Restored Topic

[Cogitoergosum]

Achiles had asked people to explain the rise of christianity. I don't know if it was supposed to prove that christianity was somehow special because of the way it rose, but how is that different than the rise of islam? Can you explain to me why you believe christianity to be better?

How do u explain the rise of christianity?

How do u explain the rise of islam?

1) The Gospels being written by at least the following dates
Mark 65-70 CE
Matthew 70-80 CE
Luke 80-85 CE

1) the koran being written about 700 C.E.

2) The letters of Paul and his writings on the subjects, specifically the parts where he refers to Jesus as a human, any of Jesus actions, and beliefs of himself and those he speaks about.

2) the "hadith" written as an add on to the kuran and the "ijtihad" written by imams that corroborate the divine message of mohammad and confirm his status as a prophet.

3) The writings of Josephus

referr to 2

4) The Historical account presented in the Talmud

The historical account in the Talmud of jesus is sketchy at best. Yeshua there is only a rabbi no magical powers, different set of parents than jesus, no disciples...
the historical account present in history books about mohammad and neighboring nations

5) The fact that the geography of the Gospels (especially Luke) is almost exact.

the geography in the history of islam and mohammad is accurate

6) The fact that Archeology has not uncovered anything that contradicts a Gospel, or acts, or Pauline letter account.

Archeology has not unproved anything in the koran

7) The beliefs of the very first Christians (Nazarenes).

the beliefs of the very first moslims

8) The accounts of history such as Caesar’s declaration around 60CE that bodies were never to be taken out of the graves, punishable by death, right near Nazareth.

I don't know what evidence that is, supposedly jesus's body is in heaven and not around nazareth. Multiple historical accounts confirm the existence of mohammad.

9) Later archeology and history such as Pliny's letters.

same as previous arguments

10) The conversion of Paul

the conversion of thousands of jews and christians of the time to islam.

11) The conversion of the early Jews, constituting the Council of Jerusalem
same as above

12) The Martyrdom of James

somebody killed him, so what?

13) The conversion of James

same as above

14) The martyrdom of the first apostles. ( I Know that there isn't solid evidence supporting these men being martyrs. However explain why the early church fathers would write about the details of their deaths, if something close to that did actually happen.)

martyrdom of the thousands of moslims while conquering lands and spreading islam.

so how exactly are these proofs of a divine religion?

[Goat]

The life expectancy of those days, according to most SECULAR college textbooks, was similar to today's.

This is not the information I have...perhaps you could reference it for me.

For the ELITE it was. Not for the average person. Of course, the infant mortality brought down the average a lot.

[bernee51]

Now I know you haven't read the Bible a lot. The disciples were fishermen. Jesus was a carpenter's son. These were not elitists. They were ordinary men who did some extraordinary things. Anyways, who is your source. I base my idea of life expectancy on the textbook Traditions and Encounters.
My point exactly. These simple folk woulld have been very fortunate to live to 40. Have you ever visied a third world country where people live a subsistence life style?

My reference is here

Note, I said full form and not fully written. If I were to say when every book was written, I would say inside 70 years.

Still outside your claim of within a generation.

I can go to the Roman museum and look directly upon the earliest known copy of the Bible, the Codex Vaticanus. Unlike you, I don't have a museum in my upstairs room. However, my library has a copy of Genesis as it was in the original Hebrew form. I can for the time being talk to the head of Wycliffe Bible Translators about the copying of the Bible and its reliability. You got any questions for him?

You point being?

[dthmstr254]

Now I know you haven't read the Bible a lot. The disciples were fishermen. Jesus was a carpenter's son. These were not elitists. They were ordinary men who did some extraordinary things. Anyways, who is your source. I base my idea of life expectancy on the textbook Traditions and Encounters.
My point exactly. These simple folk would have been very fortunate to live to 40. Have you ever visied a third world country where people live a subsistence life style?

My reference is here

Note, I said full form and not fully written. If I were to say when every book was written, I would say inside 70 years.

Still outside your claim of within a generation.

