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How do you convince people god exists?

ILoveYourVibes

How do you in history?

And how do you do it now?

With all the evidence etc.

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Mark Hamill

corks finest wrote: »

I can every day I look in the mirror

Must be blurry if you are vibrating.

corks finest wrote: »

You don't have to convince anyone end of
If youve faith ( I have) that's all you need, I see God in my family, and all around me, constantly

Don't you need to convince yourself? How did you do it?

smokingman

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

There is. We need to examine the experience of such drugs more and better than we have been. Laws related to those drugs make proper randomised controlled trials hard to do.

There really is a "there" there I think when it comes to drugs and the insight and transformative experiences they can bring us.

But the "there" there just is that. The experience of drugs. If someone thinks there is anything more than that "to be looked at" then the ball for substantiation is certainly in their court. But they would have to start by explaining exactly what they mean. Such as this....

.... I would need to be absolutely clear as to what this even means before I engage with it. Especially as I risk dismissing it out of hand given the pile of absolute unsubstantiated horse poo most people who have said such things have turned out to be talking about. And I would hate to dismiss someone reasonable solely because of what someone else unreasonable had vomitted out.

Sure but as Christopher Hitchens used to say, such a conversation would need to start with a speration of the numinous and the divine. Many mistake the two as being the same thing. Which unfortunately results in a lot of the aforementioned horse poo.

I think, on drugs, you get close to a poem that Alan Watts used to recite at his lectures.
"There once was a man who said, though
It seems that I know that I know,
But what I would like to see, is the I that knows me,
When I know that I know that I know"

Basically, it's about being aware of being sentient, seeing your own thoughts objectively...but then trying to go one step up and seeing the "you" that is disecting your own thoughts...a lot of people put a god there instead of who they are at their core.

splinter65

smacl wrote: »

I've no problem with that, just so long as the various faithful of all the many religions out there don't try to push their beliefs on me or my family. Unfortunately that's not the case in this country with religious instruction in schools largely inescapable for most of the population. Could be the question being asked here is wrong, rather than asking "How do you convince people god exists?" perhaps it should be "Why do you try to convince people god exists?"

I think it’s safer to say at this stage that what you are really feeling oppressed by is the fact that the majority of parents in the country are to be quite satisfied with the fact that their children are being educated at schools with a catholic ethos. They must be satisfied otherwise they’d be out on the streets to at least some extent objecting, or it would be a very pressing subject on the doorstep at election time, like homelessness and the environment. And their not.
Unless your suggesting that their children’s education is less important to them then housing and saving the planet?

zimmermania

Marx got it right in his time when he stated"religion is the opiate of the people".

It is a bit different now as indifference,rather than logical reasoning has made belief in god almost impossible.

The right result for the wrong reason.

Hotblack Desiato

iceman700 wrote: »

someone in the company of another further down the path, can have their vibration increased and experience spiritual happenings.

That reminds me, anniversary coming up, must get down to Ann Summers when it reopens.

nozzferrahhtoo

iceman700 wrote: »

It is , in my humble opinion not possible to prove to anyone that God exists.

"Proof" is a very high bar to reach, too lofty. My issue when I talk to theists is not that they have no proof....... but they seemingly have no arguments, evidence, data OR reasoning to offer that lends even a modicum of credence to the idea.

They have no "proof" sure, but they have no evidence AT ALL either.

iceman700 wrote: »

their vibration increased and experience spiritual happenings.

That's a very strange and vague line. You might want to expound upon it a bit to let us know what you (think you) mean by it.

Marhay70

splinter65 wrote: »

I think it’s safer to say at this stage that what you are really feeling oppressed by is the fact that the majority of parents in the country are to be quite satisfied with the fact that their children are being educated at schools with a catholic ethos. They must be satisfied otherwise they’d be out on the streets to at least some extent objecting, or it would be a very pressing subject on the doorstep at election time, like homelessness and the environment. And their not.
Unless your suggesting that their children’s education is less important to them then housing and saving the planet?

Most people are happy to have their children in a school which is close to home, they are indifferent to the religious ethos or lack of it. The fact that the RCC controls 94% of the primary schools in the country is a factor in this, I can't see there being any public disorder if it was decided tomorrow that the RCC would no longer be the controlling interest.
To me the whole sham of religious education was exposed when a radio presenter asked a child if she would miss making her confirmation this year, the child replied "Yes, I wanted to buy a Play Station"

smacl

splinter65 wrote: »

I think it’s safer to say at this stage that what you are really feeling oppressed by is the fact that the majority of parents in the country are to be quite satisfied with the fact that their children are being educated at schools with a catholic ethos. They must be satisfied otherwise they’d be out on the streets to at least some extent objecting, or it would be a very pressing subject on the doorstep at election time, like homelessness and the environment. And their not.
Unless your suggesting that their children’s education is less important to them then housing and saving the planet?

Not particularly oppressed here, both mine went to ET primaries and my youngest is in an ET secondary. My eldest was stuck in a Catholic all girls school which was pretty appalling but its problems extended way beyond religion. Thankfully she has since moved on to college. The notion that people are happy with the status quo with respect to schooling is demonstrably specious given the relative levels of over-subscription of multi-denominational schools and non-denominational schools versus religious ethos schools, the acknowledgement of this by the church and their commitment to divest a proportion of their schools, and the numerous media articles on topics such as having to get baptised purely to get into the local school.

I'd echo Marhay70's point that "most people are happy to have their children in a school which is close to home, they are indifferent to the religious ethos or lack of it". An ever increasing number however are seeking a secular education where religious instruction does not form any part of the core curriculum.

zimmermania

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

That reminds me, anniversary coming up, must get down to Ann Summers when it reopens.

I thought Ann Summers shops would have been on the "essential" list during lockdown.

8kczg9v0swrydm

Interesting title.

This is touching on something which was discussed in another thread recently. Some people claim that they can feel God with them, around them - fair enough, this is something quite personal so you can never say that they do or they do not with complete certitude.

