us who are these scholars who are skeptical of Jesus’ historical existence?
Secondly, as to my reasons for believing in Christianity, there really are too many to list in this post. NT Wright’s book *Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense* says it about as well and succintly as any book I’ve read.
But here are a few.
1. The Jesus story presented in the gospels resonates and fits in with everything we know from Jewish and secular historical sources about 1st c., 2nd Temple Palestinian Judaism. The Jesus they present is believable.
2. The gospels are unlike standard Greco-Roman myths in many and significant ways. For example, they claim to be recorded history and as such reference lots of people, places and things that can be (and have been) verified from secular histories.
3. Christianity is *not* the religion pious Jews faking a religion they hoped to sell to other pious Jews, let alone pagans, would invent. Certainly having their Messiah crucified was the *worst* claim they could make, because every pious Jew understood that Torah condemned anyone crucified as being cursed. So why make such a fantastic, unbeleiveable claim no other Messianic Jewish sect ever made? Why go so far off book?And of course giving *women* such prominent roles at the resurrection was also calculated to put people off, as we know it actually did from the objections of the skeptic Celsus in the late 2nd c., who objected that one reason you couldn’t believe the Christian story was precisley *because* the only witnesses to the faith’s central miracle was a group of hysterical women! Just having Jesus have women disciples *at all* was bad enough. The religion centered on Jesus that pagans would invent was Christian Gnosticism (what with its objection to embodied human existence, thus no talk of resurrection and new creation), but it only arose in the 2nd century.
4. Unlike other faiths or philosophies, Christianity provides a credible explantation for the existence of evil. It satisfactorily explains *why* the world routinely doesn’t meet our expectations, certainly regarding justice. Without a god and his objective moral standards we wouldn’t even know that evil or justice was.
5. I’ve read all of the alternative explanations attempting to explain away Jesus and his message and find that most of them require a level of faith far beyond anything the NT requires.
6. Nothing in Christianity is antithetical to science. It’s mainly *because* of Christianity that science even developed in the west. Materialistic Darwinian naturalism raises more questions than it answers, chiefly why there is something rather than nothing and how inanimate matter became conscious, self-aware rational matter.
I’ll stop there.
Lee.
1. That there may have been someone called Yeshu who was executed for sedition is quite possible.There is however, absolutely no evidence whatsoever for the divinely claimed walking on water, miracle performing, raised from the dead character Jesus of Nazareth as presented in the gospels, By all accounts this character is clearly a narrative construct.
2.The term you are looking for here, is historical fiction.
3.I see no relevance to my question regarding evidence in this rather long winded reply.
4. This reply is simply opinion with no evidence to support it.
5.I have no idea what this reply is meant to mean and again has no evidence to support what ever it is that you are trying to convey.
6.Yet again, not relevant to my request regarding evidence.
Sorry, but in essence all you have done is compose a short bullet point apologetic.
You asked me for reasons why I believe and I gave you some. But okay. Here’s evidence for thr existence of Jesus and the reliability of the gospels.
1. For the historical existence of Jesus we have two refercenes by Josephus, one from Tacitus one from Suetonius, the Talmud references, 12 letters of Paul, the four canonical gospels, and the testimony of the second 2nd c. apostolic fathers such as Papius, Polycarp .Ignatius, Irenaeus, Justin, etc. You may object to the NT and apostolic father references however they constitute valid historical evidence and cannot be dismissed lightly, certainly not Paul and the gospels, which constitute our earliest written references to Jesus. So that we have better, and earlier, historical attestation of/for Jesus Christ than we do for a lot of other historical figures whose existence no secular historian would seriously question.
The non-Christian sources read just like such sources wouuld read, taking Jesus’ existence for granted. They don’t waste time attempting to *prove* he existed, because nobody in antiquity seriously doubted Jesus’ historicsl existence, or the fact that he performed miracles, so that many scholars, even skeptics, argue that the stories of the miracles are among the strongest attested and mos t reliable of the Jesus traditions.
2. As for early copies of the NT, we have more (approx. 5,000) and better earlier mss for if than we do for any other writings from antiquity. For example, most of our earliest extant copies of Homer, Plato, Aristotle, etc. date to the Middle Ages (laboriously copied by Christian monks), *several hundred years* after they were originally written, whereas we have copies of, for instance, John’s gospel, dating to ca. 110-120 AD and compnlete NT mss from the 300s AD. So that, Bart Ehrman (primarily a textual critic), in his academic work admits that we can reconstruct the NT with approx. 95% accuracy. And we have those early mss in Greek, Syriac, Latin, Coptic, etc.
So the gospels themselves were written between ca. AD 60-ca. AD 100, much too early for myth and legend to accrue to them. It took roughly 300 years for that kind of myth and legend to accrue to biographies of Alexander the Great.
Copies of Paul’s letters which were all written betwen ca. 49 and ca. 65 AD, *before* the gospels were written, circulated as a compilation by ca. 110 AD. And the four gospels were being quoted or paraphrased by early fathers like Ignatius, Justin and Irenaeus in the early 2nd century, meaning they have yo be earlier than the date they’re frst being cited.
And we have very early 2nd c. evidence for the traditional authorshop of the gospels.
3. Then, as I said above, the portraits of Jesus in the gospels resonate with everything we know about ancient 1st c., 2nd Temple Palestinian Judaism. The gospel Jesus belongs in that world. The people and places mentioned jive with what we know from secular history.
Btw, who are the NT scholars who don’t believe Jesus actually existed? Richard Carrier doesn’t count.
Maybe more later.
Pax.
Lee.
I asked you for EVIDENCE not reasons.
Here is my original question.
”…please present any evidence you have to support the ”multitude of intellectual reasons” you have for your belief/s.
You did not supply any evidence.
I am insulted that you would trot out these apologetic yawns as if I would not have read this stuff more times than I care to remember. Any first year old bible study kid gets this stuff drummed into them and one sees it parroted b y almost every Christian apologist.
The references to someone called Yeshua or Chrestus have nothing to do with the miracle working, walking on water raised from the dead character featured in the gospels.
Out of curiosity, what would you consider “credible evidence” for the claim in the Gospels that Jesus healed a blind man who was blind from birth?
What kind of archeological evidence would there be?
Out of curiosity what evidence was it that convinced you that this was a factual event?
It is written in a historical biography and, like Lee said, even among the Jews who were his enemies, they acknowledged he was a healer.
Okay, so try not to deflect again, and answer my question. You keep asking about evidence for Jesus’ healings and resurrection. What sort of evidence would you expect?
The character Jesus/Yeshua was a Jew as were all his disciples and most of his initial followers and also those he is claimed to have ministered to,
So, in fact, only a select number of his fellow countryman would have been classified as his ”enemies”.
The way you phrase it, it comes across somewhat like gJohn – almost anti-Semitic.
Anyway, as we are discussing events in a literary setting, what evidence is there that the historical individual referred to as Yeshua had enemies? Aside from the fact he was likely crucified for sedition by Pilate, which identifies him as a criminal or enemy of the state.
Re: ”What sort of evidence would you expect?”
See my answer re: precedent.
Not anti-Semitic at all. The Jews of Jesus days who did not believe he was the Messiah still, nevertheless, acknowledged he was a miracle worker and healer.
Well, the fact the Gospels discuss Jesus had enemies, and that it was the Jewish Temple authorities who arrested him and handed him over to Pilate. Also, within a year or two after his death/resurrection, the Sanhedrin launched an attack and persecution of Jesus’ followers. That’s a pretty good indication.
Wrong. You have no evidence for such an assertion only the tales in the gospels for which there is no corroborating evidence.
What temple authorities? Once again, you are referencing the gospels for goodness’ sake about a tale that has no evidence to corroborate it.
Yes I’m referencing the gospels because they are first century accounts. Real scholars and historians read and generally accept historical accounts unless there is clear proof that something is false.
Using your logic, if we were talking about the Jewish War, you’d object to my using of Josephus. THAT’S the testimony and evidence for those events.
No genuine historian accepts any notion of veracity that the walk on water divine character as described in the gospels was real. To suggest otherwise is simply nonsense.
Arkhenaten, I gave you several very good intellectual reasons for why I consider the gospels reliable. Call them “apologetic yawns” if you like. That in itself does not constitute valid counter-evidence.
I hope you aren’t one of those skeptics who has confused a rigid, inflexible, almost paranoid
skepticism with critical thinking. Because they’re not the same thing.
I see no valid philosophical reason to rule out miracles and the existence of the supernatural. On purely materialistic grounds you rule out even the possibility of miracles before you even begin to study Jesus. That isn’t evience of an open mind and critical thinking.
Besides which, the miracle stories in the NT gospels are not embellished in the fashion of Greco-Roman myths–compared to them, the gospel miracle stories are positively restrained. And as we keep saying, the miracle traditions are the one group of Jesus traditions that nearly every academic scholar insists are authentic; even Jesus’ enemies didn’t doubt his miracles, only where his power to do them came from. So the miracles are among the best attested material in the gospels.
What kind of evidence would convince you of the veracity of the miracles?
And I’m still curious who all those academic NTscholars are who don’t believe Jesus actually existed. Because I don’t know of any.
Pax.
Lee.
Again, personal beliefs unsupported by evidence remain personal beliefs. Ostensibly just a claim.
Furthermore, the emotional component is crucial to religious belief and I presume this is part of your reason to believe as well, yes?
So what we are looking for here is evidence, and to date you have not presented any.
Using the bible to justify the bible does not count as evidence.
Therefore telling me how many copies there are etc, etc is meaningless in context.
There is no such thing as ”kind of evidence”, there is only evidence. If it cannot be supported it remains a claim.
So, what evidence can you present to support your claim of the veracity of miracles?
Again, what kind of evidence would you expect for the healing of a blind man?
There is no precedent, so I cannot answer. what was the evidence you reviewed and accepted that convinced you this tale was true?
Deflection. You continually demand “evidence,” but cannot articulate what kind of evidence you want. Much of history is known through testimony and writing. We know a lot of history because people in the past wrote about what happened, and that is all the “evidence” we have. Therefore, when we come to the depiction of Jesus in the Gospels, we find they are historical biographies, written within a generation of his life, and they contain a whole lot of accurate historical information of many people places and events. In short, I am convinced they are conveying history. And what I find, smack dab in the middle of those historical biographies are accounts of Jesus healing people, casting out evil spirits, and rising from the dead.
The only reason not to accept those is a predisposition to positivism, atheism, and philosophical naturalism. It certainly is NOT “lack of evidence”–because the writing and testimony IS the evidence.
Nope. Not a deflection. There is no precedent and as I keep telling you, we are dealing with a literary character for whom there is absolutely no evidence for. .
I sincerely hope you are able to grasp the full implication of this?
So, as you are asserting historical veracity for this character, the walking on water divinely claimed raised from the dead creator of the universe – the onus is on you to demonstrate the veracity of any and all claims by providing evidence to substantiate all said claims.
To date you have not done so.
Circular logic of confirmation bias.
You demand evidence, yet cannot articulate what you would consider evidence, and you continue to assert Jesus was a literary character.
Sorry, no one is fooled.
You claim that you were convinced by evidence then tell me what it was and perhaps I too will be convinced.
In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, the character, Jesus of Nazareth as described in the gospels, the walk on water, divinely resurrected creator of the universe is a literary construct for whom there is absolutely no evidence whatsoever.
This is not to say there was not an individual, possibly called Yeshua, who led a ministry for a couple of years , had a few disciples and was eventually crucified for sedition by the Romans.
I have no real beef with this scenario.
Actually the one that seems to be fooled is you, as you have accepted a scenario based solely on faith.
You can’t even give a clear explanation of the evidence you keep demanding. I’ve explained why I’m convinced. The evidence is the reliability and testimony of the gospels.
You’re rejection of the gospels accounts doesn’t come because of lack of evidence. It comes out of a presuppositional commitment to positivism and philosophical naturalism. You’ve ALREADY DETERMINED miracles don’t happen, so when you are presented with historical testimony to it happening, you reject the evidence and cling to your presuppositional BELIEF.
The fact that you continue to be unable to articulate what kind of “evidence” you’d expect and want to find for Jesus’ healing of the blind bears this out.
Considering we have just referenced Licona’s Raising of the Dead Saints debacle he had with Geisler I am surprised you are still going to assert any sort of reliability.
Furthermore, any such claims of reliability are further diminished when we consider the interpolations, the fact we have no original documents, and no idea who the authors were.
So, on this claim you have provided not a shred of evidence to support your assertion of reliability.
And this is why I reject the gospels, as you reject Ham’s YECism – no evidence.
And for this reason there is no evidence
that convinced you.
All you have is faith.
For goodness’ sake, Joel, at least have the integrity to acknowledge this fact.
No, you are jumping all over the two most hard to understand verses in the gospels in order to justify your dismissal of all of it.
And again, you are refusing to articulate what kind of evidence you would consider convincing for Jesus’ healings.
The repeated deflection points to one thing: Your commitment to your confirmation bias.
Not in the least.
The examples I listed are perfect to demonstrate the unreliability of the gospels. And there are plenty of other examples I am sure you are aware of.
We can go through them if you are up to it?
I am not sure if you are grasping how ridiculous this request is, especially as I have been at pains to tell you over and over there is no evidence for the character Jesus of Nazareth – the divinely claimed walking in water raised from the dead as described in the gospels.
If you are able to provide evidence of this character’s historical veracity then perhaps we can discuss the question of miraculous healing.
Not a ridiculous request at all. You keep screaming for “evidence,” so I ask you to articulate what kind of evidence you are looking for. In response, you deflect and refuse to do so.
If someone asks you what kind of evidence you want, and you keep responding, “There is no evidence! Provide evidence!” that is evidence that you are deflecting and aren’t asking for evidence in good faith.
Again. Demonstrate the historical veracity of the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth as described in the bible and then we can discuss the topic of miraculous healings.
Your call.
It is quite clear that your constant demands for “evidence” are a rouse. You, in fact, dismiss any evidence that doesn’t confirm to your presuppositional bias. You’ve already determined Jesus is a literary character and that his miracles didn’t happen, therefore you reject historical testimony that attests to those very things. Why? Because you already know they didn’t. And how do you already know that? You have a presuppositions faith in POSITIVISM.
Again, you’re not fooling anyone.
I’m still awaiting your articulation of the kind of evidence you want to hear and the kind you would find convincing.
Not at all.
You claim the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth is divine, walked on water, healed people, performed exorcisms was raised from the dead and is the creator of the universe.
Yet you provide no evidence whatsoever for such astounding assertions, and yet demand of me to state what evidence would convince me that these things really happened when you refuse point blank to provide any evidence to show what convinced you!
The audacity of your demand is beyond a joke.
Again, you should be able to articulate what kind of evidence you want when you demand evidence.
But you can’t or won’t because you’re playing a shell game.
No one is fooled.
I did make a concession of sorts. I asked you to provide evidence to demonstrate the historical veracity of the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth.
So far you have not even bothered to try.
Both Lee and I have done that repeatedly.
Again, care to articulate the kind of “evidence” you are demanding? When you say, “Show me evidence,” what are you wanting to see?”
No you haven’t. All you have done is make claims.
Still waiting for an answer to the question I have asked numerous times. Not going to hold my breath, though, because it is clear you can’t articulate an answer that clarifies what you mean by “evidence.”
I did. Read the reply concerning the raising of Lazarus.
No, you simply pointed to another miracle claim in the Gospels and said, “What’s your evidence?”
What kind of evidence do you want and expect? A plaque from the first century that marks the tomb where it happened? Burial clothes with Lazarus’ DNA? What?
Come on. This isnt a hard question I’ve been asking for the padt 4 hours: “What kind of evidence do you have in mind when you demand evidence?”
In fact this is what I asked.
”Example: Can you substantiate the gospel claim that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead?”
Well, can you?
Thank you for repeating the question that I pointed out you asked.
So AGAIN, what kind of evidence do you want and are looking for? Hypothetically, what evidence would convince you that Jesus healed the blind man or raised Lazarus?
As this is without precedent, I would start by examining the evidence that convinced you.
So, what was the evidence that convinced you?
We’ve gone over this before. Both Lee and I have said we accept the historical reliability of the gospels claims as valid historical testimony. Historians and scholars do this all the time.
But let the record show that you have unequivocally refused to answer my simple question. The reason why is because it exposes your shell game.
No one is fooled.
You have indeed! And yet you have provided no evidence to support such claims.
And no professional historian worth their salt will accept the miracle claims of the gospels, or any other text without evidence.
Why do you think this is, Joel?
One can presume that, most of these people are intelligent, yet they will no more accept miracle claims from the bible, or those who champion such miracle claims, than they would accept such claims about Zeus.
Therefore, bearing in mind your steadfast refusal to tell me the evidence that convinced you of the veracity of these miracle claims I feel the only answer is that, you and Lee believe in the veracity of the gospels based on faith and faith alone.
This is somewhat odd, as you are perfectly at home accepting scientific evidence that demonstrates how ridiculous The Flood narrative is, for example.
Why is this I wonder?
1. Sure we have.
2. “No professional historian worth their salt will accept the miracle claims of the gospels”–Since you mentioned him already, you don’t think NT Wright is “worth his salt”? There are many other solid biblical scholars and historians who DO accept the miracle claims. So on this, you are just provably wrong.
3. Again, both Lee and I have answered your question.
4. And AGAIN (surprise, surprise) you are deflecting and refusing to answer my simple question.
Again…no one fooled.
Again, really simple question, phrased in yet ANOTHER way: Hypothetically-speaking, let’s say Jesus really did heal a blind man or raise Lazarus from the dead. IF HE DID, what evidence would you expect that would be enough to convince that he really did do those things?
Please, for the love of Mithras, Ark, try to directly answer my question.
Lee and I HAVE given your our rationale and the evidence we accept. NT Wright IS one of the most preeminent NT scholars and historians out there. There are PLENTY of NT scholars and historians who accept the veracity of the miracle accounts.
So to sum up: You ARE deflecting and refusing to articulate what kind of evidence would convince you. The fact that I’ve asked this for the past six hours and have yet to received a straightforward answers speaks volumes. You won’t give an answer because either you don’t have one or you know full well that the answer you WANT to say (i.e. “There is no evidence I would ever accept, because I already don’t believe miracles happen”) blows a hole in this whole façade that you are “Really just are looking for evidence.” You aren’t. You are just in your own confirmation bias loop that is rooted in your own presuppositional faith in positivism and philosophical naturalism.
End of discussion. Check mate. No one is fooled.
You haven’t provided any evidence only claims.
Feel free to present a short list of professional historians who accept miracle claims.
False. There is only evidence. If it cannot be substantiated it remains a claim.
I have stated repeatedly we are dealing with a literary figure for whom there is no evidence.
Do you believe the claims of prophecy reported by Tacitus regarding supposed divine qualities about Vespasian?
Do you accept the divine nature of the Flood narrative claimed to be truth by the likes of Ken Ham?
Of course you don’t! So please stop being disingenuous regarding other miracle claims.,
3. To accept evidence of a miracle one would have to first provide evidence of a miracle.
I have repeatedly asked you to provide or at least divulge the evidence that convinced you and you have refused, which strongly suggests there is no evidence, and your acceptance of miracles is based solely on faith.
I will remind you that, the onus is on you, the claimant, and not the skeptic, to provide evidence.
Yes, someone is fooled … you.
What…is…your…definition…of…evidence?
For the love of Medusa, try to directly answer my question: Presuming Jesus really healed the blind man/raised Lazarus, WHAT EVIDENCE WOULD YOU EXPECT THERE TO BE?
Regarding miracles: They are not like the repeatable laws of nature. Furthermore, human activity in history is mostly known THROUGH WRITING AND TESTIMONY. Yes, archeology can help with “big picture” items, but specific human interaction is hardly ever “proven” by archeology. The only “evidence” for most of human interaction, be it a miracle or just day to day things like “He went to this town,” is that of human writing and testimony. If we were to only accept historical claims if they were confirmed by archeological evidence, we would know virtually nothing about any history.
So, AGAIN….PLEEASSSSSEEEE give a straightforward answer to my question: If Jesus did heal or raise the dead, WHAT KIND OF EVIDENCE WOULD YOU EXPECT THERE TO BE?
Again, the situation is unprecedented, not least by that great big IF. And of course the problem further compounded as we are dealing with a literary character for whom there is no evidence.
However, as you believe in the veracity of this character and the tales about him and are adamant c there is evidence then let us first evaluate this evidence you claim exists.
