Kosh

If this is true, then why do they have to work so hard to convince everyone?

Ebonmuse

My understanding of the matter is that Muslims believe that Jesus was whisked away by God just before being crucified, and in his place was substituted some sort of illusion or duplicate.

I believe this is called "the stunt double theory."

Ebonmuse

These arguments are astonishingly bad. If you accept that the Bible is an accurate depiction of events, there's no need to convince you that Jesus rose from the dead: guess what, you'll already believe it! But if you don't accept that the Bible accounts are historically accurate... well, is quoting the Bible supposed to convince you otherwise? These arguments are completely circular. Whether the Bible is accurate is the very thing that's in question here; logically, you can't just assume it.

This is not true; most major historical events are far better documented than the alleged resurrection. Even in the New Testament, there's only one original source - the Gospel of Mark - which later gospel writers expand on in ways that are not compatible with the original. (The numerous contradictions between the gospel resurrection accounts are, of course, not mentioned by these apologists. I recommend Dan Barker's essay, "Leave No Stone Unturned", at http://www.ffrf.org/lfif/?t=stone.txt). Paul claims Jesus was resurrected but never gives any details such as where or when this event occurred. (I happen to believe that Paul didn't believe in a historical, human Jesus, but that's another issue entirely.) And as for extra-biblical accounts, they don't even begin to appear until the later part of the first century; the most famous one, Josephus' Testimonium Flavianum, is a Christian interpolation. The others, even if genuine, are probably derived from Christian hearsay that was beginning to circulate by that time based on the gospel accounts, so again there is no independent attestation here.

There is nothing flimsy about the claim that these events simply did not happen, and the gospel accounts are later mythology. As for "weak attempts to avoid the facts", I would reply that the Christian authors of this pamphlet are the ones who are tainted by preconception and determined to reach the conclusion they have already settled on for emotional reasons regardless of what the facts say.

FlimFlamMan

a side note about that brochure. Not the Einstein Quote on the inside page. then look on the oposite page there is a statement about many scientist, scholars, ect accept that Jesus died and rose from the dead. This would lead me to think(if I didn't know better) that Einstein is one of those scientist. I emailed the company that is putting out that broshure to ask if they mean to imply that Einstein was a christain. They have not responed to my query yet.

I'm not holding my breath.

Shingen

Ebonmuse: Thanks much for the detailed reply. I see that I have a lot of reading ahead of me.