patcleaver

Emperor and Pope Flavius Claudius Julianus (360-363 CE) thoroughly demonstrated that Christianity was a fraud in his book "Against the Galileans" written in 362CE. He said that Constintine and Esuebias forged everything in the Early 4th century - nobody ever contradicted him. The Gospel of Judas is the oldest carbon dated gospel and its date is 280 CE plus/minus 60 years.

We know the Old Testament was written between 400 and 500 BC. The claims that they are older than that are just frauds. There is no reason to think that any of the Old Testament stories existed more than a few dozzen years before they were written down.

Ancient Greek philosophers demonstrated that God was a fraud. Many people throught history have known tht God was a fraud. In every society where confidential poling has been conducted, a substantial percentage (between 6% and 84%) of people are atheists. Many people in all socienties have always known that religion was just a fraud.

patcleaver

Emperor (and Pontifex Maximus) Flavius Claudius Julianus (360-363 CE) thoroughly demonstrated that Christianity was a fraud in his book "Against the Galileans" written in 362CE. He said that Constantine and Eusebius forged everything in the Early 4th century to create Christianity - nobody at that time ever factually contradicted him. The Gospel of Judas is the oldest carbon dated gospel and its date is 280 CE plus/minus 60 years. However, there is no reasonable evidence to believe that anyone thought that the Jesus of Nazareth story was anything more than fiction before the time of Constantine. There is no reasonable evidence to believe that there was a religion that followed Jesus of Nazareth before then.

Assuming that someone named Paul of Taurus even existed, Taurus which was a center of Mithraism worship. The Pagan Mithras probably worshiped a crucified savior called Jesus Christ (literally anointed savior). There is no reasonable evidence at all that Paul was not writing about Mithraism. There were several religions in the Eastern Empire who's followers were called Christians.

We know the Old Testament was written between 400 and 500 BC. We do not know where they got their stories or if the authors thought they were writing fiction or not. Regardless - it was just fiction. The claims that they are older than that are just frauds. Except for those stories that are copied from older traditions such as the Egyptians and Babylonians, there is no reason to think that any of the Old Testament stories existed more than a few dozen years before they were written down.

Ancient Greek philosophers demonstrated that God was a fraud. Many people throughout history have known that God was a fraud. In every society where confidential poling has been conducted, a substantial percentage (at least 5%) of people are atheists. Many people in all societies have always known that religion was just a fraud.

Archeology and ancient texts indicate that the Hebrew God and Christianity are myths just like Santa Clause and the tooth fairy. Archeology, proves that Noah's flood never occurred, that the Isrrealites were never in Egypt, that the Exodus never occurred, that the Jews never conquered Judea, that they were just Canaanites who had always lived there. The Bible is fiction - both the old and new testament, and not any more reliable as history than Harry Potter or Grimm's Fairy Tails.

REVROSWELL

Quote:

Originally Posted by patcleaver Quote: Originally Posted by REVROSWELL Actually I cannot concur Bigfoot and Loch Ness monster, and crop circles, etc, have been demonstrated to be frauds. The Hebrew God has no such evidence against him. Emperor (and Pontifex Maximus) Flavius Claudius Julianus (360-363 CE) thoroughly demonstrated that Christianity was a fraud in his book "Against the Galileans" written in 362CE. He said that Constantine and Eusebius forged everything in the Early 4th century to create Christianity - nobody at that time ever factually contradicted him. The Gospel of Judas is the oldest carbon dated gospel and its date is 280 CE plus/minus 60 years. However, there is no reasonable evidence to believe that anyone thought that the Jesus of Nazareth story was anything more than fiction before the time of Constantine. There is no reasonable evidence to believe that there was a religion that followed Jesus of Nazareth before then. Assuming that someone named Paul of Taurus even existed, Taurus which was a center of Mithraism worship. The Pagan Mithras probably worshiped a crucified savior called Jesus Christ (literally anointed savior). There is no reasonable evidence at all that Paul was not writing about Mithraism. There were several religions in the Eastern Empire who's followers were called Christians. We know the Old Testament was written between 400 and 500 BC. We do not know where they got their stories or if the authors thought they were writing fiction or not. Regardless - it was just fiction. The claims that they are older than that are just frauds. Except for those stories that are copied from older traditions such as the Egyptians and Babylonians, there is no reason to think that any of the Old Testament stories existed more than a few dozen years before they were written down. Ancient Greek philosophers demonstrated that God was a fraud. Many people throughout history have known that God was a fraud. In every society where confidential poling has been conducted, a substantial percentage (at least 5%) of people are atheists. Many people in all societies have always known that religion was just a fraud. Quote: Originally Posted by REVROSWELL At least the Hebrew God and Christianity has archeology and ancient texts to support it, unlike the tooth fairy Archeology and ancient texts indicate that the Hebrew God and Christianity are myths just like Santa Clause and the tooth fairy. Archeology, proves that Noah's flood never occurred, that the Isrrealites were never in Egypt, that the Exodus never occurred, that the Jews never conquered Judea, that they were just Canaanites who had always lived there. The Bible is fiction - both the old and new testament, and not any more reliable as history than Harry Potter or Grimm's Fairy Tails.

