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Who do you think Jesus was

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    #212
    King Mob
    Registered Users Posts: 25,229 ✭✭✭✭King Mob


    robindch wrote: »
    I'm talking about the apostles believing that they were going to heaven.

    Are you saying that they didn't believe they were going there?

    He's insisting on the false dichotomy that they either saw and believed it or they entirely made it up by them. He argues that since no one would die for something they made up the latter cannot be true.


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    #213
    JimiTime
    Registered Users Posts: 7,418 ✭✭✭JimiTime


    robindch wrote: »
    I'm talking about the apostles believing that they were going to heaven.

    Are you saying that they didn't believe they were going there?

    If they made up the resurrection story , then they certainly WOULD NOT believe, as they would have known that they were lying. Thats what makes it different from a suicide bomber etc. If the apostles were wrong, they were weren't simply wrong, they were knowingly lying. As I said, there is no argument againt the fact that people die for what they believe in, be it false or true. But multiples of people knowingly dying for a lie is what the apostles were doing if the accusation of porkies is made. So if we are saying that the apostles died for a belief, then that belief is that they witnessed the risen Jesus, experienced the signs he performed, and performed great signs themselves. If the accusation is that the apostles lied, then we must then say that the apostles knowingly died for a lie and NOT a belief.


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    #214
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,402 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    JimiTime wrote: »
    If the accusation is that the apostles lied, then we must then say that the apostles knowingly died for a lie and NOT a belief.
    I'm not sure that I'm being quite crystally clear enough. There are two beliefs here:
    1. They believed that they saw Jesus come back to life having been executed by the Romans.
    2. The apostles believed that they were going to live forever because Jesus told them so.

    You are assuming that because (1) is true, that (2) must be true. That this assumption holds true is a belief.

    Therefore, they died for a belief.


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    #215
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    oldrnwisr wrote: »
    Asked and answered and answered again and again.

    Answered badly multiple times on this forum. There is no decent reason why they would go out and risk their lives if they didn't genuinely believe in it. There was zero benefit in doing so. I suspect they did believe in it, that leaves us two possibilities left : 1) deluded, 2) telling the truth. Actually these 2 factors are also the two possibilities in terms of my faith as well. I could be deluded, or I could be testifying to truth.


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    #216
    The Mad Hatter
    Registered Users Posts: 4,718 ✭✭✭The Mad Hatter


    Jakkass wrote: »
    Answered badly multiple times on this forum. There is no decent reason why they would go out and risk their lives if they didn't genuinely believe in it. There was zero benefit in doing so. I suspect they did believe in it, that leaves us two possibilities left : 1) deluded, 2) telling the truth.

    Those are the only two options? And how do we know they weren't deluded?


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    #217
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    The Mad Hatter wrote: »
    Those are the only two options?

    There may be more, but they are the only two that seem reasonable as far as I can see it.
    The Mad Hatter wrote: »
    And how do we know they weren't deluded?

    I'm not even arguing this at present. I'm accepting the possibility that they were. All I was looking to gain from this discussion is the acknowledgement that it is incredibly unlikely that people would be motivated to die for what they knew for a lie given that there was nothing to be gained from it.


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    #218
    coffee_cake
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Politics Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 81,309 CMod ✭✭✭✭coffee_cake


    Jakkass wrote: »
    There may be more, but they are the only two that seem reasonable as far as I can see it.



    I'm not even arguing this at present. I'm accepting the possibility that they were. All I'm looking to gain from this discussion is the acknowledgement that it is incredibly unlikely that people would be motivated to die for what they knew for a lie given that there was nothing to be gained from it.

    I imagine you dont have the same faith as muslim suicide bombers so... :confused::confused::confused:

    I have no idea where this argument is going. People being willing to die for something has absolutely no bearing on whether that something is true or not, and that is that.


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    #219
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    bluewolf wrote: »
    I imagine you dont have the same faith as muslim suicide bombers so... :confused::confused::confused:

    Do those suicide bombers believe that they are dying for a lie? - I haven't said anything about people dying for what they believe in. I'm saying that if the disciples didn't believe in the Gospel that there would have been absolutely no gain in risking their lives for a lie. This has nothing to do with dying for ones beliefs.


