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What Did Jesus Sacrifice?

 
 
Setanta
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 07:59 am
Well, to flog a dead horse, the important point is not whether or not the putative Jesus ever actually lived, but that hundreds of millions of people believe that he did.

And the important point about this thread is that Jason just wants to jerk the chains of the religious.
gungasnake
 
  1  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 08:16 am
One name everybody should know when this sort of topic arises is that of William Ramsay...

http://www.baysideonline.com/8856/sir-william-ramsay/

Quote:

About a century ago British scholar William Ramsay focused on the book of Acts to try to show it was rife with geographical and archaeological errors. After all, many scholars of his day, equipped with the tools of textual criticism and archaeology, had exposed many errors in other classic writings. This eminent humanity professor diligently prepared himself by studying archaeology and geography before departing for the Middle East and Asia Minor in his quest to prove Luke’s history of the early Church was mostly myth.

His quest didn’t turn out as he expected. After a quarter century of research in what is today Israel and Turkey, where he carefully retraced the steps of the apostles as described in the book of Acts, this famous unbeliever shook the intellectual world when he announced he had converted to Christianity. He confessed this radical change of mind and heart was thanks in great part to his surprise at the accuracy he found in Luke’s narrative in Acts.

sir-william-ramsay-2After decades of examining the historical and geographical details mentioned in the book, Ramsay concluded: “Luke is a historian of the first rank; not merely are his statements of fact trustworthy, he is possessed of the true historic sense … In short this author should be placed along with the very greatest of historians” (The Bearing of Recent Discovery on the Trustworthiness of the New Testament, 1953, p. 80).

He went on to write many books about Acts and the epistles of Paul. Ultimately Ramsay was knighted for his contributions to the study of archaeology and geography.


Executive summary: First-rate scholar sets out to disprove the Book of Acts and converts to Christianity based on what his findings turn up.

My own case was a bit simpler than that; I turned to Christianity based on an evaluation of remaining options after discovering that evolution was a bunch of bullshit.
0 Replies
 
gungasnake
 
  1  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 08:28 am
Another category of evidence that the tale of Jesus is in fact factual is that any number of details of his life are simply at odds with what you would expect to see had people of the day indeed fabricated such a story.

Jesus being seen first by women after he came back from the dead for instance; nobody would make that part of a fabricated story, the king or elders would be first to see him.
0 Replies
 
Bi-Polar Bear
 
  1  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 08:48 am
@Setanta,
Setanta wrote:

Well, to flog a dead horse, the important point is not whether or not the putative Jesus ever actually lived, but that hundreds of millions of people believe that he did.

And the important point about this thread is that Jason just wants to jerk the chains of the religious.


true dat
0 Replies
 
gungasnake
 
  1  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 12:05 pm
One other thing to consider...

It is commonly assumed that Jesus was the first, last, and only person ever to be seen or heard from after he died. That's basically wrong.

Jesus was the last person ever heard from after death. Bible literature contains other tails of such e.g. the OT ghost story involving King Saul, the prophet Samuel, and the "witch" of Endor. In Old Kingdom times in Egypt, hearing from dead friends and relatives was common.

By the time of Jesus, centuries had passed since the last time any such was seen and people were becoming atheists and evolosers. Jesus' mission on Earth was to disabuse the human race of atheism and materialism. He basically accomplished that by saying to the world something like:

Quote:
Hey, I'm going to simply allow myself to be taken by the Romans and then executed in their customery gruesome fashion, and then in three days, I'm GONNA COME BACK, and you can decide for yourselves whether or not you want to go on being atheists after that!!!


and then proceeding to do just that.
0 Replies
 
Jason Proudmoore
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 02:08 pm
@Intrepid,
Quote:
One might wonder why someone would ask about what sacrifice Jesus actually made when that same someone disputes the very existence of said Jesus. Just sayin....

Just assuming that he ever existed, Intrepid...I don't know how many times I have to say this, but I go right alone with those who assume that Jesus existed and claimed he made a sacrifice by dying for our sins for the sake of the argument...will you get this in your head this time?
Jason Proudmoore
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 02:17 pm
@Green Witch,
Quote:
He also seems to prefer to tilt at agnostic windmills.

