The Cult of Christ

Hivemind187

You know its been bothering me a little lately. Most atheists are happy enough to go with "there is no god and religion is so much cobblers" however, there are slightly fewer (if not a lot fewer) atheists who seem willing to question the existance of the biblical figure of Jesus Christ, The Nazarene, the Lamb etc etc

Why should it be that people are unwilling to let go of (or to challenge) the concept of Christ? They say things like "I dont believe in God but I have no problem accepting that there was a person called christ who said x,y and even z!".

For many atheists the corner stone of their position is evidence (or lack thereof) and it bothers me that words like "believe" and "accept" are used in conjunction with aknowledging this Christ character. Why? What evidence is there out side of some inconsistent and mutually contradictory novels and letters written by people whom can be shown to have lived between 60 and 160 years after their idols supposed death.

Personally I find the christian belief that Christ rose from the dead and then ascended bodily into heaven as an answer to the question of genuine archaeological evidence ("haebeas corpus" or my own blunter "show me his fossil") to be a ridiculous cop out and the ammount of research and time dedicated to actually piecing together a historical figure (all of which appears to have been in vain and is little more than cryptozoology at this point) seems to have bamboozled some people into thinking that there is some legitimacy to the claim of the mans existance.

The options are (as I see it).

1) That the Christ in the biblical account existed and was indeed the son of a creator god who died for our sins and thus absolved humanity of all his sins. This requires the existance of an interested creator god, super powers and alteration of the fundamental principals of the universe (and defiance of the laws one would have to assume said creator god put in place himself).

2) That there was a bloke called Christ who lived at that time and who was a preacher or profit with a small circle of followers. This mans followers were talented preachers in their own right who would go on to spread the theology he gave them and were sucessful enough to set in motion a series of events that would turn a small Hebrew cult into a massive, global power. this requires no creator god and no magical powers - it does require a historical figure of christ (for which little if any archaeological evidence exists) and a lot of luck.

3) That there was no actual Christ and the story of this messiah is meant as allegory or metaphor to encourage new behaviors and ideals in iron age man. this requires no actual christ and no creator god with kewl powerz. It does not require 12 apostles etc It does require the basics of a story (present from the Torah and Old Testament), people to tell and re-tell the same story with minor alterations to suit specific audiences (evolution if you will - ha!) to make it relevant enough that it would "stick".

The first one is obviously not right but I wonder of the other two possibilities which is correct and why, without any useful evidence, some atheists choose to say things like "I do believe that there was a man by the name of Christ in Gallilee who claimed to be the son of God".

Is it a sheepish attempt to meet theists half way? Or do they (you) actually believe this?

Zillah

I am severely lacking in the right sort of reading to comment on the historical figure of Jesus. Either way I don't think it matters much. Even if such a person did exist, it doesn't really matter. For me the only relevant issue is whether he had immense magical powers, and no amount of supposed ancient eye witness accounts meets my standards for evidence in that regard.

Hivemind187

Zillah wrote: »

I am severely lacking in the right sort of reading to comment on the historical figure of Jesus. Either way I don't think it matters much. Even if such a person did exist, it doesn't really matter. For me the only relevant issue is whether he had immense magical powers, and no amount of supposed ancient eye witness accounts meets my standards for evidence in that regard.

While I agree with your take on the lack of evidence whats genuinely bothering me (and perhaps I allowed myself to wander a little too much in the OP) is how are atheists and critics of theology bimbling about saying that they "havent a problem with christ".

Infact, iirc Dawkins himself said that he believes that there was a gentleman hanging around at the time indicated (open to correction on this).

studiorat

"Christ" means the anointed one. I'd say the evidence for a man we now call Jesus is pretty strong.

A Jewish healer living in and around Galilee. It is sometimes thought that he took over leadership of John the Baptist's group after his execution. In my opinion his followers are the ones who deified him after his death.

asdasd

They say things like "I dont believe in God but I have no problem accepting that there was a person called christ who said x,y and even z!

a little cut of Occams razor here, why would people make it up? A founding figure, a charismatic preacher, is much more likely to be the founder rather some members of a committee a few years later deciding to make Jesus up so they could be persecuted by the Romans.