Please present the evidence you claim you have for me to examine.
Gotcha…you’re just not going to give a real answer.
No one is fooled.
A: “What’s your evidence?”
Me: “The historical testimony of the gospels.”
A: “That’s not evidence! What’s you’re evidence?”
Me: “What kind of evidence would you expect for Jesus’ miracles?”
A: “What’s your evidence?”
Me: “I gave you my evidence and my reason for believing the gospels are historically reliable. So, what evidence would you expect?”
A: [Over the course of EIGHT HOURS!!] Effectively says, “Not gonna answer that! I’m a master of deflection and no one can tell!”
Newsflash: Everyone can tell. You’re not fooling anyone.
Aside for the fact it can be shown how unreliable the gospels are, just how many times must I say this?
This is a claim, not evidence, and unless you can substantiate this claim it will remain a claim and nothing more.
Seriously, Joel, do you never wonder why those who claim veracity for miracles have no credibility in the scientific community?
It is for the similar reasons why we both know that Ken Ham has no credibility for his preposterous YEC claims.
No Evidence.
And you have repeatedly demonstrated why you have no credibility in this regard either.
I have no need to fool anyone. You, on the other hand, have already fooled yourself, and I suspect you know this only too well, don’t you, Joel?
What…kind…of…evidence…would…you…expect? For YOU, what kind of evidence would you deem convincing to substantiate those claims?
WHAT? Name SOMETHING. What kind of evidence is needed to verify those claims, in your opinion?
Again, probably for the 100th time: Can you give a straightforward answer to that question?
Again, never having encountered such a scenario this is way outside my field of experience, thus I have no idea.
What was the evidence that convinced you?
Or are you just shamming for the sake of appearance?
It is outside of YOUR expertise to determine what would convince YOU? ??? Hahaha…
No, fantastic miracle tales are outside my experience. Though you seem reasonably well versed which is why I asked you for the evidence that convinced you of their veracity.
Something you seem reluctant to do. I am suspecting you may be fibbing here, Joel.
In all seriousness, my question gets to the heart of the problem. Normally, when one asks for evidence, that person has an idea concerning what he/she would deem as convincing. But if you cannot articulate what would convince you, then your request for evidence becomes meaningless. You might as well be asking me to provide, “Skidlybopawowow!”
What does that mean?
“Sorry, I dont have the expertise to determine that.”
I am being deadly serious when I ask you for details of the evidence that convinced you.
Miracle claims fall outside all normal parameters so I have no real idea what would convince me of their veracity, and especially the biblical claims where we are dealing with a character for whom there is no evidence.
If you claim he is god and able to perform miracles then the onus is on you to demonstrate this.
This is why I ask you to reveal the evidence that convinced you. At least this is a jump off point, something for me to consider.
And this is why I find it highly suspicious that you don’t have the courage of your convictions to reveal what was the evidence that convinced you.
If, in fact, all you have is faith then I accept this.
But of there is more then at least have the integrity to state what it is and stop playing these gotcha games.
Here’s where you’re going wrong. Forget the whole idea that “Jesus is God” for a moment. The Gospels are making historical claims: That there was a Jewish guy from Nazareth who said and did certain things in history. Therefore, they are historical claims, and since they are historical claims, we assess them in the same way we assess any historical claims. You keep asking for evidence–okay. Since they are claimed to have happened IN HISTORY, I keep on asking you what kind of evidence you’d expect. That is a valid question: What HISTORICAL evidence would convince you of that HISTORICAL claim.
You are confusing that with the bigger existential/philosophical question of whether or not there is a reality beyond this material universe, and thus whether or not miracles are possible. Forgetting the Gospels or Christianity for the moment, I am open to the possibility that there is more to reality that this material universe for a variety of reasons. There are things that happen that have no material explanation; there are experiences that people have all around the world that defy the reductionist logic of positivism. Everything about human beings points to some kind of reality that goes beyond mere the mere cause-and-effect facts of the natural world. Because of that I have a certain epistemological openness to the possibility of there being something more. I’m not going to reject every claim out of hand.
With that mindset, when I come to the Gospels, I analyze them and understand that they are, in fact, historical biographies. I research and find that virtually every scholar and historian agrees that the basic facts of Jesus presented in the Gospels are historical. He really existed, had a messianic movement, had disciples, had the reputation of healing people and exorcizing demons, ran afoul of the Temple authorities during Passover of probably AD 33, and was crucified by Pilate on the eve of Passover. And then, it is equally factual that shortly after his death, his disciples claimed he had resurrected. And then it is also historically undeniable that that “Jesus movement” took off in Jerusalem initially, but then Jesus’ followers were persecuted by the Jewish authorities, and most of them fled and ended up going throughout the Roman Empire. None of what I just said is really even controversial among most biblical scholars and historians. That’s a pretty accurate historical picture that hardly anyone objects to. All that convinces me that the Gospels and Acts are telling about real history and that they are pretty reliable.
And smack dab in the middle of those books that tell of irrefutable historical facts that most scholars and historians acknowledge, we have claims of that historical figure Jesus healing people somehow. Since I am epistemologically open to the possibility that there is more to reality that just the cause-and-effect material universe, and since these claims are found in acknowledged historical books, I’m not going to dismiss them out of hand.
So, personal experience, the claims and experiences of human beings around the world, my refusal to blindly accept philosophical positivism, the historical reliability of the Gospels/Acts, the fact that miracle accounts are found in the historical works of the Gospels/Acts–all of that and more weaves together to convince me that the testimony in the Gospels is convincing evidence that Jesus really did those things.
So, what would I expect if Jesus did, in fact, do those things? I would think that people would write about it and tell others about it. I would think they would write down accounts about it. And that is what we find. We have accounts from that time period that testify to the fact these things happened.
It’s not just “one thing.” It is the entirety of human experience and an honest assessment of the Gospels and Acts.
Don’t be ridiculous. This is the central theme of the gospels and your religion so how on earth can one ”forget it …”
Exactly! And part of these claims involve claims of miracles for which no evidence is provided and thus are dismissed.
And this is the same reason why claims of a global flood and a 6000 year earth as claimed by YECs lime Ken Ham are rejected. No evidence.
The rest of this lengthy paragraph is filled with assertions that historians do not agree upon at all. In fact, all that you will find as any sort of consensus is the agreement/belief that someone called Yeshua existed, he had a few disciples and was likely crucified by Pilate for sedition. Period.
All the other things have no evidential basis at all and remain claims/speculation.
Wrong! For goodness sake, will you stop with this erroneous claim of reliability already: Neither the gospels or Acts are reliable and we have already discussed the reasons why, so please stop being pedantic ans borderline disingenuous.
This is why you, Joel are going wrong and are confusing faith claims with evidence.
False.
More power to ya. Enjoy your confirmation bias bubble and your presuppositional faith in positivism and philosophical naturalism.
Cue curtain. Good night.
Besides which, there’s different kinds of evidence. It isn’t all archaeological. How would you even have archaeological evidence of a healing or exorcism in the first place?
There is only evidence, Lee. If a claim cannot be substantiated then it remains a claim.
Consider the miraculous claim of Yahweh flooding the entire world as per Genesis ch 6-9, and Ken Ham’s YEC interpretation of the biblical tale.
For this there is no evidence . In fact scientific evidence tells us categorically that it did not happen, and even Joel will agree with this. He has even written a book about Ham’s ‘‘heresy’’.
Therefore, as you will likely agree that the Flood narrative as nothing more than some sort of apocalyptic imagery and dismiss any claims of veracity, why then, would you compromise your integrity and bend the rules of evidence when it comes to other miraculous claims?
There are many other examples. A well known one would be the tale of the raising of the dead saints at the time of the crucifixion (as described in gMatthew). Licona described this as apocalyptic imagery if memory serves, and not to be understood literally.
After what amounted to little more than a witch hunt led by Norman Geisler Licona was removed from his position of employment for refusing to offer a retraction.
Geisler (and others) asserted that Licona’s description of the event was considered to undermine the gospel and Geisler’s brand of fundamentalist evangelism.
And yet Licona still clings to his claim that the gospels were authored by the names attached to them – something even an eminent scholar such as NT Wright flatly rejects.
Consider: Most rational people no longer believe in witches – but they are mentioned in the bible.
And yet, some people still believe in demons! The Catholic church even has an official ”office” for exorcism!
It is unfortunate that, instead of applying strict critical thinking to such issues so many Christians want their cake and eat it and this is what apologetics are there for – to provide theological answers to questions that, in this day and age, we shouldn’t even need to be asking.
You’re jumping all over the place. When the topic is the healing/resurrection claims, and you jump around to the flood story, a spat between Licona and Geisler, and the odd two verses every scholar admits are odd, that is called deflection.
And Wright doesnt “flatly reject” that. He discusses the issue, and admits that it isnt conclusive, but he doesnt reject it. He further largely accepts the traditional authorship of most of the NT books.
The issue is miracles. So using other examples is well within the bounds of this discussion to illustrate the point.
“I don’t know who the Gospel writers were and nor does anyone else.”
—NT Wright, New Testament scholar
Again, what “evidence” would you expect to support the claim of Jesus healing a blind man?
Again, Wright is not “rejecting” the notion regarding authorship. I just read his 900-page “NT in its World.” He discusses the issues and says it is ultimately inconclusive, but he doesn’t reject the traditional claims.
Re NT Wright. Fair enough. He doesn’t know who wrote the gospels. But it can be asserted that there is no evidence to suggest they were authored by the traditional names which were attached later.
We are dealing with a literary character , the walking on water, divine claimed raised from the dead creator of the universe for whom there is no evidence of ever having existed.
What evidence do you have that convinced you of the veracity of these tales?
No, the evidence isn’t conclusive. Huge difference than saying there is no evidence. As far as that goes, read Richard Bauckham’s book, “Jesus and the Eyewitnesses.” So, yes, there is evidence, and although not conclusive, is pretty good.
Again, you ask for evidence of the miracles, but then you turn around and can’t articulate what kind of evidence you’d want and you call Jesus in the Gospels a “literary character.” It’s a wonderful circle of confirmation bias. The fact is you’re not looking for evidence. You’ve already determined there is none because Jesus is a literary character, and because he’s a literary character, there is no evidence. You’re not fooling anyone with this shell game.
So again, you’re asking for evidence. What evidence would convince you? What kind of evidence would you expect?
Baukman is a Christian. So he is bound to be biased in favour of his personal belief.
Odd then that it is different from someone such as Wright.
So, once again, no evidence.
That allure of the circular wheel of confirmation bias is on full display.
No, Wright is not at odds with Bauckham. He thinks it is really good scholarship.
Heck, you’re already dismissing Bauckham and you don’t even know what his actual arguments are. You just say, “Oh he’s a Christian!” to dismiss him out of hand.
Not impressive.
One more attempt to ask you: “What evidence would you want to see for Jesus’ healing of the blind man? When you ask for evidence, what kind of evidence are you looking for?”
Ark, your definition of evidence seems to be waaay too narrow. Here are two defs:
1. “Something that furnishes proof: testimony
“Specifically something legally submitted to a tribunal to ascertain truth of the matter.”
2. “The available body of facts or information indicating whether a particular belief or proposition is true or valid.”
As a historian and genealogist I use various different types of evidence on a daily basis on
the job.
As for your claim that NT Wright “patently” rejects the traditional authorship of the gospels, this is misleading to say the least. He does admit that “strictly speaking” (his phrase) the gospels are anonymous because none of the four name their authors and as evryone knows the names were appended to them in the 2nd or 3rd century. But, for example, with regard to the gospel attributed to Luke, he writes:
“Internal evidence for Luke’s authorship meshes with the tradition but is far from decisive.” (NT Wright and Michael Bird, *The New Testament in its World,* p. 608)
This is his stated view regarding all of the canonical gospels. He’s got no problem with the traditional authorship but admits what most everyone admits, that technically speaking the gospels are anonymous. Wright certainly believes thd gospels were based on eyewitness testiony. If you’ve read Richard Bauckham’s *Jesus and the Eyewitnesses,* which makes a case for the traditional authorship, you’ll know that Wright was one of the reviewers and he gave the book high praise:
“The question of whether the gospels are based on eyewitness accounts has long been controversial. Richard Bauckham, in a tour de force, draws on unparalleled knowledge of the world of the first Christians to argue not only that the gospels do indeed contain eyewitness testimony but that their first readers would certainly have recognized them as such. This book is a remarkable piece of detective work . . . ” (from the book jacket)
But more important that precisely *who* wrote the gospels is the question of whether what they say about Jesus is accurate. And on that score Wright says:
“I simply record it as my conviction that the gour canonical gospels, broadly speaking, presdnt s portrait of Jesus which is firmly rooted in real history.”(NT Wright, “Can We Trust the Gospels?,” on beIiefnet.com)
I agree with him regarding the resurrected saints in Matthew’s passion narrative. Yet I still believe Jesus himself was literally resurrected, and I’ve posted several reasons as to why.
As for exorcisms, if you’ve read anything about Catholic exorcisms you’ll that the Church *only* allows for exorcisms in extreme cases, *after* psychotherapy has failed to bring results. And if you’ll remember I told you that my mother witnessed an exorcism thay my grandmother (an Episcopalian) participated in. I’d be skeptical too if my mother snd grandmother weren’t present and involved.
Pax.
Lee.
Such extended comments are simply apologetic diatribes and are tiresome to plough through.
Yes, personal belief with no evidence to support it.
Let’s rather keep our dialogue succinct and on point, please.
There is only evidence. If you cannot provide evidence to substantiate a claim it remains a claim. Period.
“There is only evidence.”
And yet, you seem unwilling or unable to define exactly what kind of evidence you want or expect.
Are you suggesting you really don’t know the difference between a claim and evidence?
Are you saying you dont realize historians accept written records and testimony as historical evidence every day? That you don’t realize that is part of historical research ?
Oh, I know how historians work. But it is obvious you don’t actually understand the difference between a claim and evidence.
This is why the basis of your Christian worldview is built on the acceptance of claims based on faith. Not evidence.
Obviously you don’t.
We have historical claims in historical biographies from the first century. That is called “testimony.” Historians accept and historical testimony as evidence all the time.
So, when you demand “evidence,” not only are you rejecting first century testimonial evidence, you continue to fail/refuse to articulate what kind of evidence you want to see.
Again, care to do that?
We have historical claims
Absolutely we do. And those that can be substantiated are considered to be evidence.
If you can substantiate any gospel claim then it should be considered as evidence.
Example: Can you substantiate the gospel claim that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead?
Do historians consider the claim in the bible to be evidence this was an actual historical event or merely a claim?
“Dialogue?” It takes two people actually addressing the arguments to have a dialogue. No one can have a dialogue with you because you keep attempting to redefine the terms and refusing to address pretty much anything we’ve actuallh said.
You claim you can name a dozen academic NT scholars whoare skeptical of Jesus’ historical existence but when pressed to name even one of them refuse to do so. Then you repeatedly quote NT Wright out of context in order to prove a point (hoping no one has actually read NT Wr
Until we can agree on the basic dictionary definition of “evidence” we aren’t going to get anywhere. But I suspect you don’t really want to get anywhere. You apparently don’t understand what you’re arguing for (or against!)
I must say, it’s rather like trying to have a rational discussion with a petulant child.
Pax.
Lee.
I have never tried to redefine the terms and have been explicit right from the word go.
A claim remains a claim and is not evidence unless it can be substantiated.
So whatever you claim about the bible the onus is on you to provide evidence.
I said half a dozen. If you can’t be bothered to read my comments properly then why should I bother to respond?
Furthermore, I feel no compunction to name anyone as you immediately dismissed Carrier without substantiating your refusal to accept him or even waiting to see if I named him as one of the six which strongly suggests you have a presuppositional bias.
How’s this?
Evidence: the available body of facts or information indicating whether a belief or proposition is true or valid.
And do you honestly believe you credibility is enhanced one iota by your childish insults?
This is not about developing a convincing argument, but producing evidence for your claims.
And remember, the onus is ALWAYS on the claimant – you – not the skeptic – me.
You are growing tiresome…
Tiresome, really? Because I won’t kowtow to intimidation by apologetic nonsense?
*Sigh* Isn’t it around this time you level some asinine insult at me, throw your toys out of the cot and delete the entire thread?
No, tiresome because you cowardly refuse to answer a simple question.
I have answered. You just don’t like my answer because it forces you to admit you have no evidence, and as a Christian you simply cannot accept this.
Haha…you haven’t answered. You demand “evidence,” yet refuse to describe the kind of evidence you think would substantiate the claims.
Again, want to answer? What kind of evidence WOULD convince you that Jesus healed the blind man or raised Lazarus?
I don’t demand anything. That would be impolite.
As we are dealing with a literary character for whom there is no evidence whatsoever, such claims currently reside in the realm of … let’s be kind and say the mythological.
It would be like asking me you what evidence would you accept that Harry Potter flew on a broomstick?
Can you see the problem?
Repeating silly assertions gets you nowhere.
Oh no…I wont delete this beauty. This has been utterly entertaining.
Well, it gave us something to do on yet another day of Lockdown.
I’m sure you will soon be rushing off to gleefully hug yourself while you pray.
Haha….no, I’ll just keep reading and finishing grading for the semester.
Well, I’ll probably watch a movie, and maybe retire a bit later. Our lockdown restrictions are being lifted a little tomorrow so we can do some business, thank goodness.
Arkhenaten, “evidence” is what historians–and I am one–use to decide whether or not a reported event is factual or not. For example, Josephus’ two references to Jesus constitute evidence for Jesus’ existende as the brother of James and for Jesus’ execution by the Romans at the instigaton of the Jewish establishment. What historians then have to do is evaluate the overall trustworthiness and reliabiliy of Josephus as a source regarding those claims. We can’t *prove* with 100% certainty the reliability of Josephus’ claims–or even that Josephus actually even existed for that matter. However historians have criteria they use to help decide whether such claims are accurate and reliable or not.
Because while science studies the repeatable and falsifiable, history studies the un-repeatable, it studies events that can only and ever have happened once.Thus historians use methods and criteria to sift the evidence they have. Surely you must’ve taken some college-level history courses?
Pax.
Lee.
<blockquote<Arkhenaten, “evidence” is what historians–and I am one–use to decide whether or not a reported event is factual or not.
I am aware what historians do and what methodology they use. Thanks. May I ask what qualifications you hold and are you a professional historian?
Many historians consider the ‘core’ of the TF- stripped of Christian interpolation – to be valid,while there is still some disagreement regarding the ”James” passage.
It is worth noting that at one time the entire passage (TF) was considered an interpolation – a forgery – as it was not quoted and that possibly Eusebius was responsible,
And may I ask that you presume I am familiar with all currently available references to the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth? This way it will avoid pedantic back and forth comments.
The issue of the existence of the character, Yeshu, or Yeshua, who was crucified by Pilate for sedition is not currently part of this discussion. This individual may very well have existed.
We are considering evidence for the divinely claimed, walk-on-water, born of a virgin, weather calming, Lazarus raising, 5000 feeding, raised from the dead creator of the universe whom you consider to be your saviour.
So, Lee, have you any evidence to substantiate the claims for this character?
And as Joel is reluctant to divulge specifics, perhaps you could tell me details of the evidence that convinced you of the veracity of all these claims?
Thanks.
Ark.
A. I gave you my rationale.
B. Yes, there was a historical Jesus. We know about him primarily in the Gospels, which are historical biographies. And in those historical biographies, we have accounts of healings, etc.
The comment was addressed to Lee. I thought that, as you had decided not to bother providing any evidence you were finished?
There is no evidence for the ”god-man” as featured in the gospels.
I did provide the evidence, and you refused to see it as evidence.
If someone heals a blind man, you’re not going to have archeological evidence for it. The evidence will be testimonial evidence. That is what we find in the gospels. You, though, reject them as “claims,” but then you refuse to articulate what kind of evidence you want to see.
That shows that your request is ultimately a disingenuous she’ll game that really only reflects you presuppositional faith in positivism.
What you state is evidence is merely a claim in a book known to contain almost every type of error under the sun. You might as well try to cite JK Rowlings as evidence that Harry Potter is real.
As you reject the evidence of a global flood and a 6000 year old earth what sort of evidence would you accept to the veracity of this biblical claim?
No, your characterization of the gospels is just wildly wrong. No one in their right mind equates the gospels with Harry Potter.
I reject the claims of a literal, historical flood because Gen 1-11 clearly is in the ancient genre of myth. The gospels are clearly in the genre of ancient historical biography.
