If you discovered that Christianity is false,....?

[Divine Insight]

If you discovered that Christianity is false, would you be happy, or disappointed.

And why?

[Zzyzx]

.

These two verses can be harmonized if we take into account that it takes awhile to build a house and after said house is built, the One who told us how to build returns to test it.

Contrasting statements (or verses) can be "harmonized" by applying enough imagination, creativity, redefinition, smokescreen or whatever it takes. Of course, they still contrast, but may be seen as "harmonized" by those fooled by story telling.

You just summed up the 'contrasting statements' made by Big-bang Evolutionists who claim this BB created the universe out of nothing.

Truth or lack thereof in Christianity is a separate topic from origin of the universe. I have no knowledge and no favorite conjecture about such things – but leave that speculation to those who claim to have knowledge (religious or otherwise) and ask them for evidence – which has not been provided – only unverifiable speculation from both directions.

I notice that when religionists are not faring well in debate they often attack BB or Hitler as diversion from their apparent inability to deal with issues at hand. Nice try, though, it might fool a couple readers into thinking you've made a valid point.

So I agree that with just the right amount of harmonization between the religious Priests of Evolution applying enough imagination, creativity, redefinition, smokescreen or whatever it takes, the stories may even sound believable.

"Priests of Evolution" – what an interesting comment. Perhaps those who worship priests, prophets, messiahs, and invisible / undetectable "gods" assume that everyone worships as they do.

God our Creator is a fact.

CORRECTION: Your proposed "creator" is an opinion, conjecture, guess, claim, fantasy, fiction and/or downright fraud. The existence of NONE of the thousands of proposed "gods" has not been shown to be anything more than overblown human imagination. To claim otherwise in debate is not honest or honorable.

Such comments may be appropriate in church or in Holy Huddle – but not in C&A sub-forum.

"Fact" and "Belief" are two different things.

The stories in the Bible are there to let us see just how far sin has distanced us from knowing and seeing our very Creator in who's image we were created, and reveals a map to find our way back.

Correction: Tales in the bible are there because ancient unidentified religion promoters told stories and expressed OPINIONS about favorite "gods" (as is typical of religions in general).

Sure we can argue about the 'map', one can say; "No, this is not the way, this map is garbage! I know a better way!"
The other says: "No, you are looking at it upside down, you are going the wrong way, the destination you are headed is hell, not God and his Heaven."

The map you imagine seeing is based on the assumption that stories about "heaven" and "hell" are true and accurate. Remember in C&A sub-forum bible stores are NOT assumed to be true and Christianity is not assumed to be superior to any other religion or to non-religion.

[bluethread]

You are both ignoring the nature and context of the statements. One is a metaphor and the other the purpose of His earthly ministry. One is an instructional comparison and the other is a statement of purpose.

Ok, let's assume that Jesus truly is lusting to judge everyone in the way that so many Christians seem to be convinced that he is. What would that mean? . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . .. . . . . .. . .. . . .. . .. . . . .. . . Apparently they must have perceived Jesus to be a judgmental monster. I just don't see that in these fairytales. But I guess we all put a little bit of ourselves into every fairytale that we read.

Wow, I said all that? I though that I was just pointing out that two passages were not contradictory, but are different in nature and context. Before, I will even think of addressing your diatribe, one point at a time, maybe we could address the two passages I was referring to. Am I correct or incorrect regarding the nature and context of those two passages?

[Thruit]

bluethread said,
You are both ignoring the nature and context of the statements. One is a metaphor and the other the purpose of His earthly ministry. One is an instructional comparison and the other is a statement of purpose.

I'm not ignoring them. I was simply saying that Jesus' instructional comparison seems to indicate that His statement of purpose might change when He returns, showing that He's no different from His Father as dipicted in the OT, who also instructed people on what to do and afterward destroyed them for not doing it.

[Thruit]

Tired of the Nonsense said,
To believe that Jesus was the Messiah is to believe that a corpse came back to life and then flew away. This belief is the very cornerstone of Christianity. What "reasoning" do you find in believing that such an obviously ridiculous story is actually true?

The testimony of the witnesses who were contemporary with Jesus...and the prophets who lived before He was born.

Tired of the Nonsense said,
Notice that the quote you have provided was NOT written by Jesus, but by the author of The Gospel of Matthew. Jesus wrote NOTHING himself, and so what he actually taught and believed himself is unknowable. We only have the words that were put into his mouth by others decades after his death. Gospel Matthew, like ALL of the gospels, was written anonymously. At what point does your unquestioning faith not appear to be anything other then an obvious manifestation of your lifetime of indoctrination and programming?