Hivemind187

asdasd wrote: »

a little cut of Occams razor here, why would people make it up? A founding figure, a charismatic preacher, is much more likely to be the founder rather some members of a committee a few years later deciding to make Jesus up so they could be persecuted by the Romans.

I understand what you are saying however I'm not sure I buy it.

Ideas, particularly ones along these llines which are fantastical seem to have this furious stubboness when it comes to spreading. I dont think that it was so much a "committee" as it was one preacher picking up stuff from another preacher to say on a street corner for a few sheckles and this spread from one to the next finding the slightly more passionate types along the way (apostles). A virus of faith in a sense.

You can see the same kind of thing on conspiracy theorist websites, at magic shows and even with stand up comics and poets. Adopting a character, especially one so provocative as the "messiah" who was due to show up anyway as the mascot for your new-thinking in Judaism is pretty standard practice amongst story tellers.

Vampires for example. Millenia of stories and folk lore then along comes Bram Stoker and writes a good novel about them, a hundred thousand imitators, ten thousand publishings and more than a hundred sucessful stories later we get the 2 standard models for vampires. Classical vampires steeped in the folklore, legend and trappings of Christianity and the modern (protestant) style where you have some of the basic points (sunlight bad, drinking blood etc) but they are a little more friendly, a little more camp and get played by a scientologist in the movies.

I digress.

Considering the extended period over which the gospels are written, the disparity (and seeming evolution) of the accounts it suggests that the people who wrote them didnt actually know the man and quite possibly didnt know one another. We only know of Socrates from Plato (pretty much), indeed it is thought that Socrates may have been mostly (if not all) a literary invention of Plato. It is accepted that the individual may not have existed and Socrates is arguably more important than some iron-age hippy - so why do we not demand the rchaeological evidence of christ before "accepting" that he may have existed but not with the powerz.

studiorat

but surely the Gospels are evidence? they were seprate accounts before they were put into the bible, extra biblical sources too...

asdasd

I dont think that it was so much a "committee" as it was one preacher picking up stuff from another preacher to say on a street corner for a few sheckles and this spread from one to the next finding the slightly more passionate types along the way (apostles)

well maybe the first preacher was jesus? Why would these preachers "up" some guy that didnt exist, and to what benefit to them? Also lot of the Gospels rings true politically from what we know about the period; herod, pilate, the division of powers in palestine etc.

It is accepted that the individual may not have existed and Socrates is arguably more important than some iron-age hippy

also a few hundred years before - the roman period is not Iron age - it is the historical age.

Pompey Magnus

I have no reason for doubting that a person called Jesus (or more acurately Yeshua bar Yosef) lived roughly 2000 years ago in Galilee and made a fairly small impression on a certain section of the population during his life before legends and myths attached to him began to circulate after his death.

The fact is that we have sources from not long after his death that support his existence. This is pretty good supporting evidence for the claim that he was a real person.

I do think the historical Yeshua was quite a different person to the Christian Jesus figure that evolved in the decades and centuries after his death and I think that if Christians today could meet the real man they would probably be quite surprised and disappointed. I seriously doubt that he ever considered himself to be God incarnate, he was just a Jewish apocalyticist who believed the world as he knew it would end in a matter of months or years, a common belief at the time.

To claim that Jesus didn't exist puts an unnecessary burden on you to disprove the existence of a generally accepted historical figure.

asdasd

I seriously doubt that he ever considered himself to be God incarnate, he was just a Jewish apocalyticist who believed the world as he knew it would end in a matter of months or years, a common belief at the time.

he didn't, his immediate followers didn't - but did see him as the messiah (Christ the annointed one) and later Christians saw him as a God.

Pompey Magnus

Hivemind187 wrote: »

Considering the extended period over which the gospels are written, the disparity (and seeming evolution) of the accounts it suggests that the people who wrote them didnt actually know the man and quite possibly didnt know one another.

