mountainman

Mark's corrupt. How many more centuries did it take "Mark" to add the final verses at the ending of Mark 16:9–20? The last twelve verses, 16:9–20, are not present in two 4th-century manuscripts Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, the earliest complete manuscripts of Mark. It seems using reasonable dating methods, the "complete and edited version of Mark" may not have been available for the scribes who copied these manuscripts in the later 4th century. That's not four decades, but almost four centuries after, the supposed geostationary ascension event at Jerusalem.

J-D

I am curious to know what makes you confident of that conclusion. I see no sure basis for deciding the question one way or the other.

jakejonesiv

More like the multiple fabrication.

jakejonesiv

Exactly!!

It is a sad spectacle to watch Historists shrink Jesus to any degree necessary in order to not give up the idea entirely. If Jesus started out as a Rottweiler, what are we down to now? One of those pathetic little dogs that shake and tremble if their owners set them down? Yeah, historical Jesus, we ought to call him Peanut.

jakejonesiv

Based on the prevalence of your arguments to cling to a historical Jesus no matter what the cost, I doubt that you are slightly inclined to think he existed. You only play the neutrality card when you get in a tight spot. (You can prove me wrong by giving the top three reasons you think Jesus did not exist. If you have done so already, a link to that post will suffice).
So, I have heard of the God of the Gaps theory, but you are believing in a Jesus of the Gaps.

tanya

Thank you Andrew. I am not sure that much of what we discuss on this forum is ever "clear".

Since humans, once dead, for more than five minutes at room temperature, do not recover brain function, even if subsequently transferred to an external source of circulatory capability, clearly, human resurrection is a myth.

Therefore, whether a component of the earliest Christian tradition, or not, this aspect of the religion, the supposed "resurrection", is conflicted, because humans die, while dieties, possessing supernatural powers, have no need of mere human attributes, such as feeling pain, or breathing.

I am such a dogmatic person, Archibald, mea culpa, however, I have already acknowledged, and will now reiterate, that some data found in the gospels and Paul's letters are certainly accurate, correct, valid, logical, historical FACTS.

The Thin Red Line is a novel about the war between USA and Japan in the 1940's. The location is Guadalcanal, an island in the South Pacific--a real place, where real battles took place between soldiers of the two countries. The names of the characters in the novel are inventions. Some of these fictional characters' actions in the novel (USA soldiers murdering Japanese prisoners of war, then extracting their gold teeth) may well, however, resemble genuine activities witnessed by the author of the novel, during his time as a soldier fighting the Japanese on Guadalcanal.

The fact that some legitimate, truthful, honest, accurate information is contained within a framework of fiction, does not change the essential nature of the artistic composition. The Thin Red Line is not a biography. The Thin Red Line is also not history. It is not reality, it is fiction. Like all good fiction, however, it contains nuggets of reality, and truth.

The fact that we can observe, isolate, and extract from the Thin Red Line, several anecdotes understood to be genuine, not fiction, does not change the essential character of the novel. It is not history. It is simply a good story, a yarn, a fable, fiction.

Yes, Archibald, there are many, many MJ indicators in the Gospels, starting with Mark 1:1.

I am not aware of any evidence, outside the Christian religious texts, favoring the supposition that HJ is a viable option, any more than the evidence that Sargeant Welsh, or Privates Doll, Witt, Bell, or Colonel Tall existed. Those characters are all fictional soldiers, from the Thin Red Line.

But is that the question?
No, J-D, no, that was not the question. The question was, how can we differentiate HJ from MJ. I gave an illustration of the rationale for pointing to MJ, since real people, HJ, cannot perform superhuman feats.

Proving that every single one of the statements in the gospels/epistles is false, is not the task at hand.

I don't know how many inaccurate statements are found in the Bible. It is not important to weigh the quantity of accurate or inaccurate statements. I have repeatedly acknowledged that there may be MANY accurate statements within the texts of the New Testament. There could be an UNCOUNTABLY LARGE quantity of accurate points made in this compendium of tall tales. It is of no consequence in terms of identifying the essential character of this work of fiction, because, in real life, not fiction, humans do not come back to life, once dead. In real life, humans cannot walk on water. In real life, zygotes require male sperm, not ghost sperm, as aa5874 has reminded us, on several occasions. In real life, five loaves of bread do not feed a thousand people. In real life, humans committing blasphemy in ancient Jewish culture, were stoned to death, not anointed, as Sheshbazzar has explained to us.

Therefore, the "holy bible" is a work of fiction, not factual history.

That may be why the novel is referred to by Chinese book sellers as Sān Guó Yǎn Yì, rather than the "History" of the Three Kingdoms. You are the expert on Chinese civilization and language, please teach us the difference between Yǎn Yì and "history".....

My point has apparently not registered, or perhaps it is simply in dispute.

I don't know whether or not JtB was real or fictional. I don't know if he baptised folks in the Jordan river, or not. I don't know what the significance of Baptism was, in ancient Jewish rituals. There is an encyclopedia filled with things that I do not know.

