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Apologetics Thread!!!
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I really hope you are not trying to argue that the sources giving us our information on the Roman Republic during the time of Julius Caesar are as equally suspect as the Bible.
Heavens forbid. My point was that I feel the Gospels can be regarded as much (if not more) a historical narrative as the histories of Julius Caesar. I don't need to put down secular historical accounts in order to hold the Gospel accounts in high regard. It is only folks who have a bias against the possibility of miracles who have a problem with the Gospels being historically accurate, a frame of reference some people are so caught up in that they are incapable of seeing any other view as being right except theirs. The thing with Christianity is this and Fanny alluded to it earlier. Assuming a resurrection, bodily appearances and ascension all happened and all eyewitness to those events become believers, they automatically by virtue of their conversion become suspect and not a valid witness Unless a witness can be found who didn't become a believer but can vouch for what the converted have witnessed only then will you consider what those who have been converted as a result of what they were converted to. Don't you see the problem Christianity has here?
But be that as it may we are talking about the Gospel accounts being regarded as historical narratives of what the historical Jesus actually said and did. When you apply the tests you linked below they come out looking pretty good. Multiple attestation, the inclusion of embarrassing elements, the unembellished nature of Christ after the resurrection, i.e. they seen Him as a normal man and not as a blazing fire eyed white haired God like one would expect a Jewish person would expect to see of their Messiah. They are many more good examples which point to the Gospel writers as authentic re-tellers of a story, who in some cases are simply trying to get the gist of what Jesus said and did to an audience that was already converted.
And then there's the fact of their names Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. With the exception of John you would think that fraudsters would have picked more prominent names than Matthew, Mark and Luke. Like the Gnostic Gospels in the 2nd century did. Peter and Thomas etc.. It's little things like this that tip the scale in favour of them being genuine acounts rather than contrived.
Then there's the issue of so called contradiction in the accounts. The majority of historians will tell you that they would find it very suspect if there weren't any contradictions considering that each person is suppose to be telling the story from their own perspective or with the intension of teaching a particular principle about life without getting bogged down in the details that some of the other reporters get bogged down in, because what the latter in this wants to get across requires the detail unlike the former.
You go on about Caesar being validated by other sources. One of the two you mention lived centuries after the events he describes and yet there is no problem at all with his account being regarded as historical. And don't translate that into I don't think it is historical, I do, I would just like to see the Gospels get treated with the same kind of treatment. That was my point before you contrived your argument out of thin air to the contrary.
Good piece here on why the New Testament documents stand up pretty well when put to the tests of historicity that are described in the links you provided. http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/bib-docu.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_method
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source_criticism[/quote]
The Gospels pass with flying colors all these test. The problem for Christianity is that all the witnesses became believers. Only staunch non believers who are anti miracle will not accept it. Romans soldiers, Jewish leaders, Skeptics, ordinary folk and Enemies like Saul of Tarsus and heck even family members came to a faith in Jesus as the Son of God. Could you ever imagine actually believing that your brother truly was the Son of God? Well James did and there is no record that he ever followed Jesus before the so called resurrection. He was martyred for this belief even Josephus records that. So how can you explain hostile James’s conversion in the absence of any supernatural happenings? The New Testament states that Jesus appeared unto James, that would make a believer out of anyone I think.
Why is the existence of Caesar absolutely certain ?
I never said it wasn’t certain.
http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/bib-docu.html- We have multiple documents, written by multiple sources during Caesars lifetime and many more afterwards. Those sources are in turn supported by other sources. i.e > We know Cicero was real because there were multiple sources written about him. All these varying sources, from very important individuals all support and agree on some fundamental facts about an individual named Gaius Julius Caesar.
We have accounts of Caesar from external non-Roman sources including the enemies of Rome.
