Evidence for why we know the New Testament writers told the truth.

[Aepervius]

My impression is that DOC had decided that Geisler would be convincing.
Then, after 14,000 posts of being confronted by us with the paucity of his argument, he decided to try the: "I don't have to justify them; it's all personal". Which is fine but in dire contradiction with his O.P and the original theme of the thread...

As it has been pointed to him; I fully expect him to go back to the "But I DO have real evidence" BS...

I think he will indeed come back, but in another thread. There he will say he has already provided evidence, and he will point to his post on Geisler, fully and squarely ignoring the solid debunking there was here.

 

[LibraryLady]

I have split off nearly 40 posts into AAH. At the risk of having this thread closed or moderated, please stay on topic and be civil. If you want to build your post counts, there are threads for that.

Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic  Posted By: LibraryLady

 

[Gandalfs Beard]

Ah! Now I can address some points that I thought were too far back to be worth my while.

DOC:They most certainly qualify as possible "historical" evidence and we are in a history forum.

Yes, which is why I posted this:

Eyewitness accounts, whether spoken or written, can be indications that an event may have occurred, but without supporting physical evidence there is very little certainty that such accounts are "true". Though they are at least evidence enough to spur further investigation to verify the claims.

The trouble is DOC, there is almost no other evidence at all outside of the New Testament itself to support your more spurious claims. And far too much of the Gospel accounts have been cribbed from Mithraism and other Pagan Sun-God religions to credibly support any notion that the Gospels are eyewitness accounts.

Akhenaten:
It's been pointed out to DOC scores, if not hundreds of times, that this is the case. He seems to think if he simply ignores these basic truths then they'll go away, but of course, as with pretty much everything else, he's wrong.

Good luck getting a straight answer to the points you've raised.

So I've noticed . I'm pleasantly surprised DOC even bothered to respond at all.

ME:
No doubt this contributes to DOC's fallacious notion that eyewitness accounts (spoken or written) have the same intrinsic value as Empirical Evidence.

DOC:
Actually I never said it has the same value but of course it does have value in many cases, ask historians.

You could have fooled me, the way you carry on all the time DOC . Again, the historicity of eyewitness accounts depends on supporting physical evidence and multiple independent sourcing.

ME:
Of course I haven't even addressed the fact that what evidence does exist indicates that the authors of the Gospels are most likely not who they claimed they were, thus putting the lie to the term "eyewitness accounts" as it applies to the NT.

DOC:
And there are biblical scholars who disagree with this, for example the author of "Misquoting Truth (A Guide to the Fallacies of Bart Ehrman)".

And there are many Biblical Scholars who do agree including John Dominic Crossen and many of the other blokes of The Jesus Seminar, and in fact Biblical Scholars of many denominations the world over agree there is no independent evidence to support the authorship claims of the Gospels yet that there is evidence against such claims. It doesn't seem to shake their Faith, but at least they are honestly examining the evidence.

GB

 

[kmortis]

I have split off nearly 40 posts into AAH. At the risk of having this thread closed or moderated, please stay on topic and be civil. If you want to build your post counts, there are threads for that.

Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic  Posted By: LibraryLady

LibraryLady,
First, let me apologize to you for making it necessary for you to do that.

Now, let me say that I think that closing this thread would be a mercy killing. We've been at it for over two years with no resolution forthcoming. The OP has demonstrated over his tenure here to not be able or willing to present objective evidence. Rather he engages in all manner of fallicious reasoning that goes unchanged even after repeated attempts to educate. The only purpose for this thread of late has been the entertainment of the regular posters. I don't think any of us have a reasonable expectation that the OP will change anytime soon. More of what you just had to sift through will be forthcoming because the OP makes himself a huge target by his behavior. For now, I'll bow out from further discussion on this thread to not give myself the temptation of falling back into bad (yet very funny) habits.

 

[Lemastre]

The inconvenience test

The fact that a number of events have some veracity doesn't prove that all the yarns in the New Testament are "true." A rule of thumb for biblical scholars in evaluating the likelihood of Bible stories is that the most inconvenient or least supportive of the Christian viewpoint are the most likely to be true. The crucifixion, for example, is likely to have happened because it ends the life of the messiah well before he has triumphed over evil, and indeed before he has even attracted enough converts to his cause -- hardly the story most supportive of Christian hopes. And then there are the instances where Jesus refused or was unable to perform acts that would advance his cause. Tracing the historical Jesus reveals how successive chroniclers of his life became more and more inventive in explaining away these things as their separation from the actual events increased and mortality had claimed more of those who'd witnessed these events.

