Keith&Co.

So, technically, that's not an Eyewitness Account. "And then Jesus told me what Satan and He did that afternoon...." Followed by the rest of the passage.
Not all that difficult.
Read real memoirs and see how the scrupulous reporter establishes what he knew and how he knew it.
There's a difference between 'what i was eyewitness to' and 'what someone told me happened.' it's important for understanding the credibility of the author.
Even more credibility might be lent if any of the gospels actually identified their authors, you think?
He would have had to, yes, to faithfully record it.
Or, whoever the author was could have made it up.
How would you go about showing that one of those conditions was the historical one?

Horatio Parker

If not hell, where does a pious non-Xtian go? Is there an equivalency between faiths?

Adam

If you would read my blog entry here (the 60% that would fit on one post) you would see that I believe in reincarnation. We go into another life suitable to follow previous lives, probably like karma.
But as with Judaism (particularly Hasidism), that cycle ends when Messiah comes (again, Christians would say). Good people earn a heavenly state (the New Jerusalem?), the wicked start a new cycle of earth-like lives at a level lower than current conditions on Earth. Earth is already a Purgatory, the next cycle would be a worse Purgatory that could be called Hell. (Life on Earth now may be already some people's Hell.)

Adam

Right, I am saying there are seven eyewitnesses who wrote about Jesus, not that everything they wrote was directly witnessed. That's what I mean by the thread title, "Gospel Eyewitnesses" and what I meant in my Post #1 just before I launched into the first of them: "My case is that the upshot of two centuries of Higher Criticism properly is to identify seven eyewitnesses to the four gospels." [who wrote about Jesus]. I was leaving open that (as I believe) there were other eyewitnesses who were consulted but who wrote nothing (mainly women).
Yes, but these are contemporary standards no one would have met in the ancient world, as I could have replied to Joe Wallack's lengthy Post #45. But does "Call me Ishmael" prove that Moby Dick was non-fiction? Lots of fiction starts out first-person like that. One has to evaluate the evidence.
I look at the subjective stance of the source to see who could have written it and whether he casually leaves his name in it or indications thereof.

Horatio Parker

Thanks for the explanation.

What about the second question. Is there equivalency?

Adam

There could be equivalency in one's chances for good judgment after death if particular faiths are better for spiritual/etc. development.
Giving this some fresh thought, I have always thought that a person tends to be reincarnated within families (as Hasids believe) or at least among religions. Likewise with explaining that people rarely convert to a new religion, because they tend to be the same as they were in prior lives. My new thought is that people who make good decisions in one lifetime might be upgraded to a better religion in their next life because they have shown themselves ready to advance. I have always thought this is regards to progressive improvement from brute to animist, animist to polytheist, polytheist to monotheist, so the same would likely apply to advancing from one higher religion to another. Maybe at our level, however, the religion best for one person may not be the best for someone else. I worry, however, that at the highest levels of civilization the best people are subject to influences dragging them downwards. (But this feeling may be just an intrinsic conservatism from my youth that I have not adequately overcome even with my new-found abhorrence of conservatives.)

Adam

I was responding (hopefully not in kind) to Joe knocking me for coming in here with an attitude. I admit I have an agenda, but that's not the same thing as aggressively attacking people instead of arguing against ideas. Yes, I should have used a wink smilie or such so you don't mistake for hostile or intolerant. (Looking at the choices, I couldn't find a wink, I guess I would have to use a grin, even though it does not look look what I wanted.):grin:
Oh, I found it on the "post icons" that run along the bottom.
But now I see it posts up on the top left corner, like my whole post is a joke. And smilies and post icons cannot be edited? Guess the jokes on me.

Adam

I have responded in my #94 to Keith's similar post ("great minds think alike") and hope I can cover remaining issues with this reply. My thesis is that the gospels include seven written reports (sources) from men who were eyewitnesses to Jesus, thus establishing that the writing was done very early and likely to be correct even about what was not directly witnessed. Evaluation of the value of the report will vary depending upon what he saw and what he is likely to have (or not have) good information about. On the other hand, I say that my eyewitness #3 (Post 38) was Nicodemus, who probably records the highest percentage of directly witnessed material, yet it is less reliable because much of it is filtered for a hostile purpose.Courtrooms don't have dead people testify. The most we can obtain is affidavits, and sometimes we have to work with less.People do it all the time. We have to evaluate the evidence. Jesus did not write any surviving texts, so we have to decide whether someone was close enough to Him to give us worthwhile information. The Jesus Seminar people don't believe anything was recorded by eyewitnesses, yet they give pronouncements on what was really said by Jesus or not. (Bad example--I know most people here regard the Jesus Seminar as self-serving.)
Naturally if you don't believe Satan exists you will give a bad report on any account of such a confrontation. Even ardent Christians would mostly spiritualize it.

bleubird

my point is that there is no such thing as the bible.

Keith&Co.

Then what makes you think they witnessed anything?
If the authors could write about anything 'as if they were there' then they could have been written a hundred years after the event. Or the supposed event.
What do you use to make sure that ANY of the contents were actually witnessed? But once you allow that any of it could be less than a scrupulous report on events, how do you decide if any of them were? Yep.
What evidence do you have, though?
Seems to me that yo're taking quite a bit of it at face value.

We know Moby Dick is fiction because we know who wrote it. And when. And for what purpose.
We don't know who wrote the gospels. or when. Or for what purpose. Without those, analysis of contents is difficult to take in a meaningful manner.