The Bishop

But Didymus, the assumptions are not "utterly" unfounded, they are founded on what is written in the documents. It's your theory which is "utterly" unfounded, having "utterly" no evidence to back it up whatsoever.

Again, I ask the question - why is it so essential to your theory that the crucified figure at the heart of the messianic hopes be a completely unknown person? And why is that more likely than that he was a known person and the messianic fervour was started by his close personal friends?

Amaleq13

Astounding as it might be, you simply cannot believe everything you see on television.

There is no reliable evidence that the Shroud dates to the first century and the existing evidence from C-14 tests and historical provenance indicate a medieval date is correct.

See these previous threads for further discussion:

Shroud of Turin

Father Brown Fakes the Shroud

Shroud: Solved

Didymus

What?

No evidence of an unjust crucifixion? That's the only event that I'm adducing, and if there's anything that's well attested by the NT, including both the Pauline and the gospel authors, it's the crucifixion. From your post, I can't tell what you think. Are you suggesting that the crucifixion didn't take place? That it took place, not on earth, but in the heavenly spheres? Or...?

Well, if the "real story" was known at the time of the crucifixion, that information did not find its way to the gospel authors.

In fact, there's virtually nothing in the gospels that's factual. It's almost entirely derivative, with only a few factual elements included for versimilutude. Of course, that's true of any work of fiction. If you still think the gospel stories are historical in nature, I strongly suggest reading Michael Turton's Commentary on Mark, http://users2.ev1.net/%7Eturton/GMark/GMark_intro.html.

Because if he was a known person, and if his story was indeed transcribed by the gospel authors, that story would have been rooted in history and fact, not almost entirely in the Old Testament.

The only thing that's missing from VMJ is a historical alternative to the orthodox Christian explanation for the sudden acceptance of Jesus as the Messiah, i.e., a miraculously empty tomb and the post-resurrection appearances. If you are a Christian and you believe those things happened, you've got your explanation. If you are quite certain that those things didn't happen, you have to fill in that blank, i.e., what actually did happen to generate such a response?

Didymus

Jon Barleycorn

I realise that - however, the 14th c date is now disputed - check here http://www.historian.net/shroud.htm

I am not a christian & certainly don't believe that the existance of the shroud "proves" anything - however, evidence does now seem to point to it being of likely 1st century origin.

Amaleq13

It has been disputed by the faithful since it was obtained. Get back to me when someone with less of a religious/emotional investment in the subject than Mr. Kilmon reaches the same conclusion.

Even if the cloth can be shown to date from the 1st century, that does nothing to provide a similar date for the image.

The single shroud is contrary to Gospel descriptions of the burial (e.g. John 19:40) and there is no evidence the image existed prior medieval times (and that is allowing Kilmon's claim that a 12th century drawing depicts the cloth).

In short, there is simply no good reason to waste any amount of time thinking about the thing.

Jon Barleycorn

well.........sorry! So much for open debate then! I still think it's a reasonable theory though - as all i was saying is that IF the shroud does date from the 1st Century (even if a fake from that time - whatever that means exactly) then it MAY have acted as a catalist to lift an otherwise unremarkable crucifixion into one that gave rise to rumour & speculation ... that's all!

Haran

Jon, it is hard to find much good debate here because anyone who supports anything biblical has a "religious/emotional" agenda. Most nontheists here seem to see everything Christian as a fake, forgery, interpolation, exaggeration, or what-have-you. It is funny how irrational that kind of thinking really is, but it is non-the-less found quite often here. You will find a thread claiming such things about almost everything Christian in this forum if you look hard enough. Can't be too honest around here and allow Christians any historical breathing room.

Amaleq13

Did I tell you not to attempt to address my points?

Really? Even though the Shroud lacks any mention prior to medieval times and does not match the description given in the Gospels?

If the Shroud corresponded to the Gospel stories and if there were reliable references to it prior to medieval times, I would agree that your theory is a reasonable possibility.

I suggest you ignore Haran's projections of irrationality onto those with whom he disagrees. It is the Faithful who have put aside rational thought to embrace unsubstantiated claims that seem to support their beliefs here. I know it seems odd that they would feel the need to do this given that they have such great "faith" but there you go.

Only the gullible faithful are willing to suspend rational thought enough to accept such a thing as possible. Magic pictures of ghosts simply do not exist so the image can only be the result of human effort. You are free to join the Faithful in believing in this magical polaroid but don't join him in kidding yourself that such a conclusion has any basis in rational thought.

Mythra

AUB is a mythicist who I find to be highly credible and intelligent. He says this about whether or not there was a historical Jesus underlying the gospel traditions:

There are 2 kinds of cults, those founded on a leader’s personality, and those created from worship of pagan deities, and astrotheology. How does one tell the difference? Well cults of personality develop in a certain way, leaving traces of the initial personality on the earliest material. Mythic cults begin more abstract, and soon branch into multiple interpretations, mystery cults particularly, and those based on sun/son worship. What do we have with xtianity? Multiple cults of great variety from the earliest days, far more than the church admits, and the earliest writing are theological, with no trace of a founder’s personality, (Paul’s epistles). In short there could not have been a historical Jesus, the data flatly contradicts this, no way can a cult of personality leave such traces, the founder’s aspects are never so quickly obliterated, or then (as the un-historical nature of the gospels is beyond question) re-invented as a contradictory composite. The gospels are an attempt at historicising Jesus, as was the fashion at the time. Disproving the validity of the gospels is so easy that I won’t even bother here, the hard part is making the case that there could not have been any such founder, that there is no sliver of truth in the gospels many mythic motifs (as so many cling to), and explaining historicalisation.

From this site.

Haran

LOL. Irrationality...Amaleq...seriously all one has to do is look back through the history of this forum to find exactly what I'm talking about. There is no irrationality to it, just pure logic and reason. To deny that probably every aspect of the Bible or biblical history has been denied in the history of this forum is irrational and wrong.

Everyone is "faithful", it just depends upon whom you have faith. You put your faith in the views of liberal scholars whom you trust (for whatever unknown reasons or motives). You trust their views of history and have taken them up as your own. This faith is often unfounded and irrational, as many of these liberals scholars reject the very texts they are analyzing and simply make up stories of their own to fit their own ideas. That takes as much or more faith and irrationality than Christians, and for some reason it is extremely hard for atheists to realize such because they continuously put themselves high up on pedestals of false intellectualism.

Who bragged about their great faith? I have probably and sadly had the least faith of the Christians I have always been around. It has taken me a long time to realize that there is absolutely nothing that can be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt to me (not history nor philosophy nor many other things), and it has thus taken me a long time to realize the reason for faith.

You are right on one level, there is no need to defend. I, myself, just enjoy debating history.

Yes, sadly only atheists have a corner of the market on rational thought and intellectualism. Not! In fact, they think so highly of themselves and their supposed rationality and intellectualism that they ignorantly and self-righteously fool themselves into believing they are somehow better than people of religion, even though they too have faith in many things yet refuse to acknowledge it as such.