hezekiah jones

Not waiting several decades hence to write about it - in Greek.

Samhain

Sorry, also jumping in late. I don't think it would be fair to say that either. I don't know how many atheists are truly comfortable with the fact that, if we are right, we are alone in the world, and our lives are full of pain, and in the end, meaningless, for death is the ultimate end. I am quite comfortable with sitting back, and accepting non-existence myself, but of course, if it could be totally proven to me that any god existed, and that there was a grand scheme to things and that there WAS an afterlife, I would feel more at ease with my existence, as I feel that most atheists would.

Koyaanisqatsi

gixx--

I sincerely hope you stick around. You're a breath of fresh air in that you are honestly seeking answers to your questions and appear to be highly intelligent.

You're not a "hand-waver" as we affectionately refer to some of the more fundamentalist, closed-minded folk who drop in here from time to time thinking they have all the power and glory of God at their disposal, dismissing every legitimate argument and blatant contradiction with a wave of their almighty hand.

You don't really need to reply if you don't want to. They were offered merely as food for thought.

Believe it or not, I don't think there is a more balanced forum. The only problem is that this is a very large forum and the ratio of atheists to theists is comparatively large, so if you stick around long enough, you'll have dissenting opinions in abundance.

Yes, well, this is after all the Secular Web, but, as I mentioned, if you stick around long enough, eventually you will see apologist spin-doctors at work.

I am an ex-punk 36 year old with a Bachelor's degree in Film. I smoked pot for four years and watched movies.

Might I suggest anything by Elaine Pagels or Burton Mack? They are both well-respected theologians who analyze the New Testament (including the lost gospels) seriously and from a mature perspective without attacking anyone's beliefs.

You needn't "take" any of us on. We only pounce on the preachers . Just answer honestly as you have so far and we'll respond in kind. Nor do you have to address every single post, just the ones that challenge you in some manner.

The purpose of these forums is to engage in intelligent discourse. Unfortunately, most of the theists who come here see it as their holy mission to proselytize and "scuttle" the ship, so we may appear gruff and battle scarred, but believe it or not, the goal around here is to actually have an intelligent conversation/debate. As you can see from just about everyone in this thread, we all think we've achieved just that and are enjoying the interaction.

The idea is to challenge what you believe in and why you believe in it, but if you don't want to accept that challenge, you certainly don't have to. Just remember one thing, though. Most of us were cult members ourselves, so we're not "the enemy;" rather people just like you who had some questions, too and one day woke up.

Integrity comes from honesty.

I doubt anyone here will attack you in any way so much as we might, as I mentioned, challenge your beliefs so you shouldn't feel like you're a lone voice among the wolves.

We've been where you are and you're not in here frothing at the mouth like most others so don't worry.

Besides, I'm one of the pitbulls around here.

You did not.

Just go to amazon.com or barnes&noble.com and search for Elaine Pagels or Burton Mack for starters. I've read just about everything they have written and I can wholeheartedly recommend them from a purely scholarly perspective. As I said, neither one denigrates belief; they simply investigate the origins of Christianity in as exacting and dispassionate detail as is possible in order to present the most thorough analysis they can.

I particularly enjoyed Pagels' Gnostic Gospels, since I had never even known there were other gospels thrown out by the Catholic church circa 300 A.D., one of which, the now famous Gospel of Thomas being widely considered as the first gospel, thrown out because it destroyed the whole concept of Catholic hierarchy (Priest, Bishop, Pope, God).

We know what journeys we took to arrive at the truth and have no real need to brow beat anyone; just those who try to brow beat us.

The truth will indeed set you free, so by all means seek it out just don't do it with rose-colored glasses on.

Just one?

Ok. That would mean that the dead can rise from their graves (and I don't just mean Jesus), but fine, and that a creature known as the "Devil" factually exists somewhere as well as a creature known as "God."

Ok, that would mean that the chosen people--the Jews--would have been instantly freed from their bonds and that paradise on Earth was restored to them.

Think about this for a moment. If Jesus truly were Emmanuel/Elijah, then that means that the suffering of the Jews ended and their freedom was granted and that they live forever in paradise with God on Earth. That's what the Jewish Messiah as prophesied in the Old Testament represented and if, as you say, Jesus really were this Messiah, then we would have seen this already happen.

See, this is one of the primary problems with NT's mythology; it negates the Old Testament, not affirms it, which means it cannot be the fulfillment of the Old Testament.

Think about that for just a second (as I had for countless hours as a teenager). Did the Messiah free the chosen people? No.

Remember, there is no conditional clause related to the Jewish Messiah; no mention of a "new covenant" or that "belief in the Messiah is the only way to salvation." According to the Jewish prophets, when Emmanuel/Elijah arrives that means the immediate freedom of all Jews. No other condition is applied. No requirement that you must believe in order to be saved.

