sotto voce

Violations. Whooo.

outhouse

Augustus witnessed a comet, and proclaimed it was his ressurected father Julias, and claimed himself "son of god" all prior to the gospel legends.

And yes many coins were minted with this star symbol.


This influenced the roman authors of the gospels in two places.

One, the "son of god"

Two, being born under the star sign.




Its not the first time the gospels were competing with the Emporers divinity. Its actually very common all through the bible.

outhouse

Actually it does. And it goes in favor of a HJ.


Romans were competing with a mortal Jewish mans divinity, with the Emporers divinity, who as a mortal man, was first called "son of god" before the jesus character, and also used the star symbol found on these coins combined with star prophecy from the book of Numbers..

Juststeve

Ted:

You ask an interesting question. What documentary evidence would it take to convince me that something I have good reason to believe is impossible really happened. I'm not sure that documents could ever do it. They would have to be such that I would think it was less likely that the documents were false than that a man dead as dead can be came back to life and had supper with his friends.

A lot of years ago Dick Cavett had a guest on his show that claimed to have seen the maharishi mahesh yogi levitate himself and float about a room. He seemed entirely sincere and honest yet I did not believe him. Why? Because almost any possibility, that the man was lying, mistaken, deluded, tricked or insane is more probable than the claim he was making.

That's my view with respect to reports or miracles. It was David Hume's as well.

Steve

sotto voce

So what brings you here, Steve?

Juststeve

sotto voce:

I don't understand your question. What do you mean what am I doing here?

Steve

TedM

This presupposes you know the limits of natural law, which you don't, so you can only SAY they are not possible, but you can't KNOW they are not possible. It baffles me how anyone can think that God himself, if he exists, would be incapable of manipulating nature in any way he pleases. It's just laws and particles that he made in the first place! It would be odd to say that the Creator can't manipulate his own creation, but that's exactly what you are saying.

TedM

I hear you, but what if there was a clear tradition in the Roman and Jewish literature of Jesus the healer, and the claims of resurrection appearances to the people mentioned in the NT, all datable to the 30-40AD period? Does the NUMBER of witness and the CALIBER of those witnesses not at some point override the very low possibility? When does credulousness without personal observation get overridden by evidence?

Atheos

As I said before, this is a red herring. Creating a strawman draft of "what atheism says" and attacking it is neither germane to the subject at hand nor productive. I'll not follow this red herring any further.

Yet this is exactly the reason it is both reasonable and rational to remain skeptical of poorly supported and extravagant claims.


You're misrepresenting me or failed to understand me. What I said was "Historical evidence does not trump the impossible." I never said that "nothing" would be compelling enough. Bring forth the dude who can walk on water, give sight to people who were born blind and float off into the sky and I'll reconsider my skepticism about these extraordinary claims. To my knowledge these things are impossible. Historical evidence, no matter how well signed, documented, sworn to, etc., doesn't trump the absurdity of claims such as these. Dead people aren't likely to have come out of their centuries-old graves and walked around Jerusalem on Passover Friday circa 33 C.E. I don't care how many unvettable witnesses swear they did.

As I said, you're misrepresenting me. For me to believe someone can walk on water and float off into the sky I'm going to have to first see evidence of someone doing it. Then the historical evidence merits re-evaluation. Until then the single most likely explanation for your favorite god-myth is the same as the one for the Mormons. People lie.

Juststeve

Ted:

You speak of NUMBER and CALIBER of witnesses. I'm not sure what you mean. Surely you don't think the Gospel writers themselves were eyewitnesses. They are unknown people of unknown caliber reporting what other people allegedly saw. We have no idea where they got their information, whether it was second hand, third hand or just what people were saying when they got around to writing. It may I suppose have been just made up although that's not my personal view. That is hardly reassuring evidence when you are asking someone to accept as factual a story that is naturally impossible. Were I to credit that why wouldn't I also credit Mohammed's claim that he flew through the sky from Mecca to Jerusalem as he claims? If it happened he was an eyewitness. In the more secular realm stories of Alien Abductions Bigfoot and the Loch Ness monster abound. All supported by living eyewitnesses. Should I credit those stories as well.

Please don't think my doubts are limited to Christianity. I don't believe in the Risen Elvis either, even though a lot of people have claimed to have seen him.

Steve