gstafleu

Nevertheless, I can almost guarantee that none of the many alleged witnesses would have seen this zombies effect before. To them it would certainly have been unique and worth widely commenting about.

Just compare the alleged events to a real one, the 9/11 attacks. These were not supernatural, and rather well known in both their execution and results. Two buildings collapsed, not a unique event. Planes have crashed into buildings before. Nevertheless, and understandibly, people haven't yet stopped talking about it. I would submit that the zombie event would have had at least as much impact on the observers then as 9/11 did now.

gstafleu

I agree. We cannot just dismiss the supernatural bits just because now we "know better," without therewith affecting the credibility of the gosples as a whole. I have the impression that some think we can simply dismiss these events for reasons of modernity, and then carry on with the rest of the story as if nothing had changed. That is not the case: the supernatural events are part and parcel of the whole story. If you reject them, that affects your judgement of the whole, not just of the inconvenient bits.

gstafleu

Well yes and no. As a counter example I would offer the perpetuum mobile. It has now been shown countless times that all offerings of PM's are dysfunctional. That is enough to now reject any claim to finally having developed a working PM a prima facie. It would be up to the would-be inventor to come up with some very convincing evidence.

The supernatural events are in a similar position. It is, I think, an instance of extraordinary claims needing extraordinary evidence. Claims to the supernatural, when investigated, have always proved to be, well, let's just say not as claimed. That would make it extraordinary if one were all of a sudden true. It is therefore reasonable to dismiss such claims, unless some solid evidence is produced.

jjramsey

I agree. Note, though, that your position is evidence-driven, and still open to falsification, even though you rightfully typically treat the supernatural with a grain of salt. That is still fundamentally different from saying absolutely that supernatural claims must be rejected.

aa5874

The book of Matthew has been shown to be a complete fiction by Thomas Paine in a book called The Examination of Prophecies. The author of Matthew appears to have very little knowledge of the OT or he deliberately misquoted OT verses.

Let me give an example, in Matthew 2:23, 'And he (Jesus) came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be called a NAZARENE.

Now the words NAZARENE or NAZARETH are not in the OT, there is no prophecy for anyone to be a NAZARENE or from NAZARETH in the OT.

The word NAZARITE is in the OT and does not have any link whatsoever to NAZARENE or NAZARETH. In Judges 13:5, 'For, lo, thou shall conceive and bear a son; and no razor shall come upon his head: for the child shall be a NAZARITE unto God from the womb: and he shall deliver Israel out of the hand of the Phillistines'.

So we can clearly see that the author of Matthew is fraudulent or mis-leading to claim that Jesus living in Nazareth fulfills prophecy. In fact all the so-called prophecies mentioned in Matthew are all fraudulent and misleading. Check it out!!

jjramsey

True, which leads to the question--why is Matthew trying to justify Jesus being a Nazarene at all? In his birth narrative, he is making up facts to fit a prophecy. Here, though, it seems the other way round, stretching prophecy to fit what he apparently perceived as a fact. So why does he perceive it as a fact? It isn't biblically correct, obviously, unlike Bethlehem, nor is it flattering to Jesus.

Malachi151

It seems pretty obvious to me that the author of Matthew was none too bright. MOst of Matthew is copied from Mark, and what is different is absurd and shows a major attempt to heavily draw on prior Jewish scriptures without having any real understading of them. He also obviously has no understanding of the geography of Galilee or Judea.

Matthew seems to be to have either been a Greek who was intrigured with Judaism but was self taught or something, or a 3rd or 4th generation diaspora Jew who had lost touch with his roots and was confused about the religion of his ancestors.

aa5874

The author of Matthew appears to have an agenda. This author tried desperately to bring the story of Jesus Christ to reality, by using out of context OT scriptures. And what is alarming and shows the the fiction of Jesus Christ, is that all of Matthew's mis-interpretation of the OT scriptures was fulfilled by Jesus Christ.

A blatant abuse of 'non-prophecy' as prophecy is found in Matthew 21:7, where the author completely mis-reads Zechariah 9:9 and has Jesus Christ riding two asses at the same time.

Matthew in his quest to make Jesus historic actually confirms the opposite. I find it beyond belief that Matthew's mis-interpretations of the OT are carried out ,to the letter, by Jesus Christ.

These mis-judgements by the author of Matthew clearly shows that this author is one of the fabricators of Jesus Christ.

mens_sana

The author believed firmly in a human son of God whom God had raised from the dead. With this conclusion already set, he argued to back-up the conclusion, not to prove it. His "agenda" involved showing that Jesus was a latter-day Moses with all of Moses' legitimacy, yet that he was greater than Moses. This interpretation would appeal mightily to an audience in Antioch and surrounding area, which had a large Jewish "colony" and was the site of the first Christian community outside of Palestine. There is also a tradition that Peter, "missionary to the circumcized," was the first bishop of Antioch.

Rabbi Akiba's approach to biblical interpretation was already around: every little bit of scripture was related/relatable to every other little bit. Context was not a controlling factor. Hence, half a verse here could be joined to half a verse there quite legitimately, resulting in fractured prophecy as far as we are concerned today.

With this perspective, I don't think the author of Matthew was a "fabricator," most certainly not in his own mind. For him, Jesus Christ was always also Jesus of Nazareth. We get the same arguments today. The conclusion is a "given" and all roads, therefore, lead to it.

aa5874

I do not read minds, I look at the evidence before me, I am firmly of the view that Jesus Christ was a story believed to be true. The abundance of inaccuracies in the book of Matthew can only point to fiction. All other books filled with so much outrageous contradictions, inconsistencies and errors would have been discarded to the rubbish bin of history, long, long time ago!!