Well...there goes the History and Biography channels.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

Tired of the Nonsense said,
To believe that Jesus was the Messiah is to believe that a corpse came back to life and then flew away. This belief is the very cornerstone of Christianity. What "reasoning" do you find in believing that such an obviously ridiculous story is actually true?

The testimony of the witnesses who were contemporary with Jesus...and the prophets who lived before He was born.

Could you please provide a list of the eyewitnesses to the risen Jesus who left testimonies to that effect. Or are you actually referring to unsupported later stories and hearsay?

Tired of the Nonsense said,
Notice that the quote you have provided was NOT written by Jesus, but by the author of The Gospel of Matthew. Jesus wrote NOTHING himself, and so what he actually taught and believed himself is unknowable. We only have the words that were put into his mouth by others decades after his death. Gospel Matthew, like ALL of the gospels, was written anonymously. At what point does your unquestioning faith not appear to be anything other then an obvious manifestation of your lifetime of indoctrination and programming?

Well...there goes the History and Biography channels.

While it is true that Christians have been quoting "the words of Jesus" for the last two thousand years, that does not change the fact that the words they are quoting are actually derived from others and are not directly from Jesus. Assuming that the words attributed to Jesus, written down and attributed to him decades after the fact, is actually nothing more than a huge leap of faith. Assumption and faith are the foundation of Christian belief. Hard well established fact however turns out to be darned hard to come by. For example, how likely is it that a corpse actually came back to life and then flew away? The answer of course is that it is as unlikely as anything which can be imagined. Does the evidence and "facts" derived from the time this unlikely event was supposed to have occurred indicate any probability at all that such a remarkably unlikely event occurred? In truth, there is absolutely NO evidence at all that any such thing occurred which can be derived from the time the event was supposed to have happened. Nothing! Zero! The story of the risen Jesus provoked not the slightest ripple of historical comment at all, at the time it was supposed to have occurred. The very earliest mention of the resurrected Jesus on record does not occur until roughly a quarter of a century after the time that the event was supposed to have occurred. And this account was provided by an individual who clearly never met the living Jesus, and who was not personally present to witness the event he is describing. Is there reason to dismiss this account? Well, is a corpse coming back to life, and ultimately flying away, a reasonable claim?

[arian]

.

These two verses can be harmonized if we take into account that it takes awhile to build a house and after said house is built, the One who told us how to build returns to test it.

Contrasting statements (or verses) can be "harmonized" by applying enough imagination, creativity, redefinition, smokescreen or whatever it takes. Of course, they still contrast, but may be seen as "harmonized" by those fooled by story telling.

You just summed up the 'contrasting statements' made by Big-bang Evolutionists who claim this BB created the universe out of nothing.

Truth or lack thereof in Christianity is a separate topic from origin of the universe. I have no knowledge and no favorite conjecture about such things – but leave that speculation to those who claim to have knowledge (religious or otherwise) and ask them for evidence – which has not been provided – only unverifiable speculation from both directions.

Exactly, just like Big-bang Evolution. The similarity in 'Christian Religion' and the stories of the origin of the universe is the 'religion' part, as you said, no evidence, only unverifiable speculation from both directions. Religions who peddle their own created gods are unable to provide verifiable evidence in their gods, and Big bang Evolution religionists are unable to provide verifiable evidence on either a Big-bang, or biological evolution. We debated this to kingdom-come already.

I present undeniable and scientific evidence of THE Creator. You will not find me use religious defensive comments like; "I think, I believe, I assume, could be, I don't know for now but that doesn't mean I won't know million years from now, etc" If I believe, I present evidence. If the evidence cannot be seen, then just like Newton for gravity, I present other scientific facts to prove my point. I don't say; "I assume it may be that, .."

(I just want you to know ZzYzx that it is you, and others like Mcculloch, JoeyK, DI, etc. who taught me to differentiate between hearsay and real evidence. So if you find fault in my debates, it is partly your fault. I watch and listen to you guys very carefully. So try to live by what you preach/teach my friend, because your student here will remind you of what you taught me. .. I love you man.

I notice that when religionists are not faring well in debate they often attack BB or Hitler as diversion from their apparent inability to deal with issues at hand. Nice try, though, it might fool a couple readers into thinking you've made a valid point.