I look at the evidence, my dear. Why would the application only apply to Robin Hood, The King Arthur and Gilgamesh...but when it comes to the existence of Jesus, the application fails? Why does the application fail when the existence of Jesus is less probable than those characters mentioned above?

Quote:
If he was really looking for debate you would think he would be spending his time on a Christian site. Lord knows there are plenty of them to chose from.

What's wrong with this forum?
0 Replies
 
Jason Proudmoore
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 02:31 pm
@gungasnake,
Quote:
The resurrection was not about sacrifice other than for the idea of Jesus himself becoming a sin sacrifice for the entire world.

I understand pretty well the concept of escape goating, Snake. He supposedly gave his life for the sin of humankind. But what was to it? What was the sacrifice when he dies and three days later becomes a spirit and supreme ruler? Why couldn't he just forgave mankind and avoid the whole this? Why would an all-powerful deity die in a form of a man and later resurrect and then call this act a "sacrifice"? How is this rational?


Quote:
It was about providing mankind with a physical and unambiguous demonstration that there is in fact a life after the death of our physical bodies, and that the atheists and evolosers who deny this are full of ****.

You call that a "sacrifice" or "demonstration"? If Jesus wanted to demonstrate the world that there is actually life after death, why did he choose to appear to only a group of selected people? What happened to the rest of the world?
Jason Proudmoore
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 02:32 pm
@gungasnake,
Quote:
There were hundreds of witnesses and every one of those original disciples went to their deaths rather than deny it. You don't get every member of some sort of conspiracy all willing to die for some sort of a scam.

Who were these hundreds of witnesses that you're talking about?
0 Replies
 
Jason Proudmoore
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 03:47 pm
@Setanta,
Quote:
Jason's basic argument is that since the early Christian proselytizers latched onto popular religious practices and mythic themes, and those are older than the putative Jesus, that putative Jesus therefore cannot have existed.

You are wrong...this is not my "basic" argument... one of my points is that there are numerous, older religious saviors that share all the mythical attributes and the events surrounding the life of Jesus. If we were to take away all the mythical elements from Jesus (all the elements he shares with other older religious saviors), we would not be left with much, only with ripoff quotes from Buddha and Confucius, and others bigoted quotes that only the ancient Jews could profess...and the absence of Jesus from the historic time line is something to consider...and knowing how legends are made, myths are made, provide a fountain of knowledge to dismiss or acknowledge anybody's existence.

Quote:

It's rather childish and naive position to have taken.

I say it is gullible to just ignore the evidence provided to you.

Quote:
Those facts about the adoption and adaptation of popular "pagan" beliefs, mythic themes and holidays is not evidence at all in reference to the existence of the putative Jesus,

You have to be kidding me! Are you being serious? This is only qualifies as evidence that points to Christianity not being too original after all...this also tells us that Christianity is capable of "borrowing" from other religions...no? What makes you think that Christianity didn't "borrow" the Jesus character from other older religions, even when there is plenty of evidence supporting it?

Quote:
they are just evidence of how clever Christian proselytizers were, from their first mission in the Hellenistic world right up to their adoption and modification of popular holidays among the Norse and the Goths (as in the Swedes, who called themselves Goths at that time) a thousand years ago.

And how cruel were the Romans when they didn't allow passage into Roman walls because the Goths were deemed savages because they were not Christians... the Goths built villages around the Roman empire for protection from the Huns...Emperor Valens only allowed passage into Roman territories to those who converted to Christianity...this is not something made up by anybody...we could actually verify that this actually occurred...unlike the existence of Jesus, who Pontius Pilate didn't execute, because his [Jesus] name doesn't appear in the historic time line, and also there are inconsistencies whether Pilate was in power 2000 years ago...


Quote:
If, in fact, as he alleges, the evidence is that the putative Jesus could not have existed, then neither Tacitus nor Flavius Josephus could have been contemporary to him--nor could anyone else.

