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Even the three days is a stretch, Friday evening till Sunday morning is barely 36 hours.
In Christianity there's always the leading of the Holy Spirit about what to write. Whether or not they followed the Holy Spirit on that only they and God knows.
What - you're going to get the truth from an atheist?
A careful study of the independently recorded events gives rise to a logical conclusion. And you can read about that in this link. There's 12 basic, historical facts that over 1,400 scholars (skeptic and non-skeptic) agree on.
12 Historical Facts - Gary Habermas
Also, the fact is there's a number of non-biblical sources that wrote about Jesus, and they confirm a lot of interesting details. Many of these are covered in scholar Gary Habermas' book, "The Historical Jesus." Recommend you read it. Available on Amazon.
The vast majority of history is hearsay, goldsmith. Are you prepared to be consistent and rip out major sections of collegiate history books?
You didn't read the Harmony of the Resurrection link I provided earlier, did you? And don't miss the forest for the trees. They ALL confirm the resurrection!
That is correct. Both Mark and Matthew were written before Luke/Acts, and the earliest Epistles also discuss Jesus' life, death, and resurrection.
That's interesting. You want something that would almost certainly have to be faked: the transportation of modern scientific methodologies and capabilities two millenia backwards in time.
By that standard, the vast majority of history must be chucked.
This is a common misconception. We do not believe in God because the Bible told us to. We believe in the Bible because God told us to.
Naturally. You write the accounts down as the generation who can attest to it directly dies so that their accounts can be preserved. Prior to that, we have the Epistles, the expository material of that early generation. Which is precisely what you would expect.
Both John and Mark state that it was Mary. Matthew and Luke do not say, but simply record other interactions. Which is precisely what you would expect.
:lol: yes. Jesus was whipped, flogged, starved, dehydrated, crucified, and then stabbed through the lungs.... and then upon being placed in a sealed cave with zero medical attention or water, revived, survived three days (again, massive blood loss, massive trauma, hands and feet split, no food, no water), tossed a giant stone designed to require multiple men to move out of the way, ninja-fought off a company of Roman soldiers, and escaped.
:lol: Thanks. - It's been a long day, and that was a good chuckle.
I always thought him having a twin would explain the resurrection.
Well even his death / resurrection aren't consistent across the gospels.
So then you concede they weren't eyewitnesses?
What would I expect? A laboratory notebook. :lol: You write it down as it happens, not 10+ years later (again, even granting a premise Logic argued).
Would you like to lie again? Matthew says both Marys. John and Mark say Mary Magdalene. Luke says Cleopas. Corinthians say Cephas (I wonder if they meant Cephus, maybe we should ask him).
If you look at the Gospel accounts of that as being complementary, instead of "either/or," then I think your objections disappear.
Once again, if that's your criteria you'll have an extremely thin history book. Besides, the apostles were busy running for their lives back then to keep from getting murdered.
The Harmony of the Resurrection analysis buries that objection. Again, it's not "either/or" but complementary.
Greenleaf’s Harmony of the Resurrection Accounts
1. Jesus died by crucifixion.
2. He was buried.
3. His death caused the disciples to despair and lose hope.
4. The tomb was empty (the most contested).
5. The disciples had experiences which they believed were literal appearances of the risen Jesus (the most important proof).
6. The disciples were transformed from doubters to bold proclaimers.
7. The resurrection was the central message.
8. They preached the message of Jesus’ resurrection in Jerusalem.
9. The Church was born and grew.
10. Orthodox Jews who believed in Christ made Sunday their primary day of worship.
11. James was converted to the faith when he saw the resurrected Jesus (James was a family skeptic).
12. Paul was converted to the faith (Paul was an outsider skeptic).
In other words, if I ditch skepticism in lieu of blind faith. Sorry, no.
How are they eyewitnesses when they arguably weren't even alive when Jesus was around? And, if they were, they would've been children.
Not really. I have a 'history' book that goes back millions of years. It's called the fossil record.Well, they didn't appear to do a very good job. :lol:
There's no 'well it's complimentary.'