And yet the gospels are;
not eyewitness testimony (not that this would exonerate them, as we know how unreliable eyewitness testimony is )
are anonymous
Contain contradictions
Contain (interpolation) forgery:
to name but a few problems.
What ever they claim to be is irrelevant as to the reliability of their contents and from the short list above they cannot be regarded as trustworthy and almost nothing of what they claim can be substantiated and certainly not the miracle claims.
And has been pointed out to you time and again, there is no evidence for the central character, Jesus of Nazareth as described in the gospels.
.
And as we know from your initial comments last year, when you first starting commenting on my blog, you are quite sympathetic to the mythicist Carrier. Your repeated claims about the gospels are wild distortions that smack of Carrier’s bogus claims.
AGAIN, for the 132nd time, what kind of evidence would you expect that would verify and substantiate a person healed another person? “Evidence! Evidence! What’s the evidence?” Okay, what kind of evidence are you expecting? “Evidence! Evidence! What kind of evidence?” Okay, what kind of evidence would convince you? “I don’t know! I can’t answer that! Give me evidence!”
No one is fooled.
Yes, although he can be extremely long winded at times, I find some of what Carrier writes to be worthy of consideration.
Of what relevance is this to our discussion?
I suggest the best we can do is for you to tell me the evidence that convinced you and we can look at it together.
Carrier is more than just long-winded. He’s a nut, and no serious scholar takes him seriously.
I told you the evidence that convinces me.
You still refuse to explain what kind of evidence you would accept. Until you do that, your demand for evidence is meaningless.
It isn’t evidence, Joel, merely a claim, and I have explained why.
That you consider the tales in the bible as evidence when they have been shown to be unreliable to the point that some of the contents are rank forgeries tells a lot about what you are willing to swallow in the name of belief … or perhaps one should rather use the term positivism.
So, what you are really saying is that your belief is primarily because of feelings, quite likely due to some form of indoctrination, either as a child or adult, and possibly as a result of emotional needs.
This is pretty much standard with most if not all converts and more so the evangelical type.
And this is not merely my personal observation through reading such people over the years, but also- and much more telling – the honest admissions from those who have deconverted from Christianity.
Faith generally precludes most if not all critical thinking when it comes to one’s religion, as you so often aptly demonstrate.
I told you the evidence that convinces me.
No, you have absolutely not done that. And you clearly do not know how biblical scholars and historians go about understanding history. They take texts and written accounts, especially those that are acknowledged to be HISTORICAL biographies, seriously.
Your constant assertion that the only reason I accept the gospels as historically reliable is because of some “childhood indoctrination” just re-reemphasizes the bankruptcy of your own position.
Again, you have NOT explained the kind of evidence you would find convincing. You have said, “I dunno!” That’s not an answer. That’s a cop-out.
It isn’t evidence, Joel.
You need to learn the difference between a claim and evidence.
So, if not through indoctrination, why did you become a Christian?
There is no” kind of evidence,” only evidence.
When you can demonstrate the historical veracity of the character, Jesus of Nazareth as portrayed in the bible then we can look at the so-called miracles.
Again, no. That is why Lee has said this is like arguing with a petulant child.
You asked for evidence and we gave you the reasons and evidence that convinces us. This is what historians do. Texts about history written during or shortly after the events in question are evidence and are taken into consideration. This is how historians and scholars do things. Yet, you dismiss them out of hand because, according to you, “We already know miracles don’t happen.” That statement is presuppositional positivism, pure and simple. That is YOUR “blind faith” showing.
Bottom line, you are saying that you don’t think the evidence of written testimony convinces you. Okay. But you still demand “evidence.” So a logical question is, “If the written testimony doesn’t convince you, what kind of evidence would?” And to this point, you have engaged in constant deflection and have refused to answer that question. Therefore, it is easy to conclude that you are disingenuous and all this isn’t really about a search for the truth. It is about you pushing your own “blind faith agenda” of positivism, pure and simple.
There is all kinds of evidence: archeological, written testimony, court records, etc. And the fact that you begrudgingly say, “Okay, there MIGHT have been a Yeshua, but then keep saying, “When you can demonstrate the historical veracity of the character, Jesus of Nazareth as portrayed in the bible,” shows that, bottom line, you are pretty much in the mythicist camp. You don’t REALLY believe in the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth. And that is simply a fringe, tinfoil hat position to take.
One last time: Care to articulate the kind of evidence that would convince you that someone healed another person of blindness? Forget it being Jesus. Just anyone. How would any claim in history of a healing be verified, in your opinion?
That you are convinced by the tales in the bible is one thing. These tales are not regarded as evidence as they cannot be substantiated. Thus, until they are, they remain claims.
And this is all there is to it, I’m afraid.
If you wish to make a claim that some 1st century Jew called Jesus of Nazareth was born of a virgin Jewess then, as an adult performed miracles, including controlling the weather, walking on water, raising people from the dead, curing all kinds of ailments including blindness, and then after being executed was raised from the dead himself you have to provide evidence.
This is one reason why historians do not consider miracle claims.
Also:
The gospels are not eyewitness accounts.
They are anonymous.
The are unreliable, not least because in certain aspects they are contradictory, contain interpolation(forgery) and the writers of gMatthew and gLuke plagiarized gMark.
However:
Most historians and scholars consider someone called Yeshua likely existed sometime in the first century; had a ministry for a year or two, had a few disciples, and was eventually crucified by the Romans for sedition. After all, as Hitchen pointed out, it is easier to believe there was someone
behind the god man myth rather than him having been made out of whole cloth.
There is no evidence, however for the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth who is claimed to have been divine, raised people from the dead, walked on water, was executed and raised from the dead by Yahweh and also just happened to be the creator of the universe.
That you insist on your brand of positivism in this regard is simply without any sort of worthwhile foundation.
1. Again, what you dismiss as “tales” because they don’t fit with your presuppositional bias of positivism, many scholars and historians call historical texts that have testimonial evidence.
2. Again, please articulate the kind of evidence that would be needed to verify the account of Jesus healing a blind man or raising Lazarus? After 134 times asking, you still are refusing to do so.
3. No, most scholars acknowledge the gospels to be written anywhere between the 60s-80s AD and acknowledge that they are talking about real historical people and real historical events. Some may questions parts within the gospels here and there, but the overall historical picture is considered by most scholars not named “Carrier” to be reliable and accurate.
4. Your last comment tells me that you have no idea what “positivism” is.
5. Please, in a strictly, this-worldly, in-history kind of way, what kind of “evidence” would you want to see if you read a claim that someone had healed someone of blindness? Will the 135th time do the trick? I doubt it, but you can always surprise me.
1. Except they are not testimonial evidence as they are, unreliable anonymous texts, that contain forgery (interpolation), and gMatthew and gLuke plagiarized gMark.
And we haven’t even discussed what was unearthed at Nag Hammedi.
2. *Smile*
3. Really? Most scholars? I won’t even dignify this with a reply.
4. Positivism is the state of being certain or very confident of something. An example of positivism is a Christian being absolutely certain there is a God.
I’ll post the link if you’re humble enough to ask for it.
5. *Smile*
1. Your take on the “synoptic problem” is woefully inadequate. Yes the texts are first century testimony about Jesus, written no later than 30-40 years later.
2. I thought not. Good thing I wasn’t holding my breath.
3. Of course not, because all you’d be able to do is pick out a few scholars who hold a minority position. The dates of M, M, and L are set around the 70s-80s.
4. Positivism is a philosophical theory stating that certain (“positive”) knowledge is based on natural phenomena and their properties and relations. … Introspective and intuitive knowledge is rejected, as are metaphysics and theology because metaphysical and theological claims cannot be verified by sense experience. –There you go…you learned something.
5. Sheepishly smiling, because you know you’re shell game is found out. Nobody is fooled.
Yes, someone is fooled … you.
You believe in the veracity of the bible.
You would have saved everyone a lot of time if you were just honest and said, “Yes, the gospels are historical biographies that talk about what the historical Jesus did and said. Yes, I acknowledge that the only kind of evidence there can be for an extraordinary event, indeed, virtually ANY person-to-person interaction, is that of testimonial evidence. Yes, I acknowledge that in these historical biographies there are claims of Jesus doing miracles, but I don’t believe those parts because I have a presuppositional worldview that there is no God, no spiritual world, and no reality beyond the cause-and-effect material universe. Therefore, I rule out even the possibility of Jesus doing miracles in the first place.”
That is all you had to say. At least that would have been straightforward and honest, and we wouldn’t have had to engage in this long discussion where I have to call you out on your disingenuous shell game.
As it stands, this discussion is a BEAUTY. I have thoroughly enjoyed it.
In other words, they are claims and you cannot provide any evidence to substantiate them, and that your personal belief in the historicity of the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth( as a god man) is solely based on faith underpinned by some form of emotional need likely brought on because of trauma.
This is all you needed to say, Joel. And I can ask several former Christians to support such a statement and also point you to the clergy project where you will find hundreds of similar testimonies from honest, forthright former professional Christians.
They are historical claims made in acknowledge historical biographies of Jesus, written within 30-40 years later. That is what testimonial evidence looks like. It’s that simple. If you were honest, you’d just say, “Yes, that evidence isn’t convincing enough for me, because I rule out the possibility of the supernatural from the start.”
You say my faith is “solely based on faith underpinned by some sort of emotional need likely brought on because of trauma.” What is your “evidence” of this?
You have nothing. You’ve been found out. Instead of asking for evidence of the miraculous, just come out and be honest for once and say, “I don’t BELIEVE it is even possible. I am a positivist, and if there is no purely physical or natural explanation, I deny its existence.”
It is my experience that Christians are either indoctrinated from the knee or convert because of some sort of emotional issue, coupled with social pressure.
I apologise if this is not the case with your conversion/belief. I would be interested to hear the story of why you are a Christian.
Is is not that I don’t believe in the possibility of the supernatural,only that no evidence has been provided to demonstrate such a phenomena.
The gospels are not biographies in the modern sense of the word, neither are they objective historical accounts. Rather, they are stories told in such a way as to evoke a certain image of Jesus for a particular audience.
And once again, they are anonymous, replete with errors, including interpolation (forgery) and the authors of gMatthew and gLuke plagiarized gMark.
I will remind you we have not touched on what was found at Nag Hammadi that did not make it into the bible and the relevance of certain of these texts.
You don’t need me to elaborate, I’m sure.
None of the miraculous claims (among other things) made within the gospel texts can be substantiated, and there is absolutely no evidence of the existence of the central character , the miracle-working, raised from the dead figure, Jesus of Nazareth who is also claimed to be the creator of the universe.
I’ll just comment on one thing. The reason the stuff at Nag Hammadi didn’t make it into the NT canon is because there is zero evidence in among any of the Church Fathers that they were used, let alone even known about, in the early Church. All of it is dated at the earliest to the mid-2nd century. The conclusion is easy to make: They’re not in the canon because they were never used or acknowledged by the Church.
Plus there’s the fact that they bear all the hallmarks of Gnosticism and that some of the stuff is just flat out bizarre. If you are adamant on saying that the synoptic gospels are trippy, I don’t even know why you’d bring up Nag Hammadi.
Okay, I can’t help it…again, WHAT kind of evidence do you think expect to substantiate the miracle claims in the gospels???
never really considered it. Tell me what evidence convinced you and we can discuss it. Maybe it will convince me?
By the way, what was the reason you became Christian if not through indoctrination?
Hahaha…maybe you should consider it and get a clear answer before you ask for it.
Again, Lee and I have given you the reasons and evidence that have convinced us. The fact you keep asking doesn’t reflect well on you.
Reasons, yes. Not evidence.
So the reasons are all based on feelings.
Is this why you converted/became a Christian?
Was it all a cultural thing or was there some emotional issues involved as well?
It is amazing and amusing how, in an attempt to deflect from the fact that you refuse to clarify what kind of evidence for miracles you’d consider credible, you’ve now resorted to trying to psychoanalyze us to find the “emotional issues” that are supposedly at the root of our belief in Christ.
Listen, Ark, I’m not writing things on my blog to try to “witness” to people or “convert” people. I’m not trying to convince people of facts, or anything like that. I find Biblical Studies fascinating. I’ve been in the field for 25 years–Biblical Studies opens up the door to OT and NT history and OT and NT literature. Even if I wasn’t a Christian, I’d still find it all fascinating and intellectually stimulating. I just don’t think I’d go about it like an atheistic Fundamentalist who just has a one-track mind on “having to prove it’s all a crock!”
It has been my experience that hard core Christian Fundamentalists and hard core atheist Fundamentalists basically go about discussing the Bible, Biblical History, and Biblical Literature, pretty much in the same way: as a battleground to throw “fact bombs” at each other. It’s tiresome and wholly uninteresting. I have no other agenda that to put the OT and the NT in the clearest light possible to understand them within their original historical and literary contexts. If someone doesn’t believe the Exodus happened or that Jesus healed people–fine. Good for you. Quite frankly, I don’t care. It’s not my job to “convert” you. It’s my job to make sure the OT and NT texts are read and understood in the clearest possible light. What you do with it is up to you.
I don’t ”have(ing) to prove it’s all a crock!”
You are the one making all the claims, therefore the onus is on you to prove it isn’t..
Surely you are aware of this, Joel?
And I too find it quite fascinating.
I was not for one second suggesting you were trying to convert anyone, let alone me, for goodness sake!
And you seem to be doing a pretty good job until you let your faith-based beliefs influence some of your conclusions.
Yawning and bored with you.
Still waiting for you to articulate the kind of evidence you’d find convincing for a claim of healing.
History is replete with claims by so-called healers around he globe. Many are modern day. None have been independently verified.
If ever one is then I shall look at the evidence presented with keen interest.
In the Mishnah the sages taught, “At first they tied the scarlet yarn on the outside of
the door to the Temple entrance. If the yarn turned white, the people
saw it and rejoiced, but if it did not turn white, they felt sad and
ashamed. To prevent this, they began to tie it to the inside of the door
to the Temple entrance, but the people were still peeking in though
the doorway to see if it became white. If it turned white, they rejoiced,
but if it did not turn white, they felt sad and ashamed. To prevent this,
they began to tie the scarlet yarn to the rock in the wilderness where
the goat was pushed over the edge.” (b.Yoma 67a)
In the Mishnah, the sages taught: “For the forty years before the destruction of the
Temple the lot for the LORD on Yom Kippur did not come up in the
right hand; the strip of red cloth did not turn white; the western light
of the menorah did not stay lit; and the doors of the Temple would
not stay closed but opened up by themselves, until Rabbi [Yochanan]
ben Zakkai rebuked them. He said to them, “Temple, Temple for
what purpose do you frighten with your counsel. I know about you!
Your future ending will be destruction, for Zechariah ben Ido has
already prophesied about you [in Zechariah 11:1], ‘Open your doors,
O Lebanon, so that fire may devour your cedars!’” (b.Yoma 39b)
Josephus confirms the story about the doors of the Temple opening on
their own accord:
“Moreover, the eastern gate of the inner temple, which was of brass,
and vastly heavy, and had been with difficulty shut by twenty men,
and rested upon a base covered with iron and had bolts fastened very
deep into the firm floor, which was there made of an entire stone,
was seen to be opened of its own accord about the sixth hour of the
night. Now those that kept watch in the temple came but running to
the captain of the temple, and told him of it; who then came up there,
and not without great difficulty was able to shut the gate again. This
also appeared to the [uneducated] to be a very happy prodigy, as if God
did thereby open them the gate of happiness. But the men of learning
understood it, that the security of their holy house was dissolved of
its own accord, and that the gate was opened for the advantage of
their enemies. So these publicly declared that the signal foreshadowed
the desolation that was coming upon them.” (Josephus, Jewish War,
6:293–296/vi.3)
By recording that these signs began to appear 40 years
before the Temple’s destruction, the Mishnah and Josephus point toward
SOMETHING happening around 30 CE, even if as Jews they did not see
that what that SOMETHING was. For SOME reason, for 40 years, (1) the red cloth
no longer miraculously turned white, (2) the lot “for the LORD” no longer came up in the
high priest’s right hand, (3) the western lamp no longer stayed lit, and (4) the gates of the
Temple no longer stayed shut.
For example, the lot had a 50% chance each year of coming up one way or the other. 2 to the power
40 is over 1 million million. Anyone can claim that it was just incredibly bad luck or
that the whole story is fake, but why would non-Messianic Jews of the 1st and 2nd centuries
tell such a story?
Arkhenaten, I’ve been a public historian at the Florence-Lauderdale Public Library in Florencem Al (Dr. Anderson’s town) for twenty-three years. I’ve written/published one book and four articles.
As for your claims to be well-versed in NT studies, this isn’t clear at all based upon your repeatedly misquoting and misinterpeting NT Wright’s views on gospel authorship–even after we called you on it–your defense of Richard Carrier as a noted NT academic, your refusal or inability to name even *one* academic scholar who questions Jesus’ historical existence and your repeated attempts to ignore the historical method and redefine what constitutes valid historical evidence.
We’ve posted several pages’ worth of evidence for the overall reliability of the gospels. But ultimately it comes down to faith. This isn’t as shocking as it might appear condidering that I, you and every other skeptic on the planet routinely make faith-based decisions on a daily basis.
For example, you drink the latte the barista serves you at Starbucks based on your faith that she hasn’t spit in it first. You buy a plane ticket based upon your faith that the plane won’t crash. And you buy a car based upon your faith that its mechanically sound, obviously after kicking the tires, checking under the hood and then taking it for a test drive. But you can’t check every system on the car, you just have to proceed on faith that, as far as you can tell, the car’s in good running shape.
That’s how it is regarding the miracle traditions in the gospels: since they’ve proven reiable in areas we *can* check, we give them the benefit of the doubt in areas we *can’t* verify.
Name me one critical scholar who argues that we should disregard everything Suetonius or TacItus wrote just because they report that the Caesars were popularly considered to be divine.
Besides, as Dr. Anderson keeps asking, what kind of evidence other than written eyewitness testimony could you even expect to have for such one-off supernatural events as the miracles? Your claim that ancient oral tradition was/is unreliable is based upon the ananchronistic assumption that ancient oral tradition operated exactly the way modern oral tradition does, which is incorrect. The ancient cultures shich produced the NT,, as largely Illiterate, oral societies, put more stock in oral tradition, thus developed safeguards to ensure its accurate transmission.
The kind of absolute proof you seem to demand doesn’t exist for ANY recorded historicsl event, lt alone one-off supernatural occurrences, becsuse while science studies tge repeatable, history studies the UN-repeatable.
Finally, we’re not slaves to the presuppositions of positivism and materialism as you are. Unlike you, we do not stack the deck by ruling the supernatural out of bounds begore we even begin. We *do* attempt to be conscious of our prejudices and biasesu, but we also know total objectivity is neither possible nor even necessary. And we see the difference between a radical, almost paranoid skepticism and critical thinking.
Pax.
Lee.
That’s how it is regarding the miracle traditions in the gospels: since they’ve proven reiable in areas we *can* check, we give them the benefit of the doubt in areas we *can’t* verify.
***Nicely put!***
Finally, we’re not slaves to the presuppositions of positivism and materialism as you are. Unlike you, we do not stack the deck by ruling the supernatural out of bounds begore we even begin. We *do* attempt to be conscious of our prejudices and biasesu, but we also know total objectivity is neither possible nor even necessary. And we see the difference between a radical, almost paranoid skepticism and critical thinking.
***Bam!***
@ Lee
False. They are unreliable and do not convey objective historical accounts. Furthermore, gMatthew and gLuke plagiarized from gMark. They also contain interpolations(forgeries)
Rather, they are stories told in such a way as to evoke a certain image of Jesus for a particular audience.
Thank you. Some honesty at last. I
I make decisions based on trust gained through experience based on evidence.
Your core religious based beliefs are based on faith, not evidence.
Then please demonstrate how you ascertained the veracity of the unsubstantiated miracle claims in the bible?
Off the top of my head I cannot think of one. The obvious point you are missing here is that, while scholars and historians will carefully evaluate all historical claims they will not accept any divine claims made by these men. Perhaps if you re-read your comment you might see the problem?
I cannot truly say. So tell me the evidence that convinced you and maybe we can look at it and discuss it? Perhaps the same evidence will convince me?
But didn’t you say that ultimately it is simply a matter of faith, not evidence?
I am pretty sure I never once mentioned oral tradition …
I think this may be another example of you not reading my comments properly.
Not once have I mentioned proof nor have I demanded anything at all. The term I have used throughout is evidence and it is all I have asked for.