Not definitely. You cite one study whereas I cite a book that cites many, many studies and other resources. I will still stand on the textbook I cited earlier (Namely, Traditions and Encounters, a secular source, and thus free from the oft-claimed Christian bias.

I can go to the Roman museum and look directly upon the earliest known copy of the Bible, the Codex Vaticanus. Unlike you, I don't have a museum in my upstairs room. However, my library has a copy of Genesis as it was in the original Hebrew form. I can for the time being talk to the head of Wycliffe Bible Translators about the copying of the Bible and its reliability. You got any questions for him?

You point being?

My point being the same as yours. You can go upstairs and look upon a COPY of the Magna Carta, and I can go across campus and look upon a COPY of the book of Genesis, and across the ocean to look upon the earliest known copy of the New Testament. It shows that you have no point in your argument.

[achilles12604]

What do you make of Josephus (60 years later), the talmud(150 years later), and the beliefs of the Nazarenes (5 years later). These are not biblical. Besides these are of course Paul's letters which at the very least refer to the bodily resurrection of Jesus (a miracle).

The talmud does not speak of jesus of nazareth, josephus was not presesnt for the miracles so heresay at best, the nazarenes? are those early christians the same ones that saw the miracles or was it heresay? or maybe they were fooled?

Even some secular scholars I have read here concure that the talmud does speak about Jesus. However this was hardly my strongest evidence so on we go. Josephus . . . ok heresay. I have no real problem with this. Bear in mind the heresay was from individuals who were alive and available at the time of Jesus ministry so this would be paramount to a modern day interview minus the TV camera.

The Nazarenes. Yes they were the early Christians. Please feel free to join the conspiracy theory thread. We discuss them in great detail. Ultimately Lotan concurred that they did believe in the resurrection but that they must have believed in a spiritual ressurection, not a physcial. This is where we left it. I think that his evidence for a spiritual resurrection is extreamly all by itself. When set next to the counter evidence for a physical resurrection, I think his argument is flat wrong. But in any case he recognizes the individuals

1) were alive and witness to the events in question
2) did believe in Jesus miracles including his resurrection

As for why would people reject him after seeing his miracles, I address this under another thread (Jesus Confusing Words page 1 I think) In short, when a person's preconceived "truths" are challenged, they can overlook ANYTHING which is contradictory to their original beliefs. Non-theists accuse Christians of doing this all the time.

that is funny if i saw someone raise the dead i don't think i'll have the choice but to believe him.

And notice that many of his followers did believe in him . . . to the point of persecution and death.

So organized armies are required groups of different ideas to slaughter each other?

well if you can have war without armies i'm not aware of it.

Massacre in Red Square. Salem witch trials. Inquisition. Stalin's secret service. Al Cappone, Sonny Barger (spelling), Shall I go on?

I'll let you be the judge.

Which Gospel would be better?
1) Written 30-45 years after the events
2) Written 150-250 years after the events.

it is completely irrelevant when they were written, what matters is the truth. If i see a book saying that the earth is flat i'm not going to believe it to be true because the one that says the earth is round was written later.

You honestly believe that WHEN a book was written is irrelevant? Now you are at odds with every scholar I have ever read, Theistic of atheistic. They have been debating the dating of these books since the books were uncovered. If it was unimportant, then a whole lot of scholarly research was for nothing.

Which Gospel would be better?
1) Written by an apostle or follower of an apostle.
2) Written by someone so out of date, they couldn't possibly get info from an apostle.

The evidence of the gospels being written by apostles or followers are sketchy at best. Supposedly the writers were 70-90 years old if they were apostles which much higher than average life expectancy for that era, especially if you were not wealthy among the elite.

Sketchy is your opinion. I think the arguments for authorship are fine. There are many points supporting these men and very few against them. Again I refer you to the authorship sections of the Gospels commentary located at ECW. Read the secular if you like. Most of them say something to the tune of "The authorship is anonomyus because they didn't sign their books. While it is possible, it isn't proven."

Which Gospel would be better?
1) One written without additional ideas which appeared much later but didn't exist during the time
2) Include any and all ideas whenever they come along.

That you have no proof for, it is church propaganda.

