Atheism and Fundamentalism

[liamconnor]

I frequently find that the attacks against Christianity here by atheists and agnostics are not leveled against my Christianity; they are leveled against fundamentalists.


If the doctrine of Inerrancy, young earth, etc. were dropped, what would be left for atheists here to attack?

(Of course, one could say, "The resurrection of Jesus". But this would be dangerous as they could no longer point to discrepancies of the texts--that argument only works against inerrantists; not historians. Perhaps they could point to the problem of miracles at all; but that brings them into the field of metaphysics: are they ready for that?)

[Mithrae]

[Replying to post 8 by Mithrae]

Mithrae, I'm with DI on this one.

What is "My Christianity"? If "My Christianity" is allowed to stand on its own as its own religion, this means that each and every person can quite literally make it up as they go along.

Allowed? What are you, or anyone, doing to stop people from making it up as they go along? That's what we all do; we live and learn and think, and we talk to other people to hear their opinions, but ultimately we (most of us at least) make up our own minds what makes the most sense to us, subject to constant revision as we learn new things. Why on earth do you think that Christians should not do that?

Same goes with liamconnor. You yourself said it in your reply to him. You don't know what his christianity is.
If we liken what is going on here to a chess game, us atheists (DI and the rest) are playing white and going first. We start moving by attacking, questioning the Biblical canon.
That is the only thing we can do at that point, other than ceding the first move to the theist and asking them to move first, asking them to define what it is they mean by "My Christianity".

If what you're interested in is 'winning' a debate then sure, I can see why this would be a problem. That's pretty much supporting what I quoted from Cnorman, that it is safe and fun to have an argument when you know - or think you know - 99% of the things the other fellow will say or believes beforehand. In fairness plenty of religious folk do something similar in their perceptions of 'atheists,' making assumptions about what they must believe about the origins of life or the universe for example. Don't you think that's a bit unfair and a bit irrational when it happens?

But; For the first group, I propose that there is very frequently -- though not always -- another reason for concerning oneself exclusively with repressive, literalist fundamentalism in debate: It is the easiest kind of religion to argue against.

Or...that it is the only one with any kind of claim to any sort of evidence. "My Christianity" can be made up by its holder as they go along, and they don't concern themselves with having to stick to what their supposed holy text actually says. "My Christianity" could be a theology about a loving kind Father God who never has and would never order his children to kill...thus ignoring what goes on in pretty much every other page of the Old Testament.
"My Christianity" can and ought to be countered with an application of Hitchen's Razor.

Hitchens' Razor would presumably suggest that you have a burden of proof to demonstrate why Christians should be presumed, pigeonholed or selectively ignored into only the narrow band of quasi-fundamentalist views that you are comfortable having an argument against.

And are you honestly suggesting that a Christian who believes Moses wrote all five books of the Pentateuch after inflicting plagues on Egypt and leading two million Israelites for forty years in the desert has a better claim to evidentiary views than a Christian who believes those stories are legends developed over time and perhaps based on a kernel of historical truth? I would say that's not only incorrect, but obviously so: The more nuanced and thoughtful opinions are almost always based on more careful reasoning and evidence than the simple dogmatisms. Admittedly nowadays we don't seem to have as many prolific proponents of more nuanced religious views as we did back when Cnorman, Kayky, Slopeshoulder, Johnmarc and others were around. Perhaps they got tired of being ignored, marginalized and for all intents and purposes having their very existence denied by broad-brushed attacks against "religion" as a whole



What makes me particularly interested in this phenomenon is how wildly counter-productive it's likely to be as a general rule (unless of course the intention is merely to 'win' a debate), even when actually addressing those evangelical types. Attacking folks' most cherished core beliefs with a sledgehammer hardly ever persuades them to change their minds, and more often than not simply makes them feel that they need to circle the wagons, buckle down and believe even harder. That is demonstrably at least as true of political beliefs as it is of religious. By contrast looking for reasonable ways to think about the bible, Christianity and its ongoing role in society might be advancing ideas that some more traditional believers could take on board once they're not coming from an enemy determined to beat them down. And it could well prove to be just as enlightening for the folk who previously saw little value or good in the religion, too. One need only look so far as DI's own sadly inadequate understanding of historiography in post #6 for an example of what an otherwise fine intellect has missed by viewing early Christianity as something to be attacked rather than learned from