I wouldn't be too worried about the question of time before our sources appear, Mark was written about 70 AD which is a fair gap alright but its not incredibly long. We also have the epistles of Paul which were started only a few years after the death of Jesus and Paul did claim to have been aware of actual followers of Jesus, plus there is also the postulated Q Gospel which may have been similarly early.

asdasd

We also have the epistles of Paul which were started only a few years after the death of Jesus and Paul did claim to have been aware of actual followers of Jesus,

also the places Paul was writing too have clear evidence of Christian activities by the 60's. It spread pretty quickly.

Hivemind187

Charco wrote: »

I have no reason for doubting that a person called Jesus (or more acurately Yeshua bar Yosef) lived roughly 2000 years ago in Galilee and made a fairly small impression on a certain section of the population during his life before legends and myths attached to him began to circulate after his death.

The fact is that we have sources from not long after his death that support his existence. This is pretty good supporting evidence for the claim that he was a real person.

I do think the historical Yeshua was quite a different person to the Christian Jesus figure that evolved in the decades and centuries after his death and I think that if Christians today could meet the real man they would probably be quite surprised and disappointed. I seriously doubt that he ever considered himself to be God incarnate, he was just a Jewish apocalyticist who believed the world as he knew it would end in a matter of months or years, a common belief at the time.

To claim that Jesus didn't exist puts an unnecessary burden on you to disprove the existence of a generally accepted historical figure.

But again, none of this is hard evidence.

The burden of proof is on the ones making the claim that he existed not the one asking for the evidence of that existance. It's not up to me to proove he didnt exist but up to those who believe he did to provide substantial or at least reasonably compelling evidence of same.

Hivemind187

asdasd wrote: »

well maybe the first preacher was jesus? Why would these preachers "up" some guy that didnt exist, and to what benefit to them? Also lot of the Gospels rings true politically from what we know about the period; herod, pilate, the division of powers in palestine etc.

So what? I could write a book tomorow about a man who can fly and shoot lasers from his nose and mention Tony Blair, Barack Obama and Ariel Sharon and in 2 millenia someone could say the same thing. Correlation implies nothing other than the person writing the account knew the history of the period and considering that it was within two lifetimes its not that much of a stretch.

asdasd wrote: »

also a few hundred years before - the roman period is not Iron age - it is the historical age.

There is such a thing as being too pedantic. It was a point of prose not of historical accuracy but fair enough.

rockbeer

The evidence is sketchy alright. But going on the 'no smoke without fire' principle, it's enough to accept that something as plausible as an earthly jesus figure could easily be true.

It makes no difference really, but as someone said, it seems to me to be a more powerful argument against believers to acknowledge at least the possibility of a historical christ and then work on the argument that there are much more probable explanations for everything that followed than that he was actually god with all the powers and everything.

Once you start denying his existence altogether you tend to just get a lot of blank looks.

Then again, that's all nonsense really, no christians I've discussed it with have ever actually revised their views. The trouble is, if you're prepared to believe something as ridiculous as that in the first place then you've no real motivation to stop believing just on the basis that it's completely nonsensical.

I've come to the conclusion that due to the nature of their delusion, christians on the whole aren't receptive to well-reasoned rational argument, but only to faith-shattering personal experiences.

But I still can't seem to give up arguing with them.

Hivemind187

Charco wrote: »

I wouldn't be too worried about the question of time before our sources appear, Mark was written about 70 AD which is a fair gap alright but its not incredibly long. We also have the epistles of Paul which were started only a few years after the death of Jesus and Paul did claim to have been aware of actual followers of Jesus, plus there is also the postulated Q Gospel which may have been similarly early.

Considering the state of medical science at the time it is a pretty long life. Also, Pauls gospel is claimed by him to be from the period only and is not substantiated by any useful corroboration.

If we had the Roman arrest record of Jesus and documentation by others of the period then I would be inclined to give some credence to the idea. Perhaps a gospel according to Christ himself?

How do we know that Paul did not invent the character and a number of other expounded on it later? Is that at least plausible? A Christian equivalent to Plato?

asdasd

The burden of proof is on the ones making the claim that he existed not the one asking for the evidence of that existance. It's not up to me to proove he didnt exist but up to those who believe he did to provide substantial or at least reasonably compelling evidence of same.

actually the burden of evidence is with you since most scholars believe he existed. It would were I to deny the existence of caesar because the the earliest extant books written about him ( and "supposedly" by him) are from 100 years later.