Church propaganda had no effect at all on the Nag Hammadi library.

So once again you are implying that differing views require armies and empires before they can kill each other?

to have a war like the muslims did yes you need to.

Once again I point to the many times in history where smaller groups of people didn't agree and killed each other. Armies are not necessary. So this difference between Christians and Islam stands on its own merits. History is the judge here. Sorry but they are simply not the same story.

Constantine didn't appear on the scene for several hundred years. To compare to Islam you would need to figure out how people in the time of Paul were killing each other or pagans over differences of opinion about the details of their religion.

Before that christians are a minority and as a minority you tend to be more tolerant, when they got to power they abused it like anybody else. So the christians not killing anybody based on ideology before constantine meerly reflects their satus as a minority.

Tolerant? Christianity barges into other countries and tells them they are wrong in almost everything they do and to change their ways. Paul writes over and over about expelling those among you who refuse to transform. Christians were tolerant? They were Jews at first. Shall we see how tolerant the Jew's were of other religions? Or would this make my point to loudly?

[achilles12604]

As for the Magic, your passage says that magic had begun to change into a bad word. It does not say (nor does it imply) that bad things were referred to as magic.

It works one way but you are reading it backwards.

Magic became a bad thing. Bad things did not become Magic. Another example.

All Toyota’s are automobiles. Not all automobiles are Toyota’s. Same thing happening here.

no my point was that in the judeo christian tradition magic was used to mean bad deeds. that's all.

And your point is still wrong for the reason I put forth. Your thought process makes a jump that logic does not. Thats all.

As I pointed out in my prior post, this passage refers to Yeshua ben Pandera. He was the one running around with Joshua.

Joshua or yeshua both of them in these account do not fit with jesus of nazareth.

[/quote]

Once again . . . . .

There are two totally different passages here.

two.

one . . . . two.

They are even in different books.

One refers to Joshua. This is the one you quoted.

The other is the one I presented. This one came about or say 100 years later or so and mentioned Yeshua hanging and his deeds. It does not mention Joshua. You are mixing up two . . . TWO totally different passages.

[achilles12604]

How do we know of paul's conversion?

Good question. Perhaps this might even be a good thread.

Lets take it there.

[Goat]

What do you make of Josephus (60 years later), the talmud(150 years later), and the beliefs of the Nazarenes (5 years later). These are not biblical. Besides these are of course Paul's letters which at the very least refer to the bodily resurrection of Jesus (a miracle).

The talmud does not speak of jesus of nazareth, josephus was not presesnt for the miracles so heresay at best, the nazarenes? are those early christians the same ones that saw the miracles or was it heresay? or maybe they were fooled?

Even some secular scholars I have read here concure that the talmud does speak about Jesus. However this was hardly my strongest evidence so on we go. Josephus . . . ok heresay. I have no real problem with this. Bear in mind the heresay was from individuals who were alive and available at the time of Jesus ministry so this would be paramount to a modern day interview minus the TV camera.

The Nazarenes. Yes they were the early Christians. Please feel free to join the conspiracy theory thread. We discuss them in great detail. Ultimately Lotan concurred that they did believe in the resurrection but that they must have believed in a spiritual ressurection, not a physcial. This is where we left it. I think that his evidence for a spiritual resurrection is extreamly all by itself. When set next to the counter evidence for a physical resurrection, I think his argument is flat wrong. But in any case he recognizes the individuals

1) were alive and witness to the events in question
2) did believe in Jesus miracles including his resurrection

As for why would people reject him after seeing his miracles, I address this under another thread (Jesus Confusing Words page 1 I think) In short, when a person's preconceived "truths" are challenged, they can overlook ANYTHING which is contradictory to their original beliefs. Non-theists accuse Christians of doing this all the time.

that is funny if i saw someone raise the dead i don't think i'll have the choice but to believe him.

And notice that many of his followers did believe in him . . . to the point of persecution and death.

So organized armies are required groups of different ideas to slaughter each other?

well if you can have war without armies i'm not aware of it.

Massacre in Red Square. Salem witch trials. Inquisition. Stalin's secret service. Al Cappone, Sonny Barger (spelling), Shall I go on?