Firstly Do you want the long answers on these extraordinary and nearly baseless claims or the short answer ? The short answer : ha ha hahshahahahahahahhahhh ehhh...hahahahahhhahhahahha ...ahhhhh ? * * snif*

Second are you serious Mr Cleaver?

; }>

patcleaver

Oh, I see, You must have noticed that I mispelled Tarsus and Israelites other then that I think its all right.

REVROSWELL

It is interesting that when people seek historic and scientific proof of Jesus, they immediately discount the Bible as a reliable source. For example historians routinely cite Herodotus as a key source of information. He wrote from 488 B.C. to 428 B.C. and the earliest copy of his work comes from 900 A.D. (1,300 years later). There are only eight known copies of his work.

By contrast, the New Testament of the Bible (with all its information about Jesus) was written between 40 A.D. and 100 A.D. The earliest known copy is from 130 A.D. and there are 5,000 known copies in Greek, 10,000 in Latin and 9,300 in other languages. It seems the ancients thought the bible was more important because copies were expensive and time consuming endeavors! A book was a treasure like a bar of Gold bullion.So we have 8 (eight) copies of Herodotus work possibility the most important credible writer of the ancient world. Then we have about twenty four thousand copies of the bible of ancient times! Call me Mr obvious, I am suggesting that if we look at the Bible simply as a historic document, it is among the most reliable on record compared with others.

A couple of important non biblical writers documented the ministry and life of Jesus. Flavius Josephus and to Roman historian Carius Cornelius Tacitus both well known and accepted in academic and scholarly circles. Josephus, in the book Jewish Antiquities" wrote:

"At that time lived Jesus, a wise man, if he may be called a man; for he performed many wonderful works. He was a teacher of such men as received the truth with pleasure. . . .And when Pilate, at the instigation of the chief men among us, had condemned him to the cross, they who before had conceived an affection for him did not cease to adhere to him. For on the third day he appeared to them alive again, the divine prophets having foretold these and many other wonderful things concerning him. And the sect of the Christians, so called from him, subsists at this time" (Antiquities, Book 18, Chapter 3, Section 1).

Tacitus, in writing about accusations that Nero burned the city of Rome and blamed it on Christians, said the following:

". . .Nero procured others to be accused, and inflicted exquisite punishment upon those people, who were in abhorrence for their crimes, and were commonly known by the name of ChristiansThey had their denomination from Christus (Christ, dm.), who in the reign of Tibertius was put to death as a criminal by the procurator Pontius Pilate. . . . .At first they were only apprehended who confessed themselves of that sect; afterwards a vast multitude discovered by them, all of which were condemned, not so much for the crime of burning the city, as for their enmity to mankind. . . ." (Tacitus, Annals, 15, 44).

If anyone wants to be so naive as to discount the existence of Jesus, I feel that most intellectual conversation would be lost on them even is the discussion is of something as simple as 2+2+=4.

