Reason

Since DLH posted elsewhere that he follows (at least to a degree) the Russellite teachings, I suspect he does not believe in a literal burning hell. (I think that's in the Russellite bullshit doctrine, but I might be mistaken.)

Deus Ex

I think they believe in final death for the wicked. Annihilation not torment.

Grimace

Greetings everyone, this is my first post on the IIDB forums! *great fanfare*

And just so you know where I'm coming from, I would call myself an atheist, but only in the sense that I am not a theist, much like someone who is amoral is just someone without morals, but not necessarily immoral. I don't necessarily believe that a god (or many gods) don't exist, but I have yet to see any proof of them to convince me of the fact.

In any case, I wanted to weigh in here with a few thoughts. I'm no bible scholar, but I am a student of people.

-- The whole issue with how Judas died. In my humble opinion, the fact that the two gospels tell different stories is not them telling two parts of the same story. I would think that a person, writing about the life of someone who they believe is the Messiah, would not omit critical details about the death of the person who betrayed him. I mean, "Matthew" went into quite a lot of detail surrounding what happened to Judas after his betrayal -- do you really think he would forget to mention that when Judas hung himself the branch broke and he fell off a cliff, onto the potter's field that was bought with his blood money and burst open on it? Is it possible this happened? Sure. But I can think of at least 5 other different ways that both could tie together. Unfortunately I have no proof for any of them, and neither does anyone else. All we have are two (apparently) incomplete stories, and several explanations on how that could have happened. I myself like to apply Occam's Razor, which would mean that they were writing two different stories and just had different endings. Especially when you consider that both "Matthew" and "Luke" wrote their stories based on the same source material long after Jesus died. If they had hard data for what happened, both of their accounts should be very similar, but since they're drastically different, it's most likely that neither one had a source of what happened to Judas (there's nothing in "Mark" anyway) and they both separately fabricated a story to explain what happened.

-- Inconsistencies. I believe that the bible was written by humans, and as such it shows the same features that all products of humans have -- typos, factual errors, anachronisms, translation issues, and things taken out of context. Sure, some of the things that people claim are contradictions are really nothing of the sort, but there are also situations where the only way to explain something as NOT being an inconsistency or contradiction is to concoct an elaborate explanation as to how things happened, such as when and who did the spicing of Jesus' body. You have to assume a lot in order to make the bible passages work together, and since there is NO data outside of the bible about Jesus' life at all, that means we have to be extra careful to take what is there with a grain of salt. And to me, that means not making assumptions about how things "could have been", and sticking to what is written and the context it is written in. If you choose to BELIEVE that things happened a certain way outside of what is written, that's fine, as long as you accept that it is BELIEF, and there is no proof. That's where I have my problems with bible thumpers and even people who aren't inerrantists -- it's when they say "this is how it happened", because if they don't assert that, then the bible turns into a lie. They can't just admit "I really can't prove that this is the way it happened, but this is what I believe, because if I don't, then the bible loses it's meaning."

I guess my conclusion is that to try to explain away inconsistencies in the bible by creating a situation in which it is possible that both (or all) statements complement eachother is not proof of anything except your (or someone else's) imagination. We don't have extrabiblical sources that support the gospel accounts, and assuming that it's true just because it's in the bible is a circular argument, so nothing can be proved as TRUE or FALSE. The only thing that can be proved is that if God inspired the bible (which, whether you want to admit it or not, is a product of the Catholic Church), he did a horrible job of giving us consistent, moral advice.

WVIncagold

meh. matters what flavor of xian. most preach fire and brimstone. I do miss Self Mutation though. everyone goes to heaven according to him.

WVIncagold

meh. like i said depends on the flavor of the week of xian. but i did reference guilt by association.

WVIncagold

Welcome to IIDB and have fun. its what it is all about.><

thentian

When did Luke write his gospel, in your opinion? And where was he, at a guess?

thentian

Welcome, Grimace!

That was a very good first post, but I think it is a little harsh to say that the gospel writers fabricated their stories. It is more likely that they had heard different oral versions of them. This is consistent with how there are both similarities and differences between the stories. For example in the case of Judas' death, both stories say the field was purchased with the money from the betrayal, that Judas died in that field, and that the field got its namre from these events. Then they are different about some details, like the manner of Judas' death, who actually purchased the field, and the exact reason for why it got its name. This is consistent with how stories that travel by word-of-mouth change and gets embellished over time. But it would be remarkable if two persons independently fabricated stories so similar (to the degree that they are similar). However, the story may have been fabricated originally by someone we don't know about.

Cheers!

rizdek

A torture stake as a symbol for christendom? Are you kidding? It's not nearly so elegant as the cross. I mean, Jesus with his arms outstretched groaning in agony trying to embrace the world he'd been sent to save. That's poetry. That's romance. That's what people "eat up." That "sells." But Jesus on a stick, forget it. Don't hold your breath for folks to start putting stakes on their tracts, in front of their churches or on their bibles. Well, maybe if someway they can show Jesus' stake, at kind of right angles to one of the theives stake, it could still maybe "look" like a cross.

aa5874

There is no information to support that it is more likely that the unknown writers of the gospels heard stories about Jesus. The writings that are almost certain to be from the 1st century, Philo and Josephus, have no stories about Jesus, except for forgeries in Antiquities of the Jews.


The similarities in the Synoptics appear to be due to copying, word for word, of one source, and the differences appear to be modifications of passages for some unspecified purpose.

There is no indication that the authors of the gospel heard anything about an actual person called Jesus.

I don't know who could have told the authors that Jesus was the offspring of the Holy Ghost or that he took Peter up in a mountain and was transfigured.

And it is not know when the unknown writers wrote about Jesus, and from where they wrote, and what was known in the region from where they wrote.

Based on the fact that writings that are most likely to have derived from the 1st century have no stories about Jesus, then it is more likely that the Jesus stories were FABRICATED from the 2nd century or beyond and initially by unknown writers.