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    #220
    The Mad Hatter
    Registered Users Posts: 4,718 ✭✭✭The Mad Hatter


    I don't think anyone is arguing that they died for something they didn't believe was true...


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    #221
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    The Mad Hatter - Read the thread. People have suggested that this was a possibility albeit probably a good few pages ago now. The idea that the disciples made up Christianity and then went out and told it was mentioned in the thread.


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    #222
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    JimiTime wrote: »
    This has been explained to you serveral times WN. The difference is that the apostles would have been dying for WHAT THEY KNEW TO BE A LIE. A suicide bomber, a cult member, a kamikaze pilot etc, die for a belief.

    You seem to be unfamiliar with Jonestown.

    Jim Jones shot himself in the head. He also ordered that all his followers kill themselves. His closest lieutenants, who helped him fake his healing sessions, killed their families and then themselves.

    The idea that the apostles would not have allowed themselves to be killed for something they (at some point) knew was not true is unsupported by human psychology.

    It is debatable whether the apostles knew it was a lie or not, but it is not in anyway unreasonable to suggest that they would have died for that lie.
    JimiTime wrote: »
    The apostles would have known that their stories were lies, so would have gone to their death for something they knew was a steaming pile.

    Correct. Christians talk about that as if it could never happen. In reality it happens all the time in cults an other similar organisation. It happens for various reasons, from guilt of admitting the truth publicly, to the persons mind simply being all over the place and them eventually ending up believing the lie they started (such seems to be the case with Jones)
    JimiTime wrote: »
    That, is highly unlikely.
    No actually it is not. What is more unlikely would have been if they had declared it was all fake.


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    #223
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    Jakkass wrote: »
    Answered badly multiple times on this forum. There is no decent reason why they would go out and risk their lives if they didn't genuinely believe in it.

    If that was true there would never be another cult.

    I can't believe you and Jimi are so naive with this stuff. Have you never studied, even just superficially, what goes on in cults such as Jonestown?

    It is plausible that the apostles, stricken with grief would have imagined, embellished or even out right lied about seeing Jesus alive after his death.

    It is plausible that they would have come to believe these stories as if they really happened, and happily faced death because of this belief.

    It is even plausible that they would have continued to rationally know that these stories were fibs and happily faced death rather than admit the truth, either to others or to themselves.

    All these alternatives are not only plausible but are supported by examples in other cults.

    In fact the least likely outcome based on how people are in cults is that they aposels would have admitted it was all nonsense, Jesus died and they stole the body or what ever actually happened.
    Jakkass wrote: »
    There was zero benefit in doing so.
    What was the benefit of Jim Jones blowing his head off in South America?


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    #224
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    The Mad Hatter wrote: »
    I don't think anyone is arguing that they died for something they didn't believe was true...

    It is not been argued specifically. What is being argued is the position Jakkass and Jimitime are putting forward which says this simply would not have happened. That position is, frankly, nonsense. There are numerous examples of the actual cult leader himself (ie the one person who must know or have known that it was a lie) suiciding himself or putting himself in a position to die rather than simply stop and admit it was all made up.

    The example I'm using (perhaps unhelpfully since neither Jimi nor Jakkass seem that familiar with it) is Jim Jones, who decided that rather than allow his church and plantation to be split up he would order his followers to kill themselves before taking a gun and shooting himself in the head.

    Jones, and his closest followers, must have, at some point, known that they were making stuff up. Jones used to get is followers to help him con people at his healing sessions.

    Jakass asks what was the benefit of the apostles letting themselves die rather than admit the truth. Well what was the benefit of what Jim Jones died?

