Letters to the Editor
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well,
*my* responses actually addressed several of your points (we need God to be moral, there's no such thing as junk DNA, and the quote from that master of logic CS Lewis), it's ok if you don't want to respond to me though. I understand.
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You have no idea what you're talking about
Not a single contemporary of Jesus' wrote a word about his existence (curious, isn't it, given his importance at the time?). There is a multigenerational gap between the dates of Jesus' purported life and all written accounts of his life (including his miracles)
Based on internal evidence of the various New Testament documents, all the gospel accounts and all the epistles were written within the lifetime of eyewitnesses, and that's before you get to the actual carbon-14 dating of manuscripts that also place them within the lifetime of eyewitness. All but a few verses of the New Testament can be reconstructed through the quotations or early Christian fathers writing in the 2nd century A.D., which is only one generation on, a time when the books not only had to be written but also widely circulated.
Even people against Christinity, including the Sanhedrin, mention Jesus and his miracles; they just attribute them to Satan and not God.
Now compare this to, say, Julius Caesar's account of his Gallic Wars, with only a dozen or so extant manuscripts and all dating to more than a thousand years after the purported events. Do you still doubt that Caesar fought the Gauls?
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Where's the logic?
Based on internal evidence of the various New Testament documents, all the gospel accounts and all the epistles were written within the lifetime of eyewitnesses,
This is what I'm talking about: you're using New Testament documents as your references to vet what's contained in the New Testament. That sort of self-reference is beneath an anonymous person of your supposed credentials.
Other historical events and characters, and the writings that support what we know or don't know about them, are also entirely beside the point of this debate, as you must certainly realize.
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Anonymous
Sadly, that elite Liberal Arts education seems to have left you with some gaps in basic reading comprehension (and I also wonder if, in your Philosophical studies, you managed to avoid any coursework in Epistemology).
I did not say that the truth is relative to your setting and circumstance - I said that your understanding of the truth (or, in your case, The Truth) is relative to your setting and circumstances. A rather important difference, that - but, as I posted before, I don't feel compelled to argue the point with someone who believes that there is historical, objective proof of Jesus' divinity; nor, for that matter, with someone who doesn't seem to even grasp the basic point of my silly little parable enough to engage in an intelligent dialog about it.
Or, maybe you are just a troll.
In any event, have a nice day.
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A few Comments
First off, uh, DATAGUYX: Think of them what you will, but Wiccans do not try to convert others to their beliefs.
This business about Christians being persecuted: Christians are finally being called on their b.s. and that makes them feel they are being persecuted.
Is Darcy Steinke a real person? We get these essays every now and again about how some doubter or another has decided to throw in the towel and embrace nonsense. It's kind of like Dr. Strangelove ("How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb). And Sister Leslie is just plain creepy. Although I'm sure she means well.
Ben Franklin was totally right (yet another reason to like him) when he said Christian dogma is totally indecipherable. It makes no sense whatsoever. And it has nothing to do with what The Christ was all about. He was all about LOVE. LOVE is the deal, LOVE is the bottom line.
There is very little in the Bible that is original, most of it came from other belief systems. The term Bible itself comes from the city of Byblos, dedicated to the Goddess of Knowledge. The term "Easter" comes from the same root word as Estrus, Estrogen, etc: It's all about female fertility, baby.
By the way, while a good writer, CS Lewis was a major weinie. Scared to death of adult females, among other things.
I can't even fathom how Anonymous's mind works. All that blather about humankind being "fallen" and getting "redeemed" The disconnection going on there is amazing. Whatever gets you through the night, I guess.
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JosieOrtiz
I can't even fathom how Anonymous's mind works
Google "Right-wing authoritarianism". It's worth it, even important, to try to fathom how these folks think - there's a war on, alright, but it's not the one that most everyone is talking about...
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J. Mandel
This is what I'm talking about: you're using New Testament documents as your references to vet what's contained in the New Testament. That sort of self-reference is beneath an anonymous person of your supposed credentials.
I don't think it's quite as bad as you think. The line that Anonymous is spouting here seems to be very consistent with the Quest for the Historical Jesus movement, which attempts to glean knowledge and facts about Jesus the Man, in the flesh. This movement purports to be unconcerned with the spiritual stuff, and instead tries to use the best historical scholarship available to come to some conclusions about the actual guy that supposedly walked the earth, preaching the apocalypse and purporting to heal the sick. Sadly, since the overwhelming majority of autographical text that mentions Jesus the man was written by Christians themselves, they really have no choice but to use scripture as source - but we shouldn't be quick to dismiss the real scholarship that has gone on in this field, simply because of this (we shouldn't dismiss the Scriptures as a historical source just because of their authorship, although it might reasonably be seen as a strike against them). Essentially, the Historical Jesus folks aren't doing anything substantially different than what anthropologists, paleontologists, and archaeologists do - and most folks don't deny that they are doing something resembling science or scholarship.
Here's where it starts to unravel for poor Anonymous. The specific "arguments" that he trots out are easily identified as the traditional arguments that the Historical Jesus crowd usually hurl at those who would deny that a man like Jesus ever even walked the earth i.e., that he was a fraud, a hoax, or (more plausibly, perhaps) an amalgamation of earlier theistic traditions repackaged for consumption in a manner that was likely to be easily digestible to the contemporaries of the Apostles. Viewed as a response to these criticisms (for examples, Google Earl Doherty for an ingress into that discussion), rejoinders such as "You believe that Caesar fought the Gauls, right?" at least make a little bit of sense, irrespective of how compelling they really are.
Why, we might ask, does this matter so much to folks like Anonymous? Simply put, the entire worldview of the fundamental literalist Christian falls like an ill-fated souffle if it turns out that Jesus never actually lived. The things they hold most dear - that the Resurrection absolves our Sins, the fulfillment of the prophesies, the Apocolyptic stuff, all of it - are irreparably neutered if there was no physical manifestation of God. Thus, they will fight with all of their might, indeed sometimes literally to the death, to defend this Truth against the heretical doubters and skeptics.
Of course, where Anonymous stumbles badly, obscenely, almost comically is when he trots out this Historical Jesus defense against the Mythical Jesus crowd as some sort of proof not just that Jesus (most probably) trod the earth, but that he is the True Son of God, and that He rose from the dead. Literalist Fundies can't rest even with sufficient evidence that Jesus Lived (mind you, I'm not passing judgement on the merits of that question whatsoever) - they seem to need for there to be historical and objective proof of not just His life, but of His divinity. There can be no Leap of Faith, no Doubt, no Question - the Gospels are The Truth, writ by God, and available for all who are willing to accept Him.
Then again, maybe I'm wrong, but this is the best defense of poor Anonymous that I can muster.
Peace.