Ah, don't you just hate them religionist when they do that? Boy I'm sure glad I got out of religion, it really is sickening. What's worse is that the millions of followers just nod, or cheer, raise their hands in unquestioning support and agreement! Like when Richard Dawkins shows up at one of his Evolution-Ministries, .. no one asks him; "Sir, you claim to be a scientist, .. so have you ever witnessed evolution yourself Mr. Dawkins?" Nope, they'll just sit there for hours listening as he preaches his un-evidenced billions of year old religious fairytales. How this here dried jaw-bone lived millions of years ago, ate, copulated and under which circumstances he died.

As for Hitler, if it wasn't for his religious beliefs in like Evolution, where he convinced the German people that the Negros, Gypsies (even the Italians, but of course he needed their support so he didn't include them yet) and the Jews were nothing but sub-human animals, they couldn't of exterminate so many innocent people, especially little human children without even the slightest sign of guilt or remorse. 70 years later they can still inject beautiful children with radioactive waste and watch them as they die slowly, their little bodies mutate from the inside to the point of exploding. All because of religious indoctrinations.

So I agree that with just the right amount of harmonization between the religious Priests of Evolution applying enough imagination, creativity, redefinition, smokescreen or whatever it takes, the stories may even sound believable.

"Priests of Evolution" – what an interesting comment. Perhaps those who worship priests, prophets, messiahs, and invisible / undetectable "gods" assume that everyone worships as they do.

Well, what else could we call a religious fanatic preacher like Dawkins? Minister, Rabbi, Prophet .. what? He is kind of a Prophet, only he predicts billions of years into the past instead of the future.

God our Creator is a fact.

CORRECTION: Your proposed "creator" is an opinion, conjecture, guess, claim, fantasy, fiction and/or downright fraud. The existence of NONE of the thousands of proposed "gods" has not been shown to be anything more than overblown human imagination. To claim otherwise in debate is not honest or honorable.

Such comments may be appropriate in church or in Holy Huddle – but not in C&A sub-forum.

Well we have the "science and religion sub-forum" where it is proper to debate Evolution since it does have some science mixed into it, or debate the Big Bang Theory which religiously interprets the scientifically observable universe we see before us, the Holy Huddle is about religion and their gods, .. but I have no place to debate my/our God, which is true science, and rational evidenced truths. Maybe we should create a sub-forum called: "Science and Truths" where we could try to keep, or debate religion out of subjects. You know, where we could separate created gods from our Creator God, or science fiction from the actual science. What do you think?

"Fact" and "Belief" are two different things.

Of course, I believe in facts. I don't believe in belief, or fact about facts, that would be crazy. I believe in fact, but some believe in religious doctrines over facts, to a point they believe these doctrines as if they were fact.
If people would learn to believe only after they have evidence, we wouldn't have all these religions around.

They take a dried up bone, or a fossil and build an entire story about it and people believe it as if that story was real, as fact! And what do they use as evidence? Yep, .. the dried bone or that little fossil in the rock.

"The story must be real, look, there is the dried bone in Mr. Dawkins hand, .. it's right there! How could you not believe?"

The stories in the Bible are there to let us see just how far sin has distanced us from knowing and seeing our very Creator in who's image we were created, and reveals a map to find our way back.

Correction: Tales in the bible are there because ancient unidentified religion promoters told stories and expressed OPINIONS about favorite "gods" (as is typical of religions in general).

Again, I wasn't talking about 'gods' in general, I was talking about us, us humans and our Creator, the only God that can be. Creator, not one of the created. As in 'Infinite', not the finite that you find in Infinite.
Logically there can be only one Infinite, but there can be innumerable finites.

Sure we can argue about the 'map', one can say; "No, this is not the way, this map is garbage! I know a better way!"
The other says: "No, you are looking at it upside down, you are going the wrong way, the destination you are headed is hell, not God and his Heaven."

The map you imagine seeing is based on the assumption that stories about "heaven" and "hell" are true and accurate. Remember in C&A sub-forum bible stores are NOT assumed to be true and Christianity is not assumed to be superior to any other religion or to non-religion.

Yes, but I wasn't talking about the Christian Religion, or the religiously made up stories of heaven and hell.

I was talking about the true and observable definition of both hell and Heaven. I can physically show you a definition of hell, pictures of it, people living in it. Want to see? Oh, .. I don't mean those famous artists paintings of hell, no. I mean real photographs of people in hell past and present.