The 12 Facts about Jesus, according to Gary Habermas
Professor Habermas is an evangelical True Believer who refuses to acknowledge any information or data that contradicts his religious faith. He would lose his job if he did admit the 'evidence' he claims is mere supposition.
We don't know that it happened, Christians believe the crucifixion took place but there is no physical evidence.
So you're sticking to the idea that written or eyewitness accounts cannot possibly be complementary? That's not skepticism, that's personal bias and tunnel vision.
I don't know how you figure they weren't alive yet. It's probably because you late-date the Gospels and aren't up-to-date on Biblical scholarship.
You might want to update your timelines.
Funny you bring that up because there's even splits in thinking in the scientific community as to whether the Cambrian explosion was due to punctuated equilibrium / spontaneous generation, or gradualism.
Nonsense. The Harmony of the Resurrection analysis refutes that.
No, I'm sticking to the idea that something either happens or it doesn't. Either Jesus was resurrected or he wasn't. It's a dodge to say 'well, they still tell the same story, just different ways.'
I'm using the dates from the link you previously posted. Between 61 - 89 (?) A.D., I believe. Average life expectancy was 29 years old at this time.
Using circular logic it sure does. Otherwise, not quite, it does not.
Well, all four Gospels and various epistles all confirm the resurrection. On the other side of the ledger are ZERO first century writings that it didn't happen.
Already addressed. King Herod was 69.
How is it circular since you use the Gospels to make your case that it's contradictory?
Doesn't matter how old Herod was. There are people that live to be 120 years old, that doesn't mean everyone lives to be that old. How old were the gospel writers?
It's circular because you're supposing what you've preconceived to be true, is true.
You're citing the source that uses the gospels as a source for the gospels. That is the epitome of circular logic.
Nice backpedal.
You're right, I certainly qualify as a "novice" or an "amateur" as I don't make money off of religious studies.
And it's funny, you say that the more you study the Bible and yet.. studying the Bible seems to consist of reading commentaries other people wrote on the Bible. Why not just read the actual Bible? Most of those commentaries, including the Evidence that Demands a verdict series are unfortunately pseudo-intellectual fluff pieces. They spend a lot of time attacking weak strawmen arguments and are chalked full of factual inaccuracies. eg.. the New Testament wasn't written by eyewitnesses, isn’t' unique among ancient manuscripts, and is no more self consistent through the centuries than any other document... (arguably less so).
How could you ignore the Council of Nicea and it's relationship to Constantine and the politics of Rome? What about the Septuagint vs the Masoretic texts? What about Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus? The differences between the Apostles' Creed and the Nicean Creed? What of the Gnostic movement? What about the numerous contradictions throughout the Bible? The actual hard questions are far too numerous to tick off here.
A better question would be for you. What constitutes "studying" the Bible? Have you read the Richard Lattimore verision? (He's widely regarded as a preeminent translator of ancient Greek works and produced the go to versions of the Illiad, the Odyssey, etc..
Englishing the Iliad: Grading Four Rival Translations - The New Yorker
The net result is a much more true to life feel. Much of the "interconnectedness" you're talking about is that most Bible versions translate everything to sound the same. Lattimore's doesn't. Mark is choppy and unsophisticated. Luke is flowing and elegant. The letters are actually letters.
But.. I'm a novice, and you're an "expert".
Apparently you're saving the part about humility for later.Neither do I.
How would you know? You've a novice, remember?
Not ignoring anything, but what about it? Do you have a particular argument that demonstrates (for instance) that the Gospels are wrong? If you do, let's see it.
You are a novice, but I never claimed to be an expert. Just a lot further down the road than you are.
Now how about you show me where the Gospels are wrong, or fabrications. Pick your best one (1) or two (two) examples and document them. Include scripture numbers. Just one or two. Your very best ones.
Not at all - I was making fun of you switching from "Centuries" to "Decades", those two things being rather radically different.
:shrug: Sure. You could also say "no later than 1865, and it would be no less accurate.
:roll: Whatever man, it's clear you wandered outside your scope of knowledge.