Actually you are. And probably even more so.
Positivism is the state of being certain or very confident of something. An example of positivism is a Christian being absolutely certain there is a God.
As I said to Joel, I’ll post the link if you are interested?
i don’t rule it out. Who said I did? Please don’t put words in my mouth
I just haven’t seen any evidence of it. You claim you have evidence and yet, even after repeated requests you haven’t offered a single, solitary scrap of evidence to demonstrate the veracity of your continued claims.
And yet, strangely enough, you said it yourself that ultimately your Christian belief is based on faith . You also believe you are a sinner, require salvation solely through grace ( or grace and works if you adhere to Catholic Doctrine) via the divine nature of the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth, for whom there is no evidence.
You also believe in eternal damnation of one sort or another in the form of Hell.
You also believe in creation and may or may not accept evolution providing it is guided or theistic.
And all of the above is based on no evidence whatsoever.
This does not strike me as the best use of critical thinking,
Regards
Ark
Okay, now we are just delving into pettiness. This is tiresome.
The fact you clearly dont even know the philosophical stance od Positivism is enough for me. Let’s just stop this.
Once again,the comment was addressed to Lee, not you. Are you afraid to allow Lee to answer for himself?
And the definition of positivism is a dictionary definition for which I did offer to post a link for you.
Do you think you are intellectually above reading dictionary definitions?
And your assumption that Christians believe what believe based upon indoctrination or a subjective emotionalism and/or societal pressure tells me you haven’t read as widely as you claim.
Here are several authors who became or remained Christians based on intellectual reasons:
Justin Martyr
Thomas Aquinas
Galileo Galilei
Sir Isaac Newton
CS Lewis (Oxford and Cambridge prof. of medieval and renaissance lit)
JRR Tolkien (Oxford and Cambridge philologist)
Charles Wiliams
TS Elliott
WH Auden
Msgr. Georges Lemaitre (Belgian priest and astrophysicist who develpoed the Big Bang Theory)
Dr. Francis Colins (formejr atheist and geneticist and former dir. of the Human Genome Project)
Dr. John Lennox (Oxford mathematician who’s debated Richard Dawkins at least twice)
Lee Strobel (former atheist-turned Christian apologist)
Nancy Pearcey (former skeptic-turned Christian apologist)
William L. Craig (former skeptic-turned Christian philospher and apologist)
Alister McGrath (Oxford biologist, forner atheist and theologian)
NT Wright
Os Guiness
Craig Evans (NT scholat)
Ben Withrington IIII (NT scholar)
Darel Bock (NT scholar)
Michael Bird (NT scholar)
Ed Yamauchi (NT scholar)
Matthew Licona (NT scholar)
Peter Kreeft (Catholic philosophet)
JP Moreland (Christian philosopher and apopogist)
These are just a few I thought of off the top of my head.
Pax.
Lee.
Without wading through your extensive list I can tell you categorically that Collins became a Christian largely because of Death Anxiety. He even explains the circumstances in a video.
He even includes a cute story of a waterfall.
It’s on Youtube. You can search for it, I’m sure.
And for what it’s worth there are always emotional and or cultural issues involved.
I highly recommend you go and read some of the testimonies from former professional members of the clergy at the Clergy Project.
Regards
Ark.
Ark , with all due respect to you, the jig is up. Your, to be generous, woefully inaccurate definition of “positivism” proves conclusively what I have long suspected: you are simply out of your depth in this discussion and gave no real idea what you’re saying. I’m almost embarrassed for you. Seriously. Apparently you’ve read just enough material on popular internet skeptic sites to convince those who don’t know any better that you’re a deep thinker. But you don’t fool me.
As for Collins, unlike you, apparently, I’ve actually read his book *The Language of God* in which he sets ouf his conversion experience in the early chapters. Spoiler alert: it had a lot to do with his reading of CS Lewis esp. Lewis’ arguments for a Moral Law. Granted its been awhile, but I don’t remember a waterfall having anything to do with it. ‘So I prefer to get my infomation from books rather than You Tube videos.
My first assignment if I thought you were actually interested in challenging your thinking rather than simply having your preconceptions reinforced would be for you to read those authors I listed then come back and tell me why they’re wrong.
But you won’t because, sadly, you’re just posturing.
Again, I’m just calling it like I see it.
Pax. Lee.
So, you aren’t interested in reading the dictionary definition of positivism and you can’t be bothered to search for the video where Collins actually discusses his conversion and the circumstances that led to it, which include a cute tale of a waterfall.
Such hubris, Lee!
And, while I am familiar with a few of those on your list, Lewis, Licona for starters, there is little need to read all those authors as you already tripped yourself up trying to suggest that Collins conversion was purely intellectual.
I find it telling that while you insist conversion is based on intellectual reasons you not-so- cleverly chose to completely ignore all the nonintellectual beliefs I pointed out which form the bedrock of your religious belief. Namely, faith in the so called divine character Jesus of Nazareth, for whom there is no evidence, that you are deemed a sinner and require salvation gained only through this character ( who you also believe is the creator of the universe ) and the notion of Hell in whatever form you choose to accept.
Therefore, I think it only fair that before you try to dish out ”homework” for moi, maybe you should look again honestly at the reasons why you are a Christian?
In other words, start from scratch and exercise some serious intellectual style critical thinking that one can hope will be devoid of all the emotional nonsense of such things as ”sin” (original or otherwise) eternal damnation in Hell, and any other unsubstantiated doctrinal twaddle that you may have taken on board.
Once you have decided on a more intellectual approach I am sure we could have very fruitful conversations.
Oh, and a good place to start to divest yourself of all these emotional reasons would be to read the deconversion testimonies of professional theologians over on the Clergy Project.
After all, unlike me who was never more than a cultural Christian they were in the main ”hard core” believers and have experience of both sides of the fence and are very familiar with pretty much each and every argument you have used here to try to justify such beliefs.
Best of luck.
Let me know how you go, and if you need links …. dictionary or otherwise all you have to do is ask.
Ark.
Pseudo-psychobabble and self-righteous hubris.
No one is fooled. You refuse to answer direct questions, and DON’T know what positivism is. And because your disingenuousness and ignorance are exposed, you resort to psychoanalyzing the one who have exposed them.
Just stop. No one is fooled. Look on the mirror and come to grips with your own vested committment in a philosophical position you clearly have never really thought through.
I quoted a dictionary reference. Once again, I can provide the link. Just ask.
Who’s psychoanalyzing? Are you truly suggesting those things I listed regarding the Christian faith are not crucial components to belief?
Now look who’s being disingenuous!
Your arguments become ever more hollow with each comment you make.
Some suggest when you find yourself running through Hell to keep going, while another saying suggests that when you have dug yourself into a hole – stop digging! ( and ask for a hand up – which I am extending as I type.)
I would admit the truth of your position if I were you, Joel and stop digging as the walls of the hole are about to collapse on top of you.
1. That is not the proper philosophical understanding of positivism. The fact you had to look it up on an online dictionary just shows you really don’t know what it is.
2. I was throwing the psychoanalyzing that you are doing back in your face. Maybe you should respect people enough who have investigated things and have come to a different conclusion than you.
3. I haven’t been disingenuous at all. I have answered your questions in a straightforward manner and have given reasons for my views. You are still trying to play a shell game we have already called you on.
4. I have no idea what those last two paragraphs even mean. I’ll have to conclude that you are letting your emotions and feelings get the best of you, so you are just lashing out. Lol
1. Ah … so you at least acknowledge that it is listed as a definition. Good. A little honesty at last.
2. Of course I respect people’s views. Providing such views donpt set out to harm others. We are all different after all. But to try to suggest that intellectual reasons are the driving force behind becoming a Christian is absolute crap, and you know full well this is the truth of the matter.
3. You have not once offered the evidence that convinced you but have continually whined on about what evidence would I expect, phrasing the response in as many different ways you thought you could get away with … including capitals and writing ”for the 135th time.” Such an approach is simply childish.
4. You have dug yourself into a hole that you are now desperately trying to extricate yourself from by throwing out insults.
I am offering you the opportunity to admit that evidence and any form of intellectualism take a back seat, if they play any true part at all to the basis of your ”faith”. which include all the things I mentioned regarding sin, salvation through the character Jesus of Nazareth as described in the bible and for whom there is no evidence, and eternal damnation in (some form of) Hell for those who do not accept this so called salvation.
I am an atheist. I don’t have an emotional dog in this fight. You – and Less – are the one who believe they have to stand in front of your god come judgment time.
You are the ones making all the claims. All I am asking for is evidence.
So far you have offered nothing.
1. No, what you gave is not the definition of philosophical positivism. You clearly don’t know what it is, even though, ironically, it is precisely defines your own philosophical position. Therefore, it shows you don’t even clearly understand what you believe.
2. You say, “try to suggest that intellectual reasons are the driving force behind becoming a Christian is absolute crap”–You clearly DON’T respect the views of Christians who have investigated and thought things through.
3. My question still stands. I’m trying to get you acknowledge that the only “evidence” you deem worthy is physical evidence, the kind that is subject to archeology, or some other cause-and-effect type of the natural sciences–and THAT is what is at the core of philosophical positivism.
4. No hole, just growing tired of you still trying to play your shell game when your tricks have already been exposed. Just stop.
5. Yes you are an atheist, and you have a HUGE emotional dog in this fight. Your entire argument is, at root, an emotional one. Anyone someone asks for clarification, you jump to pseudo-psychobabble and deflect as all get out. You throw out the most extreme projections of the most rabid kind of extreme Fundie on both myself and Lee as a way of confirmation bias to keep yourself protected in your little bubble. You can’t deal with the fact that your over-generalized stereotypes that “all Christians” are emotionally-stunted and trauma-filled intellectual babies is laughably stupid. Look in the mirror and realize that YOUR position is NOT rooted in reason and intellectualism. It is a pure and blind faith commitment to philosophical positivism that has no real basis for it, other than your own presuppositions and assumptions.
1. I understand what positivism is, thank you. I merely provided a dictionary definition that included the religious take. Are you telling me you are not certain your god exists? Now that would be a first in my book!
2. Why should anyone respect views that are plainly wrong, especially when people such as you and Lee clearly cannot or simply refuse to recognise the overriding emotional element that is the crux of your faith? There is absolutely nothing intellectual regarding claims of the veracity/existence of Heaven and Hell for example.
And the H.G.P has dismantled any notion of Original Sin.
That’s two perfectly clear examples of non-intellectual reasons that are foundational to your faith. Ans we haven’t touched on the emotionally charged issue of the resurrection of the character Jesus of Nazareth
3. If you believe you can demonstrate supernatural claims and hold them up as evidence then be my guest.
And you don’t even have to refer to the bible. There are plenty of modern day claims. Sathya Sai Baba might be good place for you to start and millions made claims about him.
4.?
5. Everything I have listed that forms the basis of your faith is fact.
I have never once said ”all Christians’’ are ”emotionally-stunted and trauma-filled intellectual babies’’. This is a blatant lie and using such over the top terms merely compounds the fact you are trying to deflect the discussion away from your untenable position.
If you want to quote me then have the integrity and decency to quote me correctly.
I am an atheist. Any other label you wish to foist on me is done solely to shore up for your own insecurities. Before long I suspect you might be suggesting atheism is a world view and me being a Liverpool supporter has a marked effect on this.
So let’s get back to basics shall we?
And to this end, I’ll reiterate point three once more:
If you believe you can demonstrate supernatural claims and hold them up as evidence then be my guest.
And you don’t even have to refer to the bible. There are plenty of modern day claims. Sathya Sai Baba might be good place for you to start and millions made claims about him.
1. There is no such thing as a “religious take” on positivism. By definition, positivism dismisses any notion of the reality of anything that isn’t material.
2a. Ark: “Of course I respect people’s views. ” Ark again: “Why should anyone respect views that are plainly wrong?” Brilliant. That’s not contradictory at all!
2b. I have not idea what HGP is. Can you articulate what the doctrine of Original Sin is?
3-4. Back to your shell game. Move on.
5. Some quotes from Ark:
“Unfortunately this is how indoctrination or the absence of critical thinking works, and is evident among followers of all religions.”
“How did such belief come about? Why …through indoctrination, of course!
Passed on from one generation to the next. Until, that is, someone suggests things might not be as they seem.”
“in Christianity’s case there is the threat of Hell and eternal damnation which is enough to scare the living daylights out of many a child!”
“Furthermore, the emotional component is crucial to religious belief and I presume this is part of your reason to believe as well, yes?”
“It is unfortunate that, instead of applying strict critical thinking to such issues so many Christians want their cake and eat it and this is what apologetics are there for – to provide theological answers to questions that, in this day and age, we shouldn’t even need to be asking.”
And finally: “So, what you are really saying is that your belief is primarily because of feelings, quite likely due to some form of indoctrination, either as a child or adult, and possibly as a result of emotional needs. This is pretty much standard with most if not all converts and more so the evangelical type. And this is not merely my personal observation through reading such people over the years, but also- and much more telling – the honest admissions from those who have deconverted from Christianity. Faith generally precludes most if not all critical thinking when it comes to one’s religion, as you so often aptly demonstrate.”
And there you have it, direct quote FROM YOU. What I call direct quotes and fact, you call “blatant lies.” Not surprising…you don’t even know what positivism is, and you refuse to answer my basic question regarding what kind of evidence you’d expect if someone healed a blind man. [I’m dropping my mic]
Finally, yes you are an atheist; yes you have a blind, unsubstantiated faith in philosophical positivism; yes, no one is fooled by your shell games. Feel free to continue to put your charade on full display. But we all know, you’re done.
1. There is no such thing as a “religious take” on positivism. By definition, positivism dismisses any notion of the reality of anything that isn’t material.
Really? Perhaps you could drop a line to the compilers of the dictionary definition I quoted? Do you want the link?
Here’s the definition once more.
noun
Positivism is the state of being certain or very confident of something.
An example of positivism is a Christian being absolutely certain there is a God.
And here we have a perfect example of you being disingenuous, and some might suggest even bordering on being a liar, as the full sentence read.
Of course I respect people’s views. Providing such views don’t set out to harm others. We are all different after all.
Really? Odd that, like Lee, you would probably champion Francis Collins for your cause and yet you don’t know what the HGP is. SMH. Google is your friend.
Yes.
Is this because you are afraid that you cannot demonstrate the veracity of a single foundational claim of your faith? You have claimed all along you have evidence so produce it. What are you afraid of?
5. Thank you for quoting me correctly. That must have taken you a while to trawl through all that text. My, aren’t you the keen one! Did you notice that I didn’t use any of the terms in the way you attributed to me?
Really? Have I said I have ‘’a blind, unsubstantiated faith in philosophical positivism’’; Perhaps you could find a quote?
But I’m pretty sure I haven’t said such a thing.
An atheist is simply someone who has no belief in gods. Neither your god or any other.
1. Hahaha…okay.
2a. Hahaha…okay. Direct quotes make me a liar.
2b. Too lazy to articulate HGP and what you think the doctrine of original sin is?
3-4. Shell game. No one is fooled.
5. Haha…check mate.
Lastly, Of course you havent said that. You’re blind to it.
1. Glad you agree.
2. No, quoting me incorrectly . .. as you did in the comment before makes you disingenuous and some might suggest you are a liar.
3. I know what the doctrine Original Sin is and you asked if I could articulate it and I said ”Yes.”
You do know how to type HGP in the Google search bar, yes?
Checkmate? Goodness me, do you even know how to play chess, Joel? Based on your comments it doesn’t look like it.
I’m willing to bet you don’t know what the doctrine of Original Sin actually entails. But that’s okay.
Ohhh, you’re referring to the Human Genome Project? The one that Francis Collins spearheaded? Oh, okay. So, do you know where the doctrine of original sin came from and what it actually says?
AGAIN, you are playing a shell game. You have repeatedly refused to articulate the kind of evidence you think is needed that would verify Jesus’ healings. And, as we all know, the reason why you refuse is that to do so would just verify your presuppositional bias. Let me help you out, again.
Me: What kind of evidence would be required to verify Jesus’ healings?
You: There is none, because I believe miracles never happen and that there is no supernatural reality beyond the material world and the cause-and-effect reality of the natural sciences.
Me: Okay then! How do you know that there is no supernatural reality beyond the material world?
You: I just know it. There isn’t.
Me: And THAT is your presuppositional belief in positivism and philosophical naturalism.
And why on earth would I mention it in the context of the HGP if I did not know what the doctrine was?
Good for you for using Google by the way. Amazing what a few clicks can achieve and look what you learned!
I suspect, however, that it is in fact you that does not fully understand the implications the HGP has on this ridiculous doctrine.
As for you little narrative:
If you had evidence for any of the claims you continue to assert regarding the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth you would have stopped this theological two-step and presented them already.
As Lee has stated: In the end it all boils down to faith. Faith, Joel. Not evidence. Faith. For if there were evidence then you would have no need of faith.
It is unfortunate that your indoctrination will not allow you to recognise this fact. Or if you do, then you are carefully keeping it hidden and are reluctant to acknowledge it for fear of what will happen should you finally acknowledge there is no evidential basis for your belief.
One has to acknowledge the courage of those professional members of the clergy who were able to come to terms with this reality and walk away; from careers, and sometimes even friends and family, rather than continue to live and support a lie.
Maybe you’ll wake up to this reality as well one day? It would be nice if you did. For your sake as well as those around you.
Regards
Ark.
Yawning.
More soapbox preaching from atheist preacher Arky.
When you make such sweeping comments and try to psychoanalyze people whom you know nothing about, you just show yourself to be an ideological fool.
Still waiting for you to explain either the kind of evidence you’d expect of a healing of a blind man, or your understanding of Original Sin and where it came from.
Well, if you refuse to divulge details of your conversion no blame can be attached that for the basis of my assertion I use the testimonies of those who have deconverted and were honest enough to reveal that their reasons for conversion all involve some sort of cultural and /or childhood indoctrination coupled with some form of emotional component/issue/trauma.
I am on record offering an apology if this is not the case in your conversion and have asked repeatedly for you to simply provide details. To date you have refused.
If you don’t know about the doctrine of original sin, like the HGP you were originally ignorant about, a few clicks on Google will help you out.
You refuse to answer basic questions. You almost gleefully take delight in declaring you haven’t critically examined your own beliefs. You clearly have no clue what positivism is (and that isn’t surprising, given the fact you havent critically examined your own beliefs). You attempt to psychoanalyze all Christians en masse. When faced with clear contradictions in your own quotes, you accuse the other person of lying. And again, I don’t think you really know the particulars about the doctrine of Original Sin and where it came from. And all you’ve done for the past 5 days is spout the same ideological talking points, over and over again. In place of actual logic and argumentation, you throw out propaganda points.
No one is fooled. Give up.
I do examine plenty of my personal beliefs.
One such was a belief that it was okay to eat the flesh of other animals. I eventually considered this belief a number of years ago and rejected it as repugnant and am now vegetarian.
I once held a belief that being gay was abnormal. I no longer hold this belief.
I am sure there are a myriad of other beliefs I have critically examined over the years and I doubt it would be difficult to list most of them if I put my mind to it.
Atheism is simply the lack of belief in gods.
I have also examined your primary belief/worldview – Christianity – and found it almost devoid of merit and without any meaningful, or worthwhile substance. Secular humanism is a better option.
Again you demonstrate your ignorance regarding original sin if you continue to assert in this manner. Or you don’t understand the true nature of the HGP?
Possibly it’s both?
Why is secular humanism a better option?
I havent said anything about Original Sin. I want to know if YOU know what you’re talking about. And trust me, I know more about it than you. Lol
You obviously don’t know enough about it to realise why the HGP dismantles it and the ramifications for your religion and your blind faith.
You still haven’t even demonstrated you know what it actually says and where the doctrine came from. Care to tell me?
Didn’t Saul of Tarsus read it on the back of a box of ye olde Cornflakes?
??? Please stop.
Well … you did ask. Are you saying dear Saul made it up? Or was it Augustine? No… didn’t he refine it? Or was it Yahweh or that talking snake?
Such a complicated religion you have, Joel.
Just so damn confusing.
Yawning….please stop.
You continue to reply so it is only polite that I answer …
Are you going to tell me what was the real reason you converted?
When my replies consist of, “Please stop,” a proper answer would be to stop. Since you are incapable of that, from here on out I will stop you for your own good.
We really have strayed off the path.
Let’s get back on track and return to the questions asked right as the beginning of the thread.