[Zzyzx]

.

To believe that Jesus was the Messiah is to believe that a corpse came back to life and then flew away. This belief is the very cornerstone of Christianity. What "reasoning" do you find in believing that such an obviously ridiculous story is actually true?

The testimony of the witnesses who were contemporary with Jesus...

Who, exactly, where those "contemporary witnesses" to whom you refer? Where are their personal accounts?

Christian scholars and theologians acknowledge that the identity of gospel writers is unknown and that their sources of information (where they got their stories) is also unknown and unverifiable.

None of the gospel writers can be shown to have known Jesus personally or witnessed any of his feats or conversations. None of the gospels can be shown to have been written until decades, generations or even a century after Jesus is said to have lived. Even Paul/Saul, the major contributor to NT did NOT know Jesus in person – but is claimed to have "met" him in a "vision" (or hallucination, or psychotic episode, or tall tale – no one knows which).

I am no longer surprised that Christian Apologists (and perhaps preachers and followers) are not aware that there are NO witness accounts of Jesus' life and times, that the gospel writers are NOT identified by the names later assigned them, that there are NO accounts of the "miracles" and "resurrection" outside of religion promotional literature.

As this information becomes more widely known to Christian worshipers I expect the religion to continue to decline in technologically advanced, educated, prosperous nations (particularly as the old guard of believers dies out and televangelists turn off more people).

Notice that the quote you have provided was NOT written by Jesus, but by the author of The Gospel of Matthew. Jesus wrote NOTHING himself, and so what he actually taught and believed himself is unknowable. We only have the words that were put into his mouth by others decades after his death. Gospel Matthew, like ALL of the gospels, was written anonymously. At what point does your unquestioning faith not appear to be anything other then an obvious manifestation of your lifetime of indoctrination and programming?

Well...there goes the History and Biography channels.

Television programs are not regarded as reliable sources of information. However, many people think they are well informed about science, history, psychology, etc because they watch television shows (and emphasize that they learn from documentaries and history channel – as though that insured credibility).

[Tired of the Nonsense]

[Replying to Thruit]

Well...there goes the History and Biography channels.

I should also have pointed out that the History and Biography channels also devote a good deal of air time to stories of ancient aliens, Sasquatch, and various stories of other mythical monsters, to their everlasting DISCREDIT. But they do so because many people enjoy believing in pure baloney and it brings in ratings.

[Zzyzx]

.

Truth or lack thereof in Christianity is a separate topic from origin of the universe. I have no knowledge and no favorite conjecture about such things – but leave that speculation to those who claim to have knowledge (religious or otherwise) and ask them for evidence – which has not been provided – only unverifiable speculation from both directions.

Exactly, just like Big-bang Evolution. The similarity in 'Christian Religion' and the stories of the origin of the universe is the 'religion' part, as you said, no evidence, only unverifiable speculation from both directions. Religions who peddle their own created gods are unable to provide verifiable evidence in their gods, and Big bang Evolution religionists are unable to provide verifiable evidence on either a Big-bang, or biological evolution. We debated this to kingdom-come already.

Perhaps you claim to have knowledge about the origin of the universe, the beginnings of life, supernatural "gods"?

"Big Bang Evolution Religionists" is a term with which I am unfamiliar. It seems to be an attempt to combine unrelated terms for some unidentified reason. Perhaps you can clarify?

I present undeniable and scientific evidence of THE Creator.

That should be compelling. I will initiate another thread for you to present that evidence.

You will not find me use religious defensive comments like; "I think, I believe, I assume, could be, I don't know for now but that doesn't mean I won't know million years from now, etc" If I believe, I present evidence. If the evidence cannot be seen, then just like Newton for gravity, I present other scientific facts to prove my point. I don't say; "I assume it may be that, .."

I wait with bated breath.

(I just want you to know ZzYzx that it is you, and others like Mcculloch, JoeyK, DI, etc. who taught me to differentiate between hearsay and real evidence.

Thank you on behalf of myself and the others mentioned for your kind words. It is fortunate when we can learn from experience – and most of us have learned about debate by participating and by observing what works and what does not.

So if you find fault in my debates, it is partly your fault. I watch and listen to you guys very carefully.

I take no credit for your accomplishments and no blame for your failures – just as I did with university science students decades ago.

What I present is intended as take-it-or-leave-it information for anyone involved – subject to their evaluation of its merits. If some ideas are useful, anyone is welcome to use what appeals and to discard the rest.

