Johnny Skeptic

But this forum is not about what happened. It is about what probably happened. In other words, this forum if not about proof, but about probability. You cannot produce 100% proof that Hillary Clinton is a human and not an alien, but most people believe that she is probably a human. There is not 100% proof that Jesus did or did not perform miracles, but it is probable that he did not perform miracles. In addition, it is a virtual certainty that the Bible contains errors. Do you by chance believe that a global flood occured?

show_no_mercy

And here is the equivocation between faith and induction.

Let's say that someone points a gun at your head and shows you two revolvers on a table. He tells you to pick one and point it at your temple and pull the trigger. The revolver on the left only has one bullet out of six in it, the revolver on the right has five bullets out of six in it.

Which one would you logically choose if you want to maximize your chances of survival when you pull the trigger? According to this "everything is faith so everything is equal" apologetic you would claim that it doesn't matter which revolver you choose.

This is obviously nonsense; rational people would not conclude that there's an equal probability of death between the two revolvers since it's a "leap of faith" either way.

Kapyong

Gday,

The NT of Eusebius and Constantine was DIFFERENT to ours.

They promoted A NT, not THE NT.


K.

mountainman

G'Day K,

Have a closer look --- the differences are not great -- in fact rather MINOR. At the end of the day the differences resolve to only a handful of books, and the number of common books are in excess of 20. More specifically, with respect to the issues that this OP thread introduces, all the "EYEWITNESS ACCOUNTS" contained in the Gospels and Acts, and the letter collections of "Dear Paul" etc were the same books contained in the Constantine edition, which were presented according to the EDITORSHIP of Eusebius.

Eusebius, in whom we trust -- Bless his Little Cotton Sox -- asserts in book after book after book in his wonderful and glorious history which goes back 300 years to the events of the 1st century, that the authors of the gospels were the eyewitness apostles, an assertion which today is regarded as spurious. Eusebius, IMO, was well paid to lie through his teeth.

archaeologist

For my first post I will start with this topic and go through the responses and answer as many people as possible. This may take several posts so bear with me.

Yes the disciples were eyewitnesses to many of the events that took place but even if they weren't at 100% of th events, the Holy Spirit was and helped them. After all the books are not written by men but by God.

Yet Luke said he 'understood everything perfectly' (LK. 1:3) plus he and Mark, as well as Paul were obviously of anage that they understood who Christ was and what he was doing even though they may or may not have followed Him from the beginning.

This is only true for traumatic events, not those where people are relaxed and are not afraid etc. keep in mind that the Holy Spirit factor in all of this.

Proof for all that please. The Gospel writers were eye-witnesses and had help.

archaeologist

Part 2

#1 You would have to prove those contentions,please. You forget that the Holy land was hellenized long before Christ was born.

#2 Even if they were uneducated that doesn't stop them from having scirbes to help them or learning the language and it doesn't discount the help of the Holy Spirit.

No they weren't. You would need to provide proof and none exists and 'Q' does not and never existed. it is a fabrication from the over-active imaginations of people like Robinson, Kloppenborg & Hoffman.

The Gospels do not have to mention this. It would be redundant and if they did then you would charge the Biblical authors with copying each other.

The authors of the Biblical books do not have to identify themselves. They are not the focus of the Bible and even if they did you would demand evidence that they were actually real people. They were but you cannot even prove your identity to the satisfaction of many others and you are still alive.

provide evidence for that charge please.

Doesn't have to be, that isn't the purpose of the book. This claim and the many like them are mere distractions so you miss out on what is being said to you by God.

Obviously it wasn't a verbal culture as books were written by many at that time. Unfortunately for people like you, books do not survive thousands of years so we make do. Whixh is why faith is so important when it comes to the Bible.

archaeologist

Part 3

The books do tell us the authors but you just do not accept the information and want what cannot be supplied.

Not all, Paul started his writing ministry in the 40's and the gospels in the 50's but that charge actually means nothing because it doesn't change the fact that the disciples were eye-witnesses long before Paul was on the scene. if all the gospels were exactly the same thenyou would be charging that there was only 1 writer and the rest either copied or stole the information. The Bible can't win with people like you.

yet Arrian and Plutarch, the earliest biographies, wrote 400 years after Alexander's death in 323 BC (Blomberg) and you cannot prove they actually existed and 'trying to establish' their identity means nothing, they could have been forgeries.

This 'trying to establish identities' is nother weak attempt to avoid believingin the Bible.

This is simply not true.

No more so than trying to have a rational discussion with those who think Shakespeare was an actual person (since we have no proof he was)

The same is true for Jesus, you just do not want to accept that fact.

You forget that God promised to preserve His words not the words of others. Also you forget that time takes its toll on records, we do not know how much was or wasn't recorded. Also there is the Ipuwer Papyrus which helps for the 10 plagues.

Whos ays there weren't in ancient times? But then you need to remember the Holy Land operates froma Middle Eastern mind not a north American one--there is a big difference. Yes we do.

No, that would only be one part of Christianity there is a lot more to the belief than just telling others. There is growin g wise, gaining knowledge, teaching, healing, feeding, helping and so much more.

archaeologist

Part 4

What the opponents of the Gospels in this thread forget is that there were more enemies than friends of Christ and the disciples alive at the time. If what the gospels and other books of the Bible record was false, then those people would have put a stop to it and christianity would not have made it out of the 1st century.

You need to ask yourselves, where are the opposing accounts refuting the disciples and Christ? They do not show up till the middle or late 2nd century and onward, long after all the eye-witnesses were dead, both friend and foe.

Think about it.

LouisSA

Magic!

Magic!

Magic!

Magic!

Rooster

archaeologist,

I'd be interested in hearing about any archaeological evidence of 600,000 men (and accompanying women, children and livestock) roaming/living in the Sinai desert for 40 years. Could you start a new thread in the appropriate forum presenting any archaological evidence you feel supports this being a real historical event, and not a story?

Thanks in advance.