Let me refresh your memory, as we all know how unreliable human memory can be.
But the miracle working divine character …. no, there is no evidence.
Neither is there any veracity of the tale of Captivity, Exodus and Conquest as reflected in the bible, and you have yet to produce a scrap of evidence for any of the above; and I have asked you to do so on numerous occasions.
The floor is yours. And remember …. evidence is the key.
Sorry. Messed up the formatting a bit . You can fix it if you like/ know how to?
Ark, you do understand that some words have multiple meanings and the only way to know which def. is the right one is by the context, right? You can’t just arbitrarily pick a definition. You certainly can’t tell Dr. Anderson how how he meant to use the term.
Thus the context in which we’re using “positivism” is with regard to the philosophical worldview which basically says that God and the supernatural are superfluous because science can and will answer all of life’s questions. This view is akin to scientism and materialism.
As for the Collins video, I watched it, and an emotional fear of death played a very minor role. It was only when a patient asked him what his views on God and an afterlife were that he realised he didn’t know. This caused him to talk to a minister, who gave him books by CS Lewis to read. Collins was especially convinced by Lewis’s arguments for the existence of a Moral Law. That in turn led him to theism, which led him to examine the evidence for Jesus and Christianity. Collins hardly mentions his emotional state, and certainly no waterfalls! His purpose, after all, is to persuade other atheists and skeptics, esp. scientists, that belief in God is rational, which an overappeal to emotion would undermine.
It was only after he became intellectually persusaded that a Moral Law existed that Collins realised that he was guilty of breaking that Moral Law and was a sinner.
So you completely misrepresented his conversion story. Unfortunately that’s becoming a motif with you. Uoubreally should read the book.
Nor did I say that emotions play no role in conversions–obviously they do, just not the predominant role for people like Collins, who need evidence.
You should realy talk to some Christians who converted because of the evidence. There are a lot more than you think.
As for myself, l decided some thirty years ago that the unexamined faith wasn’t worth believing. I read Bertrand Russell’s *Why I am not a Christian* when I was about twenty (his arguments don’t seem as impressive now as they did then). Since then I’ve read atheists from Dawkins to Coyne to Dennett to to Flew to Harris to Nagel to Nietzsche. I’ve read skeptical NT scholars from Borg to Crossan to Ehrman to Eisenmann to Funk to Maccoby to Meyer to Pagels to Spong to Thiering to Vermes.
So who would you like to talk about first? Barbara Thiering’s use of *pesher* in regards to Jesus and the gospels? Or maybe atheist philosopher Thomas Nagel’s book, *Mind and Cosmos: Why the Materialistic, Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature is Almost Certainly False*.
If you actually believe being an atheist somehow (talk anout s miracle!) protects you from emotional or intellectual bias, this is, to be frank, very naive. I’ve met lots of atheists whose atheism was driven by their emotions. Only a *very* naive person would insist that if you”re an atheist you *cannot* thetefore be biased.
Other athests decide beforehand thst God doesn’t exist and refuse to examine the evidence. At least Thomas Nagel is honest enough to admit that he won’t consider the evidence for God because *he doesn’t want God to exist.* Nobody is completely free of bias and totally objective.
As for the Clergy Project, I’m not familiar with it, but have read enough accounts of ministers los8ng their faith that I think I have a pretty good idea how these would read. In many cases these pastors had placed their faith in a fundamentalist caricature of Christianity which they then mistook for authentic Christianity. Kinda like Ken Hamm. Many left faith for emotional rather than intellectual reasons.
So what about you? Have you ever critically examined your atheism? Can you articulate *why* you believe what you believe? Because atheism IS a faith, just like theism.
As former atheist CS Lewis wrote, a young atheist wishing to maintain his atheism cannot be too careful of his reading.
Pax.
Lee.
I didn’t misrepresent Collins at all, But at least you made the effort to find the video.
Unfortunate that you stopped short of an apology, but I suppose that would be pushing it?
What you accept as positivism is fine by me. I merely quoted a dictionary definition. Which, by the way, also included the philosophical version and several other examples.
Would you like the link?
So what about you? Have you ever critically examined your atheism? Can you articulate *why* you believe what you believe? Because atheism IS a faith, just like theism.
This is like asking me have I critically examined my non- stamp collecting.
It is a ludicrous request.
Atheism is the lack of belief in gods: your god and every other.
It isn’t a belief, and by suggesting it is you are showing your ignorance.
You make all the unsubstantiated god claims, consider yourself a sinner in desperate need of salvation and hope and pray you will not spend eternity being tormented/tortured in Hell and these utter preposterous beliefs include multiple references to the divinely claimed, walking on water, raised from the dead biblical character, Jesus of Nazareth, for whom there is no evidence whatsoever and you think I should critically examine atheism!
Really, you can’t be serious?
Why not be honest and explain the emotional considerations that surrounded your conversion? Be like Collins and at least admit there were emotional issues in play.
Maybe your conversion story includes such colourful metaphors as Francis Collins description of the frozen waterfall that was divided into three which he though reminded him of the Trinity!
Oh, and for what it’s worth, Collins is on record stating that (I paraphrase) if evidence showed his faith was in error he would reject the evidence and continue to believe. Reject the evidence! And this admission is from a world renowned scientist!
Now that is a classic example of indoctrination!
And as you refuse to look at some of the testimonies of former professional members of the clergy how can you make an honest evaluation of why they deconverted?
Don’t you think perhaps that you are being just a tad hypocritical, Lee?
To close, let me remind you that, you were the one who finally admitted that all said and done your belief (and I can take it that this will include Joel and every other Christian) ultimately rests on faith. not evidence
Read that sentence again. Faith not evidence.
Regards
Ark.
Arky has found a soapbox.
But it is illuminating to see he admits to not critically examine his own beliefs and worldview.
Do everyone a favor and stop now. This has been going on for 5 days.
What is there to examine?
Atheism is the absence of belief in gods.
It no more encompasses a worldview than me being a Liverpool supporter.
Suggesting otherwise just highlights you ignorance, Joel.
I have however, examined your religion cum worldview and found it sadly lacking, and in many areas quite revolting.
It’s foundational tenets have no evidentiary basis and all adherents are emotionally attached primarily through indoctrination and faith.
Yeah, what’s the point in critically examining one’s own views? I mean, why do that?
Atheism is generally regarded as a ground state.
Religion has to be inculcated. You are a perfect example of this.
I have examined it and found it wanting. As you know found Catholicism and various other sect of <Christianity wanting. No doubt you feel the same way about Islam and Hindu, too?.
And to remind you once again: You are making the positive claim for a god, and not just any god either, but a personal god in the form of the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth.
Surely if you consider yourself to be a man of integrity the right thing to do is to provide evidence?
After all, you wholeheartedly believe that as a non-believer I shall spend eternity in Hell.
Aren’t you in the least concerned?
No, I’m not concerned about you. You are responsible for your own decisions. It’s not my job to convert you.
I didn’t ask, or expect you to convert me. As you point out, the choice of acceptance of your Christian faith -or any religion – is a personal one.
All I am suggesting is that if you believe in integrity you should at least make a case to support your faith. After all, you changed from one Christian sect to another so you must have had a darn good reason for doing so? I mean you would not have ditched one sect for the one you adopted purely on a whim? There must have been sound, evidential reasons.
Surely you can reveal what these were?
The fact that Lee and I have both explained numerous times why we are convinced the Gospels are true, yet you still harping on how we “have no integrity” because we refuse to answer why we are convinced of Christianity is just hilarious. AND NOW, after 5 days, you’re moving the goalposts and are NOW asking why I became Orthodox?
Sorry pal, both Lee and I have gone at great lengths to explain ourselves, and you havent explained jack. You refuse to answer direct questions, and you engage in deflection, misdirection, and pseudo-psychobabble.
No one is fooled.
You haven’t offered any evidence for your claims only what amounts to your personal rationale based primarily on cultural/emotional indoctrination.
Why do you think kids are often identified as Muslim,Christian Hindu children? Are you seriously going to have the temerity to suggest a child has the critical thinking skills to evaluate a religious text?
That would be absolute bollocks!
They are indoctrinated
For goodness’ sake, most adults who claim to be religious have never bothered to fully read or understand their religious texts.
The average self-proclaimed Christian is as ignorant as they come regarding the bible.
And you have switched religion, presumably because the dogmas and doctrines of Evangelism didn’t sit right with you.
And yet you think you are capable of discerning what is evidence!
You sneer at Ken Ham, are so damned arrogant and cock sure of your position you even wrote a book about his so- called heresy and yet here you are, believing a 2000 year old corpse rose from the dead and is the crucial intermediary between you lounging around ”heaven” or being tortured for eternity in ”Hell”.
You don’t have the emotional or intellectual acumen to recognise how much of a hypocrite you truly are . Or you do, and are simply too much of a coward to admit it.
The only fool is you, Joel.
Someone is getting angry. Again, no one is fooled. You haven’t been straightforward or honest this entire time. You feign outrage to deflect from the fact you haven’t answered one direct question in a straightforward manner. Spewing out pseudo-psychobabble and propaganda talking points and caricatures does not a rational argument make.
Give up. You’re not fooling anyone.
*Smile*
Angry? Me?
Hilarious …. we’re just warming up here, Joel.
Me calling you out smarts a bit, doesn’t it Joel?
What’s psychobabble about listing the basic foundations of Christian belief?
Are you now embarrassed to acknowledge that you are sinner who requires the saving grace of a 2000 year old claimed resurrected corpse?
Are you sitting there reveling in your own personal persecution complex safe and snug in the belief that Jesus told you this would happen if you confessed and swore fealty/allegiance to him … oops, sorry. Him.
Or are you finally coming to realise just how silly it all sounds and how much nonsense such beliefs truly are?
Exactly why did you become a Christian Joel?
What was the emotional issue surrounding your conversion, I wonder?
Was it like Collins? What were you terrified of that made you fall to your knees and beg forgiveness.?
Hmm … evidence indeed!
Haha…no, five days of blather is not “warming up.” This has become boring, monotonous and tedious.
No one is fooled.
Sorry Typo. I meant to write you and Lee.
From merriam-webster.com:
Positivism:
1. A theory that theology and metaphysics are earlier imperfect modes of knowledge and that positive knowledge is based on natural phenomena and their properties and relations as verified by empirical sciences.
2. The quality or state or being positive.
Pax.
Lee.
So Lee, what would a “religious take” on positivism look like? hahaha…perhaps clinging to positivism with a religious-like fervor? 😉
The word dogmatic comes to mind.
Seriously. How can you have a rational discussion with someone who arbitrarily redefines the terms to bolster his argument then insists that his made-up definition is the definition of the word you were using in your post to him? And cannot tell us what he would consider valid evidence for the historicity of the gospels’ miracle stories, all the while demanding that we give him evidence for the veracity of the gospel miracle stories.
Does this conversation seem like part of a lost chapter of Alice in Wonderland to you? Maybe this conversation was edited out of the Mad Hatter tea party scene.
Pax.
Lee.
Haha…it’s just maddingly and humorously fascinating.
@ Lee
Yes, as you are positive, albeit erroneously, you have evidence for the character Jesus of Nazareth as portrayed in the gospels.
Hahahahahahahaahaha!!!!
Please, just stop. LOLOLOLOL
Go away, you wiper of other people’s bottoms! I fart in your general direction! Your mother was a hamster and your father smells of elderberries!
Now please, just stop.
I see your Holy Grail and raise you a Life of Brian.
”Blessed are the Greek? Did anyone catch his name?”
I am positive you still don’t understand “positivism.” Or “evidence.”
The kind of evidence you seem to want–and I’m actually not sure because you can’t or won’t tell us–doesn’t exist for ANY recorded historical event, esp. the one-off unrepeatable miracles recorded in the NT. But I feel like I’ve already said this multiple times.
If we somehow had video footage from the 1st c. of Jesus actually performing a miracle, your positivist worldview wouldn’t allow you to believe it–you’d insist the video was doctored.
Pax.
Lee.
Pathetic….please stop.
You have to first demonstrate that the character as portrayed in the bible was a real historical individual
And that is only the start of your problems..
Jesus was a real, historical individual, Mr. Carrier.
Not the born of a virgin,walk on water, feed the 5000 raise from the dead character as portrayed in the bible. For that figure there is no evidence whatsoever .
This is what this entire debacle on this thread has been about. demonstrating the veracity of miracle claims performed by someone called Jesus of Nazareth.
Historical biographies that convey history, written within a generation of the events.
And, again, not only have you shown no ability to display literary competence, you still have refused to articulate the kind of evidence you would find acceptable for things like healings and the other things you’ve mentioned. Not a hard question to answer. You won’t answer it, though. So stop with the charade. Give it up. You are showing the signs of insanity by just continuing to harp on this over and over again. Until you can answer that basic question, there is no sense in moving on. So please, either answer the question or give it up.
They are not biographies in the modern sense and do not convey an accurate picture of history.
So, no, we have no evidence for the character as portrayed in the bible.
Although there are other examples to compare the character to. Mithras is one
example that comes to mind.
Re: evidence.
Serious question: Would a demonstration of the supernatural, i.e. someone being able to summon an object from outside the natural realm then make it part of the natural world? And would we then be able to measure the effects and regard it from an empirical perspective?
Of course they are not biographies in the “modern” sense. They are still historical biographies, written according to expected conventions of ancient historical biographies. They are conveying history. No one in their right might would confuse Mithra with Jesus.
Here is your fundamental problem, indeed the “modern” problem. They very lens through which you are examining things is a modern, Enlightenment, Deistic-influence lens, where the “natural world” is over here in this box governed by science and facts, and the “supernatural world” is over there in that box governed by religion and fantasy. Thus, for you, “reality” = nature as observed by science, and “non-reality” = claims of miracles which can’t be observed by science. For you “miracles” are violations of the laws from the natural world from the “outside.” But you’ve already determined there is nothing “outside” the natural world–ergo, you dismiss it automatically. For you, there CAN’T be evidence of miracles because they are claims of the “supernatural,” which you’ve already determined doesn’t exist.
In the ancient world, particularly ancient Israel and first century Judaism, such a dichotomy didn’t exist. They didn’t think of the “natural world” and the “supernatural world” as two distinct things. There was one world and one reality. What WE call “miracles” (i.e. God “stepping in” to violate natural laws) they called “dynamic deeds” (i.e. occurrences in the world they demonstrated God’s power, but were still very much a part of reality). In fact, the English translation “miracle” is horrible. The Greek doesn’t have that–it is “dynamic deed” (literally, “dynamis” from which we get the word “dynamite”). And so, what we call “miracle,” they didn’t view as something where God “violated” natural laws. They simply viewed it as a part of God’s creation that we simply can’t explain. But the key is, they didn’t view it as a violation of some sort of “natural laws.”
I don’t you’ll dismiss this in a heartbeat, but it is what it is.
http://www.joeledmundanderson.com/book-review-surprised-by-scripture-by-n-t-wright-part-1and-why-i-dont-believe-in-miracles/
Once again … I am not suggesting that anyone should be compared with the figure of Yeshua (Had a ministry for a couple of years, gathered a few disciples etc etc) who was more than likely crucified by Pilate for sedition.
We are talking about the born of a virgin, walk on water , raised people from the dead style character featured in the gospels for who there is no evidence what soever. This character has several things in common with Mithras.
Is this finally clear enough for you?
Here’s where you go wrong again and again, and your presuppositional bias is blatant, and the fact you do not seem to pay attention to what I write. Therefore, I wish you would desist from this arrogant projection. I have not determined anything of the sort. How on earth could I for the gods’ sake? I don’t currently accept claims for the supernatural because no evidence for it has been presented to demonstrate it. I have never said there can’t be evidence. Again, this is your projection, and it is time you had took the time to actually read what I write and think before you rattle of yet another fundamentalist -style reply.
So, to be perfectly clear, I am not saying it is a violation of anything. You claim such phenomena exist and you claim that you have evidence. Therefore, the onus remains upon you to demonstrate them. Hence the wording of my question. Do you understand?
And please don’t immediately fire back with some asinine remark prefaced by a ridiculous ha ha or lol.
And yet you still refuse to articulate what kind of evidence you’d accept as proof for Jesus’ healing of a blind man.
I’ve simply described for you the positivist worldview you blindly accept.
Another thing to point out: every time you get backed into a corner, you feign offense and outrage.
No one is fooled. Unless you can man up and actually answer the question I’ve been asking for the past six days, you would be best to just stop.
By the way, it is YOUR stance that shows signs of indoctrination. You have blindly accepted the positivist stance, and therefore immediately dismiss the possibility of reality being more than just science and natural laws. You dont even consider it.
And yes, ic3 your next reply doesnt answer my question, it will be deleted
As the claimed creator of the universe for him to demonstrate that he could heal a blind person he would first have to appear in person.
This part would seem obvious but I thought I would make the point any way.
Convincing me of who he is would be fairly straightforward as being omnipotent he could simply convey the details directly to my subconscious.
Thus, identity duly confirmed, any healing would automatically be acknowledged as having been performed by a divine character – in this case Yeshua/Yahweh.
It would obviously be beneficial for all concerned if he ensured the rest of humanity was made aware in a similar fashion, otherwise I would be faced with the same problem you are faced with now trying to convince me. Not unreasonable.
Therefore, I can see no reason why such a magnanimous act conducted in this fashion would leave me in any doubt of his bona fides and I would gladly acknowledge this was who he said he was.
Question answered?
No, you are deflecting again. Simple question–Jesus’ identity aside–the historical biographies of the Gospels claim that the historical person, Jesus of Nazareth, healed a blind man. What kind of evidence would convince you that a person healed another person of blindness?
The only thing that comes to mind would be a medical team confirming that the individual was blind and then, in the presence of said medical team the person regaining his sight after multiple witnesses watching said healer work?/lay his hands on ?
You’ll have to fill in the correct terms here, as I am unfamiliar of the words one would use.
This I would acknowlege would be a non- medical intervention.
Good enough?
So eyewitness testimony. Actual people saying, “Yeah, this guy used to be blind, then this other guy shows up, did thus and so, and now the guy can see.” Does it have to be a “medical team” or can it just people who have known the individual?
If all that happened 200, 300, 2,000 years ago, would that written testimony of that event be enough to convince you, or at least go, “Hmmm…that’s interesting”?
No. Medical team crucial. Expert testimony from several specialists.
Written reports would also help.
The further back one went the less likely the medical expertise.
I would put a cut off point at where medical analysis/expertise was unable to confirm actual physical blindness, so obviously 2000 years would be out of the question..
You don’t think there were doctors in the first century Roman Empire to verify someone was blind? For that matter, you think your average, everyday person in the first century was unable to tell if someone was blind or not?
Your answer verifies what I’ve been saying about your stance. Unless it can be proven/confirmed by modern science, you will not accept testimony to an alleged event like the healing of a blind person. That is what postivism says. Unless something can be proven/verified by modern medical science, then it can’t exist. But that stance will force to deny anything unusual in the world that can’t be readily observed or proven by modern science. I acknowledge that there is plenty of things in the world that cannot be explained. Therefore, I am epistemologically open to the possibility that things like healing can occur. Then, when I read in an ancient historical biography about an individual in history who healed people, I don’t automatically toss it out as impossible. I look at other things; I consider the context; I look at other sources and historical commentaries on that individual, etc. And that is where the importance of testimony comes in. We accept testimony every day. That is how we know virtually ANYTHING about history. People back then wrote down what they claimed happened in history. Historians look at that testimony, along with many other data points, to ascertain whether or not that testimony is true, or at least possible. That is how I, and a whole lot of other people come to the Gospel accounts. We take in ALL the relevant information. You, though, seem to throw it all out automatically, and say you will only be convinced of evidence that is verified by modern medical experts. THAT’S the philosophical position of positivism. That is your philosophical position. And since that is your philosophical position, it is useless to ask for ancient evidence or testimony, because you won’t accept it unless it can be verified by modern medical experts.
So, I go back to what I said a long time ago in this thread. You’d be better off just saying, “Yes, the Gospels are ancient historical biographies, but I don’t believe Jesus of Nazareth healed people, because it can’t be verified by modern medical experts.” Your dismissing them doesn’t have to do so much with lack of evidence, for testimony is considered as evidence to determine history; but rather with your refusal to believe anything like that could happen in the first place, or at least unless modern medical experts could observe it.
So this whole charade was simply for you to say: ”See … gotcha!”
And you can’t see how your behaviour is disingenuous?
