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pleco
SFN Addict
USA
2998 Posts |
 Posted - 04/11/2006 : 14:30:43 [Permalink]
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by Filthy
The neo-con methane machine will soon be running at full fart. |
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13477 Posts |
Posted - 04/11/2006 : 14:46:37 [Permalink]
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quote:
Verso:
Again, human bias to what? Have you actually read the NT? Jesus constantly promotes love, humility and servant-hood. Does that sound like a message power hungry, manipulative leaders would push?
Forget what Jesus promotes. The NT promotes anti Semitism. And that was a church bias. The Jews, who brought you Jesus, had to put up with 2000 years of Diaspora and pogroms because of that book…
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Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.
Why not question something for a change?
Genetic Literacy Project |
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marfknox
SFN Die Hard
USA
3739 Posts |
Posted - 04/11/2006 : 17:22:51 [Permalink]
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verso wrote: quote:
There are very rationally acceptable answers to all 3 "issues" you posted.
And they are?
quote:
If they were all merely plagiarized off of each other far after the fact, you'd expect them all to be identical.
Actually, if there was a lot of identical phrasing and literary structuring of the gospels, that would be a sign that they were plagiarized off each other, and that is exactly what we see with Matthew, Mark and Luke. Glaring differences on content and suggested interpretations would indicate authors with different objectives and values, and we see that too.
What Biblical scholarly writings are you turning to to base your assumptions on?
quote:
Not only have you have assumed that the early Church was identical to the later groups that claimed to be Christian, yet violated basics tenants of the Bible, but you have gone as far as to make the ludicrous assumption that the tendency in the Bible to humble servant-hood was hand-picked by power hungry, bickering Church authorities. A little counter-productive, don't you think?
No more ludicrous or counter-productive than dictators using Marxist and other communist philosophies to promote their own rise to power and authority over the masses. Christianity may promote humbleness, but the rewards for humbleness do not come until after death.
quote:
Cite. I know there are many Biblical scholars who would disagree with most of that.
Bart Ehrman, Randel McCraw Helms, Robin Scroggs. Also, from wikipedia's entry on “the gospels” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospels: quote:
The parallels among the first three Gospel accounts are so telling that many scholars have investigated the relationship between them. In order to study them more closely, German scholar JJ Griesbach (1776) arranged the first three Gospel accounts in a three-column table called a synopsis. As a result, Matthew, Mark, and Luke have come to be known as the synoptic Gospels; and the question of the reason for this similarity, and the relationship between these Gospel accounts more generally, is known as the Synoptic Problem.
The understanding found among early Christian writers and scholars has been that the first account of the Gospel to be committed to writing was that according to Matthew, the second Luke, followed by Mark and the final one John; and this order is defended today by proponents of the "Two-Gospel Hypothesis". However, since then Enlightenment scholars have been proposing also many other solutions to the Synoptic Problem; and the dominant view today is that Mark is the first Gospel, with Matthew and Luke borrowing passages both from that Gospel and from at least one other common source, lost to history, termed by scholars 'Q' (from German: Quelle, meaning source. This view is known as the "Two Source Hypothesis". The related "Four Source Hypothesis" maintains that Matthew and Luke also had independent sources, termed by scholars M and L.
Another theory which addresses the synoptic problem is the Farrer hypothesis. This theory maintains Markan priority (that Mark was written first) and dispenses w |
"Too much certainty and clarity could lead to cruel intolerance" -Karen Armstrong
Check out my art store: http://www.marfknox.etsy.com
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| Edited by - marfknox on 04/11/2006 17:29:33 |
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R.Wreck
SFN Regular
USA
1191 Posts |
Posted - 04/11/2006 : 18:02:29 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by verso:
R.Wreck:
quote:
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OK:
Matthew and Luke don't agree on any of Jesus' lineage before Joseph, not even Joseph's father.
Nobody agrees how Judas died.
Matthew claims that dead people got out of their tombs and went into the city. Surely a singular event in the history of mankind. The most spectacular occurence ever. Nothing like it before or since. But no other gospel mentions it, nor does any contemporary historian. You would think at least one other person might find this detail worth capturing in his story.
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Nearly all the contradictions cited by "skeptics" are seen as contradictions due primarily to simplistic reasoning and lack of research. There are very rationally acceptable answers to all 3 "issues" you posted.
Alright, let's hear them.
quote:
Those detail contradictions that are legitimate simply evidence the fact that the gospels are separate, authentic accounts. If they were all merely plagiarized off of each other far after the fact, you'd expect them all to be identical.
I wouldn't expect them to be identical, merely consistent.
quote:
quote:
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I could go on, but you get my drift. Taken as a whole, the four official gospels are a mess of contradictory nonsense.
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As a whole - even including a very minor lack of harmony - the four official gospels are remarkably coherent.
If you want to pick one of these "contradictions" and research it yourself first, I will be happy to debate it with you.
