Thread: Is it possible for us as men to have a discussion on God

Originally Posted by Hutch

Other evidence to support such conclusions with regards to the passing down of folk tails are commonalities with regards to various religions throughout time, a prime example is the virgin birth, the vast majority of religions contain a virgin birth. The ancients seem to have a real thing for virgin births back in the day, amazingly they don't seem to happen now that we have a scientific understanding of reproduction.

Yes, and many of the various "saviours" of bygone religions that were born of virgins were also born on the Winter Solstice, Winter solstice - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, which is observed by many cultures as a time of rebirth and renewal.

Those little inconsistencies combined with the somewhat blurry time of actual birth of Jesus (not to mention the hazy details of his life, and complete lack of personal writings which are in abundance for other peoples living in his era and before) combine to cast some serious doubt as to whether he was truly a historical figure.

A few other virgin births:

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

http://www.bookrags.com/wiki/List_of_virgin_births

Originally Posted by hoglahoo

Yeah, something like that would have to be a miracle, wouldn't it?

The virginity of Mary was introduced very late in the history of christianity. So it was a retroactive miracle.

"CHRISTMAS DAY

It was not until the year 273 A.D.,..that the 25th of December was adopted by Christians as the day upon which to celebrate the birthday of Jesus. ...Astronomically the Sun begins a new year of life at that annual period, and so, when Sun-gods were worshipped, the 25th of December, or some day approximate to that date, was always selected for the celebration of his birthday. Almost all religions have some root in the primitive worship of the Sun, and the Christians-when they adopted the winter solstice as their Christmas day-merely continued a custom which the adherents of most of the contemporary religions had carried on for many centuries before that time. That day was, of course, the birthday of Apollo, the great Sun-god; and it was also the day upon which were celebrated, by their respective worshippers, the births of Adonis, of Dionysos, and of Mithra. ...The ritual remains; the explanation of that ritual changes. That explanation we call a myth when referring to a heathen story, the revealed truth when referring to our own! "

From "Shaken Creeds; the Virgin Birth Doctrine" by Jocelyn Rhys

Russell,

Isn't it likely that the Christians just wanted to compete with the religions around them at the time? Just like today's Christian churches have their own festivities on Halloween but they call it something else to give people an Christian alternative for that day.

Didn't the early Christians openly borrow other cultures' holidays, feast days, fast days, etc and modify them for their own usage? To me it's silly to think they would have tried to pass those dates off as original to Christianity as if that would give it some kind of credence it needed.

Originally Posted by Hutch

I fail to see anything that is offensive in any of those posts, especially the sections that you highlighted.

In the end this is the most common argument of the religious, that being feigning be offended and taking their ball home, because they don't want to play. I suspect it has more to do with the fact that the devout have no logical arguments left to explain their devotion to a man made religious dogma that requires one to surrender one's freewill, natural inquisitiveness and rational thought or spend an eternity in torture and damnation.

what an unbelievably holier than thou, demeaning, and condescending attitude. When a discussion degrades into sarcasm, as You and X are so eloquently versed, it is no longer a discussion. The sarcastic person is basically calling all others that do not agree with him/her an idiot. There is no reasoning with sarcasm.

Regarding the factual evidence of a person, any person, existing in antiquity, there is no scientific method to prove that the person lived. You have to raise the historical probability that such a person lived. You cannot scientifically prove that Jesus Christ, Julies Cesar, or Abraham Lincoln lived. You have to rely upon the documents and manuscripts of the time, to increase the probability that such a person lived, to the point that it is so probable that their existence is taken as fact. Prove to me that Mohamed lived. Prove to me that Marcus Aurelius lived.

Also, do not cite Wikipedia.

here are my secular references to Christ living:

About this time arose Jesus, a wise man, who did good deeds and whose virtues were recognized. And many Jews and people of other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and to die. However, those who became his disciples preached his doctrine. They related that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that he was alive. Perhaps he was the Messiah in connection with whom the prophets foretold wonders. [Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, XVIII 3.2]
(Josephus was a romanized Jewish historian, who wrote the above and lived until 98 AD).

Josephus in his book also goes on to document the execution of St. John the Baptist[(XVIII 5.2] and St James the Just [XX 9.1] and refers to James as "the brother of Jesus who was called Christ."

Pliny the Younger, proconsul of Asia Minor in 111 A.D. wrote a letter to to the Roman Emperor Trajan documenting the activities of Christians which included "...it was their habit on a fixed day to assemble before daylight and recite by turns a form of words to Christ as a god; and that they bound themselves with an oath, not for any crime, but not to commit theft or robbery, or adultery, not to break their word, and not to deny a deposit when demanded. After this was done, their custom was to depart, and meet again to take food... [Pliny, Epistle 97]"

Roman historian Tacitus, who is credited for his historical accuracy, sated in 115 A.D. that: "The author of the denomination was Christ[us] who had been executed in Tiberius time by the Procurator Pontius Pilate. The pestilent superstition, checked for a while, burst out again, not only throughout Judea...but throughout the city of Rome also..." [Tacitus, Annals, XV 44] The disdain for Christianity is clearly evident, but the life if Christ is taken as fact.