You tell us what you think happened. No bollocks about mythical preachers but name names, cities, and explain the rise of Christianity. Do you believe that John the Baptist existed? What thinks you of Josephus? And so on. A literate debate.

I should not even give you hints here - but you should at least have some knowledge of the epistles of St. Paul, the verisimilitude of the Acts of the Apostles ( which mention St. Paul), the existence of historical Christian sites in the areas that Paul wrote to just after the death of Jesus and so on.

So the burden of proof is on you to explain away all the evidence surrounding Jesus from people who knew him or his immediate followers. All of which which is pretty strong ( as is the evidence for Mohammed), Buddha less so.

It appears that you know nothing of the era and are going to dismiss as "not quite good enough proof for you" arguments from those of us who do know about the era. But I personally dont care about a historically illiterate opinion. I am going to absent from the debate because you did not start this thread to actually learn anything, or get a question answered, but leave the thread with the same idea you had coming in to it. So why bother?

There is such a thing as being too pedantic. It was a point of prose not of historical accuracy but fair enough.

Hardly. The historical era has historians, written evidence, letters etc. Again you dont really know much history, so again there is little point to this debate.

Pompey Magnus

Hivemind187 wrote: »

If we had the Roman arrest record of Jesus and documentation by others of the period then I would be inclined to give some credence to the idea. Perhaps a gospel according to Christ himself?

The thing is that we couldn't really expect the arrest record to still be in existence today, it would be an incredible fluke of history for it to have survived this long. That we don't have it should not be regarded as suspicious. Also we should remember Jesus was a nobody. No-one outside of a fringe element of 1st Century Judaism was interested in him, that is why none of the great historians bother referring to him, they just wouldn't have known about him.

To get an idea about Jesus' status even just in Judea by the latter half of the 1st Century we only have to refer to the writings of Josephus, he gave a pretty good account of the different characters and groups influencing the regional political and religious structures of Judea, it seems likely that he did refer to Jesus but his original accounts would have been very vague, he was aware of this person called Jesus but did not regard him as worthy of more than a few words, Josephus regarded John the Baptist as being a much more important figure and worthy of a much more detail reference. This just shows how irrelevant Jesus was in the 1st Century, very few people were even thinking about him and there was no major panic in Judaism as huge numbers of Jews converted to Christianity, this just didn't happen because Jesus was largely forgotten / unknown.

A Gospel written by Jesus would have been nice alright but again the document in itself wouldn't prove anything. Just like today we have a "Gospel of Mark" doesn't mean that Mark actually wrote it, in fact he almost certainly didn't. Likewise if we had a "Gospel of Jesus" today we would be equally suspicious.

How do we know that Paul did not invent the character and a number of other expounded on it later? Is that at least plausible? A Christian equivalent to Plato?

Well we know that there were rivals to Paul at the time, for example Paul warns his congregations against listening to the Judaizing preachers, if Jesus was invented it was almost certainly not Paul who created him. There must have been an early source for the Jesus story, and why not let that source be an actual historical figure? It is the simplest explanation.

I do think that you are somewhat correct though, the Christian figure of Jesus did not exist, there was no man who turned water to wine or rose the dead or ascended to Heaven, strictly speaking this character never existed, he is as fictional as Harry Potter. But I do believe that there was a seed for these stories, an actual person called Jesus who was built up after his death so much so that the actual man largely became lost to the myth.

I would compare Jesus to someone like Robin Hood. The character we know as Robin Hood who was involved in all these heroic events and interactions with King John and Richard the Lionheart etc is completely fictional, they are stories that were made up over many years. However I have no problem in accepting that there was a real historical figure who existed, perhaps called Robyn Hode or something similar, who achieved a heroic status during his life and after his death among his followers and locals and soon his real life was lost to the romanticised stories about him.

Hivemind187

Charco wrote: »

The thing is that we couldn't really expect the arrest record to still be in existence today, it would be an incredible fluke of history for it to have survived this long. That we don't have it should not be regarded as suspicious. Also we should remember Jesus was a nobody. No-one outside of a fringe element of 1st Century Judaism was interested in him, that is why none of the great historians bother referring to him, they just wouldn't have known about him.