However, I do think that there are some logical arguments for the existence of God based on reason and without recourse to any a holy books. Philosophers have been at this for millennia - Aristotle, for example. Going to quote something I posted in an earlier thread:

a) Everything is made by something else. Again, let's take a table. A table is made by a machine in a factory. The factory is built by builders. The builders are "made" by their parents. And so on and so forth. But this chain of causation needs to stop somewhere. It's getting late so I am going to quote John Duns Scotus' version of this argument to illustrate:
Something can be produced.

It is produced by itself, something or another.

Not by nothing, because nothing causes nothing.

Not by itself, because an effect never causes itself.

Therefore, by another A.

If A is first then we have reached the conclusion.

If A is not first, then we return to 2).

The ascending series is either infinite or finite.

An infinite series is not possible. (PS Impossible, because it provokes unanswerable questions, like, "What is infinity minus infinity?")

The series must have a start. Therefore, God exists.

b) We can define God as 'something than which nothing greater can be conceived'. This is an idea which is true by definition – people hear it and understand it. In order to deny this we must understand what we are denying. Therefore, God must exist as an idea in the mind. However, to exist in reality is greater than to exist simply as an idea in the mind. If God was to exist as an idea in the mind only, something greater than God can exist. But if this were so, it would produce a logical contradiction, as God is the greatest existent. Therefore God must exist.

As to Christianity itself, how about this:

1) We know that Jesus was a historical figure. As well as the Scriptures, secular commentators of the time wrote about him (Josephus is a prime example);
2) Jesus is either mad, bad or God; he cannot be simply a good man walking around and helping people because he never claimed to be this persona - He said that he was God and king, that he had the power to forgive sins and that he always existed. Calling him a 'good moral teacher' is simply not left open to us;
3) If he said this and it was false, then he was either mad (he lost his mind) or bad (he was actively deceiving people);
4) If what he was saying is true, then he is God.

Bannasidhe

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

Interesting title.

As to Christianity itself, how about this:

1) We know that Jesus was a historical figure. As well as the Scriptures, secular commentators of the time wrote about him (Josephus is a prime example);
2) Jesus is either mad, bad or God; he cannot be simply a good man walking around and helping people because he never claimed to be this persona - He said that he was God and king, that he had the power to forgive sins and that he always existed. Calling him a 'good moral teacher' is simply not left open to us;
3) If he said this and it was false, then he was either mad (he lost his mind) or bad (he was actively deceiving people);
4) If what he was saying is true, then he is God.

How about this - there are exactly zero contemporary accounts of Jesus.
Your prime example, Flavius Josephus, is generally agreed to have been born in 37 CE - which would mean he was born a year after Jesus apparently died.

Jesus never claimed anything. The accounts of 'his' life were written long after the events by anonymous people (later given names) who were not eye witnesses to any of the events they describe,and in parts contradict each other.
'Jesus' left no account of his actions.

Hearsay is not testimony.

Marhay70

Bannasidhe wrote: »

How about this - there are exactly zero contemporary accounts of Jesus.
Your prime example, Flavius Josephus, is generally agreed to have been born in 37 CE - which would mean he was born 4 years after Jesus apparently died.

Jesus never claimed anything. The accounts of 'his' life were written long after the events by anonymous people (later given names) who were not eye witnesses to any of the events they describe,and in parts contradict each other.
'Jesus' left no account of his actions.

Hearsay is not testimony.

In addition much of Josephus' account of Jesus is considered to be interpolation, there was, apparently, a whole cottage industry dealing with the altering of historical documents to suit the narrative.
Also the philosophy that nothing comes from nothing is not, IMO, a principle of faith but of physics.

Bannasidhe

Marhay70 wrote: »

In addition much of Josephus' account of Jesus is considered to be interpolation, there was, apparently, a whole cottage industry dealing with the altering of historical documents to suit the narrative.
Also the philosophy that nothing comes from nothing is not, IMO, a principle of faith but of physics.

Hagiography = holy spin.

oldrnwisr

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

As to Christianity itself, how about this:

1) We know that Jesus was a historical figure. As well as the Scriptures, secular commentators of the time wrote about him (Josephus is a prime example);
2) Jesus is either mad, bad or God; he cannot be simply a good man walking around and helping people because he never claimed to be this persona - He said that he was God and king, that he had the power to forgive sins and that he always existed. Calling him a 'good moral teacher' is simply not left open to us;
3) If he said this and it was false, then he was either mad (he lost his mind) or bad (he was actively deceiving people);
4) If what he was saying is true, then he is God.

Actually, we don't know that Jesus was a historical figure. It is suspected that Jesus was a historical figure because a) the idea that there was some real, if obscure, person called Jesus is a rather mundane claim and b) because a real, if obscure, person called Jesus is a marginally more parsimonious explanation for the texts that we have than a mythical Jesus. However, the evidence for or against historicity in the case of Jesus is so scant and of such a poor quality that we cannot draw any reliable conclusion about Jesus' existence one way or the other.

You see, there is a hierarchy of evidence when considering something like the Jesus story, or any historical character. When considering something like Jesus' existence, ideally we would like physical evidence (coinage, statues, gravestone etc.). Obviously we don't have any of that. Next, we'd like writings by Jesus. We don't have any of those either. After that, we'd like contempraneous writings, preferably from a neutral source. We don't have any of those either. Finally, we'd like historians writing after the events, drawing from neutral or objective sources. We don't have any of those either.

What we do have are two main sources for Jesus. One, the seven authentic Pauline epistles, written by a man who never met Jesus and containing only the most mundane and tenuous biographical information. The other source is, of course, the gospels. These do contain biographical information but they are all written anonymously by second generation Christians writing in another country, in another language over the course of a half century or more beginning at least four decades after the events they purport to depict. And within these stories are internal and external contradictions, fabrications, factual mistakes, borrowed stories and fictional characters.

So, you're wrong, and here's why?