    Rationally there was no benefit. But who said anything about rationality, this is religion we are talking about here :P


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    #225
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    Wicknight - I've explained rather simply how the circumstances clearly differ from a suicide cult, but if you want to continue being patently dishonest that's up to you I guess :)


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    #226
    The Mad Hatter
    Registered Users Posts: 4,718 ✭✭✭The Mad Hatter


    Wicknight wrote: »
    It is not been argued specifically. What is being argued is the position Jakkass and Jimitime are putting forward which says this simply would not have happened. That position is, frankly, nonsense. There are numerous examples of the actual cult leader himself (ie the one person who must know or have known that it was a lie) suiciding himself or putting himself in a position to die rather than simply stop and admit it was all made up.

    The example I'm using (perhaps unhelpfully since neither Jimi nor Jakkass seem that familiar with it) is Jim Jones, who decided that rather than allow his church and plantation to be split up he would order his followers to kill themselves before taking a gun and shooting himself in the head.

    Jones, and his closest followers, must have, at some point, known that they were making stuff up. Jones used to get is followers to help him con people at his healing sessions.

    Jakass asks what was the benefit of the apostles letting themselves die rather than admit the truth. Well what was the benefit of what Jim Jones died?

    Rationally there was no benefit. But who said anything about rationality, this is religion we are talking about here :P

    What can be interesting about these people is that they often believe in spite of the fact that they're frauds. This is something I saw in the documentary Marjoe - Marjoe himself didn't believe, but several of the other preachers who he spoke to clearly did. All of them used the same hucksterish techniques to leverage money out of their congregations.

    It's something you can see in the kind of sad people who apply for the James Randi prize. I don't think it's likely many people would kill themselves or die for something they didn't believe in, but I'm pretty sure some people can convince themselves to believe in anything, to the point of being willing to die for it.


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    #227
    King Mob
    Registered Users Posts: 25,229 ✭✭✭✭King Mob


    I've posited several theories in which the Apostles both make everything up yet also die for them. They have been ignored.

    1. The Apostles genuinely believed in the moral message of an ordinary preacher (or even just the message itself) and created stories of the miracles to help spread the message more convincingly.
    2. The Apostles' death aren't as reported. They were caught and punished for their cult and only became brave, pious martyrs after the fact when the story was spun by the other apostles or by genuine believers.


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    #228
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    King Mob - The problem with the first is that Christian morality is centred around the Resurrection, and indeed before that the Fall.

    Christians believe that it is because of the sin of mankind that the world needs a Saviour. God in the beginning created the world and He gave us standards for our own benefit to live by, we in our selfishness rejected God, and rejected His standard. We are liable to His punishment for neglecting His authority in His world. We have all done this. Therefore we are all liable to His punishment. Jesus in coming into the world, lived a perfect live, and died the death we deserved to die in order that we might be able to start afresh and be forgiven. Christian morality is centred around the idea that we can now aim to be as we were in the beginning, striving each and every day towards God's standards because Jesus has made the way for us to be reconciled with God again.

    Without this, there isn't such a thing as Christian ethics which is centred around the being of God Himself. Without grace, mercy and forgiveness at the centre we are doomed to trying to construct an inadequate form of I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine ethics. We ignore the actual problem in a sense from a Christian point of view.


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    #229
    Zillah
    Registered Users Posts: 17,371 ✭✭✭✭Zillah


    I utterly fail to see why the apostles' willingness to die for their beliefs says anything about how likely those beliefs are to be true. I've seen the absurd gymnastics that the average believer today can put their brains through, I can only imagine the ruination of the mind in someone who believes they studied under the personification of the creator of the universe.


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    #230
    King Mob
    Registered Users Posts: 25,229 ✭✭✭✭King Mob


    Jakkass wrote: »
    King Mob - The problem with the first is that Christian morality is centred around the Resurrection, and indeed before that the Fall.

    Christians believe that it is because of the sin of mankind that the world needs a Saviour. God in the beginning created the world and He gave us standards for our own benefit to live by, we in our selfishness rejected God, and rejected His standard. We are liable to His punishment for neglecting His authority in His world. We have all done this. Therefore we are all liable to His punishment. Jesus in coming into the world, lived a perfect live, and died the death we deserved to die in order that we might be able to start afresh and be forgiven. Christian morality is centred around the idea that we can now aim to be as we were in the beginning, striving each and every day towards God's standards because Jesus has made the way for us to be reconciled with God again.