To get an idea about Jesus' status even just in Judea by the latter half of the 1st Century we only have to refer to the writings of Josephus, he gave a pretty good account of the different characters and groups influencing the regional political and religious structures of Judea, it seems likely that he did refer to Jesus but his original accounts would have been very vague, he was aware of this person called Jesus but did not regard him as worthy of more than a few words, Josephus regarded John the Baptist as being a much more important figure and worthy of a much more detail reference. This just shows how irrelevant Jesus was in the 1st Century, very few people were even thinking about him and there was no major panic in Judaism as huge numbers of Jews converted to Christianity, this just didn't happen because Jesus was largely forgotten / unknown.

A Gospel written by Jesus would have been nice alright but again the document in itself wouldn't prove anything. Just like today we have a "Gospel of Mark" doesn't mean that Mark actually wrote it, in fact he almost certainly didn't. Likewise if we had a "Gospel of Jesus" today we would be equally suspicious.



Well we know that there were rivals to Paul at the time, for example Paul warns his congregations against listening to the Judaizing preachers, if Jesus was invented it was almost certainly not Paul who created him. There must have been an early source for the Jesus story, and why not let that source be an actual historical figure? It is the simplest explanation.

I do think that you are somewhat correct though, the Christian figure of Jesus did not exist, there was no man who turned water to wine or rose the dead or ascended to Heaven, strictly speaking this character never existed, he is as fictional as Harry Potter. But I do believe that there was a seed for these stories, an actual person called Jesus who was built up after his death so much so that the actual man largely became lost to the myth.

I would compare Jesus to someone like Robin Hood. The character we know as Robin Hood who was involved in all these heroic events and interactions with King John and Richard the Lionheart etc is completely fictional, they are stories that were made up over many years. However I have no problem in accepting that there was a real historical figure who existed, perhaps called Robyn Hode or something similar, who achieved a heroic status during his life and after his death among his followers and locals and soon his real life was lost to the romanticised stories about him.

Actually this Robin Hood bit is kind of what I was getting at (do not post while on medication, thats all I can say). The actual legend of Robin Hood is a composite built up over centuries of local folk lore and accounts by storytellers and bards. There was no single individual but rather a number of people who defied the law and lived long enouigh to capture the imagination of enough people to become a topic of conversation. It neednt have been too many people since traditional storytellers (and todays fiction writers) would take up a small thread of one story and construct larger, more grandiose stories from them.

The character or even the man Jesus, in my opinion, is likely to have been nothing more than this. A series of other peoples whose works were attributed to a single person (created) by storytellers alledgedly spreading the word of that individual. Think of it as a kind of memetic feedback loop where the unquestioning faith in the claims of his divinity (certainly not questioned to the same kind of standards as we would use today) were piled on top of one another along with rumours, half remembered stories and metaphorical lessons. If it can happen with Robin Hood why not in even earlier times?

I agree that a surviving arrest record would be unlikely and wouldnt be suspicious in the least but it is still excusing the lack of tangible evidence beyond the Bibles accounts.

Hivemind187

asdasd wrote: »

actually the burden of evidence is with you since most scholars believe he existed. It would were I to deny the existence of caesar because the the earliest extant books written about him ( and "supposedly" by him) are from 100 years later.

You tell us what you think happened. No bollocks about mythical preachers but name names, cities, and explain the rise of Christianity. Do you believe that John the Baptist existed? What thinks you of Josephus? And so on. A literate debate.

I should not even give you hints here - but you should at least have some knowledge of the epistles of St. Paul, the verisimilitude of the Acts of the Apostles ( which mention St. Paul), the existence of historical Christian sites in the areas that Paul wrote to just after the death of Jesus and so on.

So the burden of proof is on you to explain away all the evidence surrounding Jesus from people who knew him or his immediate followers. All of which which is pretty strong ( as is the evidence for Mohammed), Buddha less so.

It appears that you know nothing of the era and are going to dismiss as "not quite good enough proof for you" arguments from those of us who do know about the era. But I personally dont care about a historically illiterate opinion. I am going to absent from the debate because you did not start this thread to actually learn anything, or get a question answered, but leave the thread with the same idea you had coming in to it. So why bother?