Then please provide some sort of ancient testimony from medical ”experts” of their day who claimed that the biblical character Jesus of Nazareth healed people. Or any ancient medical testimony in fact of someone healing a blind person.
A more obvious example to demonstrate a healing would be the raising of Lazarus whose corpse the biblical character Jesus left in the tomb until it stank, presumably to convince those who witnessed the event that Lazarus was really dead.
Now this event was truly astounding and done in full view of numerous witnesses.
And yet, there is not a single mention of this spectacular event in any historical record.
And you don’t think this in the least bit odd, yet feel fully justified to castigate me for not accepting the healing of a blind person by the character Jesus?
In fact the raising of Lazarus was not considered worthy enough to be recorded/mentioned by all four anonymous gospel authors, and features only in gJohn!
So just how spectacular was this kind of healing back in the day?
Either it didn’t actually happen or such events were two a penny and not even worth a mention.
No, it is making the point that you don’t accept ancient testimony of any kind unless the claim can somehow be verified by modern scientific experts. For in the Gospels, we have historical testimony about certain things, and that testimony dates to, at the latest, within a generation of the historical Jesus. Any historian worth his salt will say you don’t just toss that stuff because “modern medical experts” can’t confirm it. But that is what you do, and because you KNOW that “modern medical experts” can’t confirm testimonial claims from 2,000 years ago, your “asking for evidence” is just, as I’ve said, a shell game and a con.
The Gospels are the historical testimony. Yet you are, again, just dismissing it out of hand, with a whole lot of derision and condescension. So again, be honest, and at least admit that Lee and I have provided you evidence and rationale for our accepting the Gospels as testifying to real historical events. You just don’t think that evidence is good enough. It doesn’t meet your verification standard–which, by definition is an inevitable conclusion, given the fact you won’t accept testimony without modern medical expert verification.
Nonsense. You haven’t provided any other ancient testimony that we can compare.
Furthermore I have told you several times there are modern day accounts of miracles having been performed and claimed to have been seen by multiple witnesses.
You haven’t even the integrity to respond to this.
The gospel accounts are not testimonial evidence, they are merely unverified claims by unknown authors who claim to be reporting events from a minimum of 40 years past.
And this is not even taking into account the fact that the gospels are riddled with errors, including interpolation (forgery), so how on earth are we expected to trust them let alone assert any sort of reliability?
If you are so convinced of the raising of Lazarus and consider the tale is testimonial evidence please cite me a single independent account to corroborate it?
And while you’re at it, I have asked for you to please explain why such an amazing event was not even worthy of consideration by the writers of the Synoptics, let alone an independent source.
You assert that there were doctors in ancient times proficient to identify blindness – I agree – but when I asked you to provide a single medical testimony/written account for ANY such healing you can’t even be bothered to address the point. The Romans were known to be fastidious record keepers. Are you saying such accounts went unnoticed let alone unrecorded?
So your assertion that I will only accept modern medical expert testimony is bullshit, as you can’t even provide a single case to support your claim!
What you are determined to demonstrate is that no example put forward will be enough to satisfy you and that you expect me, like you, to accept the gospel accounts on faith.
Because this is what your entire religious position is built on – faith. Not evidence. For if there were evidence then the need for faith would be moot.
You expect that any healthy skepticism must be put aside and all normal historical criteria of probability and plausibility used to test such claims must be waived simply because you assert the bible in general and the gospels in particular are above normal,rational investigation.
And you are saying I am running a shell game and a con!
Oh, my hat!
Even a child could see through such a ruse.
The fact that you won’t let this drop after a week illustrates your nuttiness. I have explained to you my reasons and why I think the Gospels count as testimonial evidence. I even said it was okay if you didnt feel that was good enough for you. No one is trying to convert you here. On a purely historical, intellectual matter, there are many scholars who hold my position.
But it is obvious that YOU are the one trying to proselytize here. YOU are the overzealous and overbearing street preacher in all this. Just accept that there are many historians and scholars who find the gospels credible historical testimony and who accept the reality of what we call miracles.
Nonsense!
You have claimed they are evidence , which they are plainly not and now to change tack and use ”reasons” as your new word for justification.
You have asserted time and again they are historical testimonies when they are clearly nothing of the sort, but remain anonymous texts, written at least a generation after the supposed events in question and nothing concerning the miracle claims are corroborated anywhere in history. The gospels don’t even corroborate themselves, for goodness sake!
You flatly refuse to provide a single ancient medical account of any sort of healing yet demand I accept the tales in the gospels! On what grounds? Because you claim the gospels are ”god-breathed”?
Oh I know there are numerous Christian scholars who hold your position. They could hardly be Christian if they didn’t. That has never been the issue.
So let me remind you. Once again, don’t just spout off unsubstantiated rhetoric. List some of the historians that support your position regarding miracle claims attributed to the character Jesus of Nazareth.
Let’s see you put you money where your mouth is for once.
I am not proselytizing at all, but merely asking you to be up front and honest about your claims.
At least Lee had the integrity to admit that all said and done your beliefs rest on faith not evidence.
You cannot even admit this much!
I have given you more than enough opportunity to name these historians who you insist accept this statement.
Why don’t you stop prattling on about them and offer the names of these em>bona fide >/em> historians?
Based on your lack of response regarding my requests concerning the raising of Lazarus I suspect that in the end you will balk and return to either deleting my comments or gush out more hot air than a balloon.
You just NEVER SHUT UP, do you? Bottom line, AGAIN: you chose not to accept ancient testimony in historical biographies solely because some of the stuff in their cannot be confirmed by “modern medical experts.” That is what all this boils down to, and all your bluster cannot deflect from it. Lee and I are open to and seriously consider written testimony–you don’t. It’s that simple. So please, shut up now.
Wrong, and I have offered you the opportunity to provide medical testimony from ancient doctors regarding incidents of healing and you have steadfastly refused to even try.
I suspect the reason for this is there are no such historical records and you are once more, blowing hot air.
The gospels are not historical testimony but completely anonymous accounts that do not present an accurate portrayal of historical events.
Ok…you caught me. I am a fraud. You are right. We are all drowning in a sea of wrongness and faith, and you are floating by in a boat of reason.
Are you ever going to bother citing a single historian to support your claims?
Just one bona fide historian to back your claims regarding the miracles of the biblical character, Jesus of Nazareth.
And the same applies for the raising of Lazarus. Just one measly historian to come out in defense of your position. Just one.
Oh, and for your edification ….
E.P. Sanders states that “these Gospels were written with the intention of glorifying Jesus and are not strictly biographical in nature.”
Charles H. Talbert agrees that the gospels should be grouped with the Graeco-Roman biographies, but adds that such biographies included an element of mythology, and that the synoptic gospels also included elements of mythology.
Ingrid Maisch and Anton Vögtle writing for Karl Rahner in his encyclopedia of theological terms indicate that the gospels were written primarily as theological, not historical items
The majority of New Testament scholars agree that the Gospels do not contain eyewitness accounts
Markan priority led to the belief that Mark must be the most reliable of the gospels, but today there is a large consensus that the author of Mark was not intending to write history
I’m sure you can find the source if you are truly interested.
Yep. You’re right. I’m converted.
I’m not trying to ”convert you”. What a ridiculous thing to suggest.
That will happen if you want it to. All I would like is for your to be intellectually honest enough to acknowledge there is no evidence for the claims you continually make regarding miracles and the character Jesus of Nazareth.
You are an adult and entitled to believe what ever you like as long as it does not hurt anyone else.
One can hope you will extend the same respect to any children you come into contact with?
Yep. No evidence at all.
Excellent! That took you long enough.
When can we expect your book review of Provan?
Does this at least contain evidence?
Yep.
In good time. But really, now I know I will just be spouting my own ignorance and emotionally-stunted indoctrination and childhood trauma.
Really? Well perhaps now would a good time to reevaluate your upcoming approach to Provan’s book?
Perhaps you might be able to put any currently held theological faith-based beliefs to one side and critically examine Provan’s approach, especially where it pertains to archaeological evidence for any claims?
That, I consider would a major step in the right direction and all power to your elbow!
Looking forward to it. Sincerely hope you emerge from the review all intellectual, historian, and scholarly buttons shining.
Yep…Provan is crap. What a fool I’ve been.
Well, if you say so …
I haven’t read the book, but some of the reviews, while not as blunt as your one liner, do tend to be critical of his approach.
Yep. Pure rubbish. My eyes have been opened because of your superior intellect and use of reason. Thank you, Ark!
My pleasure. I look forward to your …. enlightened review of Provan’s book.
Sorry I should probably clarify the term physical blindness. I mean where the eye is either non existent or has been physically damaged beyond normal repair – as opposed to blindness sometimes brought on by emotional trauma.
Well that was a fascinating read-through.
I think this discussion has run its course. It’s time to “run away.”
Pax.
Lee.
Yes, I’ve deleted six of his comments because he won’t stop.
I agree with you there. Blessed are those who go in circles, for they shall be known as wheels.
His last one to Dr. Anderson was over the top. I think he has some serious issues.
Pax.
Lee.
At the risk of stirring a hornet’s nest or flogging the proverbial dead horse, if Arkhenaten is still monitoring this discussion, ue should google on You Tube the David Rubenstein Show’s interview with Dr. Francis Collins which was filmed two years ago. Rubenstein asked Collins about his conversion. Collins says nothing about his (or anyone else’s) emotional state but instead zeroes in on the myriad of intellecual reasons which convinced him to convert–and place his faith inJesus.
Pax.
Lee.
Loved the Bob Dylan anecdote/tale. What a memory to have!
Brilliant scientific mind. Loved his vision of a world in the not too distant future where Alzheimer’s would be a thing of the past.
20:45 ´´….rational basis for faith ….”
And yet he not once divulges any details to explain this view.
22:50 ”….between what I know as a scientist …. science is going to be the way to get the answer …”
And yet the crux of his foundational belief is based on rejecting the very basis of science that dead bodies do not come back to life!
Brilliant man, but his scientific/religious compartmentalism is laid bare for all to see.
No, he just doesnt blindly accept positivism as as faith commitment, as you do.
Crap! Did you even bother to watch the video?
He did not qualify a single religious orientated claim. No one.
Because in a 40 minute interview there isn’t time for that kind of detail (each segment only lasted a few minutes), nor would such have been appropriate on such a show, which is aimed at a broad general audience, anyway. If he were being interviewed by Bill Craig it’d be a different story.
The best way to get the full details is to read the book.
Pax.
Lee.
I have listened to him explain his conversion process which I find a lot better than reading his book as the explanation comes straight from the ”horse’s mouth”.
And I am not obliged to part with my hard earned money.
The turning point arrived when he worked in a hospital and sat at the bed of a critically ill woman with serious angina.
Her question about what he believed threw him into some sort of quandary.
Why on earth would it do that? I can think on no atheist I am aware of that would be thrown by such a question, but rather answer the patient compassionately but honestly about how they regarded death and what comes after.
After that it was simply a matter of time before he ditched reason and jumped aboard the faith wagon.
It is clear he is able to compartmentalize his faith and his science.
But evidence played no part in his conversion, and he is at least honest enough to admit this.
With Joel’s permission, here is the interview in question.
https://youtu.be/9lYTCnm7BdM
Arkhenaten, where in the Scientific Method does it state that the “rejection of dead bodies coming to life” is the “basis” of science? Prof.Canis never once said that in College Freshman Earth SciFrenchman nd if you watched it carefully he walked Rubenstein through the process that led him to Jesus an acceptance of faith in Jesus and the ultimate miracle of the resurrection.
REASON led him to believe in the Moral Law that he read about in CS Lewis’ *Mere Christianity* (and btw, Lewis rejected Genesis 1-11 as liiteral history/science). That, in tiurn, led turn, led him to THEISM, which in turn, led him to BELIEF IN JESUS.
He doesn’t “divulge any details” detail becaause in a 40 minute shoe thenre wasn’t and because it wouldn’t have been appropriate to do so on that kind of talk/interview show.
As if you want the details, read the book. As good as You Tube is, it’s no substitute for actully reading the book.
So memrely believing in miracles doesn’t make ay person irrational if they have intellectual reasons which cause them to do so.
What IS irrational is deciding before you even begin that miracles are impossible therefore any reports of miracles ae either delusions or outtigt lies.
Scientism is the mistaken view that science can and eventually will answer all of mankind’s questions. But there are certain questions science simply CANNOT address, such as “Why is there something rather than nothing?” “Why are we here?” “Does God or a god exist?” “Why do human beings long for justice?” “Is Yes a better band than Jethro Tull?” “Which color is the best, red, blue or green?” Science can’t answer ANY of these questions.
Pax.
Lee.
You were the one who said I should watch the video and now you are complaining it wasn’t long enough to allow Collins to explain and wasn’t appropriate! The why the hell did you suggest I watch it?
Which he sidesteps somewhat when it comes to stem cell research. I wonder what this is?
Bollocks! If you have evidence then present it and we can evaluate it together. Don’t just point to the biblical text and whine when I exercise natural skepticism that there is no evidence to support such claims.
Perhaps you could answer the question I posed to Joel regarding the raising of Lazarus? Such a profound event is not cited anyway in the historical record, yet was apparently witnessed by many people at the time. Yet is was deemed so inconsequential that the writers of the Synoptics did not even mention it.
Why do you think this is?
1. Because you kept insisting that Collins’ conversion (indeed most peoples’) was based primarily out of emotion and that the You Tube videos of him discussing his conversion proved it. It wasn’t and they don’t.
2. What does stem cell rsearch have to do with the existence of the Moral Law?
3. “Evidence” is a much broader category than your narrow def. allows for. I don’t know where you learned that but it’s wrong. Thus *everything* we’ve shared with you constitutes evidence. You can’t redefine the terms to suit you. Not and be either honest or accurate.
The nature of evidence is what it is, and evidence comes in many forms: written, verbal, physical, etc. Then there’s good, better and best evidence, etc. (We use this last particular standard in genealogy.)
3. This is “Reading the Gospels 101.” I shouldn’t even have to explain this one to you.
The gospels were not written to convince 21st c. skeptics that miracles are possible, or even that God exists. The gospels were writen to convince ANCIENT SEEKERS (who mostly already believed in miracles and the divine) that Jesus of Nazareth was/is the Jewish Messiah.
To do that, each gospel author tailored his gospel to a specific audience or group. Each gospel author drew from the much larger corpus of Jesus material, selecting and arranging specific material to suit his narrative purposes. Lest you object, modern biographers do this all the time. Rarely does a biographer include every detail of his subject’s life. Of necesity they have to be selective. It wss no different in the ancient world. And often, different biogrphies will include different events from a subject’s life–they don’t always all include the exact same material in the exact same order.
Tradents were free to pick and choose from the larger body of material and to rearrange it to suit them, they just weren’t free to make stuff up or to alter a tradition in any significant way. But if they for some reason *did’,* as oral tradition was a *community endeavor,* the communty, who knew the tradition by heart, could correct them.
John referecnes this selectiviy in 20:30 when he writes:
“Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his discples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the “Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.”
So it doesn’t bother me at all that John’s gospel is the only one to mention Lazarus’ being raised from the dead. This fact in no way argues agInst it’s basic historicity. Only someone with a predispoition to matetialism would say that it does, as a desperate attempt to to make the evidence conform to his worldview.
Besides which, you want some variation bet. the gospels, orherwise skeptics would be arguing that the four of them sat down beforehand and agreed to tell the exact same stories in the exact same order using identical language. In that case, you’d be accusing them of collusion!
Again, you have to take of your modern blinders in order to study the gospels accurately. Just as you can’t study the *Les Morte d’Arthur* the same way you’d study a John Grisham novel, you can’t study ancient biographies like the gospels thfough modern preconceptions.
Pax.
Lee.
I never use the word proof in such contexts. Religious conversion is based primarily on emotional grounds and these are justified by trying to rationalise them by claiming there are intellectual reasons for belief in God.
To assert that this is not the case opens a huge can of worms as the exact same criteria can be, and are cited by certain Hindus, Jews, Muslims, Mormons, etc.
So we are back to evidence to demonstrate the veracity of these claims. And you simply refuse to offer any and are on record stating that faith is at the root of belief.
And it’s worth mentioning that many people convert from one religion to another. If their rejection of one religion and acceptance of another are truly based on intellectual rather than emotional reasons on what evidential grounds can you present to defend Joel’s move to Orthodoxy, for example? And while you ponder this, consider also what are the intellectual reasons for those Christians who convert to Islam?
Furthermore, it is telling that, neither Collins, you or Joel have broached the salvation issue and the fact you consider yourselves to be sinners and everyone who falls outside of these parameters is likely destined to spend eternity in Hell. I trust you are not going to try to claim intellectual reasons for this load of doctrinal nonsense?
If you do not understand why this is pertinent then you don’t know as much about Francis Collins’ position as you think you do. I suggest you do a little more research.
If you get stuck I’ll provide the relevant details.
Oh I agree, evidence covers all the things you have listed, but only if it can be substantiated. Otherwise it remains a claim – and to date you have not substantiated a single thing. I hope this is now clear?
The bible is an object. It can be submitted as an object/article of evidence. It’s contents, however, are not regarded as evidence unless they can be substantiated.
One of the reasons Joel wrote a book to refute Ken Hams outlandish claims that parts of Genesis was evidence of YEC. And the same criteria apply to miracles.
Your rather lengthy reply to my Lazarus questions fails before it gets out of the gate. I didn’t need your explanation on the Synoptics, thanks, as I am well aware of how they came to be and how they are regarded by the consensus of scholars and historians. Again, not to labour the point, they contain errors aplenty and interpolation(forgery). The gospel of John does not fare any better and contains some well know forgery of its own.
Once more, we are back to unsubstantiated claims, not to mention historical plausibility.
But you have simply allowed your indoctrination and adherence to apologetics to quash any sort of honest critical thinking that is never tolerated by historians.
Arkhenaten, merely saying that religious conversions are all based in emotion a hundred times won’t make it true, any more than my saying a hundred times that I’m a neuro-surgeon would make that claim true.
There ARE a myriad of intellectual reasons for conversion. Francis Collins wrote a whole BOOK about the ones that impress him as a scientist.
For example, his argument in the book that the complexity of DNA is evidence for God is a rational, intellectual argument totally devoid of any emotional appeal.
As for the other major world religions, Judaism and Christianity are the only ones I know of which stress the intellectual component. Hinduism certainly doesn’t.
Remember–it wasn’t Hinduism or Islam who invented thd university. That was the medieval Church. It wasn’t a fear of death which caused Franciscan Friar Roger Bacon to expetiment with optics in the 13th century. It was his belief that the laws of nature pointed to a law–giver. His faith taught him that he had a DUTY to use his mind to understand both that law-giver and his laws. As Oxford Prof. of the History of Science James Hannum writes, this was the genesis of science. Francis Collins thus stands in a very long line of Christian scientists.
People switch religions for a variety of reasons, in my experience, not all of them rational.
As for Dr. Anderson’s conversion to Orthodoxy, I don’t have to explain it and ne8ther does he. Because all of the major orthdox Christian traditions agree on the *essentials* of the faith. There are differences to be sure, but they’re mostly dfifferences in emphasis. For the purpose of this discussion, everything in which they differ is basically window-dressing.
Again, what does the NIH performing stem cell research have to do with the existence of the Moral Law? Just because Collins sees no moral objection to such research doesn’t invalidate his arguments for the existence of the Moral Law. It exists whether the NIH does stem cell research or not.
Evidence is evidence whether your or I like it or not. Thusvthe gospels ARE evidence for Jes7s’ miracles, prob the best evidenve we have. That you personally don’t’ find them compelling doesn’t mean they aren’t evidence.
As for the gospels, I haven’t read anything by you wjich lears me to bel8eve you understand their composition. What I think you’ve done is base your opinion on skimming a couple of internet sites and articles by Richard Carrier. That would be like me scanning a few Web MD articles and then claiming to have a firm grasp of the body’s immune system.
You wanna talk aout plausIbility? How plausible is it that the earth amd the space-time universe simply sprang into being out of nothing, then evolved and fine-tuned themselves to the precise levels needed to sustain life?
How plausible is it that *something* came from *nothing*? What’s your “evidence” for *that*?
Pax.
Lee.
And neither do historians ….
And this is all that this argument has been about since the beginning .
EVIDENCE.
Okay, I hate this Samsung Android I’m using. It keeps garbling what I type. Maybe my last made enough sense.
Pax.
Le.
No worries, I got the gist.