And I agree, even though we can analyze their writings and find that they talk of Caesar in glowing terms even though to many of the so called “barbarians” he wasn’t such a magnanimous figure. I mean how can the Romans who used Christians as human torches to light the gardens of Nero at night have the brass neck to call anyone barbaric? My point is that even though bias is present towards a certain view it does nothing to discredit the account as a whole. I only ask for the same treatment for the New Testament documents, they deserve that much at least.
- We have documents written by Caesar himself which also agree with the documents written by others.
If you ask me this fact does more to discredit those historians than it does to support their version of the events. You’ll find nothing like this in the New Testament.
- We have Caesars name inscribed all over Roman archeological artifacts.
There is also plenty of archeological evidence which supports the New Testament.
- Jesus for one. During his lifetime he did nothing of any importance to anyone besides his own followers. Christianity for its first few hundred years was one minority cult among many with barely a mention in any writings of the time, besides of course the religions own documents.
And that proves that the events described therein are not accurate?
- All the eyewitnesses in the gospels to the resurrection, they were of no historical importance to anyone in any way besides religious and within the religion itself.
Again what does that prove? Nothing!
- What we know about Caesar we know because of his importance in Roman politics, the writings of other important Roman politicians, the writings of his enemies, archaeological evidence both Roman and external etc.
You see what happens when you get an idea into your head that someone (ME) is arguing something (Caesar did not exist) which they are not arguing?
- For example we know relatively little about Pontius Pilate but still his existence is more credible than Jesus as his existence is supported by a few different sources. Details of his life however are scant to say the least.
Your problem is that you see the New Testament writings as one book written by a collaboration of biased individuals who are only out to prove one thing – that Jesus was the Son of God. It’s not. It is a collection of books and letters written by different individuals in different places at different times, probably at a time when they weren’t sure if any of the others were alive or not. And yet you find within their pages an attention to detail in some of the lesser important elements of their accounts which precludes that they were just making it all up just to save face. Then you have the so called contradictions which rules out collaboration. If they all sat down together and were just a bunch of idiots making it all up then there would be no contradictions at all, which like I said earlier would raise the red flag to the majority of historians worth their salt analyzing their accounts today.
The following principles are cited from two Scandinavian textbooks on source criticism, Olden-Jørgensen (1998) and Thurén (1997) written by historians:
Human sources may be relics (e.g. a fingerprint) or narratives (e.g. a statement or a letter). Relics are more credible sources than narrratives.
We have more relics then we can count for Caesar.
So if early Christians had spent more time sculpting statues of Jesus and inscribing ‘Jesus was the Son of God’ all over the place then Christianity would more credible? That’s like saying in 2000 years from now figurines of Hitler would be more valuable than Mein Kampf. And ye guys have the audacity to call our reasoning illogical.
A given source may be forged or corrupted; strong indications of the originality of the source increases its reliability.
Let the bloody thing speak for itself before disparaging it. My Lord they way you go on it sound like you’re terrified to find out something that just doesn’t gel with how you see and want reality to be. Surely that method is not a good basis to proceed either? Treat everything as suspect until it can absolutely be proven 100% to be accurate? There is no such monster be it in religious or secular texts. Like I said let the documents speak for themselves. If they are really suspect they will be found out soon enough.
The closer a source is to the event which it purports to describe, the more one can trust it to give an accurate description of what really happened
The writings supporting Caesar were written during his lifetime and afterwards.
The writings supporting Jesus were written well after his lifetime.
Given this chart and your own criteria the NT wins hands down.
A primary source is more reliable than a secondary source, that is more reliable than a tertiary source and so on.
We have multiple accounts of Caesar written by people who knew him. (who in turn had multiple accounts written by people who knew them)
Your eyewitness accounts were not written by the eyewitnesses.
Name the ones that were not eyewitness and tell us how you concluded that they were not in fact eyewitnesses.
If a number of independent sources contain the same message, the credibility of the message is strongly increased.
We have multiple sources for Caesar.
We have one (two, Josephus ?) source for Jesus.