Hardly. The historical era has historians, written evidence, letters etc. Again you dont really know much history, so again there is little point to this debate.

Sorry, if you are going to use the bible as a legitimate source of evidence then we can't take this conversation any further. What you are saying is "The biblical jesus existed because the bible says so and I have the evidence of the bible to prove that the bible says the biblical Jesus existed in the bible. BIBLE!!!"

If the only claims to the existance of this guy are in the bible then how is the bible a reference of evidence? Its circular reasoning.

Anyway, it seems you have had a nerve touched by questioning the veracity of your personal savior and missed my question entirely (for reference it was why do so many atheists feel compelled to say that they believe in the existance of a biblical christ (albeit a powerless one)

Gareth37

rockbeer wrote: »

The evidence is sketchy alright.

Pray to Our Lady for the Holy Spirit and you will be granted the grace of God.

Don't get caught up in work, money, fornication, drinking, drugs and the brainwashing that goes with these.

Don't be fooled that by the virtue of science and discovery that its ok to forget about God. No matter how much you try to disown God, He will never leave you. Its never too late to repent and no matter how much you try to ignore God He will not be leave you.

studiorat

Gareth37 wrote: »

Pray to Our Lady for the Holy Spirit and you will be granted the grace of God.

Don't get caught up in work, money, fornication, drinking, drugs and the brainwashing that goes with these.

Don't be fooled that by the virtue of science and discovery that its ok to forget about God. No matter how much you try to disown God, He will never leave you. Its never too late to repent and no matter how much you try to ignore God He will not be leave you.

Welcome to the forum. Any opinions on the Cult of the Christ?

link8r

There is a lot of evidence to suggest that there were a lot of Jesus' around at the time preaching similar ideas (think "Life of Brian"). Jerusalem at the time was under Roman occupation, there was economic hardship, the leadership seemed to be corrupt (lots of wealthy rulers with money to throw away, trading going on in temples, little or ineffective policing of Jews by Jews) - these conditions created a lot of revolutionary ideals and I think there were scrolls found written by other followers of other cult-like Jesus types but Jesus' teachings survived.

There is documentary evidence and archealogical/other historical evidence to support much of whats in the bible (e.g. that there were egyptians, that the Jews did live in Jerusalem, the was a Herrod, there was a big temple, the Romans were there, they did practice crucifiction, there was stoning) - so why would Atheists/Agnostics dispute there was a Jesus. They don't dispute there is a Dalai Lama or a pope either! It's the existence of God that is in dispute...

Pompey Magnus

Hivemind187 wrote: »

The character or even the man Jesus, in my opinion, is likely to have been nothing more than this. A series of other peoples whose works were attributed to a single person (created) by storytellers alledgedly spreading the word of that individual.

I'd say I pretty much agree with you, I do think it quite possible that some of the stories about Jesus we have today are to some degree a composite of stories from different individuals, however I find it too much of a leap to assume that there wasn't one central figure among these called Jesus who existed, who travelled around Judea preaching that the end of the world was coming with his 12 disciples, who did indeed say many of the things that is attributed to him in the New Testament and who was indeed crucified by Pontius Pilate.

jhegarty

How much history would you expect to service from what the authorities though of as the leader of small local cult in an insignificant corner of the empire ?

We lack the names of leaders of major nations from the year 0, it's quite a long time ago you know..

Perhaps the only thing we would expect is books written by his followers...oh wait.... we have that...

Pompey Magnus

link8r wrote: »

There is a lot of evidence to suggest that there were a lot of Jesus' around at the time preaching similar ideas (think "Life of Brian").

One study actually estimates that there were about 1,000 Yeshua bar Yosef's (Joshua/Jesus the son of Joseph) that lived in Jerusalem during the the 1st Century AD, Jesus had an extremely common name, his name was the equivalent of "Pat Murphy" in Ireland.

studiorat

Charco wrote: »

One study actually estimates that there were about 1,000 Yeshua bar Yosef's (Joshua/Jesus the son of Joseph) that lived in Jerusalem during the the 1st Century AD, Jesus had an extremely common name, his name was the equivalent of "Pat Murphy" in Ireland.