Arkhenaten, historians collect and interpret evidence. I’ve done it on my job as a public historian 8 hours a day, five days a week for twenty-three years.
But your bias against the supernatural has blinded you to how things work in the real world. So please stop telling me how historians define and evaluate evidence. Because I am one and I can assure you that it does not work the way you say it does.
And how does dictionary.com define “evidence”:
That which tends to prove or disprove something; ground for belief; proof.
Thus the resurrection narratives in the gospels are EVIDENCE for the resurrection. The historian then EVALUATES and INTERPRETS those narratives. Many find it compelling. Many don’t. It’s still evidence.
Pax.
Lee.
It is fascinating to see someone tell scholars and historians about what scholars and historians do and don’t do.
It really is strange. He’s simply making the rules up as he goes along. And any evidence that doesn’t fit his fantasy is conveniently ignored.
Imagine the cheek of telling you, an academic biblical scholar with a PhD how academic scholars study the biblical texts.
I’ve enjoyed it, even though it’s the strangest duscussion I’ve ever hadvwith a skeptic, and I’ve had some bizarre discussions. But thus one takes the cake and is even finally beginning to wear me out–which takes real effort!
Pax.
Lee.
Arkhenaten,
As a historian I realize that historical “proof” and scientific “proof” are different. Science studies the repeatable and falsifiable while history studies the unrepeatable. Strictly speaking I can’t “prove” with the kind of certainty you seem to need for the existence of miracles that Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, or that he was assassinated in April of 1865. I wasn’t there, I didn’t see it. All I have to go on are the written records of people who all died over one hundred years ago and the consensus of professional historians.
But professional historians use criteria to evaluate historical evidence like the gospel accounts of miracles. You should be familiar with them, right?
Now, as to the raising of Lazarus.
Firstly, a reminder from NT Wright:
“Few serious historians now deny that Jesus, and for that matter many other people, performed cures and did other startling things for which there was no obvious natural explanation.” (from “NT Wright on Miracles” https://theparkforum.org/843-acres/nt-wright-on-miracles/)
And the word “miracle” itself is problematic, as NT Wright says:
“The word comes from an Epicurean or deistic worldview which envisages a God who is outside the process and occasionally reaches in, does something funny, and then pushes off again. That’s not what the New Testament is talking about. When people say, ‘Can we believe in miracles’, I say, ‘No,’ because the word ‘miracle’ gives us this sense of a normally absent God sometimes reaching in.
“That’s not the God of the Bible. What we have is the launching of space, time and matter in a new mode. It’s not discontinuous with our present space, time and matter, but this is God’s new creation.
“The thing about what we call the ‘miracles’ is not that these are radical abnormalities within the old world, but rather that they the things which are starting to be normal in the new world, which we see close and up personal with Jesus, and then which, through the ministry of the gospel thereafter, start to happen in different ways in the wider world. It’s about the launching of the new creation, not about an invasion into the old creation.” (From “Tom Wright Doesn’t Believe in Miracles” at http://www.walkingwithgiants.net/apologetics/miracles/tom-wright-doesnt-believe-in-miracles/)
I like this quotation by Gary Habermas and Mike Licona:
”Our knowledge of the world around us is gained by gathering information. When we cast our net into the sea of experience, certain data turn up. If we cast our net into a small lake, we won’t be sampling much of the ocean’s richness. If we make a worldwide cast, we have a more accurate basis for what exists. Here is the crunch. If we cast into our own little lakes, it is not surprising if we do not obtain an accurate sampling of experience. However, a worldwide cast will reveal many reports of unusual occurrences that might be investigated and determined to be miracles. Surely most of the supernatural claims would be found to be untrustworthy. But before making the absolute observation that no miracles have ever happened, someone would have to investigate each report. It only takes a single justified example to show that there is more to reality than a physical world. We must examine an impossibly large mountain of data to justify the naturalistic conclusion assumed in this objection.”(Habermas & Licona 2004, p.144).
So if you set aside your materialistic worldview for a moment and consider the possibility that there IS a creator God who can and has done just such miracles throughout history it isn’t difficult at all to believe.
But as Wright also says, you can’t prove a miracle happened the way you can prove Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans in AD 70. But you CAN look for alternative explanations for the alleged miracle and see if they can withstand a skeptical scrutiny. Most alternative explantations take more faith to believe than the actual miracles themselves.
The early Christians knew as well as you do that normally dead bodies stay dead. And yet they insist that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead.
If John had simply made up the resurrection of Lazarus, critics of Christianity could’ve easily pointed out that Lazarus of Bethany died and stayed dead. Why would John (or whoever you think wrote it) invent a story that could easily be disproved? The observers of this “miracle” could’ve stopped it in its tracks by saying “We were there, and no miracle happened. You wanna see Lazarus’ corpse? Come along and we’ll show you!”
Plus, the gospels depict the disciples (including the two sisters) as clueless about Jesus’ ability or desire to raise Lazarus. If the disciples were making it all up later, why make themselves look so bad? That’s the criteria of embarrassment.
But nobody said anything like that. The Jewish establishment didn’t question Jesus’ ability to perform such miracles, they just attributed it to the devil or sorcery.
People don’t accuse you of being in league with the devil unless you’re doing some pretty amazing stuff they can’t otherwise explain.
How did Jesus attract large crowds? The gospels tell us that crowds followed Jesus hoping for a miraculous healing.
Why did Jesus proclaim that he was doing something new if all he was doing was traveling around giving advice to poor peasants? Without actual transformation in their lives in a radical and meaningful way, what would be new about his agenda? And how in the world could *that* Jesus pose any kind of a threat to the establishment? That’d be like the FBI arresting self-help guru Dr. Wayne Dyer on charges of being an enemy of the state. How did the Jesus Movement survive the death of the founder–unlike every other messianic claimant on record–if it was just like the other ones, or if Jesus was just a guy who said some pithy stuff? Do you think that 2000 years from now anyone’ll remember Wayne Dyer? No. Not as anything more than a historical footnote (no offense to Dr. Dyer). Because *Those* kinds of movements (and their leaders) die out when the novelty wears off. The Jesus Movement, on the other hand, is still alive and kicking, stronger than ever!
The story doesn’t appear made-up because the details are too specific; Lazarus and his sisters were real people who were well-known in their community. There’s no embellishment the way you’d get if it was a story about Hercules or Alexander the Great.
I don’t know whether Jesus would’ve raised him again if the Romans had executed him. Strictly speaking: Don’t care. Not relevant to the discussion.
Finally, why shouldn’t we be skeptical of skepticism? Skepticism is no more “objective” or “neutral” than faith. Have you ever stepped back and critically examined your own presuppositions? You might wanna do that some time. It might shock you.
So I can’t “prove” Lazarus was raised from the dead. But since my worldview doesn’t preclude the possibility of such a miracle, and since, as I’ve said ad nauseum already, for lots of reasons (whIch I shared) I trust the overall veracity of the gospels, I have no intellectual hang-ups with believing Lazarus was, in fact, raised from the dead. Smarter people than me have believed it and for the same reasons. But if you still want to live blinded by your preconceived worldview I can’t stop you. It’s just sad for someone to be so closed-minded.
Pax.
Lee.
@ Lee
I will post a fuller response if this doesn’t get deleted.
However, your drawn out reply merely tells me you have put on you faith hat first, your Christian worldview hat second, and your historian’s hat last of all.
Habermas and Licona are not historians and Licona considers the gospels are written by the traditional names attributed to them. I would not trust anything either man writes on this topic.
Regards
Ark.
Both Habermas and Licona are also historians, despite the fact that their degrees are in philosophy and theology.
So how about responding to their actual argument? Any time someone refuses to address someone else’s argument, but instead merely takes shots at the person(s) making said arguments, my first thought is that they don’t have a response to offer and are hoping that with all the noise no one’ll notice they haven’t actually addressed the arguments.
As for your claim that “I put on my faith hat first,” you obviously didn’t actually read my “drawn out reply.” I gave you several intellectual reasons for why I trust the gospels.
I hope your next response actually addresses some of my arguments instead of just telling me I’m blinded by may faith.You cannot keep dodging these issues. It makes you look like you don’t know how to respond, thus are ducking them.
Pax.
Lee.
They are not professional historians, and , like you they wear their faith hats when evaluating tales from the bible and especially miracle tales.
Habermas has demonstrated his willingness to obscure facts somewhat. You will be aware of the Flew debacle, I’m sure?
And his ”facts” argument regarding the resurrection is simply presupposition apologetics.
Neither man has any argument in this regard worth engaging .
Yes I read it and stand by my comment. Just because the Lazarus tale sounds like it is true does not mean it is.
What the gospels depict regarding the others involved means nothing other than it is a good story in keeping with the genre, as any good writer will tell you.
Furthermore, you have no idea who wrote the account so there is even less reason to trust it.
Also, there is absolutely no independent attestation of the event and considering how high profile it would have been including those who saw it – and the religious authorities who were aware of it – it went completely unreported . This strongly suggests it is simply a work of fiction.
And the fact no other gospel records the event also renders the credibility of the tale as likely to be fictional.
If you scroll up thread you will read what some well know biblical and highly respected biblical scholars have said regarding the gospels.
Here they are again ….
E.P. Sanders states that “these Gospels were written with the intention of glorifying Jesus and are not strictly biographical in nature.”
Charles H. Talbert agrees that the gospels should be grouped with the Graeco-Roman biographies, but adds that such biographies included an element of mythology, and that the synoptic gospels also included elements of mythology.
Ingrid Maisch and Anton Vögtle writing for Karl Rahner in his encyclopedia of theological terms indicate that the gospels were written primarily as theological, not historical items.
I’ll remind you of what you wrote up thread.
So, no , Lee, I am afraid you have not evaluated the miracle claims from a position of neutrality and objectivity.
And I previously asked what qualifications you hold as an historian, and what is your particular field?
Regards
Ark
Ark, you use a lot of words not to really say much of anything.
Firstly, I can tell you were never on your high school or college debate team, because merely pooh-pooing Habermas and Licona’s argument doesn’t actually constitute a counter-argument. You’ve given me absolutely no reason not to give it serious consideration. That YOU find it silly isn’t argument.
As for the Lazarus story, as you put it, being “a good story in keeping with the genre, as any good writer will tell you,” your’e exactly right . . . if the genre is ancient bios and the writer is Richard Bauckham who IS an academic historian as well as a theologian.
Compare the Lazarus story with any Greco-Roman myth you care to name and tell me it fits the genre of ancient myth. If what we have in John is a fanciful myth with lots of embellishment then John *did a VERY bad job!* He should’ve taken “Composing Greco-Roman Myth 101” first.
Considering how few ancient 1st c. Palestinian historical sources we actually have it’s impossible to say that the Lazarus story went unreported. Maybe a now-lost historical chronicle recorded it?
As for Ed Sanders and the other scholars you cherry-picked above, I actually agree with the statements you posted by them. But just because the gospels are making the claim that Jesus was the Jewish Messiah doesn’t invalidate them as biographies. They can be both. We’ve been over this one before.
Suetonius opens his *Divus Juilus* thusly:
“Julius Caesar, the divine, lost his father when he was in the sixteenth year of his age . . .”
By your logic,we cannot trust Suetonius as a historical biographer because he calls Julius Caesar “divine.”
Or Josephus, who records about Jesus:
“For he was one who performed surprising deeds . . .”
Since I know you’ll object to parts of the TF being interpolations, remember the medieval Arabic Christian ms of Antiquities which was discovered by Schlomo Pines in the 1970s, and which contains the TF largely as it appears in the Eusebian mss of Antiquities. Regardless, no one argues that this portion of the TF is an interpolation.
So. Buy your own logic, since Josephus says Jesus did “surprising deeds” (miracles) we’ll have to chuck him out as well.
Thus, by your own logic, Suetonius, and Josephus too, were writing theology and not history, thus must both be rejected as serious historians. Good bye, Suetonius and Josephus! I guess libraries have to put them in their fantasy collections next to Harry Potter and Terry Brooks now. Sigh.
Can you see how your argument falls apart here? A text, ancient or modern, can have characteristics of two or more literary genres. It doesn’t have to be one or the other for us to take it seriously.
As for my field, as believe I’ve told you a half-dozen times, I’ve been the public historian.and genealogist at the Florence-Lauderdale Public Library for twenty-three years. I’m went to UNA, where Dr. Anderson teaches (my major was commercial art until I changed it). I’ve written and published a medieval encyclopedia (you can get the Kindle version on Amazon) and have published a handful of articles in local and state historical and genealogical journals. For the past fifteen years I’ve taught or co-taught a basic genealogy seminar for the library and I serve on the board of six local historical preservation and genealogical societies. I give historical tours every spring and summer for two of those societies as well as our local Tourism Bureau, and am often called on to speak to local organizations (schools, churches, civic groups, DAR, SAR, etc.).
Currently I’m researching a biography on local Civil War guerilla, bushwhacker, Union Army deserter and outlaw Thomas Marion Clark (1828-1872) who led a gang of cutthroats bet. 1864-1872, the year he was lynched i Florence with two anonymous thieves (not in his gang). If you look you’ll find articles and videos I’ve written/narrated about him online.
So, to sum up. You haven’t answered any of my arguments. So far, all you’ve given me is your OPINION with no FACTS or ARGUMENTS to support it.
Just remember that for centuries historians thought that the city of Troy was just a myth cooked up that crazy fantasist Homer . . . until Heinrich Schliemann discovered it in 1870. But oh no! Schliemann wasn’t a trained, professional academic archaeologist. Bye, bye Troy!
Pax.
Lee.
Arkhenaten, it may not be a formal debate, but in a discussion of this type it is customary to provide FACTS and EVIDENCE to back up your assertions; particularly in light of the fact that you keep demanding that we offer evidence to back up our arguments (which we’ve done).
So I’ll ask you again to address the actual ARGUMENT of the Habermas and Licona quote I posted above. Disparaging their credentials is what someone does who is unable to make a valid counterargument.
As for Suetonius and Josephus, please pick a side. Both make supernatural claims which cannot be substantiated by secular history–and it’s actually much worse for Josephus because in *Antiquities* he presents the Old Testament account of the Children of Israel, those fantastic myths and legends, as actual history! Plus Josephus actually asserts that the Emperor Vespasaian was the Jewish Messiah! Not to even mention the fact that he was writing with an agenda–to defend Jewish religion and culture to the Romans. You’ve insisted that we cannot trust an author with an agenda. So are you going to shelve your copies of Josephus and Suetonius next to Harry Potter from now on?
But you turn around and say we actually SHOULDN’T chuck out Suetonius and Josephus because we can corroborate much of what they say from other “secular” historians? Why do they get a pass here where the gospels don’t? Much of what the gospels reference can be corroborated in secular histories. Yet Suetonius gets a pass here but they don’t? How is that at all cosistent?
As for the TF most scholars accept that a core of it is genuine and when you remove the alleged Christian interpolations that core–including that Jesus did miracles–sounds very Josephan. Regardless we now have a medieval Arabic Christian text of *Antiquities* which contains an Arabic version of the TF that is very close to the older, GK Eusebian mss, but, being Arabic and medieval, is from an independent ms tradition of*Antiquities.* So at least a core of the TF as we know It may be authentic after all.
I’m not going to repeat why I regard the gospels as generally reliable because I’ve already written a small book on it above–more than enough to satisfy any reasonable skeptic’s demand for evidence.
But I noticed you didn’t address everything I said above. For example, did it surprise you that I basically agree with Sanders, et. al. that the gospels are not *strictly* biographical in nature? But then I never said they were. It’s obvious that they have a theological agenda. But that in itself doesn’t mean they’re all or even mostly, fiction. Every author writes with a bias; the honest ones are aware of it and tell you–which the gospels do. They’re very upfront about their theological agenda, John being perhaps the most explicit of the four in chapters 20 and 21. Total objectivity is both impossible and uncecessary.
Even for skeptics. But there is a difference between radical skepticism and critical thinking, as I’ve said.
You gotta read the gospels as an ancient would, not as a modern skeptic would. You’re demanding answers to questions they aren’t asking.
And I’m just curious if my credentials as a public historian pass muster?
Pax.
Lee.
You simply are not getting it regarding the divine claims of Suetonius and Josephus, and we can chuck Tacitus in the mix here as well.
Maybe you have a blind spot in this regard as I am darn sure I am explaining this point well enough?
However, let me try again.
All three are regarded as historians.
All three record certain things about history that can be verified.
But the miracle claims and things pertaining to divinity etc are not regarded as factual and neither are they supported with any sort of verifiable evidence.
They are merely claims, and such was the way many historians and biographers of their day often recorded such things. In some cases it was even expected.
But no modern historian considers there is any veracity to such claims. They are regarded as fiction/myth.
Have you got this very salient point, Lee?
Let me reiterate. They present no evidence to support any of the divine /miraculous clams they make.
And because of this, historians of today do not consider such claims have any veracity.
Are you with me so far?
So, to the gospels. First, they are anonymous. This is very important in its own right.
The anonymous authors make many claims, among which are historical claims. Many of these cannot be verified, many are flat out wrong, and pretty much all are unsubstantiated and this is how historians regard them, as illustrated from the quotes I supplied from people such as EP Sanders.
Let me repeat. They are not regarded as objective historical accounts, and this includes all references to miracles.
Until you accept this there seems little point in me addressing the minutiae of your comment or pursuing this discussion.
If you do accept this fact then we can continue.
Regards
Ark.
Lee, this is where you just nod and say, “Okay. You’re right. I’m wrong. What was I thinking?” and let Ark think he has actually made a logical point.
Then perhaps you would be able to explain why unsubstantiated miracle claims as reported by Suetonius, Josephus and Tacitus are rejected, yet you expect people to accept unsubstantiated and anonymous miracle claims that appear in the gospels?
Silly me. You’re right.
You say there are miracle claims in Suetonius and Josephus, but you still say those works are histories. You just discount those specific miracle claims.
You say there are miracle claims in the Gospels, but in that case, that means they are myths, because no objective history account would have miracle stories.
Yes, how blind have I been. I see clearly now. It all makes sense. You’re a miracle worker.
Yes, they are ancient works regarded as historical accounts, and much of what was written can be supported with corroborating evidence.
Where such claims cannot be supported, such as the Tacitus passage suggesting Nero persecuted Christians regarding the fire of Rome, historians remain unconvinced.
A similar scenario applies to any sort of divine claims regarding Roman Caesars.
For example, you would not give credence to any claim implying any sort of divine prowess for someone such as Julius Caesar, yet you accept divine miracle claims in the gospels, which are anonymous, and unsubstantiated.
This is surprising considering you have a phd in Old Testament and I suspect this would not be the case with someone who also holds a phd in Old Testament but is not a Christian, like you.
Do you notice any degree of hypocrisy you may be exercising here, Joel?
And do you know what “moving the goal posts” mean?
But oh dear me…what am I saying? You’re right. You’re always right. Some ancient texts that purport history yet contain miracles are still histories (we just discount the specific miracle claims), and some others that purport history but contain miracle claims–those ones are outright myths and not histories.
Makes perfect sense.
Yes, I am perfectly aware of what the term means.
You do it all the time.
1.
Correct, and it is then we examine such texts to determine which parts are fact and which are fiction.
This is done by looking at probability, reliability, plausibility, and any and all supporting evidence.
Now, while much of what people such as Josephus, Suetonius and Tacitus can be supported with a high degree of probability, including hard evidence, any claims or allusions to miracles or other such supernaturalism are rejected.
And I am sure you reject them also,yes?
The question remains, why do you reject any miracle/divine claims in texts by ancient historians such as Tacitus and Suetonius yet accept miracles and supernaturalism in the gospels?
2. Why do you believe that a non Christian/religious person/scholar with a phd in biblical studies/ Old Testament will approach the texts in a critical and objective manner, while you do not and insist that the miracle s depicted in the New Testament were real historic events?
You’re right. You are completely consistent to call Josephus’ works histories and the gospel accounts myths.
Really? I don’t think I wrote this.
However, so that I don’t have to trawl through the entire post, if you can find this comment then please quote me.
Can you also include the reason why a non-religious historian/scholar with similar qualifications as you (phd) will approach biblical texts objectively while you do not?
Right. I don’t know where I would ever get the idea you did.
Where do you get the idea that “non-religious” = “objective”?
Historians do not have access to the supernatural or can demonstrate it even exists.
So, why do you as a phd in Old Testament consider biblical miracles have any veracity?
Right, of course. What am I thinking?
To be honest most of the time I have no idea what you are thinking.