[Divine Insight]

One need only look so far as DI's own sadly inadequate understanding of historiography in post #6 for an example of what an otherwise fine intellect has missed by viewing early Christianity as something to be attacked rather than learned from.

There is nothing to learn from Christianity other than to note that ancient humans were clearly quite superstitious. But we already knew that without Christianity, so we don't need Christianity to learn that.

What you don't understand about my position is that I'm not even debating with any individual's personal "opinions" of what they wish Christianity could be. That is totally irrelevant.

We have a religion that is founded on the fables of the Bible. And that Bible has a God who decrees specific commandments that we must obey lest we will be damned to death or worse.

Surely no one is naive enough to think that they could change this religion by simply offering a personal opinion that they disagree with the decrees of the original founding text.

But these texts don't stop with just a simple list of 10 commandments. These texts go on to have this God adding additional commandments and directives for many chapters and even "books" that go beyond this. These books have also been recognized and acknowledge by this "Religion" to be part of this "Holy Canon" we call the Bible.

Right off the bat, I suggest that if you have a "My Christianity" that you would like to offer that rejects any of these "Holy Scriptures" then that's fine. But at that point it's up to you to now produce your own doctrines upon which you are basing your new and unique "My Christianity" version.

In fact, if you expect to debate with me about it, you'll need to first send me your "New Bible" that describes your newly invented religion. Along with a complete synopsis of your "New Theology".

Why you would even want to call this "Christianity" is beyond me since you have just created your own new and unique religion. You really should come up with a new name for it as well to avoid confusion with the original religion that is based upon the Bible.

So until you can produce your own doctrines and theology, then where is there to debate?

I would be debating orthodox Christianity, whilst you would be debating something entirely different that no orthodox Christian would even support.

Never mind calling it "Fundamentalism" as that term itself is often used to refer to "Literal Fundamentalism". There's nothing in orthodox Christianity that says that things in the Bible cannot be taken as metaphors.

So using the term "Fundamentalism" in an attempt to dismiss all "Orthodox Christianity" is already a flawed argument.

Moreover, if your "My Christianity" is unorthodox, then you need to present an outline of precisely which parts of orthodox Christianity you agree with and which parts you reject.

Otherwise how is anyone supposed to know what your "My Christianity" even represents?

As far as I can see, all the term "My Christianity" means is that this person has already rejected "Orthodox Christianity" (i.e. any Christianity that is actually based on the Biblical Canon) and willing to discuss it based on the scriptures contained within that canon.

It seems to me that all the term "My Christianity" amounts to is an attempt to try to make arguments for something "called" Christianity without having any need to defend or support the actual scriptures upon which the original religion is built.

What a cop out.

And then you're going to try to belittle me by claiming that I have an inadequate understanding of historiography?

Sorry Mithrae. But if you are going to accuse me of that, then you must accuse Jesus of that as well, because according to the Gospels Jesus supported every jot and tittle of the Old Testament law, as well as proclaiming that the scripture cannot be broken.

Yet here you are trying to argue that you can invent a "My Christianity" that doesn't need to defend every jot and tittle of the Old Testament law.

As far as I can see, that is a lost argument already. Your "My Christianity" stands in direct contradiction to what the Gospels have Jesus himself proclaiming.

You just can't twist Christianity as far as you and Liamconnor would like to twist it without having it shatter into a million unrecognizable pieces. It's just not as flexible as you would like for it to be.

In fact, the Catholic Church knew this. This is why they set up a Papal authority. They already knew that any protesting Protestantism would necessarily be destined to become absurdly ridiculous. You just can't ignore the original texts and go off making up new stuff. That's never going to work.