*sings*
"There's only one Pat Murphy!!!" thanks be to Jaysus!!

DapperGent

Hivemind187 wrote: »

Sorry, if you are going to use the bible as a legitimate source of evidence then we can't take this conversation any further. What you are saying is "The biblical jesus existed because the bible says so and I have the evidence of the bible to prove that the bible says the biblical Jesus existed in the bible. BIBLE!!!"

That's not what he said. Also you're being a dickhead.

Zillah

Gareth37 wrote: »

Pray to Our Lady for the Holy Spirit and you will be granted the grace of God.

Don't get caught up in work, money, fornication, drinking, drugs and the brainwashing that goes with these.

Don't be fooled that by the virtue of science and discovery that its ok to forget about God. No matter how much you try to disown God, He will never leave you. Its never too late to repent and no matter how much you try to ignore God He will not be leave you.

Dades, please don't infract/ban this guy. We can farm him.

Hivemind187

Charco wrote: »

I'd say I pretty much agree with you, I do think it quite possible that some of the stories about Jesus we have today are to some degree a composite of stories from different individuals, however I find it too much of a leap to assume that there wasn't one central figure among these called Jesus who existed, who travelled around Judea preaching that the end of the world was coming with his 12 disciples, who did indeed say many of the things that is attributed to him in the New Testament and who was indeed crucified by Pontius Pilate.

I understand what you are saying but I find there to be a lot of assumptions in that line of thought.

I'm also still waiting for physical evidence of the man. Or useful historical evidence of a single individual as described outside of the Bible.

link8r

Remember the Bible is an edited composite itself. It was translated by a man. Even today we can see the problems with translating a phrase in French or Spanish into English and how easily the real message/idea is lost - hence lost in translation. There were also many sects of Christianity at the time the New Testament was put together - these were the only books/scrolls/scripts common to all of them. There were many books left out of it.

The dead sea scrolls and other scrolls found, like the ones in Ethiopia date back to time very close to the bible and they concur with much of the current bible - the evidence that there was a a single man from which this branch of ideology grew is quite strong. Forget the bible - look at the evidence from which the bible is built. The many other books and scrolls have other information that isn't in the bible (not stating is that good or bad) - they may well have other background information, such as who was the leader of Rome at the time etc (it was a Ceasar - "give unto Ceasar that which belongs to Ceasar" - but do we know the real names of the Roman emperors -Ceasar means king, hardly given as a birth name)

If you're not religious (like myself) - looking at the Catholic church objectively out of historical interest, the "Procession of Popes" is, I think, one of the most interesting aspects of human history. It's a 2000 year old lineage that that has been very well documented and maintained, and almost connects right back to the very man we're disputing here. Its a much stronger case than we have for the existence of Plato, Archimedes, Julius Ceasar (in fact all the Roman Emporers), Brian Boru, Alexander the great. Even more than Tutankhamen except we have the body as evidence . If you can believe the 2000+ drawings that accompany him - yet there is no question of any of these people existing?

Pompey Magnus

Hivemind187 wrote: »

I'm also still waiting for physical evidence of the man. Or useful historical evidence of a single individual as described outside of the Bible.

But if you take that stance then it should mean that you apply it consistently to historical figures. For example it would mean you would have to also disbelieve the existence of Caesar's general Mark Anthony because of the poor evidence detailing his existence and the same for pretty much every accepted historcial figure.

rockbeer

Gareth37 wrote: »

Pray to Our Lady for the Holy Spirit and you will be granted the grace of God.

Don't get caught up in work, money, fornication, drinking, drugs and the brainwashing that goes with these.

Don't be fooled that by the virtue of science and discovery that its ok to forget about God. No matter how much you try to disown God, He will never leave you. Its never too late to repent and no matter how much you try to ignore God He will not be leave you.

Thanks for the lecture Gareth - I'll continue to do exactly what I consider best, just as I always have, but cheers anyway.

Why pick on me? I'm struggling to see how what you say is any kind of reply to that apparently random quote about sketchy evidence.

rockbeer

King Arthur is another interesing example of this kind of thing. Surrounded by legend and mythology, a hero in the collective memory, and yet not a shred of solid evidence for his existence.

