Merged Evidence for why we know the New Testament writers told the truth - (Part 2)

[Akhenaten]

Welcome to DOCworld.

 

[Good Lt]

How do you explain the recent rapid growth of mormonism, if Jesus didn't come to america and Joseph smith didn't translate golden plates?
explain that!

Had to

 

[Good Lt]

By the way, even Christopher Hitchens was willing to accept that there may have been a popular preacher living in the time of Jesus who may have fit the bill for such an individual.

But that doesn't prove:

A) he was God's son
B) that God exists
C) that Christianity is the one true faith
D) that miracles occur
E) that his death absolved the world of any sin
F) that the Bible is true or divine in any way
G) etc etc etc

Or, as stated above:

Yup. Ehrman's position is simply that the origins of the Jesus Christ myth are best explained if there was a real apocalyptic rabbi who was put to death by the Romans for proclaiming himself the heir to King David's throne and the leader of the impending revolution.

...and the believer still has all of their work cut out for them. They're still left 'holding an empty sac,' as the Hitch put it.

 

[Lowpro]

But according to the Gospels (written by such people as respected historian Luke, and which Ehrman says is part of the historical record) it wasn't unfounded to the apostles who instigated the great growth, they "saw" the risen Jesus which could explain what Wiki reports here.

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

Lol by that logic every Hindu and Islamic martyr gives veracity to their religions too. DOC do you believe Brahma exists?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Hindu_martyrs

 

[Lucian]

Right, I'm trying to get caught up: is DOC saying that Bart Ehrman has provided evidence for why we know the New Testament writers told the truth? Where am I? What thread am I in? Have any prophecies been fulfilled?

I'm confused and frightened.

 

[Akhenaten]

I blame the Chinese for naming their babies 'Mohammed'.

 

[joobz]

But according to the Gospels (written by such people as respected historian Luke, and which Ehrman says is part of the historical record) it wasn't unfounded to the apostles who instigated the great growth, they "saw" the risen Jesus which could explain what Wiki reports here.

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

But according to the Gospels (Written by such known fabricators as Luke, who A Dominican Priest stated that he made up the nativity story) Jesus would go nuts about fig trees being out of season and condoned slavery.

So I'm not sure what any of this is to mean?

 

[Giordano]

Shouldn't this be merged with the "Evidence for why we know the New Testament writers told the truth?" thread. At first I was willing to believe that DOC might actually be striking out into new, if still hightly erroneous territory, but it quickly became the same old thing.

Unfortunately I don't know how to make that suggestion to a Mod. Anyone?

 

[HansMustermann]

How is Bart Ehrman a "Skeptic Favorite?"

He looks to be a standard religious apologist to me.

He's not really. He's a curious beast, really.

On one hand, he IS one of the most accessible sources of good scholarship for the NT, and even manages to make a coherent case for why as a historian he can't take the miracles as real. So, kudos for that.

It's only the EXISTENCE of a mundane and uninteresting Yeshua Ben Yosef that Bart Ehrman goes into dada territory, and starts rabidly pulling every single fallacy in the book to "support" it. From appeals to authority to some pretty lame ad-hominems to every kind of circular logic, mis-representation, arguments from personal incredulity, and plain old ass-pulls, give him enough time, and he'll do it, if it's about the EXISTENCE of a mundane Jesus.

I.e., strangely enough that whole historian persona goes out the window, and he does start acting exactly like an apologist, when it comes to the question of existence.

I could wonder WHY he does that, but ultimately that's irrelevant, really. All that matters is whether he has good data to support that existence or not. And clearly he doesn't.

In fact, the funny part is that he's the best at demolishing his own position. Every single argument he uses about the unreliability of the evidence of miracles, can be applied verbatim to show why the same sources are utterly unreliable when it comes to proving the existence.

In fact, to give credit where credit is due, kudos to Bart Ehrman, he's done more than everyone else combined to convince me that a historical Jesus probably DIDN'T exist. I mean, kudos to Richard Carrier and Robert Price and all the others too, but before I even heard of those, it was Ehrman that answered my question about exactly how much I can trust those NT sources, and he argues very convincingly that they're not worth much.

So that being the case, whether or not he then chooses to still believe in a Jesus he just proved to be unsupportable, is fully irrelevant, really. An argument from "but Barth Ehrman still believes that Jesus existed" is really still an argument from authority. And if not only he doesn't have any good evidence, but he just told you himself what's wrong with the evidence, then who cares what he chooses to believe without evidence?

 

[DOC]

The Bible is true because the Bible is true?

Who knew?!

