scumble

This thread seems to have wandered off into strange lands.

Christian, your appeal to using "rational supernatural explanations" can be turned right back on itself. Suppose something "supernatural" happens. How do you know this isn't natural, unless you can claim to to know what "natural" is?

I would never have got to talking about Jesus, because we have to agree that the Bible is not just a colection of texts written by people who have no demonstrated authority. You guys let him get away with too much!

As it is, the natural/supernatural thing is an argument about definitions, not about reality.

Christian

Biff,

Only if the assumptions you bring to the table are more important to you than the laws of logic.

And the soldiers and leaders in Sennacherib’s army were all complete morons who didn’t realize this? I’ve been a soldier myself for too long to even start to buy that one. Soldiers are very pragmatic and creative in protecting the tools of their craft. If you are stupid enough to let the rodents eat your bow string you might well die (and get all your buddies killed) the next day as a result. The idea that this would happen suddenly and unexpectedly to 180,000 soldiers contradicts human nature and mouse nature.

More sweeping unprovable assertions.

Angels are spiritual creatures and they do exist. Feel free to prove me wrong by any means you care to try.

In other words … they do TOO exist.

Please provide an ancient text claiming that Sennacherib’s defeat was a result of unicorns, manticores, or sphinxes. Preferably one that has changed more lives than any book in history and contains no errors in the original manuscripts.

Would too!

I agree completely.

Four examples of begging the question in one statement. I’m impressed!

Respectfully,

Christian

Christian

That's it for tonight ... but

I'll be back!

Respectfully,

Christian

Rhea

On the contrary, it's me stating that I have frequently seen mice eat things. I have never seen angels do things. So on a _probability_ scale, from experience and observation, mice are more likely in the absence of additional evidence.

You gotta start remembering that every time we make a statement about what we think is probable it is ALWAYS, ALWAYS justaposed with the sentiment, "in the absence of additional evidence".

You keep forgetting that. It's pretty important.

in the absence of additional evidence that is a perfectly reasonable statement to make. What's the problem with that in the absence of additional evidence?

How do I know? Because there is not one instance of evidence! Not one!!! I do not need to use the collective compendium of unsloved cases to make my statements about Angels. I use the history of solved cases to see. If there is not one solved case EVER showing that angels did something, then that's what I use to make a guess about the case before me. I do not use guesses to make guesses. Don't need to. Do you see where your logic falls down? You are making a claim about what evidence I admit into the proceedings. You claim that I am using previous guesses as current evidence. I am not and I don't need to. If it's a guess it doesn't get to count as evidence. So all previous guesses about mice AND angels are dissallowed. It's the SOLVED cases that I admit as evidence in deciding the probable answer for this guess. And Angels don't have any track record. Mice do. BUT FURTHERMORE there are even more better choices than either, as we must always consider, aren't there?

Heh, heh. Clever Lewis. Set up a false dichotomy and then accuse the arguers of using circular reasoning to solve it. Heh, heh. Thank you for playing. No, Christian, I am not using circular logic, as I have explained. And it remains a false dichotomy. My answer of the choice between those two probabilities remains based on previous observances, not observances of the false dichotomy. And my answer remains as an answer to a false dichotomy - that is, knowingly tied to the caveat that it's a false dichotomy.


And yes, chuckle, manly surrender _IS_ an oxymoron (at least in that historical context) and that is why laughable explanations would be put forth to explain an un"manly" act like losing a battle or surrendering.

mike_decock

First of all, writing a chronology a century after the supposed event doesn't make it terribly credible, especially since Phlegon could have simply been relating the event from Christian sources.

The fragment I think you're referring to are actually from Africanus or Eusebius, fourth century Christian apologists.

What is more likely is that Phlegon mentioned an eclipse in the time of Tiberius Caesar without specifying its duration and then early Christian apologists later tried to distort this into a reference to the darkness that the synoptic gospels claimed happened at the time of the crucifixion.

The Absence of Evidence

-Mike...

Rhea

Yes, Christian. I am saying that if I knew my suffering was going to be short (a whole day?) and I knew the outcome was saving the whole world, and that I would survive the suffering unscathed, then yes, I am saying this would mitigate my suffering SO MUCH that I wouldn't be sweating blood over it.

No, it is not so skewed that it seems painless. It IS, however, so skewed that it does not even COME CLOSE to qualifying as "the worst ever" or even "one of the worst ever" or yet "some of the worst ever" as you have repeatedly called it.

(note: please cite where in the bible it suggests that Jesus watched crucifictions every day for 3 years. Also please cite which historical texts show that crucifictions happened every day in Jerusalem.)



