123rock wrote:
If you're talking about the historicity of Jesus, then Josephus and Tacitus would be about the only few extrabiblical references in the Apostolic age. Josephus has been validated as a non-forgery. (See
here). As for Tacitus, I haven't exactly read much about it. It's definitely a non-forgery in the Annals, but it's unlikely that he met witnesses.
"cannot have been a complete forgery" it doesn't say a non - forgery, they still believe that Josephus may have wrote about a "Jesus", but not the way he wrote it in today's "Updated" copies, remember he was a Jew and died a Jew, why would he praise what he would have believed to be a false messiah/god ?
Also some research has found comparisons between the sections in Josephus' "Jesus passage" and sections of Luke, suggesting the same editor, see :
http://members.aol.com/fljosephus/LUKECH.htm
123rock wrote:
Ummm. Do I have to pull the 5,000 + Greek manuscripts? I can cite you at least 20 right off the bat if you want.
Name a few and I will look at them.
123rock wrote:
Lack of pre 4th century evidence?? Are you serious? Clement, Ignatius, Justin Martyr, Papias, Irenaeus, Greek manuscripts?
Dead sea scrolls don't talk of the magic man, surely a person of such stature would be at least mentioned, and remember many date 1AD.
Have you read the evidence you quoted, Clement uses both canonical and apocryphal Gospels (His teachings almost gnostic), he lived 150 years after Jesus. Ignatius' letters where edited and added to by the 5th century to help solve theological disputes, so not reliable. Justin Martyr, Marcion's great opposite was just a pauline follower, who favoured the old testament over anything else, but some Christians today believe he is a heretic due to some of his unusual statements, etc etc
So why not Marcion, oh that's right all his teachings mysteriously disappeared, including the first closed canon, Sola Scriptura, and his own teachings Antitheses, which do not exist today.
123rock wrote:
Yes, the Mark 16:9-20 verses are known later additions. Your point? Does it change context? It would be different to find a Gospel of Mark from 156 AD stating that Mary Magdalene was a co-goddess with Jesus.
What's Mary Magdalene got to do with anything ? it does not matter if she was married to jesus or not. It is of no importance unless your trying to prove that the magic man needed no sex.
123rock wrote:
We have evidence of the Gospels' existence and content before that, as early as Clement in the 90's.
Existence doesn't prove that they have not been edited or changed. Look at revelations, the number of the beast is now 616 (Earliest copy), 665 and 666. Now which one is right, one of them or all of them, surely the oldest on (616) is the correct one.
123rock wrote:
Maybe if you would be kind enough to do research before you post, you'd know that the earliest sources for Mithra with the alleged miracles and history is from the 3rd century CE, from only one source.
Funny ho w anything that makes a mockery of modern Christian teachings needs evidence dating to the day it began yet Christians just have to be shown a 17th cent copy (No particular reason for date) to prove anything.
123rock wrote:
Yet, we don't have to imagine! We have the early Greek manuscripts!
What manuscripts are these, would be interested in reading them, problem though is there is nothing from the romans who governed there.
123rock wrote:
Paul and Catholicism? Please provide evidence that he wasn't Christian, especially when his salvation by faith alone is so anti-Catholic.
In 138 AD Justin Martyr wrote about Marcion in a very unfavourable light, in which (surprisingly) he calls him a Christian in order to separate him and his teachings from the Pauline judeo Christian front, if I get the time I am sure theres quite a lot more evidence.
123rock wrote:
The Bible informs us that His birthname was Emanuel. Jesus is the English of Yeshua. How would we know something so specific from extrabiblical sources when we have so little?
Sure his name wasn't Emanuel, surely they would of got that right in the first place, but I see some new publications of the bible changing that now.
123rock wrote:
Yes, but these were all parallels to the biblical flood. It's similar to having extrabiblical sources passed down by oral tradition.
Too numerous to state
123rock wrote:
It's not out of nothing per se. It's that a particle and anti-particle are created simultaneously. In the case where a positive influx of matter/energy may be observed is if this happens on the event horizon, causing the anti-particle to spin into the black hole, whereas the particle goes into outer space. This is known as Hawking radiation.
And as far as I know there are many more theories on it. Some scientists even believe that the entire universe could be made from a single electron which travels faster than the speed of light, so having the ability to be everywhere at the sametime, is it true, beats me.
123rock wrote:
I hope this isn't an allusion to the uneducated claim that Christians believed that the world was flat. Not only does Jesus express it's round (Matthew 12:39), but St.Thomas Aquinas, writing in the 13th century states it as a fact.
http://www.alaska.net/~clund/e_djublonskopf/FlatHome.htm