[William]

[Replying to post 11 by Mithrae]

I think that there are some fundamental necessities involved with Christian belief systems of which all those calling themselves 'Christians' simply have to adhere to, and there is no changing that, no matter what.

I don't think it is even necessary for me to list those things, although perhaps it would be helpful all round if these things were listed somewhere.

Oft the complaint is that those calling themselves 'Christians' hardly agree on anything, and even view one another as 'non-christian/false Christians' while yet others (like the JW's) view themselves as the true church/representatives of 'GOD'.

Atheists intent on displaying their obvious anti-christian/anti religion anti/GOD prowess find such disarray as easy pickings and it obviously stimulates them - even in an ego-stroking manner - it appears to be something of an addiction in some. That is the nature of the beast.

I have often thought of the whole interaction as two opposing sides of the same coin feeding upon each other in a manner which suggests that without that interaction, neither side would exist as something assumed to be vital. As such it is a 'useful' distraction against more pressing concerns.

In that I would say that the whole expression of interaction is something one would expect members of a type zero civilization to adopt and support.

It is a childish activity.

[Elijah John]

If one removes the tenants of Fundamentalist Christianity from a given debate, there are still plenty of matters to address.

-The basic belief in the existence of God.
-The question of the Divinity of Christ
-The belief that God needs to sacrifice Himself to Himself in order to give Himself permission to forgive the contrite.

Things like that.

Those particular positions are held by most Trinitarians, mainline and Fundamentalist Christians alike.

[Divine Insight]

If one removes the tenants of Fundamentalist Christianity from a given debate, there are still plenty of matters to address.

-The basic belief in the existence of God.
-The question of the Divinity of Christ
-The belief that God needs to sacrifice Himself to Himself in order to give Himself permission to forgive the contrite.

Things like that.

Those particular positions are held by most Trinitarians, mainline and Fundamentalist Christians alike.

Truly.

In fact, I was born and raised into an extremely liberal and abstract version of Protestantism. The idea that I have rejected this religion based on "Fundamentalist" views is absurd.

What Liamconnor appears to be trying to argue is that if a person expects any of the Christian theology to be recognized or acknowledged, then they should be dismissed as being nothing more than someone who is against radical fundamentalism.

-The belief that God needs to sacrifice Himself to Himself in order to give Himself permission to forgive the contrite.

For me, this was the Single Greatest Question I had as a Christian. Ironically at that time I wasn't even skeptical about this question. At the time I was naive enough to actually believe that there could be a rational answer to this question. So I set out to discover the answer to this question by studying the Bible. And I was naive enough at the time to believe that I was actually going to find a rational answer!

That's how utterly naive I was.

It was in my pursuit of finding a rational answer to this question that led to my realization that this entire Biblical Canon contains absolute absurdities, and absolutely no explanation, for why this God would need to sacrifice himself (or his Son) to being brutally crucified by humans in order to somehow atone for their sins.

In fact, I hold that this entire idea is incompatible with the Old Testament. In the Old Testament the wages of sin was death. Not being beaten and crucified on a cross.

And men were expected to atone for their own sins. It doesn't even make any sense that God would need to atone for the sins of men.

And finally, just think about. If this was God's Plan from the very beginning then he should have offered Jesus to Adam and Eve right there in the Garden of Eden, and let them chose whether or not to accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior.

To instead wait for thousands of years, and drowning out the entire population of the earth in the interim doesn't even fit in with this scenario that the "Only Way" to salvation is through Christ.

This would have been a God who dramatically changed his entire plan after thousands of years of trying other things.

In short, Christianity isn't even compatible with the original Old Testament region. The very idea that God needs to sacrifice him son (or himself) to being brutally beaten and crucified by humans in order to offer them "Grace" is, quite frankly, the most absurd notion ever dreamed up by religious fanatics.

