Thread: Christmas poll

Originally Posted by Miner123

And by the way, how many people today do you know that worship Ra, Zeus, Jupiter, Odin or Poseidon besides a perhaps a few small cults?

Reality is not a popularity contest. If and when there ever was a time when most people thought the Earth was flat, it didn't mean it was flat and then got round. If everybody were cajoled or conned into believing the Earth was only 6,000 years old, doesn't mean it'll suddenly stop being 4 billion years old.

Originally Posted by ENUF2

I'll say it again, if you are so sure these works do not contain proof you must have evidence to back up that statement.

The burden of proof is on YOU to show that they are credible. Good luck with that. Wherever I've been magic doesn't happen ... ever!

Originally Posted by JMS

Those who are determined to believe will, and those that are determined not to believe...well...they just won't.

A different feather on the same bird I suppose.

I think this is very close to the mark, Mark (Marky Mark? )
It is not quite that I am determined not to believe, but simply that I won't until I have reason to which is the sceptical position. You are spot on about those who are determined to believe though because they do so often in blatant contradiction to the facts of observable reality. Evidence the poll results. There seems to be little doubt among the faithful of the certainty of Jesus' existence, but fewer certain about his non-existence. If the poll had included any uncertainty we might see some more realistic results.

Originally Posted by ZMKA

These "sources" are not Jesus' contemporaries. They weren't even born prior to his alleged ascension. While many love to reference Flavius Josephus, they fail to address the fact that he supposedly mentions Jesus twice. And most historians think it was fraudulently added to the original texts at a later time by someone who was not Josephus.

Pliny the Younger, Tacitus, etc... more than 100 years after Jesus supposedly walked the earth, these men wrote about him. They wrote about him after the gospels had finally been written.

This is my point. The referenced sources are utterly unreliable.

None of Jesus' contemporaries wrote about him even though thousands are said to have experienced his miracles. No one, outside of the authors of the New Testament wrote a first-person account of their dealings with Jesus.
While many believers would say, the people of the time were uneducated and therefore could not read and write, most seem perfectly comfortable with Simon Peter's (a fisherman) eloquence in his letters to Timothy.

You missed the section on James the brother of Jesus which has yet to be debunked

You missed the Talmud (Jewish Rabbonical wrritings)
Also all these sources are concidered creditable when speaking on other persons and political events. also some were written less than 100 years after Jesus' death (Pliny-111AD that would be approximately 80 years)

The Gospels themselves are concidered creditable by scholars due to the amount of origional language manuscripts and the span of years between compisition and the oldest copy (that graph is back on page 5 I think.

Originally Posted by JMS

Those who are determined to believe will, and those that are determined not to believe...well...they just won't.

I'm not determined to reject any religion. I am determined to seek truth, and to embrace that which shows itself to be plausible, and to reject that which shows itself to be implausible.

Ink and paper alone do not a God make. The testimony of men is historically unreliable. We all know that men have been known to decieve, misrepresent or even to unknowingly distort facts.
So because we know men to be unreliable, and the bible was written by men, I leave it to God to show himself in a way that cannot be distorted by men. After all, even those who believe have dissected themselves into over 32,000 denominations... is the bible really written with the perfect clarity of a perfect God who is in complete control?

Originally Posted by ENUF2

You missed the section on James the brother of Jesus which has yet to be debunked

You missed the Talmud (Jewish Rabbonical wrritings)
Also all these sources are concidered creditable when speaking on other persons and political events. also some were written less than 100 years after Jesus' death (Pliny-111AD that would be approximately 80 years)

The Gospels themselves are concidered creditable by scholars due to the amount of origional language manuscripts and the span of years between compisition and the oldest copy (that graph is back on page 5 I think.

Are you talking about the gospel of James? Written in 150 CE.

What about the Talmud? It references virtually nothing about Christianity. It mentions a hanging of a Yeshu on Passover, but thats it. And it wasn't compiled until 217 CE.

You know that Pliny was a government official who had Christians put to death, yes? He never met Jesus. He only spoke of the christians. Why is this reliable testimony? People blow themselves up for their beliefs today!

Who are these 'scholars' who accept the gospels? Do they also accept that Alexander the Great was born of a virgin as history suggests?

Originally Posted by ZMKA

So because we know men to be unreliable, and the bible was written by men, I leave it to God to show himself in a way that cannot be distorted by men.

Have you never seen a flower bloom? A child grow? A tiny seed sprout into a full grown tree? When a caterpillar creates its chrysalis the caterpillar turns into a goopy sauce, completely unrecognizable, only to emerge as a butterfly. Hows that? Science can tell us many things about these phenomena except what the force is behind these things. That force I call God.

Originally Posted by ENUF2

I pray these help you on your quest. Need others PM me.

Home: Christian apologetics including Genesis, Bible and Communicating with God - Faith Facts

THE Bible Study Web Site at BibleStudy.org: You Have Questions. The Bible Has Answers!

NotReligion - Home

Welcome to Grace to You

BiblePlus - The premiere on-line source for serious Bible study

Nope, nothing there to convince me. The religious teachings of be kind to your fellow man, etc. are IMO great and I don't dispute the benifits to society. But a belief in an all seeing all knowing being is also an excellent way of controling a widely dispersed and largely unpoliced populance, thou shall not kill, not because the police will catch you, but because God is watching, and you will not go to heaven, unless you ask for forgiveness and accept him into your heart? That is, if you have never used his name in vain, for that is unforgiveable!?

Originally Posted by JMS

Have you never seen a flower bloom? A child grow? A tiny seed sprout into a full grown tree? When a caterpillar creates its chrysalis the caterpillar turns into a goopy sauce, completely unrecognizable, only to emerge as a butterfly. Hows that? Science can tell us many things about these phenomena except what the force is behind these things. That force I call God.

Have you never seen a child starve? A flower wilt? A pestilence wipe out a community?

I've seen amazing things and I won't try to diminish that.

But you believe also that God, with full knowledge and intent, created Satan, a being who he knew would torment, torture and ultimately lay waste to mankind. God, who is pure love, did this to mankind. God, who is pure love, commands that King Saul and the nation of Israel kill Amalekite children and infants (1 Sam. 15:3) in order to prove a point.

He interferes with the will of Pharaoh (free will?) so that he would have an excuse to punish Egypt. (There is no historical record of the plague of the firstborn, by the way)

God sounds more like a tool for human governing, for the procurement of land and resources more than he does a loving and endeared creator of mankind.

To get back to the original question, yes I do believe a person that claimed to be the Son of God existed, and he was named Jesus.

Originally Posted by ZMKA

Have you never seen a child starve? A flower wilt? A pestilence wipe out a community?

I've seen amazing things and I won't try to diminish that.
Then why did you?
But you believe also that God, with full knowledge and intent, created Satan, a being who he knew would torment, torture and ultimately lay waste to mankind. God, who is pure love, did this to mankind. God, who is pure love, commands that King Saul and the nation of Israel kill Amalekite children and infants (1 Sam. 15:3) in order to prove a point.
What do you know of what I believe? Did I ever say these things?
He interferes with the will of Pharaoh (free will?) so that he would have an excuse to punish Egypt. (There is no historical record of the plague of the firstborn, by the way)

God sounds more like a tool for human governing, for the procurement of land and resources more than he does a loving and endeared creator of mankind.
Gods name is often invoked for these purposes I know But the actual God continues on as He sees fit, beholding to no mans ideas or beliefs. God is God and as such is not dependent on what man believes to be true or not to be true.

You talk of God as if you know what He should do and how He should handle his affairs. Are you a back seat driver also?