This quote makes me think that you haven't even heard of this argument, much less done the research...tell me how Josephus and Tacitus were contemporary to Jesus? And what contemporary writers were present during the time of Jesus? Who were the eyewitnesses?

Quote:
There is no such thing as a contemporary of someone who never existed. That's a pretty damned silly statement.

How is that silly? Isn't it rather logical to say that there couldn't possibly be an eyewitness to someone who's mythological?


Quote:
The best response to arguments from Tacitus and Josephus is that passages referred to are suspect, and rejected by the majority of modern scholars.

Why do you think that those passages are rejected by modern scholars? Just a simple question.
tycoon
 
  1  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 05:07 pm
@Jason Proudmoore,
Quote:
You are wrong...this is not my "basic" argument... one of my points is that there are numerous, older religious saviors that share all the mythical attributes and the events surrounding the life of Jesus.


This argument--the several savior gods who predated Jesus--has taken a severe beating with recent scholarship. When you say that "they share all the mythical attributes..with Jesus", I assume you were writing a bit haphazardly, and you're not suggesting they are in lockstep .
Jason Proudmoore
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 06:56 pm
@tycoon,
Quote:
This argument--the several savior gods who predated Jesus--has taken a severe beating with recent scholarship.


And which scholars are actually beating the arguments against the pagan gods that assimilate Jesus? You're not actually telling me that Christian scholars are involved in all this?


Quote:
When you say that "they share all the mythical attributes..with Jesus", I assume you were writing a bit haphazardly, and you're not suggesting they are in lockstep .

I meant "they share all the mythical attributes with Jesus" not individually, but as a whole...some share more than others.
tycoon
 
  1  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 07:42 pm
@Jason Proudmoore,
Jason Proudmoore wrote:

Quote:
This argument--the several savior gods who predated Jesus--has taken a severe beating with recent scholarship.


And which scholars are actually beating the arguments against the pagan gods that assimilate Jesus? You're not actually telling me that Christian scholars are involved in all this?


I'm not sure what you're asking.


Quote:
When you say that "they share all the mythical attributes..with Jesus", I assume you were writing a bit haphazardly, and you're not suggesting they are in lockstep .

I meant "they share all the mythical attributes with Jesus" not individually, but as a whole...some share more than others.
[/quote]

Who is "they"?
BillRM
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 10:57 pm
@Intrepid,
That would seem to exclude you, wouldn't it Bill?

Do you give credit to the existed of the tooth fairy Intredpide?

Come on this Jesus virgin birth/god-man is silliness beyond any question power by childhood conditionings and nothing else.

If you ongoing to give credit to this story we need to give equal weight to all the old gods also who existed are just as likely, not to mention such new "gods/religions” as contain in the Mormon bible or Xenu as created by a science fiction writer and now a major cult.


BillRM
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 11:17 pm
My main question is why would any sane and rational human being give the story of Jesus any weight at all?

It is clearly a fairy tale that had resulted in great harm since the cult had come into existed.
Setanta
 
  0  
Reply Wed 17 Feb, 2010 11:49 pm
@Jason Proudmoore,
To your first paragraph--the fact that early church proselytizers used popular myths does not constitute evidence that the man to whom they referred did not exist, not simply because they fudged the story. Your "fountain of knowledge" is chimerical.

To your second--you have provided no evidence. You've said that because the early proselytizers lied about that attributes of the putative Jesus then therefore he likely did not exist. That is not evidence, it is only an argument, and it is not a logically founded argument.

To your third--this is not different from the argument i've referred to above, and, tediously, i will point out once again that the lack of honesty by proponents of the sect does not argue one way or the other for the question of whether or not the putative Jesus existed.

To your fourth--none of that is germane to the question of whether or not the putative Jesus existed, except, inferentially your remarks about Pilate. The fact that a Judean carpenter alleged to have been executed 2000 years ago in Palestine does not appear in the historical record is not evidence that he did not exist. All of the rest of the carpenters in Judea are not mentioned, either. In about 1961, Israeli archaeologists working at the site of Caesaraea Maritima, the capital of the province if Iudaea, found an inscription in the arena they uncovered which shows that arena being dedicated to Tiberius by the Prefect Pontius Pilate. It is completely false to claim that there is any doubt about Pilate exercising power in the first century CE.