The idea that anyone take Christianity seriously is truly baffling to me. I mean, I can understand how naive children can be innocently indoctrinated by parents and a surrounding society to believe this nonsense. But how any truly mature adult can continue to support this religion is beyond me. I recognize the fallacy of this religion by the time I was in my late teens. And I even consider myself to be a "late bloomer" in terms of maturing beyond naivety.

Although, in truth, I guess I did have questions long before I even reached my teens. I just didn't actively pursue the answers until that point in my life. But once I realized that these questions need to be answered it was all over for the Bible. It was just a matter of time from that point forward before I could clearly see that the Bible not only doesn't have answers to these questions, but it actually proves that this entire scenario is impossible, and certainly incompatible with the OT.

And now modern day Christians want to avoid this TRUTH by pretending that they can create an "Alternative Christianity" that somehow escapes having any dependency on the Bible at all.

How in the world is that supposed to work?

[Tired of the Nonsense]

I frequently find that the attacks against Christianity here by atheists and agnostics are not leveled against my Christianity; they are leveled against fundamentalists.


If the doctrine of Inerrancy, young earth, etc. were dropped, what would be left for atheists here to attack?

(Of course, one could say, "The resurrection of Jesus". But this would be dangerous as they could no longer point to discrepancies of the texts--that argument only works against inerrantists; not historians. Perhaps they could point to the problem of miracles at all; but that brings them into the field of metaphysics: are they ready for that?)

If you believe that Jesus came back to life and then flew away, then criticism is directed at YOUR Christianity.

[Mithrae]

[Replying to post 11 by Mithrae]

I think that there are some fundamental necessities involved with Christian belief systems of which all those calling themselves 'Christians' simply have to adhere to, and there is no changing that, no matter what.

Not so long ago to be an 'atheist' meant that you rejected the existence of god/s, and if you weren't sure you were an agnostic. But some people wanted to call themselves atheists without being pigeonholed into such a strong position. So the meaning of the term changed to include mere nonbelief in god/s' existence. The meaning of the term is determined by common usage, particularly the members of that group. Many atheists even try to extend the term much further still, to include not even having a concept of god/s, trying to claim that babies are atheists too. Ironically, in some cases those are the same people who object to Christians who point out that Christianity needn't remain mired in medieval traditions and definitions.

I don't think it is even necessary for me to list those things, although perhaps it would be helpful all round if these things were listed somewhere.

Oft the complaint is that those calling themselves 'Christians' hardly agree on anything, and even view one another as 'non-christian/false Christians' while yet others (like the JW's) view themselves as the true church/representatives of 'GOD'.

It's not very difficult to come up with such a list, which would should cover the core beliefs of virtually all Christians who've ever lived:
- The sovereignty of 'God'
- The centrality of love
- The inevitability of shortcomings and failure
- The necessity of grace and forgiveness
- The value of transformative experience and a 'new life'
- The importance of personal commitment and action

But definitions which say that Christians have to believe that everything in the book of Maccabees, for example, is the 'word of God' and without error will exclude huge proportions of Christians; it's a ludicrous definition driven by agenda rather than common usage.

Many Christians have believed that Jesus was not God incarnate. Many Christians have rejected the notion that his death was a sacrifice of propitiation to a vengeful God. Many Christians have rejected the notion that 'salvation' is a choice to be made. Many Christians have rejected the notion of hell as a place of eternal torment. Any attempts to include these in some kind of hard and fast definition are likewise driven by agenda rather than common usage.

And that's even if we assume that it is reasonable to declare that there are things which Christians "simply have to adhere to, and there is no changing that, no matter what" in the first place.

[Tcg]

If the doctrine of Inerrancy, young earth, etc. were dropped, what would be left for atheists here to attack?

That whole god thingy. You know, belief in a being that quite obviously either doesn't exist, or never does and never has actually done anything.

If your argument boils down to the idea of a god that does nothing, then it would be rather hard to argue against.