Let's start with Josephus. As Bannasidhe points out, Josephus isn't a contempraneous source. He wasn't even born until 37CE and his first major work Jewish War wasn't written until the 70s CE. The text that supposedly mentions Jesus wasn't written until the 90s CE making it already later than the first two gospels. And the growing opinion is that the entire Testimonium Flavianum in Josephus is a forgery. There are a number of reasons for this. For those unfamiliar with the Testimonium and for ease of reference, here is the passage from Josephus:

About this time there lived Jesus, a wise man, if indeed one ought to call him a man. For he was one who performed surprising deeds and was a teacher of such people as accept the truth gladly. He won over many Jews and many of the Greeks. He was the Christ. And when, upon the accusation of the principal men among us, Pilate had condemned him to a cross, those who had first come to love him did not cease. He appeared to them spending a third day restored to life, for the prophets of God had foretold these things and a thousand other marvels about him. And the tribe of the Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared. "

This passage is likely to be a forgery, for the following reasons.

The first point is that Josephus was a Pharasaic Jew and Origen in Contra Celsus 1.47 describes Josephus as not believing in Jesus as the Christ. In addition to this, Josephus catalogues, in his works, a number of false messiahs including the Taheb, the Egyptian, Judas of Galilee, Theudas the Magician, Johnathan the Weaver etc. etc. Now to say that all of these false messiahs are portrayed in a negative light is an understatement. So it seems highly unlikely that Josephus would have anything good to say about Jesus. So this argues for the removal of the phrases "if indeed one ought to call him a man", "for he was one who performed surprising deeds", "he was the christ" and "he appeared to them spending a third day restored to life, for the prophets of God had foretold these things and a thousand other marvels about him."
Following on from point 1, with the removal of the phrase "he was the Christ", the phrase "and the tribe of the Christians, so called after him" lacks introduction. For the latter phrase to remain Josephus' audience would have to implicitly understand that Jesus was referred to as the Christ. It's unlikely that the Roman audience Josephus is targetting in 93 CE would have understood the connection between Jesus and Christians. As a further example, in 17.5.1 Josephus refers to the naming of a port as Sebastos in honour of Caesar. While there is no explanation from Josephus and no obvious connection between the two, the fact that Sebastos is the Greek form of Augustus would have occurred as a connection to Josephus' readers. So in conclusion, it seems sensible to remove the final sentence entirely.
Also, staying with point 1, removing the phrases which seem overly reverential or fawning for a pharasaic Jew creates a further problem. If we remove the overly positive phrases we are left which is fairly neutral in tone. However, as I have already outlined in Point 1, Josephus launches scathing attacks on a number of false messiahs, so why is there no negativity in the passage if it is authentic to Jesus. Further, later Roman writers such as Tacitus also have pretty negative things to say about Christians as a group, accusing them of abominations in Annals 44.2. So, why also then do Christians get an easy ride in the passage.
Returning to Origen, Contra Celsus 1.47 shows Origen quoting from Josephus in order to demonstrate John the Baptist's existence as a baptist to Celsus. However, despite, Origen mentioning Jesus he never makes mention of the Testimonium. Now, this speaks heavily against a fully authentic testimonium since Origen speaks of Jesus' miracles in the immediately preceding chapter. If the Josephan reference to "performing surprising deeds" were authentic we would expect Origen to mention it.
Following on from Point 4, Origen isn't the only church father who fails to mention the Testimonium. In "Jospehus as an Historical Source in Patristic Literature through Eusebius", Michael Hardwick points out that Justin Martyr, Theophilus Antiochenus, Melito of Sardis, Minucius Felix, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Julius Africanus, Pseudo-Justin, Tertullian, Hippolytus, Origen, Methodius and Lactantius all fail to mention the Testimonium despite each of these writers showing familiarity with Josephus' work. It could be that a very reduced testimonium simply wouldn't be noteworthy enough to be mentioned by these writers but the omission of any reference to the testimonium prior to Eusebius seems odd.
Following on from Point 5, the manuscript from which Eusebius quotes comes from the library at Caesarea established by Origen. So the fact that Eusebius quotes from the Testimonium and Origen doesn't where both are using the same line of manuscript seems like a strange disconnect. It would seem that the interpolations or the wholesale insertion of the testimonium itself happened between Origen and Eusebius (or may have originated with Eusebius).
Certain linguistic features of the suspect passages align closely with the vocabulary of Eusebius indicating that he is the author of some of the interpolations. In particular, the phrase paradoxôn ergôn poiêtês that Jesus was a performer of surprising deeds (i.e. miracles) seems out of sync with Josephus. Josephus when using forms of paradoxos seems only to use it in the sense of poet and not maker. Olson argues in "A Eusebian reading of the Testimonium Flavianum" that the use of the full phrase paradoxôn ergôn poiêtês and other phrases in the text such as wise man and the use of phylon to mean tribe align with Eusebius' extant work.
As scholars such as Roger Viklund have noted, the digression into the testimonium interrupts the flow of the passage. The preceding passage details Pilate's violent suppression of a protest by Jews over the use of what they saw as sacred money which Pilate appropriated to build an aqueduct. The succeeding passage to the Testimonium begins "About this time another sad calamity put the Jews into disorder". The digression into Jesus not only interrupts the flow but is not logically connected to the other passages even as a digression.
As well as the individual facets of the argument, the entire idea of the testimonium fails a test of common sense. As previously alluded to in point 3, Josephus had nothing but negativity for false messiahs which he would have concluded about Jesus. So any later Christian interpolator would have had to take what would have been a negative comment and fully turn it 180 degrees into a positive passage which seems far-fetched. It's far more likely that a negative passage would simply have been excised completely or that section of Antiquities would no longer be extant.

Now, we can continue to go through all of the supposed extrabiblical sources for Jesus, going through the reasons why they aren't the evidence that Christians claim them to be, but for the moment I think the points above serve as a lesson in not taking random references to Jesus at face value.

As for the scriptures, they also aren't reliable as evidence for a historical Jesus. Apart from their late composition, late manuscript evidence, internal and external contradictions, factual mistakes and borrowed stories, the gospels and Acts don't even read like historical accounts or eyewitness testimonies. There are several reasons for this.