But all I see here at the moment is you doing what people on this forum constantly compain about creation scientists doing in debates: "winning" the debate by spewing out flimsy arguments rapid-fire - arguments to which the refutation takes time and careful reasoning.
This isn't exactly rocket science. The issue is whether or not this Jesus person actually existed, and if he did, was he really the son of (or part of) the creator of the universe? For the sake of argument let's stipulate that Jesus actually lived. Now the question is about his divinity. Since this is an extraordinary claim, with the stakes being high (the eternal salvation or damnation of every human being for the next however many years before we go extinct), then the evidence must be held to a high standard.
So let's take the claim of the denizens of the boneyards going out for a stroll. I assume this was included in the gospel as supporting evidence of Jesus' divinity. I know if we had a crucifixion in my town tomorrow and all the local stiffs went all Night of the Living Dead afterwards, I would be very inclined to believe there was some sort of supernatural involvement. So why does only one gospel mention it? Could it be because its an embellishment? And if that part is fabricated, and I can find contradictions among all the accounts, then why should I believe any of it?
The point is that if you expect us to believe that the son of god walked the earth, your evidence should stand up to intense scrutiny. There shouldn't be gross inconsistencies or claims without any independent verification. How much of that are you willing to accept and still believe that it supports the most extraordinary claim ever made? |
The foundation of morality is to . . . give up pretending to believe that for which there is no evidence, and repeating unintelligible propositions about things beyond the possibliities of knowledge.
T. H. Huxley
The Cattle Prod of Enlightened Compassion
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beskeptigal
SFN Die Hard
USA
3834 Posts |
Posted - 04/12/2006 : 04:17:21 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by pleco
Sitin' back on this one I take it?  |
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pleco
SFN Addict
USA
2998 Posts |
Posted - 04/12/2006 : 04:42:52 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by beskeptigal
quote:
Originally posted by pleco
Sitin' back on this one I take it?
Yeah, I'm tired of debating religious topics - they are quite draining in the way that slamming your head into a brick wall is draining, so I'll sit this one out... |
by Filthy
The neo-con methane machine will soon be running at full fart. |
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Cuneiformist
The Imperfectionist
USA
4955 Posts |
Posted - 04/12/2006 : 06:29:06 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by verso
quote:
But moving on, Biblical scholars are in agreement that the Gospels were not written by eye-witnesses. It is a general consensus that the authors of Luke and Matthew used Mark as their main source, and that all three were written to be the gospel, not to be in a set with two others telling basically the same story with various contradictions. Not only that, but we also know that certain things in the Gospels were changed to accommodate the theology of the leaders of what would become the Church.
Cite. I know there are many Biblical scholars who would disagree with most of that.
Hi, verso. While it may be the case that you know people who would disagree with the above, there are plenty of others who agree. In general, Mark is considered to be the earliest Gospel, written just after the destruction of the temple in AD 70. This was followed closely by Matthew, who wrote for a completely different audience than Mark. While Mark was for a community which has recently broken off from a Jewish community, Matthew was writing for Jewish Christians. Matthew included elements of Mark, but also of the collection of sayings known as Q.
After this came Luke, who wrote ca. 120. Like Matthew, Luke borrows from Mark and Q (however, the author of Luke doesn't seem to have known about Matthew).
Several works on this from mainstream scholars include Burton Mack's Who Wrote the New Testament, and L. Michael White's From Jesus to Christianity. Both are smart, respected individuals, and both give accounts that are, as near as I can tell, the accepted presentation of the Gospels. |
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leoofno
Skeptic Friend
USA
346 Posts |
Posted - 04/12/2006 : 07:56:19 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by R.Wreck
This isn't exactly rocket science. The issue is whether or not this Jesus person actually existed, and if he did, was he really the son of (or part of) the creator of the universe?
Some interesting stuff on this very topic:
http://jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/home.htm
Earl Doherty supports the "mythesist" view of Christ's nature as being dominant amoung Christians in the very early church.
This view sees early Christans as believing in a Jesus who is a strictly spiritual being who inhabits a spiritual realm where he died and was resurrected. As such, Jesus never existed as a real human being who had a ministry on earth. The "historical" view of Jesus (that Jesus was a real person)starts showing up in the late first and early second century, and becomes the dominant view later in the second century. He shows that the early apologist writings, and the letters of Paul, are consistent with this view.
One of the interesting points that he makes is that the size and diversity of the early Christian community shortly after Christ's death is difficult to explain as originating from a single founder and his disciples around 30 AD. More likely is that Christianity had already developed prior to this time from a combination of Hellenic and Jewish influences. Sometime during the first century, a sect invented a "real" Jesus and this view eventually supplanted the original.
Interesting stuff. But I'm no historian, so I take it all with a grain of salt. |
"If you're not terrified, you're not paying attention." Eric Alterman
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