Patriot7

I see. Interesting. And you know where Christ's body is then?

Fortuna

Hi guys.

I've been reading through this thread, and I actually think (well, err, hope) that Patriot7 simply misunderstood or did not read carefully Diogenes statement, or perhaps does not understand the difference between a first-hand(or eyewitness) account and a second-hand account

Perhaps an example from elsewhere will help him to understand.

Let us assume for a moment that we are talking about the Seige of Alesia in 64BCE, which was done under the command of Julius Caesar. Julius Caesar wrote the "Gallic Wars". We know both from history and JC's book that he was in fact present at the seige of Alesia and wrote about it.

Therefore, JC's Gallic wars can properly be called an eyewitness account or a first-hand account. The person who wrote the book was present when the siege of Alesia occurred and wrote about it.

Roman historian Suetonius also writes about Julius Caesar and the siege of Alesia, and it is fairly certain that Suetonius uses JC's Gallic Wars as a source.

We could not properly refer to Suetonius as an eyewitness account, It is at best a second-hand account, meaning that Suetonius uses a first-hand or eyewitness acount. The eyewitness account is the first-hand account, while Suetonius's account is "second-hand".

We have the same situation with Luke. Luke's account is second-hand. Luke was not an eyewitness, but he might be using first-hand accounts.

I know that it seems overly simplistic to have to explain this, but I have had to explain this to Christians myself (sometimes the same Christian) many many times.

I've also had to explain many times that the NT gospels are works of literature written by skilled Greco-Roman writers who were educated and experienced in the literary art of the time. This not at all what we would expect from native Jewish Galilleans.

Let's see this from the typical Christian's perspective. They have probably been told, or it has been alluded to all their lives by their ministers, priests, teachers and peers that these gospels were written by Jesus's apostles, and are thus eyewitness accounts.

Given that, how else should we expect them to react when they finally hear the truth ? They initially don't believe it and go into denial. But, as they begin to do the research, they soon discover the truth, as Patriot7 eventually will also.

Sven

I see. You apparently can not explain. Bummer.

Sven

Problem is: You are the only one who talks about this argument. He has never suggested this. Care to stop this strawman anytime soon?

See above.

:banghead: What exactly about "read this text book" and "follow this link" do you not understand?

Maybe that's because no one uses this reasoning here.

I'm not aware of any other way to define a claim as true.

Julian

*cough*

52BCE

*cough*

Patriot7

Man, that is so nice of you to dumb that down for me! You are a true saint! I can't wait to get home, let my wife out of the basement and explain this to her and our 27 children...after she chops wood, makes soap and cleans my whiskey stile of course!

Really?! Amazing!! Please tell me more!! I mean these guys must've been really, really good to spawn a worldwide religion and get thousands of people to die in their lifetime for a work of literary art!

You wouldn't happen to have some other works of that time in mind that we could compare the Gospels to would you? You know other works of Jewish or Roman historians? I mean phrases like this one where John writes...."Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger."....that's pure poetry!! Doesn't sound like he's making a statement of fact there at all.

Diogenes the Cynic

This makes no sense at all. You asked me to defend my claim.
Well then you should be now be satisfied that what I said was true. The mainstream consensus of contemporary scholarship is that nothing in the New Testament was written by an eyewitness of Jesus.
I've implied no such thing.
It's not important to me at all. I haven't made the slightest attempt to imply that my own (quite unimpressive) education imbues me with any authority. There are posters on this board who are a lot more credentialed than I am. I'm actually slightly embarrassed at how modest my academic background is compared to some others. I am very much an amateur and would never pretend otherwise. This whole tack is just a red herring and an evasive maneuver as far as I'm concerned.
I;ve made no claim that it does.
Well now that you've cracked a textbook and clicked a link, you know that my claims correspond to reality, so what's your problem?
:rolling:

First, I'm not investigating "spirtual" matters. I'm discussing historical questions about an ancient text. The Bible has no more "spiritual" significance to me than Homer's Iliad or the Epic of Gilagamesh.

Second, do you actually think this kind of thing is really going to scare anyone around here? We've heard it all before many times, my friend. If you give it a moment's thought, you should be able to figure out that people can't be frightened by something unless they actually believe it exists. When I was in high school, I spent a couple of years in West Africa. On one occasion a tribal native who was alleged to have magical abilities once threatened to turm me into a dog unless I gave him all my money. I laughed out loud at the guy and told him to go ahead, that was something I had to see. The guy walked away. Christian warnings about my soul arouse exactly the same level of fear as that did - none whatsoever.

buckshot23

I'm not saying either. I am saying that number one he didn't have to know about it and number two that not listing it is not an error.
Who knows? Point is there is not a contradiction just because there is more information in one than the other.
Which event specifically? Of course I have never tried to say that any event happened twice so I am confused.
How can you make such bold definite proclaimations about who met who? With that kind of certainty YOU would have to be an eye witness to the writing of the autographs of the gospels. I don't think you are claiming that so I find your certainty curious.
It is your opinion that the authors of the bible are not the ones traditionally attached to each book. You cannot objectively prove a thing.
I disagree. If you don't like the harmonization explanations then that is your choice and that means exactly zero to the rest of us.(or at least it should)

Patriot7

You keep changing your claim. Your statement was that the mainstream consensus from modern scholarship is that nothing in the NT is an eyewitness account, when clearly at a minimum, Luke makes the claim that his account of the events is from eyewitness. Perhaps you mis-typed. I don't care at this point. This is a waste of time. You're a smart guy. You seem extremely happy entrenched in your position.

Can we change gears here? I would love to explore your hypothesis that the gospels are merely Greek literary creations. Can we try a different path? For the rest of the discussion, I'll try and prove your case - that the Gospels are merely Greek literary creations and you take the counterpoint. I think it would be interesting. What do you say?

Diogenes the Cynic

Your posts in this thread contain more strawmen than a scarecrow convention.

IF Jesus existed at all (which is an open question) and IF he was crucified (ditto) then there is still no reason to suppose that anyone close to him would have known what happened to the body. They all scrammed when he was arrested. Crucifixion victims were either left on the cross to rot or buried in shallow, unmarked, communal criminals' graves. The Empty Tomb story was probably invented by Mark. There never was a "missing body," just a body whose final disposal was unknown by the earliest Christians.