The gospels make little or no attempt to identify the sources they draw upon in writing their stories. (e.g. Luke mentions that he draws on sources but does not name them)
The later gospel authors make no attempt to resolve contradictions with earlier works (e.g. Luke makes no attempt to reconcile his nativity narrative with Matthew's)
The author does not place himself in the story.
The gospels are written for the common man rather than the social and literary elite audience of Greek and Roman histories/biographies.
The gospels contain far too many hagiographical elements to be historically reliable.
There is no attempt to warn the reader that certain events or words may not be recorded clearly. None of the gospel authors make any attempt to identify where they speculate on content.
The interdependence of the gospels makes them unlike the historical writings of the time.
Unusual events disappear from the wider narrative. The aftermath of the graves opening in Matthew is not discussed in any other text.

Moreover, the layout of the gospels themselves align better with fictional novels that of historical accounts. Mark, for example, employs dramatic irony and an omniscient narrator, uncharacteristic of a historical retelling. The gospels also employ dialogue at a much higher level than historical accounts of the day. Acts reports the highest usage with 51% of the overall text being made up of direct speech. The gospels have a slightly lower but similar proportion. This aligns well with Jewish novels of the day (Judith 50%, Susanna 46%) but stands in marked contrast to historical accounts and biographies: (Josephus’ Jewish War I: 8.8%, Plutarch’s Alexander: 12.1%; Tacitus’ Agricola: 11.5%).

All of this has lead a number of scholars to conclude that the gospels are intended to be theological fictional novels rather than reliable histories:

Ancient Fiction and Early Christian Narrative (Ronald Hock)
Ancient Fiction: The Matrix of Early Christian and Jewish Narrative (Jo-Ann Brant)
The Ancient Novel and Early Christian and Jewish Narrative: Fictional Intersections (Marilia Pinheiro)
Profit With Delight: The Literary Genre of the Acts of the Apostles (Richard Pervo)
The Problem of Markan Genre: The Gospel of Mark and the Jewish Novel (Michael Vines)
What Are the Gospels?: A Comparison with Graeco-Roman Biography (Richard Burridge)
The Homeric Epics and the gospel of Mark (Dennis MacDonald)
Direct Speech in Acts and the Question of Genre

If you want a really good introduction to this topic you should read The Power of Parable: How Fiction by Jesus became Fiction about Jesus by J.D Crossan.

As for your rewording of Lewis' trilemma of liar, lunatic or lord, I've always felt that Lewis left out one option from his original trilemma: legend. It is perfectly possible for Jesus to have been an obscure preacher who later had legends build up around him. It is also possible for Jesus to have been an entirely fictional character, made up out of whole cloth to fill a Jewish theological need. You see, there is the Jewish belief that the Jews are God's chosen people and that God is on their side. You also have the Jewish belief in the Messiah, a kind of immortal warlord who will turn the Jewish people into the rulers of the world, presiding over an era of perpetual peace. However, in reality its difficult to reconcile this self-image of God's chosen people with being overrun by the Roman empire and having the temple, which the Messiah was supposed to rebuild and resume sacrifices in, being destroyed. So, its possible that first century Jews adopted a revisionist idea of what the Messiah should be, just as second temple Judaism did after the Babylonian captivity.

However, the important point here is not what is possibly true but what is actually true and whether the evidence is sufficient to determine what is actually true and like I said at the beginning we just don't have enough evidence of sufficient quality to say one way or the other whether Jesus actually existed with any degree of certainty.

Mark Hamill

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

This is touching on something which was discussed in another thread recently. Some people claim that they can feel God with them, around them - fair enough, this is something quite personal so you can never say that they do or they do not with complete certitude.

If people said they feel spiderman around them, would you be able to say they don't?
You might not be able to say these people are feeling nothing, but you can contradict their claims about the source of the feeling.

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

The series must have a start. Therefore, God exists.

The start of the universe is the Big Bang. That include space and time. Therefore, whatever the Big Bang came from (assuming the words "whatever", "came" and "from" can apply to it) is not necessarily under the rules of causality as we experience them (causality being something we experience subject to space/time).

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

b) We can define God as 'something than which nothing greater can be conceived'. This is an idea which is true by definition – people hear it and understand it. In order to deny this we must understand what we are denying. Therefore, God must exist as an idea in the mind. However, to exist in reality is greater than to exist simply as an idea in the mind. If God was to exist as an idea in the mind only, something greater than God can exist. But if this were so, it would produce a logical contradiction, as God is the greatest existent. Therefore God must exist.

Two things:
1) Firstly this is just nonsense. An idea is not true simply because people hear and understand it. We can also define, lets say mega-god, as inconceivably greater than god (i.e. greater than god, but in a way that we can never conceive). You have heard and understood that definition of mega-god, therefore mega-god must exist?
2) Secondly, it's contradictory, because of the two possibilities of how god created the universe:

God created the universe from nothing - therefore god + universe > god, therefore your claim that god is the greatest thing conceivable is wrong. [LIST=b]
God created the universe from himself - therefore god after creating universe + universe = god before creating universe, therefore god, now, is not the the greatest thing conceivable.
[/LIST]

8kczg9v0swrydm

So, you're wrong, and here's why.

Let's start with Josephus. As Bannasidhe points out, Josephus isn't a contempraneous source. He wasn't even born until 37CE and his first major work Jewish War wasn't written until the 70s CE. The text that supposedly mentions Jesus wasn't written until the 90s CE making it already later than the first two gospels. And the growing opinion is that the entire Testimonium Flavianum in Josephus is a forgery. There are a number of reasons for this. For those unfamiliar with the Testimonium and for ease of reference, here is the passage from Josephus:

About this time there lived Jesus, a wise man, if indeed one ought to call him a man. For he was one who performed surprising deeds and was a teacher of such people as accept the truth gladly. He won over many Jews and many of the Greeks. He was the Christ. And when, upon the accusation of the principal men among us, Pilate had condemned him to a cross, those who had first come to love him did not cease. He appeared to them spending a third day restored to life, for the prophets of God had foretold these things and a thousand other marvels about him. And the tribe of the Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared. "

This passage is likely to be a forgery, for the following reasons.

Hi oldrnwisr

That's quite a reply, you clearly put a lot of research into it. However, I will have to disagree on many of your points. Let's take a look.