    Without this, there isn't such a thing as Christian ethics which is centred around the being of God Himself. Without grace, mercy and forgiveness at the centre we are doomed to trying to construct an inadequate form of I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine ethics. We ignore the actual problem in a sense from a Christian point of view.

    That's great and all Jakkass, but all that is after the fact. That faff is all based on reasoning made by people other than the apostles well well after the resurrection.
    It doesn't discount that the apostles simply made up the resurrection.
    Nor does it account for some of the Christians I know who do not believe the resurrection is important.

    And how do you account for the second scenario?


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    #231
    The Mad Hatter
    Registered Users Posts: 4,718 ✭✭✭The Mad Hatter


    King Mob wrote: »
    I've posited several theories in which the Apostles both make everything up yet also die for them. They have been ignored.

    1. The Apostles genuinely believed in the moral message of an ordinary preacher (or even just the message itself) and created stories of the miracles to help spread the message more convincingly.
    2. The Apostles' death aren't as reported. They were caught and punished for their cult and only became brave, pious martyrs after the fact when the story was spun by the other apostles or by genuine believers.

    The first of those doesn't seem particularly convincing. We get the occasional sceptic on here even who posits that there is a moral lesson to be gained from religion, even if they don't believe in religion themselves, but these people tend to be pretty watery in their beliefs, and don't generally hold out for very long.

    The second is a fair argument, though. I think, given the rest of the bible (and many historical and religious documents), that there's fair precedent for embellishment and making things up after the fact.


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    #232
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    Zillah - I haven't even said that.


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    #233
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    King Mob wrote: »
    Nor does it account for some of the Christians I know who do not believe the resurrection is important.

    Interesting that you say that but I think you'd agree that the Resurrection is clearly very central to the Christian message even if it is a load of twaddle. I would question as to what degree one could legitimately believe in it otherwise.


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    #234
    King Mob
    Registered Users Posts: 25,229 ✭✭✭✭King Mob


    The Mad Hatter wrote: »
    The first of those doesn't seem particularly convincing. We get the occasional sceptic on here even who posits that there is a moral lesson to be gained from religion, even if they don't believe in religion themselves, but these people tend to be pretty watery in their beliefs, and don't generally hold out for very long.
    Well the first one doesn't depend on the moral lesson being very good, just that the apostles believe in it enough so they feel it's worth lying a little to spread it.

    Of course it could be the case were they were giving the stories of allegory to help people understand the moral lessons only to become taken as actual events.
    For example, the apostles wish to explain that by loving and giving into God you can find a spiritual rebirth (you know like the "spiritual death" in the garden of eden). So to illustrate this they make a story (or embellish a true one) where their preacher character is put to death, but by giving into God gains rebirth. And this eventually becomes an actually rebirth rather than a spiritual one in later, second hand retellings.


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    #235
    King Mob
    Registered Users Posts: 25,229 ✭✭✭✭King Mob


    Jakkass wrote: »
    Interesting that you say that but I think you'd agree that the Resurrection is clearly very central to the Christian message even if it is a load of twaddle. I would question as to what degree one could legitimately believe in it otherwise.
    http://neverfeltbetter.wordpress.com/2011/04/11/the-teachings-are-the-important-part/

    Jakkass, why are you dodging the other questions?
    Come on man, you're better than those tactics.


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    #236
    strobe
    Closed Accounts Posts: 7,872 ✭✭✭strobe


    Zillah wrote: »
    I utterly fail to see why the apostles' willingness to die for their beliefs says anything about how likely those beliefs are to be true. I've seen the absurd gymnastics that the average believer today can put their brains through, I can only imagine the ruination of the mind in someone who believes they studied under the personification of the creator of the universe.
    Jakkass wrote: »
    Zillah - I haven't even said that.

    Lol what?

    You never stop saying it ye big mad Christian bastard.

    Jesus...:pac:


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    #237
    oldrnwisr
    Registered Users Posts: 1,594 ✭✭✭oldrnwisr


    Jakkass wrote: »
    Answered badly multiple times on this forum.

