GakuseiDon

The problem here is though that certainly supernatural events are reported to have occurred. The OP is about how to assess supernatural claims in religious texts. If you reject that supernatural claims are impossible, then does that mean that you reject the claim that Vespasian apparently healed someone? E.g. the claim itself is false? To be clear: I'm differentiating the claims with the events actually occuring. Do you think that Christians believed that the tomb was empty?

figuer

It is easy to explain it as fictional myth.

Johnny Skeptic

The topic of this thread is "How should we assess supernatural claims in all religous books?" What I meant was "Is there sufficient evidence that any tangible supernatural events in religious books have ever occured?" You have shifted the argument to what some people believed. What I am mainly interested in is what probably happened, not what people believed probably happened. Over one billion Muslims believe that Allah has done many supernatural things. Does their belief make it so, or probably so? Obviously not. History has adequately shown that much of what many people believed probably did not happen.

Since I am an agnostic, I do not preclude a reasonable possibility that some beings exist who are able to do tangible things that humans cannot do. If they do exist, it is apparent that they do not want to show people that they are able to do tangible things that humans cannot do. If they did, they would show up and do tangible things that humans cannot do.

Regarding "Do you think that Christians believed that the tomb was empty?," if Jesus existed, and was buried in a tomb, I am not aware of any credible evidence that he was buried in a specific tomb. Are you? When you say "THE tomb," that refers to a specific tomb. You can't believe that a tomb is empty unless you have a specific tomb in mind. If Jesus' body was put in Joseph of Arimathea's tomb, who saw it put there?

Johnny Skeptic

That is debatable, but there is not really any need to explain claims of resurrection by suggestion since on their own, even if resurrections have occurred, that is not nearly sufficient grounds to worship any being. If Elvis Presley rose from the dead, you certainly would not worship him. If Jesus rose from the dead, that proves only one thing, that he rose from the dead.

In my opinion, resurrection is a very minor issue because it has only to do with POWER, not with CHARACTER. Logically, CHARACTER is the primary issue regarding accepting or rejecting any being. What evidence do you have that God has good character? If you wish to discuss this issue, please start a new thread at the General Religious Discussions Forum.

Will you agree with me that what Jesus said is just as important, or almost as important as what he did? If so, do you believe that there is sufficient evidence that Jesus said most or all of what the New Testament says that he said? If you wish, you can start a new thread on this issue. Even if Jesus had supernatural powers, if it cannot reasonably be established what he said, all that we would have would be evidence that a powerful being exists who can do things that humans cannot do.

GakuseiDon

I'm not quite clear what you are asking, then. Your example in the OP was Jesus performing miracles. Which one of those was a "tangible" supernatural event, and what would constitute "sufficient evidence" for that event today, in your opinion?

Johnny Skeptic

Obviously, the stories about the loaves and the fishes were claims of tangible supernatural events. You do consider bread and fish to be tangible, don't you? You do reject the stories, don't you?

It is my position that if beings exist who are able to do things that humans cannot do, they either 1) want people to believe that they exist, 2) do not want people to believe that they exist, or 3) do not care one way or the other if people believe that they exist. Which of the three choices do you endorse? I believe that the best choices are #2, or #3. In my opinion, choice #1 does not make any sense because if God exists, and wants people to believe that he exists, he could easily convince more people to believe that he exists. Surely spiritual/emotional evidence would be much more effective if it was combined with tangible, empirical, firsthand evidence. Fundamentalist Christians agree with that assessment, right?

As a very liberal Christian, the only evidence that you have is a spiritual being with no specific identity who you assume promotes "love your neighbor" exclusively by means of spiritual/emotional evidence, a being who promotes "love your neighbor," but never specifically states what "love your neighbor" means regarding issues such as physician assisted suicide, homosexuality, same-sex marriage, abortion, divorce, and the war in Iraq. You typically find fault with arguments that skeptics make, while seldom taking issue with fundamentalist Christians, all the while refusing to back up any of your beliefs with credible evidence. In short, you criticize the approach that skeptics use without offering a better approach.

Would you prefer that all skeptics remain skeptics, or become fundamentalist Christians? Which group do you believe is generally more harmful to American society, skeptics or fundamentalist Christians?

GakuseiDon

OK, good. So what would constitute "sufficient evidence" for that event? When you ask for sufficient evidence for the miracle about the loaves and fishes, what would that be, IYO?

Well, no, I don't. I usually argue against MJers and people like yourself. I generally don't argue against skeptics as, more often than not, I agree with them.

Johnny Skeptic

Sufficient evidence for me that beings exist who are able to do things that humans are not able to do, such as multiplying loaves of bread and fishes, and walking on water, would be for them to show and demonstrate that they can do that. Now that was easy, wasn't it? If beings exist who are able to do that, it is obvious that they do not want people to know that they can do that or they would show up and do that.

Less convincing evidence that some beings exist who can do things that humans cannot do, but still pretty good evidence, would be widespread demonstrations all over the world, in a number of centuries, in front of millions of people, of the ability to instantly convert energy into matter.

Now then, what would be sufficient evidence for you? Why have you rejected Bibical claims of tangible supernatural events? Why aren't you a fundamentalist Christian? You typically ask lots of questions, but you seldom give any definitive answers. I take that back. When you debate Earl Doherty, you often give definitive answers, but not when you debate me.

What exactly are you trying to convince me to change regarding my agnostic beliefs? What would satisfy you? If a God exists, I want him to provide more information than he has provided, and I believe that a loving God would provide more information than he has provided, and help humans more than he has helped them. What is wrong with that approach?

By the way, do you intend to participate in Earl's new thread on "Kata sarka"? Earl appears to be pretty well-prepared this time.

GakuseiDon

Yep. Easy and informative. So, to answer the OP, for you "How should we assess supernatural claims in all religious books?", the answer is that the we are unable to do so until the supernatural being showed up and demonstrated that they can do it. Thus, you saying that it is impossible to assess supernatural claims otherwise, right? So, for you personally, it is impossible to assess supernatural claims without the beings showing up?

If so, then I have to ask: How do you assess non-supernatural claims in religious texts?

Really? It looks like his usual adhoc responses, at least to me. Doherty is making his usual appeal to the biases of his supporters. "Failure of imagination", and all that. What examples has he used from the literature that has convinced you that he is pretty well-prepared?

GakuseiDon

Unless you define your terms, then how can I answer? What is "sufficient evidence" that Jesus did the loaves and fish miracle? It is a simple question.

I'm not interested in embarrassing you, as such. I'd simply like you to stick to the topic. In my opinion, you don't post "in good faith". What I mean is, you don't really care what the topic is, you are just interested in turning these threads to your own monomania, which is verifiable evidence for God and God's character. Now, there is nothing wrong in raising these questions, but that you try to turn other people's threads to this is simply rude. I suggest that in most of the threads you create, you aren't interested in the answers -- you just want to turn them to "verifiable evidence" questions. Thus, I don't think you are posting in good faith.

Sure, criticize God's character all you like. But from your OP, should that be a topic of THIS thread? As I said, I think you raise all these threads in order to bring up your own monomania. You aren't really interested in discussing the topics that you raise. Otherwise you would be discussing "how we should assess supernatural claims" (which is, after all, the topic that you raised in the OP), rather than what non-human beings should be doing. You just simply aren't posting in good faith. And that irritates me.