I've already pointed out a number of issues which need to be confronted for any rational discourse of the accuracy of the Gospels... or even why there are any Gospels to begin with. That you completely ignored the bolded text is telling. You assert that the Gosples are absolutely true because they're self consistent. That's not actually true, but we'll leave that for now.
The problem you have is that there were more than four Gospels. Offhand, we have the Gospels' of Thomas, Mary, Truth, Philips, Judas, and Q. There are many more besides those.
There were many divisions within Christianity at the time, Gnosticism, Arianism, Ebionism, etc...
Constantine needed the power inherent in a unified Church, so all of these sects but one was pruned away. Sure, you can believe that the individual books of the Bible were inspired, the copiers who copied them were inspired, the early church leaders who preached without the guidance of an official ordained set of manuscripts were inspired, an Emperor of Rome with a vested interest in a certain result was inspired, and the council members he appointed were inspired.
But.. what you can't do is to assert that internal consistency of the Bible is proof of its veracity.
The Bible was assembled by a council of elders who canonized some texts, and rejected others.
As an analogy, imagine if a council of governmental leaders sat down 300 years from now and canonized a handful of the myriad of LR Hubbard's texts. They pick a handful that tell mostly the same story. Then you come along and say.. obviously scientology is true.. look at these texts! They agree with each other!
Wrong. I did not switch anything. In post #131 I wrote:
It is a good analogy because the process took decades to hundreds of years.
The writings took place decades to hundreds of years AFTER Jesus died...
Of the epistles which some consider pseudepigraphical, scholars tend to place them somewhere between 70 and 150
New Testament - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
...making my statement CORRECT.
Obviously not as common and accepted basic math shows...
why those three guys thanked you is the real mystery.
Recapping how we got here.I'm still waiting for a specific example from any of that vs. the New Testament that makes a case for you.
That's not a problem for me. There's only four that are 1st century that have support from the early church fathers as being original authors - Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The others are 2nd century Gnostic redactions, pseudepigrapha, etc.
Still doesn't help you. There was the real thing too. You can read about it in the Book of Acts. Again, it goes back to what's authentic, not what's digressed from the authentic.
From my 40 years of studies the New Testament and its foundations in the Old Testament are trustworthy and reliable.
And they did a super job of getting rid of the 2nd century Gnostic redactions and pseudepigrapha too.
I think you'd have a better argument if you could show me where the Gospels and New Testament are wrong. You make many arguments that they are but I've yet to see the first specific evidence from you that they are wrong. You're into generalizations whereas to make your case you need some specifics.
I previously asked you to show me where the Gospels are wrong, or fabrications. I asked you to pick your best one (1) or two (two) examples and document them. Include scripture numbers. Just one or two. Your very best ones. I've yet to see those from you. Can I expect that in your next post to me?
Abraham(1) was the father of Isaac(2),
Isaac(2) the father of Jacob(3),
Jacob(3) the father of Judah(3) and his brothers,
3 Judah(3) the father of Perez(4) and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar,
Perez(4) the father of Hezron(5),
Hezron(5) the father of Ram(6),
4 Ram(6) the father of Amminadab(7),
Amminadab(7) the father of Nahshon(8),
Nahshon(8) the father of Salmon(9),
5 Salmon(9) the father of Boaz(10), whose mother was Rahab,
Boaz(10) the father of Obed(11), whose mother was Ruth,
Obed(11) the father of Jesse(12),
6 and Jesse(12) the father of King David(13).
Matthew 1:17 Thus there were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Messiah..
John lived until around 95 AD so I guess that doesn't help your case. And I guess it would be too much to believe that God might keep them alive until they finished their work.
Ditto back, since you're supposing it isn't true, but you've got nothing but conjecture on that to plead your case.
That's what I'm saying - that you using the Gospels to make your anti-Gospel argument must then be circular logic too.
Recapping how we got here.
YOU claimed that the bible was true because the bible says that it was inspired.
I replied that that was a circular argument
But sometimes a pacifier is necessary.... so to calm you down, we'll just look at the first page of the New Testament..
Awww... crap..... There are only thirteen generations listed from Abraham to David.