I feel for you. That has to be an incredibly hard separation.

What you are missing is that it is not the foreknowledge of the torture that makes it easier to endure. It is the foreknowledge of the purpose and foreknowledge of the duration and mostly, foreknowledge of the outcome.

Can we agree that Jesus did not die from this? He did come back to life, in your opinion, right? He's not gone forever, nor still suffering. Can we agree on this?

IMO, that mitigates the suffering enormously! If you were sent to Korea and NOT told it was a one-year assignment, but rather it was unknown, and indeed you might not ever be allowed to rejoin your wife, are you saying that might be a teeny tiny bit more suffering, but not much?

Because that's what you're saying about Jesus. That even though he spent only a year in Korea, it was just as difficult for him as for the soldier who was told "who knows, it might be forever. Now kiss you wife goodbye." Are you claiming these are the same?

Are you really going to stand next to Jake, at the airport and hear him say, "I am leaving for my assignment in Korea, I just kissed my wife goodbye. They said my assignment might be a year, might be ten years, or I might never be assigned to come back. This is so hard." And you're going to look Jake in the eye and say, "yeah, I'm in for a year. I just said goodbye to my wife for a year. I hear you, we're both making the biggest sacrifice a soldier can make."

And you don't think Jake is going to think you're a monster?

And I disagree with you completely. Your own Christian martyrs were famous for doing just that.

If they had the advantages of
1. Knowing why it was happening
2. Having that why be to save the world.
3. Knowing they would not die permanently from it and
4. Knowing how long it would take,
5. Having it take one day

Then I absolutely don't care who it is, I would not call that "the worst suffering known to man"


Exploited? No, I was providing you with an example. I'm not promoting anything, I'm trying to provide an example of suffering that I think is monumentally worse than what you claim Jesus went through. I'll pick another one if you like. I'll make a story that is "typical" but not real. (Oh, I did that already - see "Bana") You keep telling me that Jesus "suffered the worst kind of torture" and I have no way of showing you WHY I disagree without using examples.

Because I believe that his knowledge and godhead, if real, would have mitigated this torture enough to not result in sweating blood. I am saying that anyone who sweats blood over their death must not really believe in the afterlife. I am saying that anyone who sweats blood over their torture must not be really convinced that they are saving mankind by enduring it. And I am saying that anyone who sweats blood over their impending ordeal doesn't really believe they are the son of a god.

I have already covered this. Significantly greater torture in duration. Significantly greater torture from immaturity. Significantly greater torture from uncertainty, and significantly greater from purposelessness.


You may be able to stand next to that soldier who is being separated from his wife forever while you are being separated for one year and say, with a straight face, "yeah, we're in the same boat". But I think most people would not think well of you if you did.

Volker.Doormann

Christian,

I guess, there are a lot of misunderstandings about that what I wrote.

Sure because English is not my first language, I am selecting not ever correct English terms, but I think that’s not really the point.

You mention, that you are classifying me as a person in the box of naturalists. I can tell you, that I never have known, what that term means until today. A definition from Cambridge International Dictionary of English reads: »Naturalist: ‘A naturalist is a person who studies and knows a lot about plants and animals.’«

If I understand this correct, then this means, a naturalist deals with the physical life containing the social life of all creatures with its special laws of live and dying as an endless process of the physical part of nature. (?). But that is wrong, as wrong it can be.

Studying nature means IMHO studying the order of the immaterial world as well as the more simple physical world. I have no big interest in the laws and in the ‘order’ of the physical world, I have studied them and it is not my world.

If one is studying the laws of the physical/social world and is studying the laws of the spiritual world, one can see, that the targets and laws are very different. The sense of the physical world is the preservation of the process of life, with its attributes of birth and death in an endless cycle. The sense of the spiritual world cannot be understood by the mind, because the mind has no sense for it. The sense of the spiritual world is only to be grasp by a still mind with the consciousness of the soul and cannot be transmitted by words of the physical word. Maybe by poetry, music or love.

There is a great debate about Christianity and its roots chatting about all, but not on the core teaching of Jesus.

The parables of Jesus are all hidden teachings about the laws of the spiritual world. He has said: (John, 18,36) : »My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of his world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence.«

He has rejected his family; he has rejected a man who has more interest to his social (dead) father, than studying the spiritual teaching of the immaterial spiritual world/realm. He has said, that he was not come to bring peace (Luke 12:51): ‘Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division: For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided, three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother; the mother in law against her daughter in law, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.’