[Mithrae]

And then you're going to try to belittle me by claiming that I have an inadequate understanding of historiography?

Sorry Mithrae. But if you are going to accuse me of that, then you must accuse Jesus of that as well, because according to the Gospels Jesus supported every jot and tittle of the Old Testament law, as well as proclaiming that the scripture cannot be broken.

'Inadequate' was putting it very politely. I suspect that any historian who read your post #6 would be thoroughly insulted by the views and methods that you tried to attribute to them.

Among the first questions an historian would ask are:
Who was this written by?
What were their circumstances (time, location etc.)?
What were their sources?
What was their purpose in writing?
How reliable can we consider the claims of the text?
Are the claims supported or refuted by other sources?

But instead you've claimed that historians would simply assume that the text is an accurate record of Jesus' words verbatim (and not only that, but that Divine Insight's interpretation of those words is utterly unquestionable):
"as a historian you need to recognize that these stories have Jesus supporting extreme literal fundamentalism right down to every jot and tittle of the Old Testament. . . .
So even as a non-religious historian you are stuck with having to defend a Jesus who is himself a hardcore scriptural fundamentalist."

And if the historian does not accept the words as absolutely correct and your interpretation of them as utterly unquestionable, you've got an answer for that too:
"But the moment you make that proclamation you're done. All you are doing is trying to get out of having to confess that these Gospel rumors are indeed riddled with extreme problems, and cannot possibly be true in their claims."

It's not even as if you can plead ignorance; over the years there've been innumerable threads about the historical Jesus and Christian origins with intelligent contributors such as Student, ThatGirlAgain, Historia, Jagella, tfvespasianus, Elijah John, bjs, liamconner, TiredOfTheNonsense and doubtless others I'm overlooking; all of whom (despite wildly differing perspectives in some cases) understand and have posted more than enough about historical methods that anyone interested in learning, rather than blindly attacking, would have picked up enough to know how wrong your approach above is. This understanding of historiography you've presented is utterly dismal and extremely insulting to any historian.

[Divine Insight]

Your understanding of historiography is utterly dismal and insulting to any historian: Presumably driven by whatever it is that compels you in this unrelenting crusade against reason and religion

Where did I EVER claim to be concerned with approaching the Bible as a historian?

The authors of the Bible didn't claim to be recording "history". To the contrary they specifically claimed to be voicing the commandments of God.

Also Christianity presents the Bible as "Holy Text" not a mere historical record that was supposedly recorded by unbiased historians.

Any historian that attempts to view the Bible as a normal historical document has to be kidding themselves. Have your read the introductions to any of the books of the Gospels?

Romans 1:1 Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,

Mark 1:1 The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God;

Matthew 1:1 The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

Luke 1:1 Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us,

John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

It shouldn't require a Ph.D. to recognize that these authors are NOT historians.

The put their cards on the table right off the bat. They are about to present a highly biased argument for the supposed divinity of a single solitary person. These are not general historical accounts.

Approaching these texts as though they represent some sort of unbiased history would be absurd.

Also you say:

Among the first questions an historian would ask are:
Who was this written by?
What were their circumstances (time, location etc.)?
What were their sources?
What was their purpose in writing?
How reliable can we consider the claims of the text?
Are the claims supported or refuted by other sources?

It is unclear who actually wrote these texts.

Paul claims to have had a "vision" so he's not writing about history at all.
There sources are unknown.

In fact, Paul references 500 people who supposedly claimed to have seen Jesus after his crucifixion. But he doesn't say who these 500 people were. Also wouldn't a historian immediately question why someone else didn't mention this if there were so many people who supposedly saw this?

If I were a historian my very first thought would be to ask if there is any independent evidence to back up this claim. And if none can be found, then this extraordinary claim should be set aside until it can be backed up by extraordinary historical evidence.