The thing is, these stories start from somewhere, they don't just appear out of the blue. So it's actually more plausible to accept the likelihood of a historical figure than not, because without one you're still faced with the problem of where it all began.

The bizarre thing is how easily people are willing to suspend their critical faculties and accept fiction as fact. It's not just christians either. Go to Glastonbury and marvel at the Arthurian cult. It seems that people just need to believe in something.

MrDaithi

I don't have a problem being 100% certain that god does not exist and is the delusion of a guy called Jesus who did exist 2000 or so years go.

And there is a lot of evidence showing the Jesus wasn't Caucasian looking, that he had brothers and sisters and the church removed any mention of them in the texts. Also, the fact Mary was so young and Joseph was way older is creepy even in those days, I guess holy impregnation was more acceptable.

asdasd

I don't have a problem being 100% certain that god does not exist and is the delusion of a guy called Jesus who did exist 2000 or so years go.

Jesus hardly invented God, now did he?

And there is a lot of evidence showing the Jesus wasn't Caucasian looking,

Not really. He probably looked like a modern Jew.

that he had brothers and sisters and the church removed any mention of them in the texts.

until you came along ang found out the truth!
James is clearly mentioned as the brother of Jesus in Gallatians.

Also, the fact Mary was so young and Joseph was way older is creepy even in those days, I guess holy impregnation was more acceptable.

No it was standard enough. She was 14. People lived shorter lives. That was an acceptable age for bethroal.

asdasd

By the way I am not a Christian. However there are as amny myths amongst Atheists, badly learned nonsense about the Church manipulating texts etc. and so on which are clearly believed on faith

Dades

Gareth37 wrote: »

Pray to Our Lady for the Holy Spirit and you will be granted the grace of God....

Leave your placard at the door. Post something relevant to the thread, or not at all.

DapperGent wrote: »

That's not what he said. Also you're being a dickhead.

DapperGent taking a short break from A&A.

selephonic

I think the most reasonable explanation is that Jesus was, as has been pointed out, a collection of myths from a similar period. This created character was then consolidated by the Roman empire so as to extend their reach from the physical to the spiritual, something which continues to this day in the form of the pope.

There are of course all of the parallels between the supposed life of the Jeesus character and the lives of previous pagan demi-gods and sungods like Krisna, Dionysius and Osiris. It could be argued that Jesus was a reimagining of these myths to capture a new audience and consolidate the old one.

I certainly can't bring myself to believe that the biblical Jesus existed.

asdasd

I think the most reasonable explanation is that Jesus was, as has been pointed out, a collection of myths from a similar period.

who pointed that out? This thread is hopeless.

link8r

asdasd wrote: »

badly learned nonsense about the Church manipulating texts etc. and so on which are clearly believed on faith

Are you saying the church didn't manipulate texts ? How do you translate a document from Aramaic into Latin and then into English without manipulating it? Take "Holy Blood - Holy Grail" - the Aramaic (I think) for Grail is the same as it is for blood, yet in English there are two distinct words - the translator had to pick and therefore took the text into a distinct and separate path from the other literal translation (which he could have been right or wrong).

Secondly, it is document fact supported by both the Church and Atheists that the modern bible was assembled from different books and many items were intentionally discarded. IMHO: IF the bases for the bible is that it's the Word of God, it was the hand of man that cobbled it together - whether I believe in God or not, the bible certainly isnt a good place to start

Pompey Magnus

link8r wrote: »

Take "Holy Blood - Holy Grail" - the Aramaic (I think) for Grail is the same as it is for blood, yet in English there are two distinct words - the translator had to pick and therefore took the text into a distinct and separate path from the other literal translation (which he could have been right or wrong).

From what I remember that was French I think, something like San Graal meaning Holy Grail and Sang Raal meaning Royal Blood. These were translations of the medieval Grail stories and weren't Biblical translations (the Holy Grail is never mentioned in the Bible)

That said you are correct that the early Christians did change scripture to suit their own viewpoints, this is pretty much indisputed.

link8r

Yes sorry, I stand corrected it was the French wording in relation to Blood/Grail!