I'll let you be the judge.

Which Gospel would be better?
1) Written 30-45 years after the events
2) Written 150-250 years after the events.

it is completely irrelevant when they were written, what matters is the truth. If i see a book saying that the earth is flat i'm not going to believe it to be true because the one that says the earth is round was written later.

You honestly believe that WHEN a book was written is irrelevant? Now you are at odds with every scholar I have ever read, Theistic of atheistic. They have been debating the dating of these books since the books were uncovered. If it was unimportant, then a whole lot of scholarly research was for nothing.

Which Gospel would be better?
1) Written by an apostle or follower of an apostle.
2) Written by someone so out of date, they couldn't possibly get info from an apostle.

The evidence of the gospels being written by apostles or followers are sketchy at best. Supposedly the writers were 70-90 years old if they were apostles which much higher than average life expectancy for that era, especially if you were not wealthy among the elite.

Sketchy is your opinion. I think the arguments for authorship are fine. There are many points supporting these men and very few against them. Again I refer you to the authorship sections of the Gospels commentary located at ECW. Read the secular if you like. Most of them say something to the tune of "The authorship is anonomyus because they didn't sign their books. While it is possible, it isn't proven."

Which Gospel would be better?
1) One written without additional ideas which appeared much later but didn't exist during the time
2) Include any and all ideas whenever they come along.

That you have no proof for, it is church propaganda.

Church propaganda had no effect at all on the Nag Hammadi library.

So once again you are implying that differing views require armies and empires before they can kill each other?

to have a war like the muslims did yes you need to.

Once again I point to the many times in history where smaller groups of people didn't agree and killed each other. Armies are not necessary. So this difference between Christians and Islam stands on its own merits. History is the judge here. Sorry but they are simply not the same story.

Constantine didn't appear on the scene for several hundred years. To compare to Islam you would need to figure out how people in the time of Paul were killing each other or pagans over differences of opinion about the details of their religion.

Before that christians are a minority and as a minority you tend to be more tolerant, when they got to power they abused it like anybody else. So the christians not killing anybody based on ideology before constantine meerly reflects their satus as a minority.

Tolerant? Christianity barges into other countries and tells them they are wrong in almost everything they do and to change their ways. Paul writes over and over about expelling those among you who refuse to transform. Christians were tolerant? They were Jews at first. Shall we see how tolerant the Jew's were of other religions? Or would this make my point to loudly?

The early christian writings site is HUGE. Can you narrow it down?

Like, an acutal link to a secular scholar that thinks the Talmud specifically mentions Jesus of Nazareth? How about chapter and verse of the Talmud, so
we can look at that chapter and verse IN CONTEXT.

[achilles12604]

What do you make of Josephus (60 years later), the talmud(150 years later), and the beliefs of the Nazarenes (5 years later). These are not biblical. Besides these are of course Paul's letters which at the very least refer to the bodily resurrection of Jesus (a miracle).

The talmud does not speak of jesus of nazareth, josephus was not presesnt for the miracles so heresay at best, the nazarenes? are those early christians the same ones that saw the miracles or was it heresay? or maybe they were fooled?

Even some secular scholars I have read here concure that the talmud does speak about Jesus. However this was hardly my strongest evidence so on we go. Josephus . . . ok heresay. I have no real problem with this. Bear in mind the heresay was from individuals who were alive and available at the time of Jesus ministry so this would be paramount to a modern day interview minus the TV camera.

The Nazarenes. Yes they were the early Christians. Please feel free to join the conspiracy theory thread. We discuss them in great detail. Ultimately Lotan concurred that they did believe in the resurrection but that they must have believed in a spiritual ressurection, not a physcial. This is where we left it. I think that his evidence for a spiritual resurrection is extreamly all by itself. When set next to the counter evidence for a physical resurrection, I think his argument is flat wrong. But in any case he recognizes the individuals

1) were alive and witness to the events in question
2) did believe in Jesus miracles including his resurrection

As for why would people reject him after seeing his miracles, I address this under another thread (Jesus Confusing Words page 1 I think) In short, when a person's preconceived "truths" are challenged, they can overlook ANYTHING which is contradictory to their original beliefs. Non-theists accuse Christians of doing this all the time.

that is funny if i saw someone raise the dead i don't think i'll have the choice but to believe him.