    Just because your faith requires you to discount those answers doesn't make them bad, just bad news for your chosen mythology.
    Jakkass wrote: »
    There is no decent reason why they would go out and risk their lives if they didn't genuinely believe in it.

    First of all, those who died may in fact have genuinely believed it. The fact that the story is untrue is not connected to whether people believe it or not. After all, we tell children that Santa Claus exists and they wholeheartedly believe it even though we know it's not true.
    Jakkass wrote: »
    There was zero benefit in doing so.

    Really? Have you not heard of martyrdom? The benefit for them was that they are remembered as martyrs, holy warriors. The benefit for the mythology is 2.2 billion followers and 15 billion dollars in the bank with no taxes to pay. [1] [2]


    Jakkass wrote: »
    I suspect they did believe in it, that leaves us two possibilities left : 1) deluded, 2) telling the truth. Actually these 2 factors are also the two possibilities in terms of my faith as well. I could be deluded, or I could be testifying to truth.

    Well, I wouldn't agree completely that those are the only possibilities, but for the sake of argument let's go with them. The only way to decide between delusion and truth is to examine the evidence. The evidence, such as it is, is stacked in favour of delusion.

    We have numerous examples of people dying for cult leaders : Jonestown, Waco, Heaven's Gate, Order of the Solar Temple.

    We have numerous examples of self-declared messiahs such as Claude Vorilhon, David Icke, Apollo Quiboloy etc.

    We have numerous examples of resurrection stories from other mythologies such as Odin or Quetzlcoatl.

    We have numerous examples of people dying because of their belief in modern religions: Christianity, Islam, Judaism and even Sikhism.

    We don't have any physical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus as Christians believe it. We don't have any contemporary accounts of the resurrection. We have no extra-biblical evidence for the resurrection.

    On this basis, I think that delusion is not only a plausible choice but a probable one.

    On a personal note, I don't think there is necessarily any sinister motive involved in the creation of the Christian message. I think that it is possible that a real person named Jesus (well, actually more likely Yeshua) existed and preached a message of forgiveness which ran counter to contemporary religious teaching. I think it's likely that he was executed for challenging the religious establishment. However, I think that the aspects of the story which elevate him from philosopher to supernatural being are stories borrowed from other contemporary or older mythologies as a means of communicating and in some ways reinforcing the core teachings of Jesus.


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    #238
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    I wish people would actually respond to what I'm saying:

    1) I'm not saying the death of the Apostles makes Christianity more true.
    2) I'm not saying that they couldn't have for what is false.
    3) I have said that it is extremely unlikely if the Apostles knew / believed that Christianity was a lie that they would go to the lengths that they did.

    The above post deals with dying for what one actually believes rather than dying while knowing full well those beliefs are false.

    I don't see the point in posting if you're going to twist what's been said.

    As for posting about suicide cults, as I've explained already they have zero comparison with the situation in the New Testament church.

    The Vatican has no bearing on what the early Christians did. There is no evidence for financial gain from looking to early church history. The RCC didn't even exist until the 4th century.


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    #239
    King Mob
    Registered Users Posts: 25,229 ✭✭✭✭King Mob


    Jakkass wrote: »
    I wish people would actually respond to what I'm saying:
    I know how you feel, what with you ignoring my points and all.


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    #240
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    King Mob: There's not much point in even attempting if people cannot even understand what at the most rudimentary level I'm arguing.

    Besides I'll more than likely go back to them inbetween sorting out some PHP stuff for my CS project.


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    #241
    philologos
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,479 ✭✭✭✭philologos


    King Mob wrote: »
    2. The Apostles' death aren't as reported. They were caught and punished for their cult and only became brave, pious martyrs after the fact when the story was spun by the other apostles or by genuine believers.

    Looking to the second: This is only if one doesn't agree that there is actually historical basis for the martyrdom of the Apostles. What reasoning would you have to suggest that we don't?

    In terms of ecclesiastical history there is much that would tell us about how many of the Apostles died. Indeed some non-ecclesiastical history too.


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