And before you fluff it off, realize that numerology is a significant aspect of many kinds of Judiasm. Matthew 1:17 is not an accident. It's the first bit of evidence for the Divinity of Jesus. 7 is the number of the divine. 2 represents the tablets in the covenant, and 3 represents a spiritual journey. So 2*7, 2*7, 2*7 is a very clear statement that Jesus is the divine fulfilment of the covenant to the Jewish people. So the claim is important.
You can also say copiest error, but then you have to accept that there is no one who's missing a father, meaning at least one generation is factually incorrect. Furthermore, 14, 14, 14, begins to run into serious factual problems when you begin to line the generations up with actual known history.
Eg, Ur was founded in about 4000BCE and destroyed in about 2004 BCE by the Elamites. Abraham was from Ur. According to Jewish Chronologies, the temple was constructed in 960 BCE in the 4th year of Solomon's reign. Solomon lived to be 52, and ruled for 40 years... meaning according to biblical estimates he would have been born in ~976. So Abraham leaving Ur to the birth of Solomon is at least 1028 years. That's 14 births according to Matthew 1:17 meaning the average age of each Father was 73.... Ouch...
Now the excile to Babylon happened in ~598BCE. We have 14 generations in 378 years, or every 27 years. And finally, we have 598 to 4 BCE or a generation every 42 years. Basically nonsense.
It's clear this was an attempt to use using jewish numerology to to lend creedence to the divinity of Christ. It's also false, and that's just page 1.
It is still debate whether or not a single man named John -- and this is the same 'beloved' apostle John -- wrote the gospels. And yes, that's a bit much. There are more than a few critical scholars who doubt the apostle John ≠ the evangelist John. You're also neglecting the fact that according to your link the gospel of John was written somewhere in 87 AD (some people think earlier and some think later). That is still 50+ years after Jesus' supposed death. When I write my lab notebooks and protocols, I don't even wait days. I do it as it happens.
No, it's called skepticism. Try it sometime.
You're saying the Gospels (and, presumably, the Bible as a whole) is true. Essentially, you're clutching at straws and I'm telling you have nothing to hold on to.
Of course all that assumes they never previously reduced to writing (in their own records) that which transpired, or they all developed amnesia, or whatever.
They also had a helper - the Holy Spirit.
"But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you." - John 14:26
And now would be the time for skeptics to trot out their anti-supernatural bias!
I don't recall saying that. I've said I base my beliefs on the preponderance of the evidence.
I'll answer that, but do understand that to falsify Christianity you'll need to show the resurrection never happened, and all four Gospels and various epistles confirm it.
As for Matthew's generations of Jesus, and your "only thirteen generations," you may have missed something:
https://mitchchase.wordpress.com/20...mes-make-up-14-generations-in-matthew-112-16/
LOL, Now I have to falsify Christianity? You've moved the goalposts so far you should be a groundskeeper.
You've repeatedly made the claim that the Gospels were supernaturally inspired so we can trust them.. And you've continually cited John 14:26 as a reason. That's a circular argument. You cannot rationally continue to claim that the Gospels are true because they're internally consistent, and then deny that you're using the Gospels to prove themselves. Also, doing this while pretending to be some sort of wizened sage and that everyone else is beneath your level of understanding isn't a good tactic.
But I hope you enjoy your day.
These debates are frequent and can go on forever but ultimately it comes down to whether a person has been touched by Jesus, or God, or has not. Those who have never been touched will never get it.What you have missed in all this is that I just don't automatically believe they were divinely inspired - I researched them and studied them for decades. I looked at the scores of Messianic fulfillments and their accuracy at a rate far, far greater than chance (the signature of God), and see the divine inspiration of God in them. In short, I've looked at the evidence that backs up what the Bible says, and it's extremely impressive. The evidence, Mithros. That's why I believe they were divinely inspired; not just because the Bible says so. That's what you're missing. And that's why I point you in that direction, so you can see it too.
You too. Still recommend that evidence book and others like it so you can see what you're missing.
These debates are frequent and can go on forever but ultimately it comes down to whether a person has been touched by Jesus, or God, or has not. Those who have never been touched will never get it.
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