That's a profoundly significant problem with the claims of the Jesus cults, beyond of course the obvious, which is that the Jewish Messiah was to be named Emmanuel, not Jesus.

Also not a necessary condition of the Jewish Messiah. There is strong debate to this day over whether or not Elijah/Elijah would necessarily be "fully man" as the claim goes for Jesus.

I've even heard arguments that God (Yahweh) cannot possibly appear in the flesh (because no man can see his face or some such nonsense) and thus sends his messengers so the Messiah will be just another messenger.

Frankly, I've heard all kinds of things.

Ok, let's suppose this is true, too. Jesus, who is God according to Christian dogma, dies as a sacrifice to whom? Himself.

Again, I'm just asking you to seriously think about these concepts. In essence, what you've just asked us to suppose is that God died as a necessary sacrifice to himself in order to reconcile mankind with God. God sacrifices himself to himself for himself to stop himself from punishing his own creation.

Does that make any sense to you at all, because that's what it all boils down to once you strip off the theocratic nonsense? Honestly, does that make sense to you? A god who trifurcates (splits into three) in order to die as a sacrifice to himself in order to save us from himself?

The key here, is, once again, in the Old Testament, whence the concept of sacrificing is stolen from. So, go to the Old Testament and review the whole notion of a God requiring the murder of a purely innocent creature as a necessary condition for salvation.

It's patently ludicrous.

So what could be an alternative reason for this requirement? Well, what was wealth back then? Cattle and grain was wealth. So, how better to maintain your own wealth than to say to the "peasants" around you, "God said you all have to ritually kill your best breeding stock and/or give up your best grain."

It serves a dual purpose. First is to insure that your own wealth remains comparatively superior (i.e., your livestock, due to the number of "perfect lambs" remains the best livestock in the region and your grain, due to the amount you have remains the best grain, etc.) and secondly, it instills the notion of class hierarchy without blame.

Everyone had to bow down to "Yahweh," rich and poor alike, which is, of course, transparently in favor of the rich with the appearance of justice to the poor.

So, you've got a possible reason behind the original tribal rituals of sacrifice; rituals that must be extended into the New Testament in order for it to be a "new" Testament, which get transformed into an even more esoteric, symbolically significant ritual as well as a seemingly logical extension within the context of the Old Testament. Take it out of the context of the OT, however, and it makes no sense at all.

Why in the world would God require what amounts to his own death as necessary sacrifice of himself to himself? It serves absolutely no purpose outside the context of the Old Testament and the requirement that Jesus be an extension of the Old Testament.

And finally this. Ok, let us suppose that a dead man truly did rise from the dead. Considering this has happened many thousands of times (if not millions), just arguably not after an alleged three day period, it's still not inexplicable or necessarily explained by supernatural intervention.

It certainly isn't exclusively explained by Judeo/Christian constructs of God, since just about every God on the books has the ability to take or restore life.

The same kind of written accounts that would be necessary to convince me today. Non-contradictory historical accounts from several disparate and, preferably non-biased journalists, whose reports are not littered with other historical mistakes (such as the trial that never would have happened and the releasing of a prisoner contrivance that was never a Roman tradition and the description of Pilate as being acquiescent to a Jewish crowd even though he has already acquitted Jesus and the recounting of private conversations that the authors could not possibly have been present for--such as Jesus' temptation in the desert--, etc., etc.).

In other words, basic journalistic rules of evidentiary presentation that are not only absent from the NT stories, but brazenly against both logic and each other's accounts.

Mark, for example, the first one who made up the passion narrative, does not say that the tomb was empty. He tells us there's a "man" sitting in the tomb. Jesus' body isn't there, but the tomb wasn't found empty.

No one questions this man or where he came from or how he knows Jesus, the disciples, the apostles, etc., etc! Right then and there I would say, "Um, wait a minute. Who the hell is this strange guy? We know the names and intimate details of just about everyone else--we even know about visions of the apocalypse--but we don't know who the guy is that's sitting in Jesus' tomb?"

That's what I mean by the most basic evidentiary, journalistic procedures.

The most basic elements of evidentiary procedures and not obviously fantastical claims and aggrandizements of deity; especially not pro-Roman/anti-Jewish claims that contradict the very prophecies they are meant to fulfill.

I know you're trying to make it as simple as possible, but in so doing you (or those who have done this before you that you have read or parroted; no offense, but this isn't new here so forgive my assumption), in so doing you are rather conveniently leaving out the most pertinent facts of the case, as it were.

We don't have a simple reportage of a miraculous event in the sense of a CNN piece. We have seriously biased, anonymous, factionalized cult myths based on earlier "orthodox" cult myths, told in such a way as to not just be historically inaccurate, but historically false as well as historically fraudulent. Pilate was not a wishy-washy, indifferent ruler who would have ever asked a crowd of Jews for anything at all, let alone told them that they would let a convicted seditionist/murderer like Barabas go just because it was a Jewish high holy day.