; {>

REVROSWELL

Hmmm' There may be a reason no one contradicted emperor Flavius Claudius Julianus, its called the lion pit. Anyway, lets examine a couple of Pat Cleavers favorite ancient authors shall we?

First Flavius Claudius, emperor, often called Julian the Apostate born A.D. 331. An Apostate is somebody who renounces belief: somebody who has renounced a religious or political belief or allegiance. I think its rather comical that an atheist (I assume Mr Cleaver is an atheist, if not please correct me) like Pat Cleaver would suggest a man who recommend a Christian hating NeoPlato sun God worshiping emperor that (1) practiced ritual magic would have any credibility with this audience (or any unbiased audience).

This favorite of Mr Cleavers had a vested interest to lie about Christianity (see the entire article 1.). BTW he failed in his quest to erase the up and coming Christian movement and install his magic sun worshiping paganism as Romes official religion.

So what this comes down to Mr Cleaver is that you embrace and recommend a author who's motives are highly suspect, who's belief system is all about magic and deity worship! Worse he is a politician! (heh) ! You insist on a whacked out Sun worshiping magic practicing pagan but reject the most credible of other sources? How wonderful and telling! Just being a politician would slam him out of the credible realm in my opinion.

I find your rants against Christianity less than credible, to say the least.

(1)..http://www.chasclifton.com/reviews/julian.html

; {>

diana

Split from here.

d

Roger Pearse

I think that we would all like to see just where Julian says this. This all sounds like MountainMan's invention. Is it possible that he has found someone gullible enough at last? Really? Truly?

I'd also like to see where Julian is called 'pope' in ancient literature.

The manuscript which contains a Coptic translation of a Greek text under the title of the 'gospel of Judas' is dated by carbon dating to ca. 280 AD. The idea that the date of this particular *copy* makes the *text* it contains older than a good many other early Christian texts hardly needs discussion.

Lots of assertions in there! I wonder if you have ever read any of these people. Are you asserting that nothing that anyone ever disputes can possibly be true? If not, what is the point of these remarks?

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Withered

Dear Mr. Obvious,
All other issues aside, this is of course not logical.
The number of copies made of a text will in no way provide that text with any credibility. Even if the bible had been copied a billion times in the first century, that would in no way mean that it is a reliable source for anything.

A documents reliability in matters of history has to be based on what can be supported with evidence and fact, not how many people copied it.

Granted the number of copies can be used to show that there was considerable interest in the subject matter at the the time. Or perhaps that those that were marketing the book were pretty good at what they did.

Prolific does not equal correct.

L.

Roger Pearse

Some points of detail; but Rev, much of this is endlessly repeated in this forum and you may well get some very rough responses.

When they do so, the 'reasons' seem to come later.

This is true, but I fear that there is a little confusion here about what may be inferred from this, as I will discuss below.

Ah, a bit too fast here, my friend! Firstly we're discussed numbers of *surviving* copies here, aren't we? -- not those actually made, which is of course hard to calculate.

We can't determine from these numbers what the ancients thought valuable, but rather what people between the end of antiquity and the beginning of modern times thought valuable or found useful.

For Greek texts this means mainly Christian Greece, and inevitably the copyists mainly copied bibles; then works of the Greek fathers; lectionaries, etc; and then school texts such as Homer or the repertoire of plays.

The pagans did not consider the bible valuable, of course.

I hate to say this, but there is confusion here between the reliability of the text -- i.e. do we have the actual words; and reliability of what the text says -- i.e. does the text say something which is true.

Certainly the bible is the best preserved text of antiquity, for the reasons given above. Whether its testimony is true must be decided on other grounds.

'Carius'? Some mistake, surely?

Tacitus does refer in passing to Jesus in the context of his mention of the Christians being persecuted by Nero. Josephus does refer to Christ in two places, one rather dubious.

Unfortunately this passage has often been considered a later interpolation. While this view is not the consensus today among scholars, it is still widely held, and everyone can see that the passage 'feels wrong'. (Unfortunately there is no consensus in what respect it is 'wrong'). The other passage refers briefly.

This has been discussed in this forum ad infinitum.

All the best,

Roger Pearse