dog-on

You were asked to present your facts and what you did present was merely a bunch of opinions based on special pleading and assuming the conclusion type arguments.

So I thought you must have been joking.

ercatli

It looks like we are agreed. Both science and history are uncertain, though to different degrees. And yes, we probably need to accept others' expertise in both.

He gave a link to a bunch of scholars. I had no problem with that, except I felt they might represent a narrow range of opinion.

These were not just anybody's opinions, but those of some of the best historians around. As Camio says above, we need expert input if we are going to conclude intelligently about a difficult subject. If we don't trust them, then we don't have history and we don't have a discussion.

Perhaps you'd like to outline the "special pleading and assuming the conclusion type arguments"?

Well its midnight here in Sydney, and I'm going to bed. Thank you, and good night.

dog-on

You would have to present the actual arguments, in that case.

Take this for instance:

This opinion assumes the conclusion that Mark wrote some sort of history, or that Paul was speaking about an actual historical person that was crucified, among other problems.

To claim that texts about a god-man and evidence of a person, (J. Caesar, in this case), for whom we have actual archeological evidence, is in any way equivalent, is simply special pleading.

Toto

I don't get it. We spend time examining and dissecting the search for the historical Jesus on this forum, and find that the so-called experts either assume the existence of a historical Jesus, or grab a few facts to justify their belief, and there is no real basis for their opinions.

Then someone like ercatli comes along and repeats the same so-called expert opinion, consisting of some quote-mined tidbits from a variety of people who don't actually agree on much, as if this is supposed to be impressive. It's not.

I did not refer to experts. I referred to the Jesus Project, which is a group that, for the first time, intends to actually examine the issue of whether Jesus was a historcal figure using the best modern historical methods.

This has not been done up to now.

Toto

ercatli - google says this might be you:

Australian apologist: why I believe

Did you read actual historians, or theologians, or just Josh McDowell? Or just someone else saying that there is a consensus of historians?

Do you realize that none of this can be historically validated?

But Antony Flew does not believe in that miracle, even after Christians took advantage of his situation and wrote a book for him that makes him out to be a believer. Shouldn't you at least mention that? Saying that something is the best attested miracle is about like saying that someone is the most accurate astrologer gypping the public today.

This is standard apologetics. And it is boring.

corey

I am no educated religious professor, or even a theologian student, except on my own time, but from what I understand, there is no way to prove that the "Jesus" spoken about, however inaccurately in the Christian religion, ever existed because of a few facts.

One is, there were many men named Jesus, so to pin point just one man named Jesus, one of many, that would be almost impossible, as, there supposedly was some sort of census, from what I have read, but how accurate can that really be seeing as so much of the history of the Jews was snuffed out by the killing off of most of those who passed down history via orally and through written word.

Secondly, from what I understand, any written word about the Jesus Christians speak about, was written many years after his death and in many places, contradict each other.

All one has to do is look at one of your grandparents you may have never met, and take one set of your parents and write down what they say about these people (say your mother’s parents), then wait a few years, as in decades, then ask your grandchildren to continue to write the story about these folks, without giving them any information about any other people, or any other information.

These grand or great-grand children will have to come up with many assumptions, and not being able to use the internet or any written words about the grandparents of your other sets not written about originally, ( your father’s now), they will be left with quite an empty slate, much like a ‘Ad lib’ game I used to play.

How are my great-grandchildren supposed to find out any information about my father’s parents, if they only have some badly written history, if that, of my mother’s parent’s and they have no access to a library, the internet or any other “modern” was of doing research?
It is impossible.

But like ALL religious folk, Christians refuse to fail….when it comes to the history of their Jesus, it does not matter if anyone ever really met him, read anything he ever wrote, met anyone who ever met him or met anyone who ever read anything about him, can come to the conclusion that what they know now is 100% accurate;

They have this nifty guy called the ‘Holy Spirit’ that guided them and guides them, so what is now written in the bible, is what is true….no questions asked.
Huh….what a bargain!

I wonder if this ‘Holy Spirit’ is pissed that the Catholic Church is having to close many of it’s churches to pay off all the victims of rape the Catholic Priests were allowed to act out and be protected by the Catholic Church?

I wonder, how this ‘Holy Spirit’ feels about the relationship between the Nazis and the Catholic Church; the Mormons that married off preteen girls for 80 year old men for many years; Protestants hunted down and killed Quakers; burnt mid-wives and herbalists; etc….?

I get it, this wasn’t the ‘Holy Spirit’ this was “men” who had fallen.

But is the same excuse ‘Diebold’ can use when their machines count votes, but do so with such great inaccurately, but when doing my banking with the ATM machines, who Diebold own, never seem to make mistakes?

Sheshbazzar

I was going to say "don't be so hard on a newcomer" and "Welcome to the Forum ercatli"
Then I noticed that ercatli joined up way back in 2006.
10 posts, the first listed is back in 2006, and is in the Graveyard.
The other 9 were -all- made today?

From the Graveyard ercali the Christian has arisen!
There IS a resurrection of the dead!
Praise Jesus!

But....but....
Hey ercali, are you sure you have arrived in the right place? :devil1:

Camio

He provided a link to an ongoing scholarly project dealing with the Jesus issue. But he already explained what this was about.

Where the heck did I say that? The gist of my previous post was about the difficulty to come to sound conclusions in the ancient history department, in contrast with physics where the scientific method is much easier to apply. Sure, you don't improvise yourself an NT scholar, yet it doesn't take three PhDs to point out flaws in some reasoning emanating from the specialists in the field when you see one.

Sleep well.

the_cave

But this is an interesting question even aside from the historicity of Jesus--because it is commonly assumed that the author of Luke was also the author of Acts. The author of Luke was certainly aware of the sayings of Jesus! So why didn't his characters in Acts quote Jesus more?

Does this imply that Acts is based off of stories that predate the writing of the gospels, whether these stories were written or oral traditions?

And if so, why would the author of Acts defer to their authority, without revising them to incorporate gospel material (like the sayings of Jesus)?

bacht

Right, Luke seems more interested in tweaking the existing gospel genre than in re-inventing it. He does include the passage about Jesus communing with the disciples after his resurrection, presumably giving them further instruction and clarification of the mission. But none of this shows up in the gospel or Acts.


In the first book, O The-oph'ilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commandment through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen.

To them he presented himself alive after his passion by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days, and speaking of the kingdom of God.

And while staying with them he charged them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, "you heard from me, for John baptized with water, but before many days you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit."


Acts 1:1-5