 

[Simon39759]

By the way, the podcast Chariot of iron had an interesting episode containing, among other, and interview with Frank Zindler, author of the book: "The Jesus the Jews Never Knew".
During this interview, the author touched on several subjects that surfaced on this thread (which is not too difficult considering the wide spread of the 'evidences' that have been brought forth); this included whereas Nazareth or Bethlehem did exist at the time; the veracity of both of Josephus testimony on the reference to Jesus in the Talmud.
I have not read the book and, at any rate, lack the expertise to evaluate the author's argument, but it is, at any rate, food for thoughts and might interested several posters here...

 

[kmortis]

By the way, the podcast Chariot of iron had an interesting episode containing, among other, and interview with Frank Zindler, author of the book: "The Jesus the Jews Never Knew".
During this interview, the author touched on several subjects that surfaced on this thread (which is not too difficult considering the wide spread of the 'evidences' that have been brought forth); this included whereas Nazareth or Bethlehem did exist at the time; the veracity of both of Josephus testimony on the reference to Jesus in the Talmud.
I have not read the book and, at any rate, lack the expertise to evaluate the author's argument, but it is, at any rate, food for thoughts and might interested several posters here...

You putting that out there for all to see?

 

[Simon39759]

You putting that out there for all to see?

I found the interview interesting and it went over several of the subject this thread did, so I decided some posters here might share this interest...

 

[amb]

There's a fair bit of evidence out there that this Jesus guy could have been a complete fabrication. In my humble opinion, the tales gathered are from many fire and brimstone rabbis who roamed the countryside 2 thousand years ago. Or it could be based on a nobody who the Romans and the majority of the Hebrews completely ignored as just another kook among the many.
Then Paul came along and had some kind of a seizure and heard voices in his head and saw a vision, or a blinding light which was probably just in his head, and thus christianity started to bloom. He had a formidable subject he was selling, namely. eternal life.
Then there are sites like this................

www.jesusneverexisted.com

 

[Kapyong]

Well there is conflicting info on the internet.

About WHAT?
YOU claimed we do not where Caesar's tomb is.
You were wrong - we DO know.

Meanwhile - there IS plenty of conlficting info on the internet about Jesus.

Bottom line is we don't have Julius Caesar's signature and his ashes were supposedly scattered by the conquering Visogoths. No signature, no urn filled with ashes.

WTF?

YOU claimed we don't where Caesar's tomb is.
But we DO!

Now you've been shown wrong, you CHANGE the subject to signature and ashes?

Do we have Jesus' signature"
No.
His ashes?
No.

NOTHING from Jesus at all - no writings, no artifacts, NO accounts of ANY Christian even MEETING Jesus (not counting the late forged 2 Peter.)


Kap

 

[Rincewind]

Well there is conflicting info on the internet. Bottom line is we don't have Julius Caesar's signature and his ashes were supposedly scattered by the conquering Visogoths. No signature, no urn filled with ashes.

As I pointed out some days ago, contemporaries of Caesar wrote about him, which would seem to prove that he existed - especially as some of them didn't like him very much.

Also it's difficult to imagine how Gaul was conquered by Rome without Caesar being a real person.

However, I assume that just like the last time I posted information about Caesar, you'll also ignore this post as it contradicts your illusions.

 

[DOC]

My impression is that DOC had decided that Geisler would be convincing.
Then, after 14,000 posts of being confronted by us with the paucity of his argument, he decided to try the: "I don't have to justify them; it's all personal". Which is fine but in dire contradiction with his O.P and the original theme of the thread...

RED FLAG -- Another post that doesn't respond to a specific post of mine. In fact in responds to a X post.

 

[Cleon]

RED FLAG

I knew it. You're a communist.

 

[X]

RED FLAG -- Another post that doesn't respond to a specific post of mine. In fact in responds to a X post.

Well then, why not reply to my post instead of complaining about Simon's?


Here, I'll copy it below for you:

I noticed you left out the sentences in my post immediately following the above sentence which were:

If Barack Obama went on TV and said he saw an alien at Camp David, that would increase the probability in my mind that aliens exist. If a transient on a street corner told me he saw an alien last night it probably wouldn't increase the probability that aliens exist for me.

(bolding and size added)

__

Anyone who read the whole paragraph which you cut short would have or should have known that I meant (regarding the president of India) it increased the probability in your own opinion and not whether or not it was an actual fact or not.

So why should something which affects your opinion have any affect on ours?

Especially when it has been pointed out to you time and again that we consider arguments based on their own merits, not the merits of the person who said them?


