There is no written word of Jesus from the time he lived outside the bible, except one work that seems to have been doctored or reinterpreted.

Reading up, I see that most of you argue your positions by citing the bible... The bible is a document to promote the faith, and was written with that in mind.

Of course the bible says that the romans were bribed to spread a lie. What better way to invalidate an claim which destroys the very basis of your faith?

You don't need his words, we don't care about what he was preaching, here, but rather what happened to him. ;)

By that, I mean he may not of existed. Now, Xenu...

@ Tantris

The sources that I have disagree with you on that. The Josephus work appears to be tampered with, but even if you ignore the part that attests to CHrist's divinity it still supports his existence. There is also Julius Africanus who cites Thallus (writing in about 52 AD, so we've got a source within twenty years of the event) as making an attempt to explain away the darkness that appeared at the time of the Crucifixion. One would ask why try to explain it away when there were people in the city who could just refute the whole story?

http://www.westarkchurchofchrist.org/library/extrabiblical.htm

Jesus is better attested to (even if you )

Oops forgot about that point at the bottom

Even if we ignore the parts of Josephus that attest to Christ's divinity, he's still the best documented person, of like social status, that we can find from the time.

@ Dominic

I'd like to have access to the evidence that makes that claim. If you can find any of it please let me know.

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

Found it. Like any book treating a touchy subject, there's a criticism section on wikipedia, but interestingly enough no argument against the staged crucifixion is retained.

I'll have to assume that's where the historian I know got his stuff (among other places), though I haven't read the book myself.

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

This also looks interesting...

"he's still the best documented person, of like social status, that we can find from the time."

And I have the best speaking goldfish known to mankind. I still can't hold a conversation with it, though.

With regard to your P3, you haven't changed the fundamental point I was making that we have an argument for the existence of God from testimony of Miracles, miracle being defined as something that breaks the laws of nature.

Because you are arguing for the existence of God, and because there is no reason to suppose he exists before we get to this, you have to start without the premise of god's existence being in any way probable (i.e. you must begin your inquiry skeptical).

Once you've done that, miracles are, by their very definition as breaking the laws of nature the most improbable thing to happen that is not impossible, and so are, by their very definition, more improbable than any natural explanation. Therefore, for any miracle to be convincing evidence of Gods existence, you must through your testimony preclude all possibility of it not actually being a miracle, i.e. to show that it is a choice between the impossible and the maximally improbable. Clearly this is impossible to do.

@ ghostmaker

At first, Wow that's a terrible analogy. How do you justify it? There is actual evidence for the existence of Jesus Christ. It comes in biblical and non-biblical form. You could use your gold fish analogy to debunk the existence of Julius Caesar (whom I assume we both agree existed).

For instance I'd state:
"Julius Caesar is the best documented person of like social status that we can find from the time. "

If you replied:

"And I have the best speaking goldfish known to mankind. I still can't hold a conversation with it, though."

Basically there is evidence that Jesus existed and scholarship does attest to it pretty well. Unfortunately I'm not so sure about the scholarly reliability of your goldfish claim. It just seems spurious.

@ghostmaker (again)

Please cite where I asserted that the Resurrection was evidence of God's existence. The argument is not one of God's existence, I'm merely stating that it seems likely that Christ was resurrected based upon the evidence that we have. If one denies the resurrection they are doing so:

A) without any actual physical evidence regarding the case

and

B) by ignoring eyewitness testimony to the contrary.


Applying science to history is a misuse of science, or at least bad practice for a historian. In this case it does nothing but allow you to make the supposition (whenever necessary to your argument) than nothing unexpected ever happened in ancient history. Therefore using the same rationale every event in history could be perfectly fine except those that weaken your stance. If something unexpected happened, then we apply current thinking in science to state that it didn't without regard to testimony by real people who saw it and stated otherwise. Eyewitness testimony simply is accepted as evidence in history and rightly so. Without it much of what we know of history would have long since been lost.

if i may, TGM didn't say Jesus wasn't real, he said being the best documented is not the same as being well documented.

Hitler is documented much better than Jesus - not questioning the existance of Jesus - just pointing out the obvious fallacy - best does not mean good - the nicest nazi still believed that the jews were subhuman and the arians were a superior race (the counter arguement there is Nazis would rule the world if they really were a superior race, and they don't.)

You have as much reason to believe that there are aliens in area 51 and that people are routinely kidnapped by them and implanted anal probes than to believe in resurrection. Both rely on eye-witness account to perpetuate something that nobody can otherwise prove.

danm lost my elvis remark - that people testify Elvis is still alive does not mean it is so.

The bible is also *not* a neutral or reliable historical source.

@ orathaic

Sure but he's documented nonetheless. That puts an assertion that he didn't in the camp of discounting all evidence both scriptural and non-scriptural. The original point on my part was that Christ's existance is backed up by evidence to support it. TGM's goldfish talking is an otherwise wild and unsupported claim. The two statements simply cannot be equated.

As to Christ's existence being well documented, I'll have to fall back on the scholarship of others and the discussion that we already had on this subject in which you seemed to accept the eivdence that was submitted. I'll have to admit I'm in no rush to reargue something that I thought we already agreed on. It's in this thread if you want to go back and review it, but as to the scholarly argument, most accept that there is sufficient evidence to suppose that he existed.