Matt

I guess what I intended to say is that people frequently believe that Christmas WAS the day that Jesus was born on, that the wisemen followed a star to the stable and presented the newborn king with gifts because he was prophesied to be the son of God. This is all very cut and paste from a multitude of other pre-existing religions.

I don't know about you, but to me it would be much more historically convincing to have some record of his actual birthday, rather than a convenient, existing holiday for it.

Any thoughts on the virgin birth issue?

Or about the lack of documentation of his life by his contemporaries?

Originally Posted by mhailey

1) You cannot scientifically prove that Jesus Christ, Julies Cesar, or Abraham Lincoln lived. You have to rely upon the documents and manuscripts of the time, to increase the probability that such a person lived,

2) Also, do not cite Wikipedia.

3) here are my secular references to Christ living:

....


Matt

1) No, but you can rely on writings about the person by contemporaries who were in their pressence, which can be found at great length for all of the people you've cited except Jesus.

2) Why not? Would it make it any more credible if I cited the various legitimate sources at the bottom of the page instead of presenting the summarized version? Please, if you can find error in it, notify us all.

3) None of those sources are of direct personal contact with Jesus, so they are hearsay at best. Also, he "lived" from ~7 BC to ~36 AD. All of those sources are a good 60 years after his death which leaves a tremendous amount of room for error in reporting factual events.

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

I don't know about you, but to me it would be much more historically convincing to have some record of his actual birthday, rather than a convenient, existing holiday for it.

I agree. I just don't think the lack of having a historical record of his specific birth date adds any doubt to his existence. My mother in law doesn't have a historical record of her birth date, but because of *other factors* I happen to know that she exists. I think those other factors are what Christians and non Christians debate over. It is over what is the proof of Jesus' existence rather than what is the proof of his nonexistence. It's tough to prove that any particular person in history never actually lived, so I think the burden is on Christians to prove that he did and especially that he still does

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

Any thoughts on the virgin birth issue?

Not many. Either it was a miracle and it happened or it didn't. Without time travel, I don't think it's possible to scientifically or medically prove that it even could have happened to anyone anytime anywhere.

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

Or about the lack of documentation of his life by his contemporaries?

There's an atheist-based internet forum dedicated to that very question: well, I was going to include a link here but now I can't find the one I was looking for. Anyway, there apparently isn't any clearly specific contemporary documentation of Jesus' historical life available to the public. I'd admit that probably none exists that has been found and it's possible that there isn't any at all.

I have my own personal wonderings and musings about why he wasn't written about, and this is where arguable facts regarding this discussion pretty much end and my own guesswork and thoughts for simple trivial entertainment value begin: The Jewish scribes were always presented as anti-Jesus in the Bible. He represented a threat to their religious way of life and I wonder if those that would have been charged with keeping present-day records (back then) could have been ordered not to mention Jesus at all. Followers of Jesus who the Pharisees could corner or bring to religious court were either warned to stay away from Jesus or risk suffering what is the Catholic equivalent of excommunication from the church or temple as it was. Why would they have given him any credibility? Why didn't the Romans write about him? I don't know - but maybe they never had a reason to until the end of Jesus' life when he was brought before both Herod and Pilate multiple times. But he was brought there by the Jews and because of violation of Jewish law. If the Romans killed Jesus for no other reason than the demands of the Jews and their laws, I doubt they would have wanted to admit that to their superiors. Is there any historical Roman writings detailing such events regarding other people? Pilate washed his hands of the matter and probably wanted the entire Roman involvement in the matter to not spread beyond his own delegation of authority. And why didn't at least the historians of the day mention him if he was such a dynamic popular figure? If there was a local newspaper (or newsparchment) you'd think he'd be on the front page everyday unless the publication was controlled by the religious establishment at the time

So, if it's not to bold to ask, what is the benefit of Chistianity in comparison to the other religions who have incrarnate deities born of virgins, with sacred holidays on the conventional dates, prophets that are of questionable validity and doctrines that were used to coerce early civilians into behaving?

It's a loaded question, I know, but I wanted to bring things back to the original topic.

I guess it boils down to "why do you have faith?".

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

1) No, but you can rely on writings about the person by contemporaries who were in their pressence, which can be found at great length for all of the people you've cited except Jesus.

2) Why not? Would it make it any more credible if I cited the various legitimate sources at the bottom of the page instead of presenting the summarized version? Please, if you can find error in it, notify us all.

3) None of those sources are of direct personal contact with Jesus, so they are hearsay at best. Also, he "lived" from ~7 BC to ~36 AD. All of those sources are a good 60 years after his death which leaves a tremendous amount of room for error in reporting factual events.

The "personal contact" accounts, and writing of those who were in his presence, are in the Bible, which you all dismiss as fanciful works of fiction.

So in essence your argument is "I don't believe the Bible, so give me secular references." Okay, see above. "those people were not with Christ, give me accounts of those with Christ." Okay, see the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John in the New Testament. "I don't believe the Bible. Give me secular accounts."


Matt