Think about that, for a second, too. Barabas was a convicted seditionist/murderer, which meant that he acted against the Roman empire, most likely murdering a Roman citizen (since Pilate would hardly care whether or not a Jew had killed another Jew).

So we are asked to believe by Mark (I was about to say, "the authors," but the considered opinion of biblical scholars--not atheists, mind you--is that there is only one author of the passion narratives and others who revised his story) that a brutally sadistic anti-Semite like Pilate would <ol type="A">[*] ask a crowd of Jews anything at all[*] do what they told him to do[*] exchange a convicted murderer/seditionist for a man who has committed no crime at all[*] exchange a convicted murderer/seditionist for a man who was acquitted by Pilate and set free[*] crucify an acquitted man (the most severe punishment meted out by the Roman Empire)[*] have anything at all to do with a Jew accused by Jews (allegedly) to have broken Jewish law[/list=a]

Remember, Pilate states categorically that Jesus has broken no Roman law and sends him off to Herod, who also states he can find "nothing wrong with this man."

Jesus has committed no crime against Rome and has been fully and publicly acquitted by Pilate, yet Pilate, for no historically accurate reason, metes out the most severe punishment available to him? For what reason?

Not to mention the questions surrounding why the Sanhedrin would go to Pilate to begin with, when they could have killed Jesus anytime they wanted to (and tried twice) by stoning!

That would be identical to Jewish concentration camp victims asking their Nazi Kommandant to try a traitor amongst them for claiming he was their King.

Either the Kommandant would simply have them all immediately shot and not think twice about it, or the victims would simply kill the traitor in his sleep without thinking twice about it.

The point being, of course, that the Jews would under no circumstance go to their mortal enemies and oppressors for anything at all, even if they were in collusion in some manner unknown to us (but certainly implied in the NT).

The only logical reason for the passion narrative to have been written with such a pro-Roman/anti-Jewish bent was that it was either
<ol type="1">[*] Roman propaganda written at the time of the war, just like we would do.[*] written by power hungry cult factions who wished to "cozy" up to the Roman occupiers; otherwise known as Roman sympathizers.[*] entirely rewritten by the victors (aka, Holy Roman Empire) destroying any and all credibility of the entire mythology.[/list=a]

We do understand it and have answered it countless times in several other threads on this site. You'll forgive us when we say we've seen it all before. It may be new to you, but, unfortunately, not to us.

Here's a better question so that you don't feel this is all lopsided. Why do you think those stories are true?

Any time.

So, you see that we have opinions (some would argue "conclusions," me among them), but we always attempt to deconstruct precisely why we have those opinions and explain in as much detail as possible what our thought processes are, which derived these opinions.

In that way, it is hoped, you (or anyone) can address the line of reasoning as well as the conclusions drawn so that we can all truly search for the truth.

Doesn't that make you feel warm all over?

Seriously, stick around and relax. We only bite those who bite us.

(edited for formatting - Koy)

[ March 19, 2002: Message edited by: Koyaanisqatsi ]</p>

Flynn McKerrow

Hold on now. While the three Avalanche players who dressed for Team Canada (Joe Sakic, Rob Blake, Adam Foote) might indeed count as "several", Chris Drury, who dressed for Team USA, certainly is only one person. Unless, of course, Chris Drury is part of some unknown Trinity.

Sorry...this was off-topic.

*edited because I suck at UBB Code*

[ March 19, 2002: Message edited by: Flynn McKerrow ]</p>

Koyaanisqatsi

We get this one a lot, too, by the way. Not necessarily a complaint; just an observation.

Answering a question with a question is not an acceptable form of debate, in case you care. All it does is say, "I don't have the answer, so I'll ask you a question in order to redirect the topic away from the fact that I don't have an answer."

Also, as I hope my last post showed, we are fully prepared to go into as much detailed deconstruction as possible in order to "seek out the truth," and never (I'll repeat that) never dismiss claims without due process (another frequently lobbed false accusation) so present whatever evidence you wish and we'll deconstruct it.

Unfortunately, it's not possible for us to evaluate someone's claims of, "I KNOW God exists because he spoke to me." We can only ask very legitimate questions, such as has been done here.

Rarely, if ever, do we get any answers to those legitimate questions, however, the most favored response being something along the lines of, "You just have to be me to know what I'm talking about," which is, of course, the most ludicrous argument of all.

Indeed, it's not an argument for obvious reasons.

Again, as QueenofSwords pointed out, we don't doubt you had some sort of experience; what we're wondering is why you've ascribed it to the millenia old warrior-deity mythologies of the Judeo/Christian cults and not, say, to Zeuss or Buddha or Allah or Vishnu (I think you see where this is going)?