We also have Tacitus, Pliny, Josephus and other extra biblical sources which agree that a Jesus who was viewed as the Christ existed, and as already stated earlier the New Testament texts themselves were written by different writers which although biased in relation to what they believed about Jesus are still evidence that Jesus existed. I’m just wanting a level playing field here. I don’t want people to believe everything in the New Testament because it has be shown that it is most likely true given the evidence both biblical and no biblical that the Jesus of the New Testament actually lived.
The tendency of a source is its motivation for providing some kind of bias. Tendencies should be minimized or supplemented with opposite motivations.
OK then give us an example of what you mean in the histories of Julius Caesar. Give us an example of something which say, discredits Caesar as being the rightful ruler of Rome written in the annals of the Roman Empire. And then explain why the absence of it in these writings is good reason to regard those histories as unreliable sources? Because that is exactly what the New Testament has to put up with when it comes to Jesus. My point is that you won’t find written down in the history of the Roman empire any derogatory slurs (on the part of the history writer) against Caesar, so why should you expect to find them in other historical accounts of other people whom the writer thought worthy of writing about? That doesn’t prove Jesus was the Son of God but it sure doesn’t mean that the writings are bogus either.
We have multiple accounts of Caesar by political allies, political enemies, military allies, military enemies. We have accounts of Caesar from within and outside the Roman Empire, all during his lifetime.
Look you said it yourself earlier:
“For example we know relatively little about Pontius Pilate but still his existence is more credible than Jesus as his existence is supported by a few different sources. Details of his life however are scant to say the least.”
And:
“All the eyewitnesses in the gospels to the resurrection, they were of no historical importance to anyone in any way besides religious and within the religion itself.”
You even admit that Christianity didn’t start to flourish until centuries after its inception, so why would any historian back then dare to write anything on a positive note about an apocalyptic rabble rousing upstart Jew called Jesus who the Romans themselves crucified as a criminal when they were primarily employed to write about Emperors and such like?
The gospels are religiously biased.
Well you know what they say? When in Rome do as the Romans do.
“Upon his death in AD 14, Augustus was declared a god by the Senate, to be worshipped by the Romans.” More here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustus
If it can be demonstrated that the witness (or source) has no direct interest in creating bias, the credibility of the message is increased.”
As with Caesar we have multiple sources with no direct interest.
Yes but what if you were left with just the Roman version of the life of Caesar? Would you throw that out as unhistorical? I think not. Hence the hypocritical double standard when it comes to the New Testament documents.
Not so with Jesus. (except possibly Josephus)
Non Biblical sources for on Jesus:
JEWISH SOURCES ON JESUS
Flavius Josephus, Antiquties of the Jews
written about 94 A.D.
He (Annas the Younger) convened a judicial session of the Sanhedrin and brought before it the brother of Jesus the so-called Christ -- James by name -- and some others, whom he charged with breaking the law and handed over to be stoned to death. - Antiquities 20.200
Now, there was about this time Jesus, a wise man for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of principal men among us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him. And the tribe of Christians, so named for him, are not extinct to this day.- Antiquities 18.63-64 (Greek)
Epitome from Church History of Agapius
(Arabic)
At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus. And his conduct was good and he was known to be virtuous. And many from among the Jews and other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. And those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that he was alive. Accordingly he was perhaps the Messiah concerning who the prophets have recounted wonders.
Babylonian Talmud
On the eve of Passover Yeshua was hanged. For forty days before the execution a herald went forth and cried, "He is going to be stoned because he has practiced sorcery and enticed Israel to apostasy. Anyone who can say anything in his favor, let him come forward and plead on his behalf." But since nothing was brought forward in his favor he was hanged on the eve of Passover. - Sanhedrin 43a
ROMAN (PAGAN) SOURCES ON JESUS
Gaius Suetonius, Lives of the Twelve Caesars
written about 100-125 A.D.
He expelled the Jews from Rome, on account of riots in which they were constantly indulging, at the instigation of Chrestus. - Claudius 25.4
Punishment was inflicted on the Christians, a body of people addicted to a novel and mischievous superstition. - Nero 16.2
Cornelius Tacitus, Annals
written in the 2nd century A.D.
