pharoah

What on earth are you ranting about? Should a Greek scholar accept Zeus as his personal savior before he studies the Illiad? This is seriously inane. :banghead:

Amaleq13

I denied your generalization.

This is only true if you distort the meaning of "faithful" so that it is indistinguishable from "confidence".

This is yet another false generalization. I tend to view skeptically the conclusions of all scholars who appear to have an emotional investment in their conclusion. I admire Christian scholars like Meier and Brown when they display a willingness to allow the evidence guide their conclusions despite a conflict with "tradition".

You haven't the first clue what view I hold or the basis for it. This is simply another generalization straw man. They grow tiresome as replacements for a rational argument.

Who said anybody bragged?

Yes, if "certainty" is what you desire, faith is a necessity.

No, many Christians recognize that this magical picture of the resurrection is probably not real.

All of this "Well, atheists have faith too!!" nonsense is nothing but an example of the Tu Quoque fallacy. Those who reach conclusions on faith cannot defend such a position rationally so they are forced to accuse their opponents of sharing the problem. Utter hogwash but I understand why one might be compelled to such lengths. :wave:

Haran

What is confidence but belief and faith?

Most hardline and militant atheists mistakenly begin by saying something is false when they actually have no idea what they are talking about.

To more appropriately reword you statement, you only agree with the scholars with which you agree. Everyone has an "emotional investment", especially if they are scholars. If you didn't have some sort of "emotional investment" yourself, then you wouldn't be here arguing liberal points of view on biblical scholarship.

I have many clues to what you believe, Amaleq, as I've been around these forums for quite a while and have read many of your posts. You are one of many here who deny nearly anything biblical that pops up. That is why my posts threaten you enough to respond.

LOL! And certainly I have seen you express certainty many times on your liberal views of biblical history. As you can see (though you will deny it as atheists always do), that you also have a certain amount of faith in your own unsupportable views.

If they recognize this then they are not Christians. A Christian, unless they are merely nominal, must of necessity believe in the death and resurrection of Jesus. This is the crux, if you will excuse the pun, of Christianity.

The point is that atheists cannot see that the foundations of their own views are likewise built on faith. You can handwave all you like in an attempt to ignore it, but the fact remains, solid as a rock. And let me put it this way....if your beliefs are so logical, rational, and lacking in faith, then I and everyone else would immediately jump into atheism. The fact remains, that you have no proof that your worldviews and beliefs are any better than those of Christians. If they are, then prove it and convince me of your beliefs. After all, we Christians are constantly challenged to do so. Convince me that atheism is a better belief system (in another thread, perhaps if you like), though I doubt you'd take up the challenge because down deep you know all your beliefs are based on faith in your own experiences of this world.

Gamera

I have to agree with you. The notion that the Shroud can be use to "prove" the gospels goes against the whole concept of faith. As if God needed help to make his case, and fouled up, and now some helpful carbon daters are going to validate Christianity once and for all.

No Christian should care one way or another about the Shroud. But they should be assured of one thing -- you cannot empirically "prove" the gospel and shouldn't try.

John 20:29 - Jesus said to him, "Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe."

Haran

I think you've missed something in your analysis. You are correct in that Christians do not need these things, however, that doesn't meant that they want all true historicity removed from Jesus. One big problem that I see today is the rejection of so much biblical historicity and archaeology on flimsy and even false grounds. It is not so much that they are needed to bolster faith, but they are part of the shared history of the world, and I don't think that they should be rejected out of hatred for Christians and Christianity. Christians and other honest people shouldn't sit by while liberal scholars attempt to destroy every bit of history of the Bible.

Gamera

Well, I disagree with you that liberal scholars are attempting to destroy the history of the bible. But I of course agree with with your position that the historicity of Jesus has a basis in fact. I just don't expect the Shroud to contribute anything to that factual debate. If it's a fake, then it won't help, and if its real, it suggests the bible is utterly confused about the need for faith. Either way, it has no role to play in the historicity of Christ.