Actually, not technically true. Atheism means the absence of belief in god or gods, so we aren't necessarily biased by a belief system the way you are, which is why we always ask people to qualify their personal claims of experiencing "God" or "Jesus" in their lives. How did you know it was the Judeo/Christian god; what version of the Judeo/Christian god was it; could it have been Allah, etc., etc.

Obviously if I proclaim, "I've experienced Isis!" That is not sufficient for establishing whether or not Isis factually exists.

[ March 19, 2002: Message edited by: Koyaanisqatsi ]</p>

David Bowden

"...and in the category, 'You Could Say That Again,' the award goes to..."

<img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />

-Wanderer

Ruy Lopez

You were asking for reading material specifically about Jesus and what anyone thinks of him. I suggest "Jesus Before Christianity" by Albert Nolan, a Catholic priest who seems to have crossed the line by ignoring the Apostles Creed.
If you have doubts about your faith, the book is good transition reading from a believer to a more secular person. You might continue to admire Jesus, as you profess, but now for very different and perfectly logical reasons.
I'll just add a brief backgrounder to help appreciate the book better. You recall that Jesus of Nazareth is portrayed in the gospels as a compassionate person like Mother Teresa. Another portrayal as an apocalyptic prophet, another as an angry self-righteous egomaniac, another as an all-knowing somewhat arrogant teacher and then a cosmic somewhat divine being. A psychologist will probably say these traits cannot exist in one person at the same time. The point--- this is evidence of mythmaking. Gospel writers were writing Theological Constructs an elegant phrase meaning fiction. I personally agree with the compassionate reformer figure with apocalyptic beliefs but was terribly mistaken --model.
thanks for your patience and hope you stay.

tony

Malaclypse the Younger

gixxer750

I'm not all that interested in history. Because of that lack of interest, I'm probably not going to adopt any life-changing belief based only on history.

One reason is that history, especially ancient history, is notoriously uncertain. There's not much we can know about it, and even the knowledge that we do have is dependent on the assumption of naturalism. Once we abandon naturalism, we have no way of comparing alternative theories; it becomes just as "reasonable" that the world magicked into existence last Thursday.

I don't want to believe or disbelieve. I want to know.

Simply the notion of relying on evidence is contrary to supernaturalism. By the definition of "evidence" it cannot lead to supernaturalism, because we need to assume naturalism to define "evidence" at all.

Depends on what you mean by "bias". In the sense that we have metaphysical systems that define what terms like "evidence" and "rationality" mean, then yes of course.

If you mean, however, that given a definition of evidence we would be unable to treat some fact that met that definition on its own terms, I would deny that I am biased.

Ron Garrett

Originally posted by gixxer750:
Brave talk amigo. Now let's see you walk it. I'm not the only one here who is a former clergyman with graduate training in Biblical literature, apologetics and theology. I left the faith not because I was convinced that atheism was true, but because I could not avoid knowing that Christianity is not. My experience so far is that many atheists know as much or more about rhetoric, logic, theology, scripture and Christian history than my seminary professors with their doctorates from Harvard, Oxford, Tubingen and Claremont. Notice that you are using subjective terms like "experience", "felt", and talk about seeing others "experience." All these things are interpretations you place on emotions, hormones, impulses, drafty rooms or what have you. None of it is measurable is it?

You say "my MIND cannot reject these things as delusions - especially when they have been shared by so many." My friend, millions are Moslems, Buddhists, Taoists, Jews, Pagans, Animists, and we could go on and on. These groups have mutually exclusive and contradictory experiences that they have "felt" and "seen" and "experienced" just as vividly and powerful as you. But the claim of your faith is for exclusive truth! That Jesus is the only way! That Yahweh alone is God! That Mohammed was a false prophet! That Buddha was a false prophet! That Lao Tzu was a false prophet! That shamanic religions are demonic, etc. etc.

Why are your "feelings" more valid than the "feelings" of those who say your faith is false? Why are your "experiences" proof your faith is true, but their "experiences" are proof of nothing but that they are deceived?

You said:

"I will not sacrifice my intellect on the altar of "blind faith".

Do you mean it? What is the altar of blind faith other than choosing one's path on the basis of one's subjective feelings and not on the basis of reason and evidence?

Now there is some Biblical wisdom you can take to the bank Gixxer. If your faith has to rest on your feelings it is clearly not resting on your intellect is it? You are trusting to your emotions to tell you what is true and how likely are your emotions to be a good guide to the truth? Would you invest in the stock market based on your emotions and expect a good return? WHy are you investing your life based on emotions and expecting to gain immortality thereby?

I hope you stick around. I would be a shame to see you spend decades believing in and propagating lies and myths as I did.

[ March 19, 2002: Message edited by: Ron Garrett ]</p>

Kosh

What, you didn't see the way he sacrificed
himself on that one play?