And notice that many of his followers did believe in him . . . to the point of persecution and death.

So organized armies are required groups of different ideas to slaughter each other?

well if you can have war without armies i'm not aware of it.

Massacre in Red Square. Salem witch trials. Inquisition. Stalin's secret service. Al Cappone, Sonny Barger (spelling), Shall I go on?

I'll let you be the judge.

Which Gospel would be better?
1) Written 30-45 years after the events
2) Written 150-250 years after the events.

it is completely irrelevant when they were written, what matters is the truth. If i see a book saying that the earth is flat i'm not going to believe it to be true because the one that says the earth is round was written later.

You honestly believe that WHEN a book was written is irrelevant? Now you are at odds with every scholar I have ever read, Theistic of atheistic. They have been debating the dating of these books since the books were uncovered. If it was unimportant, then a whole lot of scholarly research was for nothing.

Which Gospel would be better?
1) Written by an apostle or follower of an apostle.
2) Written by someone so out of date, they couldn't possibly get info from an apostle.

The evidence of the gospels being written by apostles or followers are sketchy at best. Supposedly the writers were 70-90 years old if they were apostles which much higher than average life expectancy for that era, especially if you were not wealthy among the elite.

Sketchy is your opinion. I think the arguments for authorship are fine. There are many points supporting these men and very few against them. Again I refer you to the authorship sections of the Gospels commentary located at ECW. Read the secular if you like. Most of them say something to the tune of "The authorship is anonomyus because they didn't sign their books. While it is possible, it isn't proven."

Which Gospel would be better?
1) One written without additional ideas which appeared much later but didn't exist during the time
2) Include any and all ideas whenever they come along.

That you have no proof for, it is church propaganda.

Church propaganda had no effect at all on the Nag Hammadi library.

So once again you are implying that differing views require armies and empires before they can kill each other?

to have a war like the muslims did yes you need to.

Once again I point to the many times in history where smaller groups of people didn't agree and killed each other. Armies are not necessary. So this difference between Christians and Islam stands on its own merits. History is the judge here. Sorry but they are simply not the same story.

Constantine didn't appear on the scene for several hundred years. To compare to Islam you would need to figure out how people in the time of Paul were killing each other or pagans over differences of opinion about the details of their religion.

Before that christians are a minority and as a minority you tend to be more tolerant, when they got to power they abused it like anybody else. So the christians not killing anybody based on ideology before constantine meerly reflects their satus as a minority.

Tolerant? Christianity barges into other countries and tells them they are wrong in almost everything they do and to change their ways. Paul writes over and over about expelling those among you who refuse to transform. Christians were tolerant? They were Jews at first. Shall we see how tolerant the Jew's were of other religions? Or would this make my point to loudly?

The early christian writings site is HUGE. Can you narrow it down?

Like, an acutal link to a secular scholar that thinks the Talmud specifically mentions Jesus of Nazareth? How about chapter and verse of the Talmud, so
we can look at that chapter and verse IN CONTEXT.

Good points. Critique taken. I will do so tonight.

[Cogitoergosum]

I have no real problem with this. Bear in mind the heresay was from individuals who were alive and available at the time of Jesus ministry so this would be paramount to a modern day interview minus the TV camera.

People who see ghosts tell other people, but the fact that these people were alive when the fact was reported does not make the ghost true.

