Sheshbazzar

By God! I think you got it!


(Reminded me of "Jacob's ladder", "God" at the top, angels in 'da middile, an us down 'ere at 'de bottom. )

mountainman

Dear Requia,

It is difficult at times to discern what it is that motivates people to believe in the things that they do. Motivation of belief is often a psychological characteristic -- some people are prone to believe in almost anything while others are prone to believe in almost nothing.

As far as I am concerned, we need to learn from history. What does history tell us about the belief in Jesus? Before the fourth century, when christianity was underground, history is very silent. When it became a political entity in the fourth century, we learn that Constantine had to legislate against clever and rich pagans who were taking advantage of the tax-exemptions offered to status of christian bishops. In this case clearly, belief for some, was a commercial advantage.

Best wishes,


Pete

zygot126

Some people just think King Arthur existed and will not let go of it. It is all about what gets written and what gets written well - look at FOX and MSNBC Two entirely different false depicitons of current reality -

spamandham

This is historically naive. There are numerous recorded instances of direct followers of a king/cult leader blowing the memory of that person all out of proportion. A cult follower will typically rationalize their leader's demise rather
that face reality.

Elvis lives.

That said, Jesus could just as easily never have existed. The evidence for him is not compelling. Even today, people who have no way of verifying he existed are willing to die for him, so why not the same in ancient days?

zygot126

Actually I would say the evidence he existed is compelling - I would say that he rosde into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the father is a bit of a stretch

spin

You know, every time I ask someone who says this sort of thing to supply a solid evidential case that is "compelling", they can never supply any substantive evidence whatsoever.

They can't say when their hypothetical sources were written or by whom. They can't show one historical datum that can make Jesus, the Jesus behind the gospel figure, enter history. They crap on about the existence of Jesus being the best fit (and haven't considered any other functional hypothesis), about how every movement has a leader (not willing to accept that the leader might not be the figure they want), about how several pagan sources know of Jesus (taken the pagan sources of the 2nd century as unquestionedly veracious)... We've heard it all before.

I'd say it may seem compelling until you start to examine the case or rather the lack thereof.


spin

spin

That didn't take long.

(But it needs contextualizing, for the significance to have effect.)


spin

spin

Not making any judgment here, if you remember the German form "Kaiser" (which is closer than the Russian "czar"), you'll get the letter order right, as "Caesar" is counter-intuitive. A town in Turkey called Caesarea (after Caesar) in ancient times is now called Kayseri.




spin

zygot126

Surely you agree that billions of people believing is substantial - that is one of the cruxes of peoples' religion - if it isnt true how come so many people believe ? It becomes a self fulfilling prophecy

unfortunately the fact that billions of people believe in jesus is just about the only thing that makes it a compelling story - Most people do not know that king arthur never existed -

for the longest time people in the US thought Russia was a geographically smaller country - we are ruled by the social and religious politic - informations is controlled so well that at times the controllers do not know they are even doing it. We are lambs -

spin[/QUOTE]

fatpie42

Okay, "makes it a compelling story" I can agree with. However, you weren't arguing for a compelling story, you were arguing that there was compelling evidence. Argument ad populum is not compelling evidence by any stretch of the imagination.