Haran

I certainly think there are many liberal scholars who are attempting to destroy Christianity. There have been some who have admitted so. In fact, I remember an anecdote in this very forum a long, long time ago from a student of Robert Eisenmann. The basic gist was that Eisenmann didn't really seem to believe anything could be known about Jesus, so who cares what gets written about him historically. There are other such scholars. You see, there are liberal scholars who hate Christianity and wish to destroy it (especially here in the US where Christianity is hated by the activist political left). There are also liberal scholars who, since they do not believe in Jesus, are willing to accept things that may not be true simply because they cannot accept claims made in the scriptures. There are some moderate scholars who are better, but I feel that even many of them make unnecessary concessions with respect to biblical history.

This seems slightly confused to me. I doubt there is much of anything archaeologically speaking that could be discovered that wouldn't be disputed. That would leave room for doubt and the necessity of faith. There is absolutely no reason to think that things from biblical times should not have survived until today and no reason to think that those artifacts absolutely destroy the need for faith. Just because historical items dealing with Jesus and/or biblical times are found, that still doesn't prove anything with respect to Jesus' resurrection or deity, which still require faith.

Gamera

[QUOTE=Haran]I am a Christian and an activist on the political left. So I disagree with you profoundly. I think you've been listening too much to the religious right, which is a movement that is totally at odds with the gospel message, and a heresy in the good old mediaeval sense.

The Shroud isn't just an artifact. If it is what some purport it to be, it is evidence not just of Jesus's historicity but his resurrection. And that I suggest is nonsense. The idea that God wants to "prove" Jesus' resurrection with an artifact (but somehow didn't get around to it until now) is theological incoherency.

Like I say, the Shroud has nothing to do with Christianity. It's probably a fake, but even if its real, presumably God would never let anybody prove it, since to do so would make faith unnecessary. If you have factual proof of the resurrection, then you don't need faith, just reason and rational people would then brag about how nonbelievers are irrational. And you know what Paul says about bragging, I hope.

Haran

First, I don't listen to any religious right or right talk shows. I listen to NPR every day and I watch liberal news, so I know what's out there. I do not listen to Fox, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, or any other such source.

I do not think I said that all of the liberal left hates Christianity, but if I were a bettin' man, I'd be willing to wager that something close to a majority of the liberal left (especially the far liberal left) do not like Christianity and/or religion in general. As I said, I listen to their news shows and I hear it in their reports.

And you are certainly within your rights as a Christian and human being to say so. However, there is absolutely no way that the shroud could be evidence for a resurrection and you, I, and most other Christians and non-Christians know this. After all, what would a resurrection do to a shroud? No, it is simply an artifact. I doubt that the shroud is Jesus' shroud, but I don't think discussion should be halted about it because of some pronunciation that it is a fake (which happens a lot in atheistic circles).

As I said above, this obviously can't "prove" Jesus' resurrection, but some might see it as proof of a historical Jesus. If so, that does not destroy faith in any way. For those who believe it is in some way proof of a resurrection, then one would simply need to ask what comparisons were done and how they know that this proves a resurrection....common'...

I've stated it twice above, but perhaps three times will get the point across. I doubt there are really many that believe the shroud to be evidence of resurrection....there simply is no way to confirm this. If they do, then your statements are correct. For those who believe it may be a historical artifact related to Jesus (whether I do or not), it cannot destroy faith.

Perhaps we agree on some level...

Gamera

[QUOTE=Haran]I think you would lose that bet as I think there are far more committed Christians on the left than on the right, whose ideology is incompatible with the gospel message.

I think you're being coy. Shrouds don't normally have images of the body on them. If it's real, something odd would have had to have happened, and of course the standard line of the pro-Shroud types is that the resurrection left the image.

It would be evidence of a supernatural event that imprinted the image of the dead Jesus on a shroud.

A simple historical artifact in the form of a shroud wouldn't have an image of Jesus on it, now would it. Why are you being coy about this?