No one can be independent as spiritual soul, if he is slaved in a social world by its social rules and social claims. The Christian Church never has read the gospels. Church has taken Jesus as 'alpha animal' of a social tribe of spiritual blind 'beta' creatures.

Because the laws of the physical/social world are different from the spiritual world, it is impossible to realize both. This is parabelized by Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas: "A person cannot mount two horses or bend two bows. And a slave cannot serve two masters, otherwise that slave will honor the one and offend the other.” and is repeated in Luke (16:13): »No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other.«
I do not remember the name of a spiritual teacher, who has said: ‘99% of spirituality is a clear mind’. This means, that a mind must be empty from any idea or theory to see the reality of that, what is also in the real spiritual part of nature.

Physical Scientists of nature have studied successfully the order of the physical world rejecting social laws and claims of kings, popes or police officers only by a clear mind.

People like Jesus, Lao=Tsu, Buddha, Socrates, Kabir, Giordano Bruno or Rumi have studied the spiritual laws also by rejecting the social claims of social authorities and by a clear (cleared) empty mind.

The meaning of a clear mind is to understand as an ability to understand, that, what is while a mind full of dead theories and education is searching vain for a matching nature life for life.

Christianity never has understood, that spirituality is a world or realm, of no social meaning, with its contradiction, hurting each law of logic and truth, but a world of perfection to enter, if one is able to leave the untruth in the physical/social world.
Because the laws of the world of spirituality are not to find in remote places in this physical world, but in the inner world of the spiritual consciousness of the soul, no one need to be a poor missioner in a social manner; the poorness is necessary to the mind, which should be empty. This is parabelized by Jesus in Luke (9:2) “And he sent them to preach the kingdom of God, and to heal the sick. Take nothing for your journey, neither staves, nor scrip, neither bread, neither money; neither have two coats apiece. “.

No one of any reason is traveling blind into the social world without some package to supply the body. It is a parable, that teaches, that to discover the alocal spiritual world, no one must leave his warmth room and do not need money.

Maybe you have an impression, that my position is not the position of a naturalist as defined above. I think that the core teaching of Jesus (unmixed with Hollywood soap operas) in the four Gospels and mostly identical to the sayings in the Gospel of Thomas can be decoded from the parable state to the spiritual consciousness without any contradictions, as I have tried to show here in short in unperfection. These thoughts of Jesus are in common with several other thoughts in other cultures regarding the spiritual order, as I have named some.

Christianity has mistaken spiritual things to the physical/social world and is fighting since 2000 years for phantoms therefore, instead taking attention to the nature of physics, to the nature of spirituality and to the spiritual teachings of spiritual teachers like Jesus.

In the end I would like to ad a poem from Kabir, that deals also with the lack of meaning of the physical/social world, as Jesus has stated this:

“The night you passed in sleep
And the day in visiting your false friends;
Alas! Thus have you wasted
The diamond of your life on naught.
You will die one day, perhaps tomorrow;
Grass will grow on your tomb,
And your friends will forget you.
Therefore know your soul soon.
Whom will the son of a harlot call his father?
Worship God in your being
And do not waste your life.
Your body is like a jar of unbaked clay;
It may break to pieces any moment and all will be over,
Nowhere is there delight except in God.
This world is a house made of wood,
And, lo! it is burning furiously;
He who stays in it dies.
The Yogi withdraws from it in meditation and he is saved.
Thy birth as man is a ripe fruit which is seen only once;
Make the most of the practice of devotion and compassion
And the acquisition of true Knowledge.
O Kabir, there is a way out of this illusory world:
Know the soul at any cost.”

best

Volker

Biff the unclean

Biff: Frankly I've seen Marines suffer much worse and get up fighting.
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Chris: That is not medically possible.

When did you become a doctor? (If your reply is 'when did I?' the answer would be back in the 70's) The crucifixion-lite in the gospels wouldn't have killed a healthy man in his 30's. And by the bye the whipping you described was the type done by the British Navy before the nineteenth century and is much worse than what the Romans did. The Brits used a Cat-o-nine tails the Romans a scourge that had between one and three thongs.


Please define "real crucifixion."
Person is tied to cross with ropes on wrists and around ankles. A fourth rope is passed over the crossbeam and snugged up over the victim's chest. The victim's legs are both broken with a mallet. Unable to support their body weight they slowly suffocate from the rope around their chest. A process that could take days. The body is then left to rot.

Do you even understand how crucifixion killed people??? Tying ropes around the chest to speed the suffocation process would have been merciful.
It took days of slow torture.
Jesus with a spike in his feet would have been completely supported. He wasn't up long enough to die of exposure.