Many of the facts which you mention about Josephus are correct. I should have elaborated; I posted off the cuff. Josephus isn't reliable as a historian - he mentions a third wall in Jerusalem at the time of the Jewish War with Rome, and archaeologists have no evidence whatsoever of that wall. It has always been a matter of debate as to how much of Josephus' mention of Jesus is directly from his pen and how much interpolation. Scholars debate this: however my friend, in contrast, you seem to be very certain of your facts. It has been debated endlessly and could be debated endlessly. A few comments:

It is likely that the passage has been changed by Christians over the centuries, but it does not follow that Josephus made no reference to Jesus. If Christians interpolated the whole passage, why not make it more impressive? As it stands now, it is very modest, especially in relation to Josephus' treatment of John the Baptist. So an entire interpolation has that evidence against it.

It's unlikely that the Roman audience Josephus is targeting in 93 CE would have understood the connection between Jesus and Christians.

Why not? We do, in fact, know, from documents of two decades later that Christians were already widespread, and these documents, (Tacitus' referring back to the 60's of the first century), already speak of large numbers of Christians in Rome. References are already given - both in Acts and in various other sources - of the expulsion of Jews from Rome in the 40's of the first century due to disputes caused by "Chrestos." This "Chrestos" may or may not refer to Jesus, but at least means that some sort of messianic sense (the Greek for "Messiah" being "Christos") was present in Rome thanks to its Jewish population, for half a century before Josephus wrote.

"If the Josephan reference to "performing surprising deeds" were authentic we would expect Origen to mention it."

Not necessarily: if Josephus' mention is short and uninteresting, then Origen might not have felt it worthwhile to mention. As for the comment that "Josephus had nothing but negativity for false messiahs which he would have concluded about Jesus", it is not necessarily true either, if Jesus, among all the other claimants, was outstanding, and especially if he had a name for a miracle worker rather than a rabble rouser.

In any case, though, Josephus is not solid ground to debate since it is perfectly correct that we do not know how much of it is interpolation and, in any case, how dependable Josephus is as a historian.

Much more interesting are the letter of Pliny to the Roman Emperor and Tacitus on the Lives of the Caesars, both of which make it clear that Christians are widespread in the Roman Empire within eight decades of the purported death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus. If Tacitus is accurate in his description of a "huge number" of Christians being killed in Rome in the 60's of the first century, then Christianity spread very rapidly indeed. Did their religion, which resulted in many martyrs, and spread so quickly and widely, result from thin air? What parallel would there be in the history of the world to that? It takes a lot of credulity to imagine that such a religious movement could have grown so fervently and rapidly out of nothing but "legend." If, as you rightly say, the Gospels are written at least four decades after the life of Christ, is four decades long enough to give birth to a major religious movement based on a falsehood? Is eight decades? Is any amount of time? Are there any parallels to this in the history of the world that would make such a thought plausible?

Now, we can continue to go through all of the supposed extrabiblical sources for Jesus, going through the reasons why they aren't the evidence that Christians claim them to be, but for the moment I think the points above serve as a lesson in not taking random references to Jesus at face value.

You are quite right to say that St. Paul, writing in the 40's to 60's of the first century, makes little reference to the life of Christ. He speaks only of his death and resurrection, the Last Supper (1Cor 11), and his birth from a woman (Gal 4). Which is not paltry. Nevertheless, since he does refer to Christ as a real historical person, your point that Paul's writings fail to support the historical existence of Jesus itself is self-contradictory.

As for the scriptures, they also aren't reliable as evidence for a historical Jesus. Apart from their late composition, late manuscript evidence, internal and external contradictions, factual mistakes and borrowed stories, the gospels and Acts don't even read like historical accounts or eyewitness testimonies. There are several reasons for this.
The gospels make little or no attempt to identify the sources they draw upon in writing their stories. (e.g. Luke mentions that he draws on sources but does not name them)

The later gospel authors make no attempt to resolve contradictions with earlier works (e.g. Luke makes no attempt to reconcile his nativity narrative with Matthew's)

The author does not place himself in the story.

The gospels are written for the common man rather than the social and literary elite audience of Greek and Roman histories/biographies.

The gospels contain far too many hagiographical elements to be historically reliable.

There is no attempt to warn the reader that certain events or words may not be recorded clearly. None of the gospel authors make any attempt to identify where they speculate on content.

The interdependence of the gospels makes them unlike the historical writings of the time.

Unusual events disappear from the wider narrative. The aftermath of the graves opening in Matthew is not discussed in any other text.

Moreover, the layout of the gospels themselves align better with fictional novels that of historical accounts. Mark, for example, employs dramatic irony and an omniscient narrator, uncharacteristic of a historical retelling. The gospels also employ dialogue at a much higher level than historical accounts of the day. Acts reports the highest usage with 51% of the overall text being made up of direct speech. The gospels have a slightly lower but similar proportion. This aligns well with Jewish novels of the day (Judith 50%, Susanna 46%) but stands in marked contrast to historical accounts and biographies: (Josephus’ Jewish War I: 8.8%, Plutarch’s Alexander: 12.1%; Tacitus’ Agricola: 11.5%).

As for the Gospels, they are certainly inconsistent and even at first glance contradictory in their accounts (they can be easily reconciled through a practice known as harmonisation, dating back to the times of the ancient Church Fathers). However, these inconsistencies in detail only serve to underline the consistency in the story more generally: it makes it clear that the Evangelists were not trying to construct a cover-up by quoting each other. And yet they are consistent in pointing to a man, whose origin is Nazareth, preacher and miracle worker, who drew crowds after him, who descended to Jerusalem, entered in triumph, was crucified, died, rose and ascended. The contradictions themselves point to the authenticity of the event, even as they show that the passage between event, oral tradition, and written word, was, as we would expect in a rapidly expanding religious movement, rocky in patches. Nevertheless, the one Jesus is recognisable in all four accounts amidst the inconsistencies of detail.

Luke mentions that he draws on sources but does not name them

Not quite true: Luke speaks specifically of "eyewitnesses" and not just "sources."