My ignorance is appalling. It overwhelms me. I am very unhappy to be both so stupid and so completely uneducated. Nevertheless, despite being dumb as Haley's comet, I do imagine, or believe, or suppose, that I can understand one thing:

The gospels/epistles are myth. It does not matter how many ACCURATE observations are contained therein. It could be that EVERY OTHER SENTENCE IS CORRECT, save for those relatively few, which have been illustrated here, commencing with Mark 1:1.

The corpus as a whole, is corrupt. It is dishonest rubbish. It is nonsense. It is FALSE, because people do not come back to life, following death. That fundamental character of the "holy bible" is not altered, by the presence, (even if accurate, honest, and truthful,) of anecdotes about John the Baptiser, or any other character from the novel.

Yes, your question remains open, because you are not addressing the same question, as has been posed on this thread.

You are asking whether or not proof exists to repudiate every claim made in the gospels/epistles. No such endeavor is underway. This thread does not assert that it has proof that MJ is correct and HJ false, based upon having proof that each and every statement made in the gospels/epistles is false.

On the contrary, for the nth time, there may well be LOTS of genuine, accurate, factual data contained in the gospels/epistles. Much, Much of this writing could be correct, but, the collection, as a whole, is a pure myth, because humans do not possess supernatural capabilities.

There is no need to do so. One can immediately discern the mythical nature of the jesus character, upon opening the first page of text, Mark 1:1.

Even in that circumstance, where every remaining word in the Gospels/Epistles were correct, accurate, and truthful, that one verse, alone, suffices to label the "holy bible", and the Christian faith, as both myth and fraud.

MJ does not mean "not all things said about Jesus were true"
MJ means, the character called "Jesus" had the same modest quantity of human DNA as the amount of human DNA found in Haley's comet.

Yes, the operative word here, is "seem".

Tacitus, whose extant work has certainly retained, during the past 1900 years, its original, pristine, pure, and unadulterated form, was writing only five decades after the fact, about something, supposed to have been related by someone, about an event that is supposed to have taken place only about two decades earlier than the date when that someone's description of the anecdote, occurred.

Good work, Archibald. Clever. Well done. Yes, indeed, the actual evidence, does seem to have a pattern to it.

That evidence includes the writing of Philo of Alexandria, a Jew of distinction, whose concerns about fraudulent conduct vis a vis the demand for Jews to worship the Roman emperor as a deity, led him to write a letter, "Embassy to Gaius" to the emperor, explaining why Jews could not worship humans. This, Archibald, is evidence, proclaiming in a very loud voice, that there was no such person, as Jesus has been portrayed in the gospels.

Archibald, rather than repeating the same dreary nonsense about Tacitus, you would benefit, I believe, from reading what Philo wrote about Apion.

Who?

Apion?

Yeah, exactly. Who's he?

Philo could write about obscure people, if those obscure persons related, in a significant fashion, to the practice of Judaism, in his era.

In his era, Archibald, not fifty years later, or twenty years earlier, in his era... Philo was eyewitness to strife between Roman occupiers and Jews. It is a stretch of the imagination to suppose that this guy, Philo, would have ignored a story about the purported, long awaited Jewish messiah, operating in the holiest of holy cities (in the minds of Jews), Jerusalem, (towards which Jews faced, in offering prayer) but then devoted pages to a description of Apion, an ordinary citizen of Alexandria.

Kapyong, thank you for an excellent rejoinder, repudiating my contention. Outstanding post.

We need such discussion, on this forum, well done. I enjoyed reading it...

I am not writing to contradict, Earl, you, J-D, or even Archibald.

I am simply expressing my own personal belief:

HJ = actual DNA (get one of those foreskins, and test it!!!)
MJ = no DNA, with or without foreskins, hair, or any other body parts.

jakejonesiv

Hey Mary,

Thanks for reproducing Spin's great chart!

Jake

jakejonesiv

OMG! Here is the Jesus of the Gaps theory again. Well, it doesn't work for God and it doesn't work for jesus.

mountainman

Didn't Bilbo Baggins meet Gandalf in the flesh on a hilltop far far away in Lothrolien? It alludes to such a meeting, just after Gandalf the Grey was resurrected to become Gandalf the White. But I am curious to know what makes people confident of such a conclusion. I personally, having reflected on the matter for several seconds, see no sure basis for deciding the question one way or the other.

As I have already said several times, some of the statements in the canonical books of Tolkien, such as "The Hobbit" and "Lord of the Rings" using the name Bilbo Baggins cannot possibly be literally accurate reports of events that actually took place. I do not see how that is an adequate basis for concluding that none of the statements in "The Hobbit" and "Lord of the Rings" using the name Bilbo Baggins are literally accurate reports of events that actually took place, because the presence in a document of some false statements does not automatically prove that all the statements in the document are false, so to me the question remains open.

mountainman

It should be a sticky.