Perhaps this is what indoctrination and unsubstantiated religious belief does to people such as you and Lee?
Yep…gobba goo goo. That’s what it is. We’re morons, drowning in a sea of superstition.
No, not morons.
Indoctrinated, yes.
All religious believers suffer from this in varying degrees. As a scholar, you have been able to compartmentalize such beliefs. Francis Collins acts similarly.
Your self-deprecating responses now on display are merely defense mechanisms.
Yep. You are a true expert in the field of psychiatry and psychoanalysis.
No, merely responding to the way you react when you are called out for unsubstantiated claims.
If you were really serious about your credibility you would respond in such a manner as to demonstrate exactly how you arrive at the beliefs you hold rather than simply positing asinine responses that just make you look silly and somewhat childish.
Many former Christians who I interact with admit to once behaving in a similar manner as you are right now, when challenged.
And also, I have mentioned on numerous occasions the testimonies of former religious professionals over on the Clergy project.
For the love of Medusa, just stop. You’ve been doing this nonstop for, what is it? 10 days? Give it up. What you are doing is the real sign of psychosis. Good lord.
Perhaps if you were to set aside your Christian perspective for just one comment and approach it with genuine honesty you might be able to admit that your acceptance of said miracles is based solely on faith?
Can you do this?
Give it up.
See … this is exactly the point I have been making since the get go.
You simply cannot be objective and brutally honest as your Christian indoctrination clouds any objectivity.
Yep. I am a slave to superstition. I can’t be objective.
Oh, I am sure you can be about many things, but it appears that with these miracle accounts in the gospels your faith somehow prevents you from being objective.
This was the reason I asked why a non religious scholar who holds a PHD such as yours will approach miracle claims without any regard for faith. This was when you became asinine with your replies.
Have you ever heard of the Marcus Aurelius’ Rain Miracle?
Apparently, you think being secular and “non-religious” is to equated with objectivity. Thats awesome.
Please stop.
No, but being secular and non religious means religious indoctrination has no influence when it comes to examining the historical credibility of certain religious texts.
As a PHD, why do you allow your religious convictions/faith to interfere with the objective analysis of the gospels, for example?
Hahaha…okay.
You’re right. Cue Homer Simpson: “D’oh!” (smacking head).
Pax.
Lee.
ARK: “All three [Suetonius, Josephus, Tacitus] are regarded as historians.
All three record certain things about history that can be verified.”
LEE: Same with the gospels. All four record certain things that can be verified. So why treat them differently than secular historians like Tacitus?
Because of an irrational, almost paranoid level of bias and prejudice!!!
ARK: So, to the gospels. First, they are anonymous. This is very important in its own right.
The anonymous authors make many claims, among which are historical claims. Many of these cannot be verified, many are flat out wrong, and pretty much all are unsubstantiated and this is how historians regard them, as illustrated from the quotes I supplied from people such as EP Sanders.
LEE: Firstly, again, I fail to see how the gospels are substantially any different than secular histories. Yet for some reason you have different criteria for each one.
I mean, Josephus basically accepts the whole Old Testament as reliable, factual history, and records it as such in *Antiquities.* Yet you’re willing to give him a pass but not Luke’s gospel?
The gospels, too record certain things that can be verified from secular histories. So why treat them any differently than Josephus or Suetonius?
As I already said, only because of your biases and prejudices, that’s why. Your prejudice against Jesus and Christianity blinds you, and causes you to be much more skeptical towards the gospels than is strictly necessary.
The way skeptics approach the NT, esp. the gospels is to *presume them guilty until proven innocent.* Yet that is NOT how professional historians work. You have to proceed from the assumption that most people, including historical chroniclers—and even gospel authors!—are honest, and aren’t deliberately lying in their writings. No competent historian starts out *assuming* that a text is lying then tries to prove it,
Until it comes to the gospels and their supernatural claims. Suddenly NOW it’s okay to presume a group of historical authors was lying and then bend over backwards to prove it. Why? Because modern skeptics have drunk the Enlightenment Kool-Aid of being skittish and paranoid of anything that smacks of the supernatural. Assuming God or a god even exists, we’d prefer the Deist version who doesn’t really get involved with things down on earth, thanks very much. If it’s all the same, we’d prefer God didn’t really get too involved because we’re doing a jolly good job of running the branch office down here without anyone from management telling us what to do.
It’s almost like skeptics DON’T WANT the gospels to be true, thus bend over backwards to prove that they aren’t. But how is that being an objective scholar?
As for the gospels being anonymous, all throughout history you will find anonymous chronicles. And while we’d love to know who wrote them, that in itself isn’t as important as whether what they wrote is accurate or not.
As for the authorship of the gospels, *technically speaking,* they’re anonymous, in that the individual texts don’t identify their authors. However we have very early, independent attestation for their traditional authorship. As I keep stressing, the ONLY reason skeptics are as skeptical as they are regarding the authorship of the gospels is because they’re Christian religious texts which make supernatural claims. If they were secular histories, or even non-Christian religious texts, nobody would be making much noise about their alleged authors, miracles, etc.. But because skeptics like yourself are prejudiced against the existence of the supernatural, esp. the Christian take on the supernatural, an unreasonable level of skepticism is applied to the gospels which wouldn’t be and isn’t applied to other historical texts.
It actually doesn’t make any difference who wrote the gospels, just whether they’re accurate or not.
ARK: Let me repeat. They [the gospels] are not regarded as objective historical accounts, and this includes all references to miracles.
LEE: There is NO SUCH THING as an “objective historical account.” No author who has ever lived was totally free of bias or prejudice. Reading a few ancient and medieval chroniclers will disabuse you of that idea right off. But just because a person writes with an agenda, doesn’t automatically make them a liar or inaccurate.
You’re writing with an agenda. Should I infer from that that nothing you say can therefore be trusted?
And as for miracles, I can’t PROVE they happen/happened, but you can’t PROVE they didn’t/don’t happen, not unless, as Habermas and Licona said, you’ve somehow been able to investigate every single modern and historical miracle ever reported in the world.
So can you proof that miracles can’t and don’t happen? I mean prove it? No, you can’t. Just because you’ve never seen a dead body raised isn’t proof that it can’t happen.
As Hamlet said, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in all your philosophy (the medieval and Elizabethan term for science).”
No, it’s blatantly obvious that the only reason you are treating the gospels differently is because they make religious/supernatural claims that clashes with your world-view so you then cherry-pick looking for evidence to discredit them.
It wouldn’t be as bad if you’d just be intellectually honest enough to admit it. I can respect that kind of honesty. But this feigned “objectivity” and dispassionate interest isn’t fooling anyone.
Pax.
Lee.
Sorry, Lee , did you miss the final paragraph of my previous reply?
Regards.
Ark.
No, l didn’t miss it. That would be impossible seing as how this constitutes the bulk of your argumemt and you’ve said it, like a hundred times now.
Please read this carefully: I have never argued that the gospels are “objective” history. They aren’t. NO historical writing is. But they don’t have to be to be truthful and accurate in what they report. This is Historcal Method 101 here.
So I’m not going to concede the phrase “objective history” to you because it’s a red herring.
However there are a lot of academic scholars who DO believe the gospels are fairly reliable historical accounts. One or two of them came to this conclusion after a prolonged period of trying to discredit them.
My goal–fruitless though it be–has been to try to get you to see the numefous fallacies in your underlying premise.
Where in any textbook on historiography or the historical method does it state that a historical source CANNOT be taken seriously unless it can be PROVED that it is one hundred percent objective? Throw out all non-objective histories and you’re left with zero histories.
NO historical documents are one hundred percent objective. Josephus isn’t. Tacitus isn”t. Suetonius isn’t. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle isn’t. William of Malmesbury isn’t. Winston Churchil isn’t. John Meacham isn’t. The gospels aren’t.
So until you remove your philosophical and methodological blinders I think I’ve said all there is to say. I refuse to turn my brain off for you or anyone else.
I’m at a loss as to how to reason with anyone as closed-minded as you are. You’re obviously a smart person, but you’re blind, willfully or otherwise, to your biases and preconceptions, and have a misplaced faith in your own skepticism, and you think reading a few atheist/skeptic websites makes you an expert in NT Studies.
So, I guess it’s been a facsinating, if frustrating discussion.
To quote Eric Idle, “And now, for something completely different.”
Pax.
Lee.
Oh, no one is disputing that historians are not always entirely objective. A person like Gibbon certainly included a degree of subjectivity in his writing.
So while the gospels will include a number of historical realities, including people, (Herod, Caesar etc) plus certain archaeological and geographical settings,some of which were reasonably accurate, what was overlaid onto these settings was not historically objective, or accurate.
After all, the primary objective of the unknown gospel authors was to convey a theological message – that the person of Jesus Christ was the promised messiah, and the writers did not expect anyone to get too upset if the details were not necessarily historically objective, or even that accurate, and much of the audience of the day probably did not expect these stories to be accurate either!
But the question for today’s scholar is just how much embellishment and subjectivity occurred in the writing of the gospels?
More to the point, how do scholars and theologians sort the ‘wheat from the chaff”, and how is your average Christian who very likely does not study the bible, supposed to judge who is in possession of the correct interpretation?
Young earth creationists truly believe AiG and Ken Ham have it nailed down and they have ”highly qualified” scientists on board, some with degrees from recognised secular universities! How much more legit do they need to be?
So I am not, in fact, close-minded in the least. But you are expecting me to be open-minded about miracle claims and biblical objectivity when you cannot demonstrate the veracity of miracles or which parts of the bible are genuine history and which are not. And Christians can’t agree either!
And if doctrinal disputes are not that important and the only thing that matters is that all Christians believe/accept that Jesus rose from the dead, why do mainstream Christians get upset with people like Ken Ham and Ken Hovind?
Arkenaten, against my better judgment, I’m going to try this one more time.
Firstly, Edward Gibbon and his Enlightenment cronies exhibited more than a “degree of subjectivity” in their writings. It’s largely because too many people drank their Enlightenment Kool-aid that we’re in the mess we’re in now.
Certainly that’s where Jesus scholarship really jumped the shark. It still hasn’t completely recovered, as echoes of the Enlightenment’s false assumptions still reverberate. NT Wright’s latest book *History and Esccgatology: Jesus and the Promise of Natural History* addresses the preconceptions, biases and methodological quagmire bequeathed to us by the Enlightenment. See my last post for some of his thoughts on this subject.
As for Matthew,Mark, Luke and John, while they were most certainly writing theology, they insisted that that theology was firmly grounded in actual space-time historical events, so it very much mattered that the details were as accurate as possible.
The idea that nobody in the early church really cared, or was even able, to accurately remember what had happened a mere thirty-forty years later hence just made stuff up willy-nilly, is just ridiculous, and displays a terrible ignorance of how oral cultures like those which produced the NT actually functioned.
In these oral societies only approximately 18% of the population was literate. Thus by necessity they depended very heavily on oral tradition; to ensure such tradition was
transmited accurately safeguards were in place. Cultural anthropologists have demonstrated over the past fifty years that otherwise “primitive” cultures around the world are still able to transmit oral tradition very accurately over several generations. So as I keep saying, if you want to be a proper skeptic, you have to get rid of your 21st c. blinders and stop reading the gospels through such modern and inaccurate preconceptions.
As for miracles, it is your positivist worldview which will not allow you even to consider the possibility of thr miraculous. So YES, that is in fact the very DEFINITION of “close-minded”.
As NT Wright rhetorically asks in my last post, “How can any scientific enquiry not allow for the possibility that its own worldview might be incorrect?” But people such as yourself, while demanding that peple of faith set aside our worldview, never seem to stop to question your own worldview with all its inherent preconceptions, assumptions, biases, etc.
So until you can PROVE that miracles cannot and never have happened, the door is still open to the possibility that Jesus actually did the “signs and wonders” the NT attributes to him.
As for doctrine, what’s more important, that Jesus was bodily resurrected, or how often you observe the Eucharist? Is it more important that your worship be a capella or that the church is taught, uplifted and edified by that worship? Thus, there are “Big D” doctrines (the Trinity, the Eucharist, providing for widows and oprhpans, etc.) and “litle d” doctrines (frequency of communion, time of meeting, instrumental or a capella, one cup/chalice or multiple cups, etc.). At the risk of trvializing some legitimate disagrements, nearly all orthodox Christian denominations agree on the essential elements of the faith, so that, to quote Elder Thomas Campbell, our disagreements are over “things of which the Kingdom of Heaven *does not consist*”. That the church exists in a divided estate is a shameful thing which is not the way it should be.
“Mainstream Christians” like myself wouldn’t have a problem with Ken Hamm if he weren’t so dogmatic, insisting that his views are right and anyone who disagrees with him isn’t a *real* Christian. That and the fact that his views actually teach a simplistic one-dimensional view of scripture that actually trivializes it, while claiming to revere and honor it. Dr. Anderson’s book does a great job of explaining in more detail why Hamm’s views are problematic. The blogs here are good, but are really no substitute for reading the book.
Pax.
Lee.
Food for thought from NT Wright’s magisterial *The New Testament and the People of God*:
“In particular, why have so many scholars been coy, to say the least, about ‘events’ in the gospels being actual events, rather than simply fictions in the mind of the evangelists?
“It is sometimes thought that the real reason is a rejection of the ‘miraculous’, and hence the felt impossibility of using the gospels as serious history. . . . But a basic point must be made here. Accounts of strange happenings in any culture are of course subject to legendary accretions. But one cannot rule out *a priori* the possibility of things occurring in ways not normally expected, since to do so would be to begin from the fixed point that a particular worldview, namely the eighteenth-century rationalist one, or its twentieth-century positivist successor, is correct in postulating that the universe is simply a ‘closed continuum’ of cause and effect. How can any scientific enquiry not allow for the possibility that its own worldview might be incorrect?
“This is emphaticaly *not* to say that the *pre*-Enlightenment worldview was after all, correct. Why, once we challenge the prevailing dualisms, should there only be two possibilities, the ‘pre-modernist’ and the ‘modernist’ ones? To say that the gospels cannot be read as they stand because their view of the ‘miraculous’ conflicts with the Enlightenment worldview does not of itself mean that they can *only* be read from within a pre-critical Christian faith. There might be plenty of other worldviews, not necessarily Christian ones, within which one could read the gospels without being offended by the ‘miracles’ . Nor is it to say that if we are to reard the gospels as they stand, ‘miracles’ and all, we must frankly admit we are ceasing to do ‘history’ and are now doing something else, namely ‘theology’, or a kind of meta-history. Only if we have devalued ‘history’ so that the word now *means* ‘the positivist recounting of those events which fit with an eighteenth-century worldview, and which seem to have actualy happened’, would we need to think that. . . . The closed mind is as damaging to scholarship as the ‘closed continuum’ idea is to history itself.” (pp. 92-93)
“A further point about myths also tells quite heavily against the theory that much of the gospel tradition consists of them. Myths of the basic kind Bultmann envisaged (quasi-folk tales, articulating the worldvjew of a people) characterstically take a long time to develop at least in a concrete and intricate form. But the first generation of Christianity is simply too short a time to allow for such a process. This point has been made often enough, but it is still necessary to repeat it. The hypothesis about the early church necessary to support the idea that the first Christians told ‘foundational myths’ to legitimate their life and faith is far too complex to be credible. . . .
“The gospels then, *are* ‘myth’ in the sense that they are foundational stories for the early Christian worldview. They *contain* ‘mythological’ language which we can learn, as historians, to decode in the light of other ‘apocalyptic’ writings of the time. But they have these features because of their underlying, and basically Jewish, worldview. Monotheism of the creational and covenantal variety demands that actual history be the sphere in which Israel’s god makes himself known. But this means that the only language in which Israel can appropriately describe her history, is language which, while it does indeed intend to refer to actual events in the space-time universe, simultaneously invests those events with (what we might call) trans-historical significance. Such language is caled ‘mythological’, if it is, not because it describes events which did not hapen, but *because it shows that actual events are not separated from ultimate significance by an ugly ditch*, as the whole movement of Deist and Enlightenment thought would suggest, but on the contrary carry their significance within them.” (pp. 426-427 )
Pax.
Le.
Language Ark! Otherwise, not gonna dignify that with a response.
Ark has been posting profanity-laced responses all day. I’m just deleting them. Ive been driving so I didn’t get to that last one until now.
What is it with these people? Fifteen years ago I used to hang out in the Amazon.com Religion Forums and I must have met a dozen people like him, arrogant, obnoxious, condescending. And all of them insisted that being atheists guaranteed they were critical thinkers. Actually I think Arkhenaten used to post there, too. I seem to remember his Egyptian-sounding screen-name.
Pax.
Lee.
Note to everyone: This specific post will have no more comments. So stop.
Again, to all the idiots who are getting their comments deleted because they don’t know when to shut up. Stop.
Correction. I was trying to be nice and not single out THE idiot who won’t shut up. Yes, the single, solitary idiot who won’t shut up. Stop.
The statement “Heiser points out that when we come to the Exodus and Conquest narratives, we are told that the Anakim live in Canaan (along with other related groups like the Rephaim), and that they are the descendants (i.e. offspring) of the Nephilim” is key because the entire theory of post-flood Nephilim, which Heiser teaches, is based on one single verse that is then employed as a hermeneutic via which to misread other texts.
Num 13:33 is an “evil report” for which the unfaithful and disloyal speakers were rebuked.
Heiser consistently fails to interact with the narrative of Num 13 and so he just picks up v. 33 and runs with it (in all of his books, papers, lectures, videos, etc. he merely addressed it in one generic footnote).
I usually just hand them a nice dose of the atheist destroyer aka Ron Wyatt that proved the entire Bible to be historical fact. Here are a few videos on the topic that will utterly nuke your mind. Semi off topic, I personally believe the city of David is where the 1st and 2nd temples were and the traditional Temple Mount is actually fort Antonia. Remember the verse no stone left unturned? Nice article btw, I appreciate your work. God bless and Godspeed.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=KOyOuptO2GE
Here is also summary of Ron’s Work. Have fun disproving all that. Most people can’t understand how a simple and humble man led by God can find all that.
-Noah’s ark (measured it and it matches the biblical account 300 Egyptians cubits 450feet as the Bible states) they found large Anchor stones with holes in them to keep the ark steady during the biblical flood, also gopher wood covering of the ark that made a strange sound when tapped on.
-Village of 8 (doomsday mountain) where the ark landed and came to rest, it was impaled on a limestone rock and covered by lava until the 70’s-80’s when an earthquake uncovered it.
-Noah’s home, tomb and his wife’s grave (his wife’s grave was dug up and her jewelry and gold was sold on the black market for over 100 million)
-Tower of Babel (Euphrates)
-Joseph’s grain pits (7 years of famine/plenty)
-Pyramid building machine (lift devices some multilevel and holes on the pyramids stone base for these lift devices not to move)
-True Red Sea Crossing, he tracked their route by following wadi’s watirs (water locations) and found large round stones with holes for them to use for tents. The children of Israel were stuck 3 million of them at nuwayby al muzayyinah translation (Waters of Moses opening). Ron and his 2 sons dove into the water and found chariot wheels, coral encrusted bones and a golden choice chariot 18th dynasty 4,6 & 8 spokes wheels were found in the Red Sea aka Gulf of Aqaba
-True Mt Sinai (Jebel El Lawz) (Ron and his two sons were prisoners by the Saudi’s for 78 days it made the mainstream news) he showed them the pillar Solomon had put there and it likely saved their lives. They found the real split rock of horeb, jethro’s cave, blackened top when God descended to the mountain, 12 wells (Elim aka desert oasis) and where the golden calf altar was.
-Ark of the Covenant he dug two tunnels after he broke into the Calvary Escarpment (many 1st temple artifacts such as the veil, holy ark, the mercy-seat, the two tables of stone (EGW said one side has 4 commandments the other side has 6 commandments), the holy raiment of the priests, the altar of incense, the forty-eight precious stones wherewith the priest was adorned, all the holy vessels of the tabernacle & goliath’s sword)
-Actual crucifixion cross holes (3), cross hole plug, cutouts for the signs (3), rolling stone for the garden tomb buried near the cross holes (in front of them)
-Sodom and Somorrah (ashen cites) he found tons of sulfur balls and they were lab tested and came out to over 97% purity. Nowhere in the world is it found that pure in its natural state it’s only 40% crystalline
-Burial pots Philistine (Ark of the covenant when temporarily stolen destroyed their graven image of the fake fish God Dagon by cutting off its hands and head and knocking it down)
ROM 12:19-21- Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.