The author does not place himself in the story.

Not true: John twice refers to the author as an eyewitness. From Acts 16 on most of the Book of Acts is eyewitness material, both in the use of the first person plural in recounting the story and in the details of places given.

The gospels are written for the common man rather than the social and literary elite audience of Greek and Roman histories/biographies.

So?:)

The gospels contain far too many hagiographical elements to be historically reliable

How many hagiographical elements are "too many" if they are narrating the story of God Incarnate?

Moreover, the layout of the gospels themselves align better with fictional novels that of historical accounts. Mark, for example, employs dramatic irony and an omniscient narrator, uncharacteristic of a historical retelling. The gospels also employ dialogue at a much higher level than historical accounts of the day.

Change of style doesn't change the historicity of the work. Each of the four Gospels has a different style ... what point does that make? And Acts has a different style from the Gospel according to Luke, although they come from the same pen and are of the same genre.

The interdependence of the gospels makes them unlike the historical writings of the time

What does that mean? If the Gospels contain inconsistencies among themselves, to what degree are they interdependent? The most plausible answer is that their interdependence is not because they closely copy one another, but a joint interdependence on an event, which event you, my friend, are trying to deny. Since they clearly did not closely copy each other, they would then be interdependent on an event which ... wasn't an event? What sense does that make?

As for your rewording of Lewis' trilemma of liar, lunatic or lord, I've always felt that Lewis left out one option from his original trilemma: legend. It is perfectly possible for Jesus to have been an obscure preacher who later had legends build up around him. It is also possible for Jesus to have been an entirely fictional character, made up out of whole cloth to fill a Jewish theological need. You see, there is the Jewish belief that the Jews are God's chosen people and that God is on their side. You also have the Jewish belief in the Messiah, a kind of immortal warlord who will turn the Jewish people into the rulers of the world, presiding over an era of perpetual peace. However, in reality its difficult to reconcile this self-image of God's chosen people with being overrun by the Roman empire and having the temple, which the Messiah was supposed to rebuild and resume sacrifices in, being destroyed. So, its possible that first century Jews adopted a revisionist idea of what the Messiah should be, just as second temple Judaism did after the Babylonian captivity.

I would argue that a tetralemma is impossible here. From the main sources we have about the historic Christ (Gospels and Paul), none of them claim that he was a guru, a good man, a leader. They all put words into his mouth that, in a way, make it all or nothing: he was God or he was a "bad man". To make it a tetralema would be akin to asserting that Neil Armstrong landed on Mars; based on the sources actually in our possession, the only [semi] reasonable debate you could have is whether he landed on the moon or nowhere at all. I do not get to put in my own variable. To quote Christopher Hitchens (yes, the Christopher Hitchens

Absent a direct line to the Almighty and a conviction that the last days are upon us, how is it 'moral' [...] to claim a monopoly on access to heaven, or to threaten waverers with everlasting fire, let alone to condemn fig trees and persuade devils to infest the bodies of pigs? Such a person, if not Divine, would be a sorcerer and a fanatic.

8kczg9v0swrydm

As to books on the topic, there are quite a number which make great arguments on the historicity of the Gospels. Here are a few:

James D.G. Dunn, The Evidence for Jesus (Louisville Kentucky, Westminister Press; 1985)

Dunn, in arguing for the historical nature of the Gospels, highlights that they should not be read as a historical biography of Jesus because that is not what they are. Rather they tell the story of Jesus with an emphasis on evangelistic, apologetic and teaching purposes. Dunn holds that differing details (eg. sequence) in the Gospels can be explained by the different emphasis of the various evangelists, who, while not agreeing on such details, always agree on the core or “punch line”. For example, he contrasts the story of the centurion with a sick servant found in both Matthew and Luke. Dunn notes that both the evangelists tell the same story, but while Matthew's emphasis is on faith, Luke focuses on the humility of the centurion. Each tells the story with his own slant. In light of such examples, Dunn asserts the historical reliability of the content of the Gospels (what Jesus said and did).

Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 2006)
(chapter describing the work of Kenneth Bailey):

Bailey sought to address the claim made by some modern scholars that the oral transmission of the Gospels (from the Jesus event to the written word) was deeply unreliable and tainted by layers of additions. Bailey identified three methods of oral transmission in operation, drawing on his experience of life in the Middle East. The methods are: (1) informal uncontrolled, (2) informal controlled and (3) formal controlled. For Bailey, the first referred to transmission where there is no identifiable teacher or student and there is no structure within which material is passed from one person to another. He identified this most with “rumour transmission”. The second method, informal controlled, was to be found in situations where a predominantly oral society wishes to faithfully retain traditions over a long period of time. Here, although there exists no identifiable teacher, control mechanisms are in place, mostly through a community rejection mechanism of information which is deemed false. The person transmitting the story has a certain flexibility “as long as the central thrust is not changed”. Finally, the formal controlled method refers to transmission which is strictly undistorted, having a clearly licensed teacher and a system of control,such as, for example the necessity of direct memorisation. Bailey points to the transmission of the Koran as an example.

For Bailey, the oral transmission of the Gospels falls under the informal controlled method. He bases this assertion on his observations of how important traditions are passed on in Middle Eastern village life. He notes that in these situations, although there are no formally identified teachers and students, the community strictly enforces the boundaries of the stories recited, most notably through elders who are experts in these stories. Therefore, while the stories might be told in different ways, the punch line is never changed. Bauckham agrees that this is observed in the Gospels, which may appear to vary in details, but faithfully hand on key features and structures.

However, some scholars argue that the oral transmission of the Gospel could also have been achieved through the formal controlled method, which would make the Gospel accounts even more coherent in the details. Bauckham points to the writings of Paul as evidence for this. He notices that Paul uses technical terms for handing on and receiving tradition and speaks of faithfully retaining or observing a tradition in his letters. Bauckham also draws attention to the fact that Paul's stay with Peter in Jerusalem must have been used to carefully receive the Jesus narrative from an eyewitness and claims that Paul must have memorised a precise account of the Last Supper. He notes that Paul is cautious to distinguish his own words from those of the Lord (so as to not muddy the waters). Finally, Bauckham also tenders the proof that the Pauline churches had designated teachers appointed, further adding to the formal controlled character of the transmission.