But neither the aid of men, nor the emperor's bounty, nor propitiatory offerings to the gods, could remove the grim suspicion that the fire had been started by Nero's order. To put an end to this rumor, he shifted the charge on to others, and inflicted the most cruel tortures upon a group of people detested for their abominations, and popularly known as "Christians". Their name came from one Christus, who was put to death in the principate of Tiberius by the Procurator Pontius Pilate. Though checked for a time, the destructive superstition broke out again, not in Judaea only, where its mischief began, but even in Rome, where every abominable and shameful iniquity, from all the world, pours in and finds a welcome. - Annals 15.44
Mara bar Serapion, Letter to Son Serapion
What advantage did the Athenians gain from putting Socrates to death? Famine and plague came upon them as a judgment for their crime. What advantage did the men of Samos gain from burning Pythagoras? In a moment their land was covered with sand. What advantage did the Jews gain from executing their wise king? It was just after that their kingdom was abolished. God justly avenged these three wise men: the Jews, ruined and driven from their land, live in complete dispersion. But Socrates did not die for good; he lived on in the teaching of Plato. Pythagoras did not die for good; he lived on in the statue of Hera. Nor did the wise king die for good; he lived on in the teaching which he had given.
Pliny the Younger, Letters to Trajan
It is my rule, Sire, to refer to you in matters where I am uncertain. For who can better direct my hesitation or instruct my ignorance? I was never present at any trial of Christians; therefore I do not know what are the customary penalties or investigations, and what limits are observed. I have hesitated a great deal on the question whether there should be any distinction of ages; whether the weak should have the same treatment as the most robust; whether those who recant should be pardoned, or whether a man who has ever been a Christian should gain nothing by ceasing to be such; whether the name itself, even if innocent of crime, should be punished, or only the crimes attaching to that name.
Meanwhile, this is the course that I have adopted in the case of those brought before me as Christians. I ask them if they are Christians. If they admit it I repeat the question a second and a third time, threatening capital punishment; if they persist I sentence them to death ...
All who denied that they were or had been Christians I considered should be discharged, because they called upon the gods at my dictation and did reverence, with incense and wine, to your image ... and especially because they cursed Christ, a thing which, it is said, genuine Christians cannot be induced to do. Others named by the informer first said they were Christians and then denied it, declaring that they had been but were no longer, some having recanted three years or more before and one or two as long ago as twenty years. They all worshipped your image and the statues of the gods and cursed Christ. But they declared that the sum of their guilt or error had amounted only to this, that on an appointed day they had been accustomed to meet before daybreak, and to recite a hymn antiphonally to Christ, as to a god, and to bind themselves by an oath, not for the commission of any crime but to abstain from theft, robbery, adultery and breach of faith and not to deny a deposit when it was claimed. After the conclusion of this ceremony it was their custom to depart and meet again to take food: but it was ordinary and harmless food, and they had ceased this practice after my edict in which, in accordance with your orders, I had forbidden secret societies. I though it more necessary, therefore, to find out what truth there was in this by applying torture to two maidservants, who were called deaconesses. But I found nothing but a depraved and extravagant superstition, and I therefore postponed my examination and had recourse to you for consultation. - Letters 10.96
ibid., Trajan's Reply
The method you have pursued, my dear Pliny, in sifting the cases of those denounced to you as Christians is extremely proper. It is not possible to lay down any general rule which can be applied as the fixed standard in all cases of this nature. No search should be made for these people; when they are denounced and found guilty they must be punished; with the restriction, however, that when the party denies himself to be a Christian, and shall give proof that he is not, that is by adoring our gods, he shall be pardoned on the ground of repentance, even though he may have formerly incurred suspicion. Information without the accuser's name subscribed must not be admitted in evidence against anyone, as it is introducing a very dangerous precedent, and by no means agreeable to the spirit of the age. - Letters 10.97
We may add the following principles:
Knowledge of source criticism cannot substitute subject knowledge:
"Because each source teaches you more and more about your subject, you will be able to judge with ever-increasing precision the usefulness and value of any prospective source. In other words, the more you know about the subject, the more precisely you can identify what you must still find out". (Bazerman, 1995, p. 304).