Because some roman soldiers who probably had seen more death and gore than a platoon of marines verified that He was dead.
And they did that just how? "Looks dead to me."
There was no point in killing Him quickly by breaking His legs because He was already dead.
Quickly???? It would take days to die that way.

And if the centurion had been mistaken about His death, then he would have been killed himself.
No he wouldn't, the Romans were not barbarians. You've never read any secular history books about Rome, have you?
But Pilate gave permission for His body to be taken. It seems that Pilate is only an expert when it’s consistent with your assumed conclusion.
This is a plot flaw in this fictional piece. They didn't take bodies down from crosses, they let the birds do that for them.

That’s an interesting criteria for proving death. Do you think anyone in the first century ever really died? Maybe they all just looked sort of dead.
My point is that if you have no way to check if a man is actually dead and a couple of days later you find him walking around, it is ludicrous to assume that he had been dead, but he got better.

It is medically impossible to fake death by crucifixion.
Because the body rots and is eaten by scavengers. This wasn't a real crucifixion.
Tremendous exertion and movement is required for every breath. Even a small breath would have been dramatically visible. How long would you be able to go without breathing in order to fake your death?
Only if your legs are broken and there is a rope around your chest. A spike in your tootsies would enable you to breath unrestricted.
Also I never said anybody "faked" anything. No strawmen please. If Jesus passed out the breathing would have been very shallow. You'd need to hold a glass mirror to the nose to find the breath. No mirrors at the time.

Can you offer any evidence that Jesus’ tomb had a door that could be opened from the inside?
That's another plot flaw, this type of tomb belonged only to the rich. A new character with a spare tomb had to be written into the story. The tombs from this period still exist. We know that they can be opened from the inside because there are still hundreds of them.

Again, can you provide any evidence that such a custom existed in first century Palestine?
Oh good grief, do you think the Jews disappeared? They kept records. Talk to a Rabbi.

But that is beside the point. It is medically impossible to fake death by crucifixion.
STRAWMAN!!! Mistake, not fake.

Biff the unclean

Biff:If you read this piece all by itself you would wonder if Lewis was sane or not.
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Chris: Only if the assumptions you bring to the table are more important to you than the laws of logic.

What you are trying to denigrate by calling "assumptions" is all the knowledge humanity has gained since the Bronze Age when this silly story was written. Logic dictates that you not disregard facts so that you can believe a story that you are fond of. Lewis abandons logic in favor of superstition.

And the soldiers and leaders in Sennacherib’s army were all complete morons who didn’t realize this? I’ve been a soldier myself for too long to even start to buy that one. Soldiers are very pragmatic and creative in protecting the tools of their craft. If you are stupid enough to let the rodents eat your bow string you might well die (and get all your buddies killed) the next day as a result. The idea that this would happen suddenly and unexpectedly to 180,000 soldiers contradicts human nature and mouse nature.
Bullshit. I spent four years in the service myself, two of them fighting in 'Nam, and I know for a fact that things break, plans go wrong and shit happens. I've seen rodents chew through concrete block walls to get at food.
If these crack troops of Sennacherib were too spit and polished to let little tiny mousies sneak into their stores then how come great big angels with wings got in under their noses?

(Angels are mythological creatures).

More sweeping unprovable assertions.

Of course it's provable, I can supply the myths that they come from. The original Angels in the bible were winged sphinxes; they didn't become what you think of as angels until the Greeks conquered Israel. What you think is a angel is the God Eros.

Angels are spiritual creatures and they do exist. Feel free to prove me wrong by any means you care to try.
I can show that such a creature is not to be found anywhere in the world. I can also show that you base your assumptions on religious beliefs from a primitive culture and can't back them up with facts.

Please provide an ancient text claiming that Sennacherib’s defeat was a result of unicorns, manticores, or sphinxes. Preferably one that has changed more lives than any book in history and contains no errors in the original manuscripts.
Excuse me? Is this supposed to be clever? Because it is just making you look panicky.

Four examples of begging the question in one statement. I’m impressed!
Nice try, but you didn't fool anyone. You've abandoned both facts and logic in favor of religion.
:banghead:

Mageth

Volker:

You mention, that you are classifying me as a person in the box of naturalists. I can tell you, that I never have known, what that term means until today. A definition from Cambridge International Dictionary of English reads: »Naturalist: ‘A naturalist is a person who studies and knows a lot about plants and animals.’«

I think Christian was referring to "naturalist" in a different sense, as in one who ascribes to naturalism, "the belief that phenomena in the universe are explained by natural laws, and that there are no supernatural forces at work. " At this point, I would not classify you as a "naturalist."

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy on Naturalism