Bart D Ehrman, The New Testament 4th ed., (New York, Oxford University Press; 2008).

Ehrman takes an interesting approach to the historicity of the Gospels. He borrows a number of tests from the legal world which are used to establish the credibility of evidence and applies them to the Gospels. He calls the first test “independent attestation”, which refers to the premise that assertions which are corroborated are more likely to be true. He points out that information on the historical Jesus exists in the Synoptic Gospels, John, the letters of Paul, the New Testament Apocrypha and historians such as Tacitus.

Ehrman calls his second test “the criterion of dissimilarity”, meaning that if something is problematic to the writer or community from which the text originates and yet is still included, there is a high likelihood of authenticity. He points to a number of examples. The Baptism performed by John the Baptist on Christ raises a number of issues, as it was assumed that “when a person was baptised, he or she was spiritually inferior to the one doing the baptising”. Yet this event is recorded in all four Gospels. Similar examples are the betrayal of Judas and the Crucifixion of Christ, which Paul himself called a “stumbling block” for the Jews.

The third test used by Ehrman is called “the criterion of contextual credibility”. This means that historical texts have to “conform with historical and social contexts to which they relate” in order to be credible. Therefore, the story of Jesus as found in the Gospels must sit well in the historical setting of first century Palestine, which it undoubtedly does. Interestingly, Ehrman points out that this criterion serves to cast doubt over the authenticity of the apocryphal Gospel of Philip, which contains a gnostic understanding of Baptism and the Eucharist more appropriate to the second or third century.

Mark Hamill

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

As to books on the topic, there are quite a number which make great arguments on the historicity of the Gospels. Here are a few:

James D.G. Dunn, The Evidence for Jesus (Louisville Kentucky, Westminister Press; 1985)

Dunn, in arguing for the historical nature of the Gospels, highlights that they should not be read as a historical biography of Jesus because that is not what they are.

So asserting that the Gospels should not be read as a historical biography is an argument that they should?
Either they are historical documents or they aren't.
And doesn't this contradict your other books who do approach the bible as an historical text?

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

He calls the first test “independent attestation”, which refers to the premise that assertions which are corroborated are more likely to be true. He points out that information on the historical Jesus exists in the Synoptic Gospels, John, the letters of Paul, the New Testament Apocrypha and historians such as Tacitus.

More likely to be true, or more likely to be from the same original source?
It is possible that after the first gospel was written, the later ones used it as a reference and added to it. Therefore, despite repeating some of it's claims, do not corroborate claim.

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

Ehrman calls his second test “the criterion of dissimilarity”, meaning that if something is problematic to the writer or community from which the text originates and yet is still included, there is a high likelihood of authenticity. He points to a number of examples. The Baptism performed by John the Baptist on Christ raises a number of issues, as it was assumed that “when a person was baptised, he or she was spiritually inferior to the one doing the baptising”. Yet this event is recorded in all four Gospels. Similar examples are the betrayal of Judas and the Crucifixion of Christ, which Paul himself called a “stumbling block” for the Jews.

I've never seen anyone else try to argue that plotholes (Jesus being baptised makes him less spiritual that John) make a story more likely to be true.
And I don't find it at all surprising that a text trying to get people to change their religion tells people bad things about their current religion. Evangelising rarely starts with "You are great and don't need to change a thing".

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

The third test used by Ehrman is called “the criterion of contextual credibility”. This means that historical texts have to “conform with historical and social contexts to which they relate” in order to be credible. Therefore, the story of Jesus as found in the Gospels must sit well in the historical setting of first century Palestine, which it undoubtedly does.

This equally applies to Spider-man.

8kczg9v0swrydm

Mark Hamill wrote: »

So asserting that the Gospels should not be read as a historical biography is an argument that they should?
Either they are historical documents or they aren't.
And doesn't this contradict your other books who do approach the bible as an historical text?

The above authors try to put forward various arguments for the historicity of the Gospels. They are arguments, not conclusive proofs, therefore they do differ from each other. However, what is important is that they are all quite reasonable.

From what I remember of reading him, I think Dunn's argument was that the evangelists described those events of Christ's life in which they were personally interested. That is why not all of them have extended narratives of Christ's infancy etc, but they might instead focus on how he fulfills the Old Testament (this was very important for Matthew, for example).

Mark Hamill wrote: »

More likely to be true, or more likely to be from the same original source?
It is possible that after the first gospel was written, the later ones used it as a reference and added to it. Therefore, despite repeating some of it's claims, do not corroborate claim.

Well the large diversity of detail of the Gospel accounts would argue against this. John's prologue is very philosophical. Matthew and Luke are all about the parables.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

I've never seen anyone else try to argue that plotholes (Jesus being baptised makes him less spiritual that John) make a story more likely to be true.

This would have been a massive deal. Read the account to see how uncomfortable John the Baptist is with baptising Christ. He is told to "suffer it for now". John was basically baptising God.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

This equally applies to Spider-man and New York.

Again, this is not a proof but an argument. Nevertheless, I think it is a good one. As stated above, the apocryphal Gospel of Philip, which contains a gnostic understanding of Baptism and the Eucharist more appropriate to the second or third century, was rejected as inauthentic. It is a mechanism used to discern error.

Jordan2077

You don't have to convince people, there is no excuse for not believing in God for the evidence has been clearly displayed in all of creation.

storker

Jordan2077 wrote: »

You don't have to convince people, there is no excuse for not believing in God for the evidence has been clearly displayed in all of creation.

Sounds like you're confused about what qualifies as evidence. Also, people don't need an excuse for not believing in something for which there is no evidence.

And if you're dealing with people who prefer rational thought and critical evaluation to blind faith, yes, you definitely do have to convince them...or content yourelf with being dismissed as a crank.