Yes that is all great but where does the jump to “The New Testament documents are unreliable” come from?
The reliability of a given source is relative to the questions put to it.
"The empirical case study showed that most people find it difficult to assess questions of cognitive authority and media credibility in a general sense, for example, by comparing the overall credibility of newspapers and the Internet. Thus these assessments tend to be situationally sensitive. Newspapers, television and the Internet were frequently used as sources of orienting information, but their credibility varied depending on the actual topic at hand" (Savolainen, 2007).
Yes but you will still pick up a newspaper and read what it has to say and you will still watch the news on TV and listen to what its says and weigh everything up after that in your mind. I say that the New Testament documents deserves at least the same level of courtesy. What we have though is a world which will willy nilly accept as reliable historical documents the earliest extant copies of which dating hundreds of years after the events they describe as reliable because the events and sayings therein just don’t make any claim to total commitment to the subject of those writings on the part of the reader, whereas to believe the events described in the New Testament as historical facts would mean you’d be insane to choose otherwise.
Anyway I don’t get much time to post these days because I’m so darn busy in work, so as soon as I can I will pop back I will. Thanks to all for your contributions to this thread.0 -
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Yes but they should surely, if being consistent, open the door to everything beyond the physical universe. Anything humans can imagine. And we have imagined an awful lot. There are thousands of religions and hundreds of thousands if not millions of claimed supernatural phenomena or happenings, witnessed or otherwise.Fanny Cradock wrote: »No! I am saying that most beliefs or worldviews other than naturalism open the door to something beyond the physical universe.
What exactly is it about Christianity's specific claims of supernatural happenings that someone coming to this with an open mind but without the preconceived notion that God exists, would find compelling that they wouldn't find in most other stories of supernatural events that believers claim are true?Fanny Cradock wrote: »So, yes, I guess, that at a purely perfunctory and cursory level, all supernatural claims are plausible - in the same way that natural claims are also plausible. That there is an abundance of supernatural claims - both from within Christianity and outside - doesn't actually mean that they are all false.
Yeah but that isn't it issue is it.
Christian apologetics are about the idea that Christian faith is rational and reasonable, so I assume this thread is about, rather than about Christians arguing that atheists haven't put forward a good enough reason to stop believing.
The main reply to most of the objections being put forward here is that yes all these things are implausible if you start from a position of non-belief. But isn't that not exactly where we are supposed to be starting from?
If Christian faith is rational and reasonable it should be possible to get from a position of non-belief to a position of belief following a rational argument.
There is no point attacking us for being close minded to the possibilities, everyone is close minded to possibilities until they are presented to arguments not to be.
I'm reminded of the old saying that Christians are atheists with the exception of one god, actual atheists just take it one step further.
So you guys already dismiss 99.999% of supernatural claims as things you see no reason to believe in. Atheists extend this to Christianity, and are then dismissed as being close minded. Yes we are, that is the point.
What is the argument that applies to Christianity that doesn't apply to all other supernatural events (which neither of us believe in) that should take a non-believer and rationally transport them to being a believer.
People have mentioned eye-witnesses a lot, but to me that doesn't make sense. Most supernatural events have eye witnesses. Neither of us believe in them simply because they have eye witnesses. There are far more eye witnesses to the miracles of Jim Jones than to Jesus, I don't believe in Jim Jones and I imagine neither do you (interestingly some of his ex-followers who no longer believe he was sent by God still believe he had magical healing power)
So there has to be more to the argument than simply saying that the resurrection has people claiming to have witnessed it.0 -
There is no point attacking us for being close minded to the possibilities
I haven't attacked you guys over anything - especially about being closed minded. If you happen to think that belief in the supernatural opens all possibilities, and these possibilities are all of equal probability, then bully for you. I don't.I'm reminded of the old saying that Christians are atheists with the exception of one god, actual atheists just take it one step further.