So try to live by what you preach/teach my friend, because your student here will remind you of what you taught me.

It is generally best to live by one's OWN decisions rather than depending upon external structure and guidance.

Ah, don't you just hate them religionist when they do that?

Au contraire, I appreciate when opponents or adversaries resort to rants about BB and Hitler, thereby demonstrating to readers that they have exhausted their ability to intelligently debate a topic.

Boy I'm sure glad I got out of religion, it really is sickening.

Have you actually and honestly rejected religion?

What's worse is that the millions of followers just nod, or cheer, raise their hands in unquestioning support and agreement!

Millions follow all sorts of ideologies without critically thinking and without examining evidence upon which to make sound decisions.

Scientific study differs from those ideologies which discourage challenge / question / disbelief. Instead, science encourages and promotes challenge and disproof of prevailing ideas – which leads to new concepts and understandings.

Like when Richard Dawkins shows up at one of his Evolution-Ministries, .. no one asks him; "Sir, you claim to be a scientist, .. so have you ever witnessed evolution yourself Mr. Dawkins?"

If you have learned from what I present you realize that evolution (genetic change through generations) DOES occur every time microorganisms become antibiotic resistant – and every time a plant or animal is changed by selective breeding.

One who has learned should not confuse evolution (genetic change through generations) with origin of life (abiogenesis). Those are completely separate topics that I would expect freshman university students to master (most do).

I do not speculate about the origin of life (abiogenesis). However, I have studied genetics at undergraduate and graduate level enough to understand that genetic change (evolution) DOES occur regularly and naturally. Those who dispute evolution have typically NOT studied the topic but get their "information" (opinions) from sermons, television or other incredible sources.

If they were sincerely interested in learning (rather than trying to "debunk"), they might start by studying the works of Gregor Mendel (a monk) and Darwin – from 150 years ago – and progress chronologically to the modern understandings of genetics. Not many bother doing the work – but just yammer on from an uninformed position and often attempt to debate against century and a half old ideas.

Nope, they'll just sit there for hours listening as he preaches his un-evidenced billions of year old religious fairytales. How this here dried jaw-bone lived millions of years ago, ate, copulated and under which circumstances he died.

Do you have professional level understanding of biology, geology and/or anthropology as a basis for critiquing the work of people who actually study those fields? Do you actually have that level of background information?

As for Hitler,

I refer you to:

Godwin's law (or Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies)[1][2] is an Internet adage asserting that "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1"[2][3]—​ that is, if an online discussion (regardless of topic or scope) goes on long enough, sooner or later someone will compare someone or something to Hitler or Nazism. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law

70 years later they can still inject beautiful children with radioactive waste and watch them as they die slowly, their little bodies mutate from the inside to the point of exploding. All because of religious indoctrinations.

Who is it that is injecting "beautiful children with radioactive waste and watch them as they die slowly?"

Are you referring to US use of Depleted Uranium weapons in Iraq? Or is your reference a different case of affecting children with radioactive contamination?

"Priests of Evolution" – what an interesting comment. Perhaps those who worship priests, prophets, messiahs, and invisible / undetectable "gods" assume that everyone worships as they do.

Well, what else could we call a religious fanatic preacher like Dawkins? Minister, Rabbi, Prophet .. what? He is kind of a Prophet, only he predicts billions of years into the past instead of the future.

What, exactly, does attempting to label Dawkins a priest, prophet, rabbi, have to do with the OP subject of the effect of someone discovering that Christianity is false?

Well we have the "science and religion sub-forum" where it is proper to debate Evolution since it does have some science mixed into it, or debate the Big Bang Theory which religiously interprets the scientifically observable universe we see before us, the Holy Huddle is about religion and their gods, .. but I have no place to debate my/our God, which is true science, and rational evidenced truths. Maybe we should create a sub-forum called: "Science and Truths" where we could try to keep, or debate religion out of subjects. You know, where we could separate created gods from our Creator God, or science fiction from the actual science. What do you think?

I like the idea of combining the creator god with science fiction.

Notice, however, my conspicuous absence from the Science and Religion sub-forum. After spending decades studying and teaching sciences it is unappealing to "debate" science topics with people who have far less understanding than university freshmen.

"Fact" and "Belief" are two different things.

"The story must be real, look, there is the dried bone in Mr. Dawkins hand, .. it's right there! How could you not believe?"