To your fifth--either you are not very bright, or you just haven't been paying attention. I've never claimed that Flavius Josephus or Tacitus were contemporaries of the putative Jesus. I've just pointed out that that is no good reason to dismiss them as sources. There are other better reasons to doubt the veracity of what most scholars now consider interpolations in the works of those authors. But the fact that they would not have been contemporaries is not one of them.

Sixth--it's a silly statement because you assert that Jesus could not have existed, and therefore to object to someone's testimony because they weren't contemporary of someone you claim never existed is both stupid and silly. Once again, one dismisses the passages in Flavius Josephus and Tacitus for other, better reasons.

To your last question, i will give you no answer. I've already given detailed examples of at least three reason for dismissing the passages for each author as interpolations. I see no reason why i should be obliged to repeat them again and again just because you've been too damned lazy to read my post.

Finally, i will repeat myself on this--there is no reliable historical evidence that the putative Jesus existed; nor is there any evidence that he did not.
BillRM
 
  0  
Reply Thu 18 Feb, 2010 04:46 am
@Setanta,
Your whole reply to Proundmoore overlook the fact that it is not the duty of anyone to prove something does not exist but it is instead in this case it is your duty to prove that a man by the name Jesus does indeed exist in that time frame.

It is well understood, by anyone with an IQ above one that no one can prove a negative and therefore you could had cheerfully taken Proundmoore to task for not disproving the existed of the tooth fairy in the same manner as you had done for the existed of Jesus.

Not even by the standard of an American civil case IE more likely then not have you or anyone else in history had shown the existed of a religion leader by the name Jesus in that time frame

A whole major groups of religions base on a man-god where it can not even be shown that the man part of the equation happen to had walk the earth is beyond being silly if it was not for all the harm done by the followers of those religions in history.

0 Replies
 
Setanta
 
  0  
Reply Thu 18 Feb, 2010 05:49 am
Your typically idiotic and unperceptive post overlooks the fact that i have made no claim regarding the putative Jesus other than that his existence cannot be proven or disproven, by any reliable historical evidence, so i have no "duty" in the matter at all.

Putz.
0 Replies
 
gungasnake
 
  1  
Reply Thu 18 Feb, 2010 06:19 am
@Jason Proudmoore,
Quote:
You call that a "sacrifice" or "demonstration"? If Jesus wanted to demonstrate the world that there is actually life after death, why did he choose to appear to only a group of selected people? What happened to the rest of the world?


You're hung up on one particular formulation of the "Problem of evil", all formulations of which amoung to the question: What exactly is the term 'omnipotent' supposed to mean?

If the term is taken to mean 'having all the power which anybody could imagine', then it leads to conundrums. If it means 'having all the power that there actually is', the conundrums go away.

The real answer is that the spirit world has vanishingly little power to act in this physical realm which we inhabit. Jesus' life amounted to getting a message across to mankind. The fact that American Indians for instance had to wait 1500 years to hear about that message would indeed be a problem if you accepted the conundrum version of the thing; that would mean that an 'omnipotent' God basically just didn't give a rat's ass about American Indians. In real life, you don't get all the news as it happens either; no message ever gets out to the entire planet simultaneously.

Jesus spoke of this ("My father's kingdom is not of this world"). There once at least was reliable communication between our world and the realm of spirits, but that communication broke down at later times.













0 Replies
 
Intrepid
 
  1  
Reply Thu 18 Feb, 2010 06:42 am
@Jason Proudmoore,
Jason Proudmoore wrote:

Quote:
One might wonder why someone would ask about what sacrifice Jesus actually made when that same someone disputes the very existence of said Jesus. Just sayin....

Just assuming that he ever existed, Intrepid...I don't know how many times I have to say this, but I go right alone with those who assume that Jesus existed and claimed he made a sacrifice by dying for our sins for the sake of the argument...will you get this in your head this time?


So, in other words, you are just creating **** for the sake of creating ****. Argument is your forte. Proving your point is not.
 

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