Matthew claims that Saints were jostled from their graves and got up and walked into the Holy City of Jerusalem to SHOW themselves to the people there. Again this is an extraordinary claim that should be set aside until it can be backed up by extraordinary historical evidence. In fact, NONE of the other authors even bother to mention this. That should raise red flags for any historian worth his or her salt.

Especially considering that the claim is that very long dead saints had risen from graves that were jostled open by an earthquake. Shouldn't any decent historian immediately conclude that he or she has just stumbled onto some sort of fictional works or mythological writings?

I mean, give me a break, long dead saints are climbing out of graves that had been jostled open by an earthquake? And we're still reading this as though it represents an actual historical event? Surely you're joking?

Mark, Matthew, and Luke all claim that a God spoke from the clouds proclaiming Jesus to be his Son. It's also crystal clear that Matthew and Luke are repeating the rumors that Mark had started. Again, extraordinary claims should be set aside until it can be backed up by extraordinary historical evidence. Why aren't there any independent reports of a God speaking from the clouds?

That's the FIRST thing that any decent historian should ask. Not only this, but this is just additional evidence that these stories are just fictional myths that are being repeated and embellished by other authors.

How reliable can we consider the claims of the text?
Are the claims supported or refuted by other sources?

Exactly. And there are no other sources to support these outrageous claims. So they should indeed be dismissed as mere mythology. Especially when it's crystal clear that Matthew and Luke are just repeating the rumors started by Mark and adding even more outrageous embellishment. Precisely what we would expect from people who are passing around outrageous rumors.

There's is no credible evidence to treat these stories as actual historical events.

So from a historical perspective there's really no reason to do anything other than place these writing on the shelf marked "Fiction" or "Mythology" and move on to studying actual history.

But instead you've claimed that historians would simply assume that the text is an accurate record of Jesus' words verbatim (and not only that, but that Divine Insight's interpretation of those words is utterly unquestionable):
"as a historian you need to recognize that these stories have Jesus supporting extreme literal fundamentalism right down to every jot and tittle of the Old Testament. . . .
So even as a non-religious historian you are stuck with having to defend a Jesus who is himself a hardcore scriptural fundamentalist."

But what kind of a historian are we talking about here? Have you asked yourself that?

If you ask a historian worth their salt they will tell you that these writings are most likely rumors, myths, superstitions, or outright purposeful fiction (possibly even with religious motives behind them). Even these sensible historians would need to recognize that these stories have their "Character Jesus" defending every jot and tittle of the Old Testament law. That doesn't mean that Jesus needs to be anything more than a fictional character (or exaggerated rumors about some actual person)

On the other hand if you ask a BIASED historian who has already embraced this religion, then they are indeed stuck with a Fundamentalist Jesus whether they like it or not.

I'm just telling you what your stuck with no matter how you view these things.

You can view them either way you like, that doesn't change the fact that these stories (true or fictional) portray their Jesus character as supporting strict fundamentalism.

So you're stuck with that no matter what.

And if the historian does not accept the words as absolutely correct and your interpretation of them as utterly unquestionable, you've got an answer for that too:
"the moment you make that proclamation you're done. All you are doing is trying to get out of having to confess that these Gospel rumors are indeed riddled with extreme problems, and cannot possibly be true in their claims."

Why would it matter?

If you are a historian who recognizes that these stories are necessarily fictional, you're still stuck with having to recognize what the fictional stories say about their fictional characters.

It's just like with any work of fiction. It doesn't matter whether you believe the Lord of the Rings is real or fictional that's not going to change what the characters are actually said to have done.

Moreover, if you are a historian who actually believes these stories are divinely inspired stories (AS THE AUTHORS CLAIM) then you have no choice but to accept that every word they say must be the "Gospel Truth".

So there's really no excuse to come at this half-heartedly pretending to be a historian who believes "Some of it" but not "All of it".

Don't forget, Paul claimed to be in direct communication with Jesus via his visions. In fact, since Paul believed in visions when he said that 500 other people saw Jesus he may have meant that they too had visions of Jesus.