If you put any weight on the old saying that we Christians are only a hop-step-and-a-jump away from being atheists that again is just fine. But I fail to see that actually means. I don't bother saying that you are only one god away from being a theist because I believe it would be a childish way of trying to muddy the waters.If Christian faith is rational and reasonable it should be possible to get from a position of non-belief to a position of belief following a rational argument.
There are plenty of former non-Christians who would state that they found the arguments for Christianity instrumental in convincing them of the truth claims of Christianity. There are still more who found the arguments presented to be sufficiently rational to help them along the road to faith in Jesus, the resurrection etc.
Again, I fail to see your point. Your rational arguments, for example, have failed to convince me. So I'm not sure where that leaves you and your criticism of Christianity apparent failure to muster rational arguments. 0 -
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It is worth remembering what is actually meant by supernatural. It is something beyond what can be scientifically detected. And as such, I don't know how it can make any sense to “consider them as being possible”. By their nature, they do not lend themselves to such rational assessment. You can do little more than arbitrarily decide which if any of such claims you want to believe in. To some of us it seems reasonable, and it is certainly consistent, to reject them all..... Until there is evidence found for them. At which point they will be downgraded from supernatural to plain old natural.chozometroid wrote: »You reject every supernatural claim, no matter what it is, because you reject "the supernatural" or the superset of supernatural claims. It is not possible for you to accept a supernatural claim, because they are not even options.
Franny however, accepts "the supernatural," meaning she actually has options of claims to choose from, and is actually able to consider them as being possible.
Of course it is worth pointing out that according to the view broadly taken by Christians on this thread, the resurrection of Jesus was not a supernatural event. They claim that the evidence supports the view that this historical event did in fact occur and as such, it was a natural event, albeit an extremely rare if not unique one.
BTW, unless Fanny has had some recent gender realignment, I am fairly sure she is a he!
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postcynical wrote: »SW- Bit of a monster you've born here, hope it goes well. Too fast moving a thread for me to keep up with.
Tell me about it, I can only get time at night to post. Have to hit the hey now, wrecked, night night all
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I've no idea, I wasn't there. Neither were you.
We only have a filtered version of events written decades after they happened by the religious followers who came afterwards (lets ask Tom Cruise what he really thinks of L. Ron Hubbard shall we...)
We have no idea what actually happened, why anyone may have lied or conned or been deluded. .
We have loads of idea what happened, we have the historical record. It amazes me how you can say to me 'how do you know you weren't there?' when you will stand up and claim evolution, yet you weren't there? Your double standard is amazing. And now your comparing Christianity to scirntology, or will you deny that as well?
Why and how?Therefore your claim then that they had nothing to gain by lying or being deluded is utterly baseless and frankly ridiculous. .
Heavens you brought up Jonestownin post #3 and right away compared it to the claims of the apostles.Well it was Jonestown actually, and I wasn't making it analogous I was pointing out that humans are not predictable machines who always make predictable judgements. Jim Jones had nothing to gain by killing himself, he still did it without actually believing he was a prophet. . And then you bring it up again in post #103.
Because that's what Jones did and you keep comparing the two.What does that have to do with anything?.
No, its probably because you are so inconsistent and around teh bend that your point is impossible to determine.You are (on purpose I would imagine) are utterly missing the point. .Your argument is that they must have believed in Jesus' resurrection because they would have nothing to gain by going along with it if they didn't believe. I'm saying that is nonsense reasoning. Even if we accept the time line as told in the Bible, humans do harmful things to themselves without any apparent gain all the time.
No my argument is that they believe in the resurrection because they witnessed the risen Christ.
Stop putting words into my mouth.:mad:0 -
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