Actually when the 9 different New Testament writers---writing at different times and places--- wrote their works, they didn't have a clue it was going to end up in something called a Bible.

 

[Moss]

They apparently also didn't have quite have the clue what was up with that Yeshua guy. I mean, they can't even get that simple story straight and end up writing different versions? Bit odd, init?

 

[Mojo]

In the 5 years or so I've been on this site many people have written in my threads that Jesus is a myth, a fairy tale. Well that is not what skeptic favorite Bart Ehrman says in his new book, "Did Jesus Exist".

Here is a quote from the inside jacket of the book.

"As a leading Bible expert, Ehrman's supporters and critics alike have queried him about this nagging question that has become a conspiracy theorIst cottage industry the world over. The idea that the character of Jesus was an invention of the early church-- and later a tool of control employed by the Roman Catholic Church-- is a widely held belief, and Ehrman has decided it's time to put the issue to rest.

YES, THE HISTORICAL JESUS OF NAZARETH DID EXIST.

But the Jesus he says existed is not the same as the Jesus you say existed. From Jerry Coyne's comments about the book:

You’ll also know that that the book doesn’t assert the divinity of Jesus, claiming, as Ehrman has consistently, that the man was a fully human apocalyptic preacher.

 

[DOC]

Will you post any that present Erman's belief that your religion was fabricated over generations and has very little to do with the historical Jesus whom you reference?

I have a feeling the apostle Peter (who probably knew a thing or two about the historical Jesus after 3 years of traveling with him) wasn't fabricating things in Rome where he went to preach.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=85633

 

[DOC]

Quote:
You’ll also know that that the book doesn’t assert the divinity of Jesus, claiming, as Ehrman has consistently, that the man was a fully human apocalyptic preacher

Jesus talked some about the end of the world, but he also managed to slip in enough morality to motivate Thomas Jefferson to write a book which included over 60 pages of Christ's life events and morality teachings.

If a guy is so focused on the end of the world why is he spending so much time on everyday morality, and loving your neighbor, and loving your enemies.

 

[Lowpro]

Jesus talked some about the end of the world, but he also managed to slip in enough morality to motivate Thomas Jefferson to write a book which included over 60 pages of Christ's life events and morality teachings.

Ah did you read Barton's "Jefferson Lies"?

 

[pakeha]

...The only way that Bart Erhman could be described as a a skeptic favourite is if someone named a pizza after him.

Which will probably happen, now that I come to think about it. ...

Will this count as a fulfilled prophecy, O Pharaoh?

I have access to the book, and I have spent about a half hour so far skimming it. Just from that short time it seems most of the book is Ehrman giving facts as to why he believes the historical Jesus existed.

Ummmm.
No.

I've never said the Resurrection is true because the bible said so, but I have presented sites like the one below to give rational reasons to believe it happened.

http://www.leaderu.com/everystudent/easter/articles/josh2.html

And that site says...
"FACT #4: ROMAN GUARD GOES AWOL
The Roman guards fled. They left their place of responsibility. How can their attrition he explained, when Roman military discipline was so exceptional?"

And we know the Roman guard fled because....?

 

[zooterkin]

Bart Ehrman, who started as an evangelical Christian, and became an agnostic after studying the bible? This is like when you advance Jefferson cutting out all the supernatural parts of the bible as proof that the supernatural parts of the bible are true, isn't it?

Jesus talked some about the end of the world, but he also managed to slip in enough morality to motivate Thomas Jefferson to write a book which included over 60 pages of Christ's life events and morality teachings.

Ah, I do love reruns...

 

[DOC]

They apparently also didn't have quite have the clue what was up with that Yeshua guy. I mean, they can't even get that simple story straight and end up writing different versions? Bit odd, init?

I would be more worried if there was no inconsistencies when 9 separate writers are writing at different times and places. And as I've said before, I've never read an alleged inconsistency in the Gospels that can't be logically explained.

If you had 9 people in the general area of the NY 911 attacks and none of them saw news accounts and that night you asked them to describe what happened that day do you think there would be any inconsistencies in their stories.

 

[Moss]

Except those writers seem to have played Chinese Whispers with the same story. And they all had some distance to the events which given what we know about testimony isn't exactly a good thing.

 

[zooterkin]

I would be more worried if there was no inconsistencies when 9 separate writers are writing at different times and places. And as I've said before, I've never read an alleged inconsistency in the Gospels that can't be logically explained.

If you had 9 people in the general area of the NY 911 attacks and none of them saw news accounts and that night you asked them to describe what happened that day do you think there would be any inconsistencies in their stories.

On which page of the book does Ehrman address this?