And the other authors claimed to that God spoke from the clouds. They claim to be able to quote Jesus verbatim in just about everything he ever said. They even claim to have overheard conversations between the pharisees and Pilate in places where they would have needed to be a fly on the wall. If you are going to believe those kinds of reports, you really have no choice but to imagine that these authors were being divinely inspired like Paul. In fact, that's the idea that most Christians have. They view the Gospels as being the divinely inspired word of God.

It's not even as if you can plead ignorance; over the years there've been innumerable threads about the historical Jesus and Christian origins with intelligent contributors such as Student, ThatGirlAgain, Historia, Jagella, tfvespasianus, Elijah John, bjs, liamconner, TiredOfTheNonsense and doubtless others I'm overlooking; all of whom (despite wildly differing perspectives in some cases) understand and have posted more than enough about historical methods that anyone interested in learning, rather than blindly attacking, would have picked up enough to know how wrong your approach above is.

I'm totally aware of proper historical methods and I have just shown above several reasons why these Gospels fail to meet those criteria. So there's not point in approaching these as a historian. But even if a religious "believer" claims to be approaching these as a historian, they still have no choice to be acknowledge what's written in these tales.

You can hardly claim that the Gospels are "valid historical accounts" and then hypocritically say, "Oh, but we don't need to believe the claims they make"?

What?

Make up your mind. You're either going to claim that these rumors have historical credibility or they don't. Pretending that some of the outrageous supernatural claims have "historical credibility" whilst others do not, is just plain silly.

These are clearly nothing more than extremely failed apologetic arguments for this religion.

Your understanding of historiography is utterly dismal and insulting to any historian: Presumably driven by whatever it is that compels you in this unrelenting crusade against reason and religion

Hogwash.

Let's look at your list of historical criteria again. By the way I totally agree with your list:


Among the first questions an historian would ask are:
Who was this written by?


Exactly. And I answered that by posting the first verse of these authors books. They are clearly religious zealots who are attempting to make a case for the divinity of Jesus. They are NOT credible unbiased historians.

And Matthew and Luke, were basically just regurgitating the original rumors of Mark and then adding their own embellishments.


What were their circumstances (time, location etc.)?


Paul claims to have had a vision.

It's not clear what Mark's circumstances were. But Matthew and Luke were clearly repeating the original rumors that Mark started and adding their own embellishments.


What was their purpose in writing?


That's crystal clear. They were totally obsessed with trying to convince people of the divinity of Jesus as the Son of God. And apparently they were so desperate to prove this that they had God confirming that Jesus was his Son by speaking from the clouds.

I can't imagine why any credible historian wouldn't question that as being quite suspicious.

Not only this, but even think about this logically. Why would a God need to speak from the clouds to confirm that Jesus was his Son if Jesus himself was so compelling? That's already problematic in and of itself.

Also if God can speak from the clouds why didn't he just state what he wanted people to know that way.

In short, a historian worth his or her salt should be saying, "Hey, wait a minute, these stories aren't even making any sense". Never mind that they have absolutely no independent evidence to back them up.


How reliable can we consider the claims of the text?
Are the claims supported or refuted by other sources?

What makes you think I haven't consider this?

Where are the 500 people Paul claims to have seen the resurrected Jesus?

Where are the reports of the people in the Holy City where the zombie Saints that crawled out of their graves when into the city to show themselves to the people there?

Where are the independent reports that some guy named Jesus was going around miraculously healing the sick and raising the dead?

Where are the independent reports that God spoke from the clouds?

Where are these independent sources that a historian is supposed to care about?

You'll need to show me where these sources are before accusing me of ignoring them.

Your slanderous accusation that I have no clue about historical methods is totally empty and devoid of any credibility.

Apparently you can't argue the topic so you have sunk to the depths of trying to discredit me. That's not even a valid argument.

If you want to argue the points argue the points. If you want to make personal attacks in an attempt to discredit me don't wear out your keyboard because that tactic only makes you look bad.