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

" essentially all scholars in the relevant fields agree that the mere historical existence of Jesus can be established using documentary and other evidence."

and here's the thread where we discussed this last time.

http://webdiplomacy.net/forum.php?threadID=493738&page-thread=3#threadPager

@ Dominc

As to aliens and such. That's an odd assertion as the conspiracy theory is on your side, and you cited it. The book that you cited "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" is widely (I'm being conservative because the critque said universally) seen as as pseudohistory by scholars. ". If you check the background section of the Wiki article you'll see that it was largely drawn from a text "The Dossiers Secrets" that is now known to be a muh later forgery. If anything the guys that put that book together weren't critical of their sources.

@ orathaic

That's true, but how many of Elvis's closest friends testify that he is still alive in the face of torture to get them ot deny it? That's hardly an apt analogy.

@ Dominic (again)

That's exactly what I was saying. You deny the resurrection because you ignore the testimony that supports it. The testimony is not entirely based on biblical resources though. See the earlier reference to Thallus (a non-Christian Roman historian writing within living memory of the event).

@Crazy Anglican:
Josephus may mention Jesus in two places, both disputed. There are no writings from when Jesus was alive. Even Josephus wrote long years after he had died. Your other source was just speaking about a darkness, which does not prove Jesus lived.

There are no solid sources. Yet, during that time, there are solid histories of others. Even very minor characters, who, supposedly, Jesus would not be. Now, if you go forward 100 years or so, you start getting references to Christians, but that is by no one that could have seen Jesus.

@Crazy Anglican:
I like how you pull that quote about all scholars from the Wikipedia article which lists scholars at the end that specifically say that isn't true.

See, I think we need to nail down that issue, before we move on to others.

@Crazy Anglican: re @Dominic:
Thallus said it was dark, he didn't say Jesus was resurrected.

@ Tantris

As far as saying it wasn't true in the last section devoted to the Christ Myth model (I'm assuming).

Did you mean this one

"The existence of Jesus as an actual historical figure has been questioned by few scholars and historians"


or this one

"Nevertheless, the historicity of Jesus is accepted by almost all Biblical scholars and classical historians.["

or that one

"New Testament scholar[125][126] James Dunn describes the mythical Jesus theory as a 'thoroughly dead thesis'."


Most interpretations of the Josephus quote show it to exaggerate the claim that he was the Christ (an assertion that Josephus would not have made). However it is only partially tampered with. That is it still mentions Jesus.

I'm not asserting that he's the Christ for the purposes of this argument. I'm asserting that there is little reason to suppose that he never lived. The idea that he is entirely a myth does have a few proponents, but you're overstating the argument and it's weight.

@Thucydides:
It's something good Christians should know, as it helps reafirm the faith, but in the end, it's not actually going to convince anyone because they do not want to be convinced. It's human nature.

@Crazy Anglican:
So, your argument is that sometime after 100 A.D, Josephus wrote that someone named Jesus was mentioned to have lived, and had a brother named James, who doesn't seem to be the right James? We don't know where that information came from, and could have been oral tradition or from Christians.

Ok, if that is what you want to prove, I agree, Josephus mentioned that person. He didn't describe anything more about that person, than 1 sentence.

http://www.nobeliefs.com/exist.htm

Sorry, I meant around 100 AD, not after.

@ Tantris

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

Here's some more on the the myth theory:

Regarding the theory itself-
"The Christ myth theory is essentially without supporters in modern academic circles, biblical scholars and historians being highly dismissive of it,[51] viewing it as pseudo-scholarship.[42] Some of these specialists have even gone so far as to compare the theory's methodological basis with that of flat-earthism, Holocaust denial and moon landing skepticism.[55]"




support for a historical Christ regarding Josephus:

mainstream scholarship believes the writings of Josephus contain multiple authentic references to Jesus. Josephus' allusion in The Antiquities of the Jews to the death of James is almost universally accepted as legitimate.[156] This reference states that James was "the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ." The fuller reference to Jesus, known as the Testimonium Flavianum, while suspected of containing later interpolations, is nevertheless believed by a large majority of scholars to also preserve a comment regarding Jesus original to the text.[157]


Let's turn the argument around now. I've spent plenty of time making a case for something that I've already argued. I'll respond again when you've given some proofs for your theory, otherwise it pretty much is settled.

I am having fun with this in much the same way as you guys must with Creationists. The theory is based on supposed lack of evidence and not taken seriously by academics, but if you're willing to try to prop it up, I'll get around to knocking it down.

I knew that you'd get to that nobeliefs.com argument. What a spurious bunch of nonsense. This guy also argues that Hitler was a "good Christian" if you're rejecting the New Testament based on the supposed bias of the authors, you have a long way to go to put forth the argument that he's in any way non biased.

@Crazy Anglican

First, I suppose you accept that the resurrection is a miracle, rather than the result of chance actions of physical laws? That is, that it broke physical law rather than being a quite exceptional case of it?

@ TGM

That's a big assumption. For the purposes of the argument the miracle need not be evidence of anything (that's purely faith). If we were going that route there have been miracles in my life that would be more compelling for me as I was there to witness them. I make no assertion based on the miracles though. My acceptance of Christianity is not based solely on the Resurrection or on miracles. Rather my acceptance of the interpretations of events like the Resurrection and miracles is based on my acceptance of Christianity.