The Nazarenes. Yes they were the early Christians. Please feel free to join the conspiracy theory thread. We discuss them in great detail. Ultimately Lotan concurred that they did believe in the resurrection but that they must have believed in a spiritual ressurection, not a physcial. This is where we left it. I think that his evidence for a spiritual resurrection is extreamly all by itself. When set next to the counter evidence for a physical resurrection, I think his argument is flat wrong. But in any case he recognizes the individuals

1) were alive and witness to the events in question
2) did believe in Jesus miracles including his resurrection

Explain to me the cult of john frum in new guinee. It arose in 1944 when american soldiers took workers from one isolated island to build an airstrip to use in WWII. These people believe than john frum will come back to them on an airplane some year in february and bring the cargo to his people. Every year they build control towers and radios that look like the ones the US army had in WWII out of bambo waiting for john frum to come. The US army in their records had no john frum listed, nobody knows who he is, or when he exactly died, but his followeres say he was alive among them died and will come back on airplane full of cargo. That was only 60 years ago. A myth or story could arise at anytime, how fast it catches on is not testimony of its truth, what the initial followers believe depends on how gullible they are. Find an expalnation for this phenomenon and see if it does not also apply to the nazarenes.

And notice that many of his followers did believe in him . . . to the point of persecution and death.

And so did those who followed david koresh.

So organized armies are required groups of different ideas to slaughter each other?

well if you can have war without armies i'm not aware of it.

Massacre in Red Square. Salem witch trials. Inquisition. Stalin's secret service. Al Cappone, Sonny Barger (spelling), Shall I go on?[/quote] I was talking about two people fighting each others like the moslims did, you give me examples of one sided murders, these are not wars. You said moslims were at war with each other, i told you because they had armies. If the christians did have armies, say the gnostics and the rest, they would have had wars between them instead of one sided persecution.

You honestly believe that WHEN a book was written is irrelevant? Now you are at odds with every scholar I have ever read, Theistic of atheistic. They have been debating the dating of these books since the books were uncovered. If it was unimportant, then a whole lot of scholarly research was for nothing.

It is very important to find out when one was written, but the timing has nothing to do with IT'S TRUTH.

Sketchy is your opinion. I think the arguments for authorship are fine. There are many points supporting these men and very few against them. Again I refer you to the authorship sections of the Gospels commentary located at ECW. Read the secular if you like. Most of them say something to the tune of "The authorship is anonomyus because they didn't sign their books. While it is possible, it isn't proven."

Please give me the link

Church propaganda had no effect at all on the Nag Hammadi library.

But who said the nag hammadi was definetly wrong while the others are right? the church did.

So once again you are implying that differing views require armies and empires before they can kill each other?

to have a war like the muslims did yes you need to.

Once again I point to the many times in history where smaller groups of people didn't agree and killed each other. Armies are not necessary. So this difference between Christians and Islam stands on its own merits. History is the judge here. Sorry but they are simply not the same story.

LMAO, what you showed me before is one group in power exterminating the other who did not have an army or power, read your examples again. Moslims, had armies (the two sides) so they fought, the sunnis having more power than the shi'a, outnumber them today.

Tolerant? Christianity barges into other countries and tells them they are wrong in almost everything they do and to change their ways. Paul writes over and over about expelling those among you who refuse to transform. Christians were tolerant? They were Jews at first. Shall we see how tolerant the Jew's were of other religions? Or would this make my point to loudly?

Lol thank you for saying christians are not tolerant, i feel the same way. My point was when christians were a minority, they preached and tried to convert as many as possible without use of force, the invention of hell probably was a good trick. But as soon as they had constantine's power they persecuted and killed different opinions.

[Cogitoergosum]

And your point is still wrong for the reason I put forth. Your thought process makes a jump that logic does not. Thats all.

If magic for jewish people is correlated with bad deeds and for aztecs is correlated with good deeds, i don't really care how the aztecs define it when i read it in a jewish book.

As I pointed out in my prior post, this passage refers to Yeshua ben Pandera. He was the one running around with Joshua.

Joshua or yeshua both of them in these account do not fit with jesus of nazareth.

[/quote]

Once again . . . . .

There are two totally different passages here.

two.

one . . . . two.

They are even in different books.

One refers to Joshua. This is the one you quoted.

The other is the one I presented. This one came about or say 100 years later or so and mentioned Yeshua hanging and his deeds. It does not mention Joshua. You are mixing up two . . . TWO totally different passages.[/quote]

First i quote yeshua you tell me no it is joshua, then i quote joshua, you tell me it is yeshua. Please link me the paragraph you are talking about so we can avoid this confusion.