It seems as though you have a real dislike for anthropology, geology, biology, evolution, etc (and Mr. Dawkins in particular (and perhaps Darwin and Mendel – the monk?)

Do you have FACTS that contradict anthropology, geology, biology, evolution, etc – or is it just your personal dislike / opinion / speculation?

Again, I wasn't talking about 'gods' in general, I was talking about us, us humans and our Creator, the only God that can be. Creator, not one of the created. As in 'Infinite', not the finite that you find in Infinite.

All that is missing in your conjecture about a "creator" is actual evidence – not opinion, hearsay, testimonial, unverifiable tales, etc. Perhaps you will present the evidence in the new thread?

Logically there can be only one Infinite, but there can be innumerable finites.

What "logic" suggests the existence of an "infinite" (god or whatever is being proposed)?

I was talking about the true and observable definition of both hell and Heaven. I can physically show you a definition of hell, pictures of it, people living in it. Want to see? Oh, .. I don't mean those famous artists paintings of hell, no. I mean real photographs of people in hell past and present.

Perhaps a good starting point would be to define "hell" as you use the term. Depending on that definition I might be interested in the photos.

[Thruit]

Tired of the Nonsense said,
Could you please provide a list of the eyewitnesses to the risen Jesus who left testimonies to that effect. Or are you actually referring to unsupported later stories and hearsay?

As far as ancient history goes, the copies of surviving manuscripts in support of the gospels with respect to date, volume and exactness have no equal, which is partly how scholars determine the validity of the NT...along with other factors such as the early church fathers who quoted directly from the gospels. You are obviously unaware of this, but since it is a concern for you, I would suggest doing an in depth study of the process, which I did years ago and found it extremely tedious. Happy leg work if you decide to do it. Of course, feel free not to, in which case you can just flush every ancient manuscript down the toilet and history along with it.

Tired of the Nonsense said,
While it is true that Christians have been quoting "the words of Jesus" for the last two thousand years, that does not change the fact that the words they are quoting are actually derived from others and are not directly from Jesus.

Flush.........

Tired of the Nonsense said,
Assuming that the words attributed to Jesus, written down and attributed to him decades after the fact, is actually nothing more than a huge leap of faith. Assumption and faith are the foundation of Christian belief.

Another area you are obviously unaware of is that "decades" in the ancient world is equivilent to the internet today. You're beating a dead horse my friend.

Tired of the Nonsense said,
Hard well established fact however turns out to be darned hard to come by.

No matter how hard and well established you believe a fact to be, those facts are all based on the testimony of others. Therefore, testimony is paramount...even in our modern world.

Tired of the Nonsense said,
For example, how likely is it that a corpse actually came back to life and then flew away? The answer of course is that it is as unlikely as anything which can be imagined. Does the evidence and "facts" derived from the time this unlikely event was supposed to have occurred indicate any probability at all that such a remarkably unlikely event occurred?

Not really, if you discount the fact that the prophets said when the Messiah comes, He will reveal the God of the Jews to the entire gentile world and that through Jesus the entire gentile world has come to know about the God of the Jews. Still, there it is, fulfilled prophecy in black and white (and sometimes a little red) for all the world to see.

Tired of the Nonsense said,
In truth, there is absolutely NO evidence at all that any such thing occurred which can be derived from the time the event was supposed to have happened. Nothing! Zero! The story of the risen Jesus provoked not the slightest ripple of historical comment at all, at the time it was supposed to have occurred. The very earliest mention of the resurrected Jesus on record does not occur until roughly a quarter of a century after the time that the event was supposed to have occurred. And this account was provided by an individual who clearly never met the living Jesus, and who was not personally present to witness the event he is describing.

I find it even more amazing that because of an insignificant Preacher who was executed after three short years of ministry, the world got flipped on its head. Under those circumstances, you can span human history from the beginning of the world to date and you'll never top that.

Tired of the Nonsense said,
Is there reason to dismiss this account? Well, is a corpse coming back to life, and ultimately flying away, a reasonable claim?

It is, when you consider because of the account, they paid for it with their lives. Of course, it's possible they did have another motive. Maybe they were smoking crack.

Tired of the Nonsense said,
I should also have pointed out that the History and Biography channels also devote a good deal of air time to stories of ancient aliens, Sasquatch, and various stories of other mythical monsters, to their everlasting DISCREDIT. But they do so because many people enjoy believing in pure baloney and it brings in ratings.

Ah...I think you found it! The gospel writers were after TV ratings!!!