8kczg9v0swrydm

What I have shown with the above arguments is that belief in God is reasonable and that Catholic claims are credible. No one can shut themselves in their room and think their way to a certainty of Christ's death and resurrection, the Eucharist, Heaven, or the Church (the existence of God itself can be reached by reason alone though). This requires faith - an assent of the mind to what God reveals about Himself. Moreover, this faith is a gift from God to those who want it.

All that arguments (natural theology) can do is predispose to receiving that gift and to show the faith as a credible option.

Jordan2077

storker wrote: »

Sounds like you're confused about what qualifies as evidence. Also, people don't need an excuse for not believing in something for which there is no evidence.

And if you're dealing with people who prefer rational thought and critical evaluation to blind faith, yes, you definitely do have to convince them...or content yourelf with being dismissed as a crank.

Ok so if you dont believe in God then what is good and bad, why dont we just make up good and bad for ourselves and do what we want? why do we let other things create what is good and bad for us?

If a cat kills a bird why is that not bad. But if a cat kills a human that is bad.

What makes our life worth more than theirs?

Yet if any other creature or thing kills any other creature or thing it is not bad?

mlem123

I'd argue that belief has nothing to do with proof. A belief is just something you believe in.

I believe in God but that is my own personal belief. I also don't really go to mass etc as I don't think it's necessary. Actions speak louder than a few words in a specific building.

storker

Jordan2077 wrote: »

Ok so if you dont believe in God then what is good and bad, why dont we just make up good and bad for ourselves and do what we want?

We always did make up the rules for ourselves. That's how we managed to live successfully in groups. Everybody doing whatever they like wouldn't allow for any group cohesion and wouldn't have allowed civilisation to develop to the extent it did even before your god appeared to take an interest in things.

why do we let other things create what is good and bad for us?

You mean "dictate?". We do this because we know what is needed for people to live together in large groups. If certain rules weren't in place, civilization would break down.

If a cat kills a bird why is that not bad. But if a cat kills a human that is bad.

Yes, in our eyes, because we are human. If the birds could talk they'd probably tell you the reverse was true.

What makes our life worth more than theirs?

See above

Yet if any other creature or thing kills any other creature or thing it is not bad?

See above.

I'm really struggling to see (a0 what your point is and (b) how any of this relates to your post that suggests people need an "excuse" for not believing in your god.

smacl

Jordan2077 wrote: »

Ok so if you dont believe in God then what is good and bad, why dont we just make up good and bad for ourselves and do what we want? why do we let other things create what is good and bad for us?

If a cat kills a bird why is that not bad. But if a cat kills a human that is bad.

What makes our life worth more than theirs?

Yet if any other creature or thing kills any other creature or thing it is not bad?

In modern democratic society, we decide what is bad and good through a process of consensus. At an international level we have agreed standards for fundamental human rights. So for example we agree that discriminating against people based on gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity or religious beliefs is bad. We've seen this codified at a local level through changing our laws to allow for gay marriage, where previously this was not allowed as it ran contrary to religious dogma. This change, in my opinion and that of the majority of people in this country, is an example of something good.

As for your cat and bird question, how we treat animals is also something that's changing. Most people at this point would consider big game hunting immoral and we have evolving standards how we are expected to treat farm animals and domestic pets.

Hotblack Desiato

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

What I have shown with the above arguments is that belief in God is reasonable and that Catholic claims are credible.

I don't think you've showed anything tbh.

Ty Straight Villa wrote: »

This requires faith - an assent of the mind to what God reveals about Himself. Moreover, this faith is a gift from God to those who want it.

I would describe it as a conscious decision to ignore the ridiculous nature of many of the claims religions make, and the complete lack of evidence for any of the claims religions make, in favour of what feels good to the person concerned - almost always the same or a slight variation of the religion that was put forward as true by the authority figures in their childhood.

Jordan2077 wrote: »

Ok so if you dont believe in God then what is good and bad, why dont we just make up good and bad for ourselves and do what we want?

But this is exactly what we all do.
Religious and non-religous alike.
It is always rather convenient for believers that their god dislikes all of the same kind of people that they do

why do we let other things create what is good and bad for us?

What other things?
If you mean laws, in a democratic society these are agreed by broad consensus by the lawmakers we elect, with the aim of providing for the greater good of society as a whole.
Infinitely preferable to having a god-man telling us the rules under which we all must live.

If a cat kills a bird why is that not bad. But if a cat kills a human that is bad.

Presumably a big cat in the latter case!
No it's not bad. In both scenarios the animal is acting according to its nature and its instinct to hunt prey in order to eat. No doubt the bird and the human concerned regarded this as a bad thing, but it's a law of nature. Some days you're the hunter, some days you're the prey. Who considers the fate of the worm or insect the bird ate? And I fail to see what any of this has got to do with a god at all.

What makes our life worth more than theirs?

Is it?

Yet if any other creature or thing kills any other creature or thing it is not bad?

Killing to eat, whether by humans or any other creature is imho entirely justifiable.
Killing for fun, as humans and cats sometimes do, is much harder to justify.
But again, nothing to do with any god or religion.

mlem123 wrote: »

I believe in God but that is my own personal belief. I also don't really go to mass etc as I don't think it's necessary. Actions speak louder than a few words in a specific building.

That's rather... convenient, isn't it?
Does your god require you to do "good works" or give to charity or do anything at all, or is it all one way? You get the good feels and don't have to really do anything?

Odhinn

If the devil isn't real, who is it that constantly whispers in my ear to order shredded chicken in szechuan sauce?

storker

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

That's rather... convenient, isn't it?
Does your god require you to do "good works" or give to charity or do anything at all, or is it all one way? You get the good feels and don't have to really do anything?

I think you're possibly being a bit harsh. Mlem123 doesn't seem to have provided enough information to draw any conclusions, and as for criticising him/her for going for a "watered-down" version of religion, that's more the kind of thing I'd expect from other believers.

If Mlem's beliefs include not inflicting those beliefs on others, and not insulting the intelligence and/or morality of people who lack faith. then I'd say more of that kind of religion would be a good thing. Surely you'd agree?

Hotblack Desiato

I wasn't making statements, I was asking questions and there's no harm in that - unless you think that religious belief is immune from being questioned?