I want you to do something, DOC:

Every time you hear n argument for the veracity of the New Testament which you like sit back and as yourself:
"Is my opinion of this argument influenced by the person who said it?"
If the answer is yes, don't bother posting it.
Seriously.

We already understand that you have no grasp of logic at all.

You can stop giving evidence of that.
(even though it is the only thing you have given evidence of in this thread)

 

[DOC]

And there are biblical scholars who disagree with this, for example the author of "Misquoting Truth (A Guide to the Fallacies of Bart Ehrman)".

http://www.amazon.com/Misquoting-Truth-Guide-Fallacies-Ehrmans/dp/0830834478

Great. Since there are no eyewitnesses to your Jebus, where is this evidence again?

How do you know there were no eyewitnesses? It would seem likely these people were eyewitnesses:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_martyrs

And if you want info about the authorship of the Gospels you can read my posts in this thread about the evidence Matthew and John wrote their gospels and also the entire Chapter 6 (which I don't have time to get into now) of the book "Misquoting Truth" (A guide to the Fallacies of Bart Ehriman). I give a link to this below. People outside the US will not be able to see specific pages of this book on this link.

...BTW: What scholarship has this fella done?

You will be able to get this info on page 151 of the link below unless you live outside the US.


http://books.google.com/books?id=gV...&resnum=1&ved=0CCUQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

And if you hit the arrows of the above link to page 9 you will see a table of contents of the book.

 

[Cleon]

How do you know there were no eyewitnesses? It would seem likely these people were eyewitnesses:

Only if you redefine "eyewitness" to mean something other than, well, eyewitness.

DOC, at least get new arguments, instead of recycling the old ones again and again and again.

 

[DOC]

...We've been at it for over two years with no resolution forthcoming. The OP has demonstrated over his tenure here to not be able or willing to present objective evidence. Rather he engages in all manner of fallicious reasoning that goes unchanged even after repeated attempts to educate. The only purpose for this thread of late has been the entertainment of the regular posters. I don't think any of us have a reasonable expectation that the OP will change anytime soon. More of what you just had to sift through will be forthcoming because the OP makes himself a huge target by his behavior. For now, I'll bow out from further discussion on this thread to not give myself the temptation of falling back into bad (yet very funny) habits..

Red Flag: Does not respond to a specific post of mine.

ETA: And this thread is not over 2 years old. It is about 1 year and 9 months old. And what difference does it make how old it is if new information occasionally comes out- and new important info does occasionally come out.

 

[Mister Agenda]

Clarification that may be helpful: someone reporting what someone else was an eyewitness to is hearsay. What we lack are eyewitness accounts, that is, reports by people who actually saw the events in question themselves.

I can say there were 100 eyewitnesses to a UFO landing by the State House yesterday. I could say it was 1000 and it wouldn't carry any more weight. A report by one person who saw it for themselves would carry more weight than a report from me claiming a million eyewitnesses.

 

[kmortis]

Red Flag: Does not respond to a specific post of mine.

And this thread is not over 2 years old. It is about 1 year and 9 months old. And what difference does it make how old it is if new information occasionally comes out- and new important info does occasionally come out.

Ok, I'm responding directly to you now. Does that make you feel better? IT doesn't change the fact that you have nt provided any evidence to support you claim that has not be refuted, regurgitated by you and refuted again, lather, rince, repeat. You have not added one piece of information in...oh, anytime that you've been here. Now, I will refrain from asking, yet again, for evidence, since you will either ignore this post or claim that you did (for a very weak definiton of evidence in post 13).

I don't care if this thread is 1 year, nine months or fourteen years old, it doesn't change the point I was making. Which is that you are not an honest debater. I'm not terribly sure what your point here is, but it's not to have discussion. It's not to impart information. It's not to provide evidence. I don't know what it is becuase all the claims you've made have been shown to be invalid.

 

[DOC]

Clarification that may be helpful: someone reporting what someone else was an eyewitness to is hearsay. What we lack are eyewitness accounts, that is, reports by people who actually saw the events in question themselves.

I can say there were 100 eyewitnesses to a UFO landing by the State House yesterday. I could say it was 1000 and it wouldn't carry any more weight. A report by one person who saw it for themselves would carry more weight than a report from me claiming a million eyewitnesses.

Then the testimony of the former Christian hater and witness Paul (who was ranked as the 6th most influential person ever to live according to the book "The 100 -- A ranking of...") who claims he saw a light (that temporarily blinded him) and heard the voice of Jesus, should carry a lot of weight.

And gospel writer Luke claims this light was also seen by others who were with Paul. And don't say there is a contradiction in accounts. We've already been over that and there is no contradiction.