Did Christ exist?

[john_doran]

clarkal:

In this case, I suppose that we cannot know for certain. However, if there were multiple unbiased sources (documents) or artifacts that can be shown not to have been tampered with, I would be inclined to believe that such and such apostle existed.

ok, but what counts as sufficient evidence for you that an historical document hasn’t been tampered with?

 

[clarkal]

john doran:

ok, but what counts as sufficient evidence for you that an historical document hasn’t been tampered with?

I’ll leave that up to the professional historians without a religious agenda.

 

[clarkal]

“in the end, though, what ultimately matters is the evidence…” says this article.

The evidence of Jesus is in the lives of the Saints. Not all of us who claim to follow Him provide evidence that He exists, but they did. Examine their lives and you’ll find Jesus.

By the way, the whole quote is: “In the end, though, what ultimately matters is the evidence, and I am certain that the evidence is on our side.” That is, not the Christian’s side.

clarkal

 

[Ghosty]

clarkal: We actually have the non-interpolated editions of History of the Jews, so we know what was actually said. No praise, just “there was a guy named Jesus who some folks thought was the Messiah”. The denunciation in that article is based on incomplete information.

The argument against the Talmud is similarily flawed. Yes, it is polemic in nature, but notice that the existance of Jesus is not questioned even though that would be the ultimate denounciation of Christianity. Furthermore, the article alleges that the Talmud was composed centuries later, but this is not the case. It was written down centuries later, but it had been around in some form since before the time of Jesus. The article shows a distinct lack of understanding of Jewish oral tradition. As for things like “hanged” being used, that is simply a Jewish term for crucifixion. Another common historical account is that he was “nailed to a tree” for example.

I’m not familiar enough with the other accounts to address them, but I will say that it is my opinion that it is a far greater camel to swallow to say that Jesus did not exist given the sheer number of independent, though contradictory, accounts of his life and the lives of his followers.

 

[Ghosty]

I would also add that most professional historians without a religious agenda believe that Jesus existed; the major question is what he taught.

 

[Della]

clarkal:

I’ll leave that up to the professional historians without a religious agenda.

Then you are deliberately blinding yourself to many such historians who study the world of the 1st century. Do you really think all the universities in the world have been hoodwinked by Christians into thinking that Jesus of Nazareth existed and that he founded the Christian religion? If so, you and those you believe correct are the ones living on blind faith, not Christians.

 

[Della]

This discussion reminds me of a joke I heard, which I hope I get right:

It seems the tomb of Jesus was found outside of Jerusalem. Scholars from 3 orders of the Church go to investigate. They find that there can be no doubt about it.

The Dominican says: “My God, this changes everything!”

The Franciscan declares, “We must erect a Shrine to the Sacred Bones!” and composes a canticle on the spot.

The Jesuit mumbles, “Well what do you know. He did exist.”

 

[gardenswithkids]

clarkal:

What about ‘saintly’ Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus, Confucists, etc.? Should I take their lives of devotion to their religion and its morality as a sign of it being true?

It is evidence that saintly people know that a Higher Power exists. You don’t seem to even acknowledge that.

You really do seem argumentative. I did not take the quote out of context; I found some common ground by agreeing that in the end the evidence does matter. However, I disagree with the assessment that the evidence favors atheist so I didn’t include that part of the quote.

If you don’t want to believe, that is your choice. In the end, I’ll either die and never know I was wrong, or you will die and find out you were wrong. No matter which one of us is right, I’d rather be me.

 

[john_doran]

clarkal:

I’ll leave that up to the professional historians without a religious agenda.

who may nonetheless have an irreligious agenda…

what counts as sufficient evidence for you that the corpus of a particular (professional) historian is free from the taint of personal bias?

 

[DianJo]

I don’t think you’ll find much eveidence without a religious slant to it. Not just from the Christian side but from all sides.

The world at that time was ruled by religious thinking. Everything was done to and for the gods (if you were not Jewish or Chrisitan, then it would be God). Everyday living was done for God or for the gods. People prayed up to 5 times a day (and still do) knowing that whatever god they prayed to had an absolute affect on their lives. So anything that was written back then would have a religious slant - intentional or not.

People did not live their lives like we do today - doubting everything they cannot see and not letting God into their lives and trying to erase all evidence of God from our society. Those people most certainly attributed everything in their lives to God (or gods) and their writings would reflect that. You may be looking for a long time to find someone then who writes and believes as people do now - with no connection to God whatsoever.

 

[clarkal]

Ghosty:

clarkal: We actually have the non-interpolated editions of History of the Jews, so we know what was actually said.

First of all, the passage in question appears nowhere in earlier copies of Josephus until the beginning of the fourth century. Are you sure that you have the non-interpolated editions or simply what you “think” are non-interpolated editions?

Ghosty:

No praise, just “there was a guy named Jesus who some folks thought was the Messiah”. The denunciation in that article is based on incomplete information.

What? The paraphrase “there was a guy named Jesus who some folks thought was the Messiah” is not accurate at all if you exclude the obvious interpolations from the passage.

Please, if you will, reconstruct what you believe is the non-interpolated passage from Josephus.

Ghosty:

The argument against the Talmud is similarily flawed. Yes, it is polemic in nature, but notice that the existance of Jesus is not questioned even though that would be the ultimate denounciation of Christianity. Furthermore, the article alleges that the Talmud was composed centuries later, but this is not the case. It was written down centuries later, but it had been around in some form since before the time of Jesus. The article shows a distinct lack of understanding of Jewish oral tradition.

I think that you should reread that part of the essay. It says exactly that.

"A compendium of Jewish oral law and rabbinical commentary still used by Orthodox Jews today to complement the Torah, the Talmud was entirely oral until it was codified and written down somewhere around 200 CE."

Also: "By the time the Talmud was compiled, centuries after Jesus’ alleged death and after the Jewish War which caused vast destruction in Jerusalem and scattered the Jewish people to the winds, third-century rabbis would have been in no position to be able to refute the very existence of Jesus (not to mention that they also lacked the exegetical techniques that would have allowed them to even suspect such a possibility). It would have been much easier to grant his existence and then slant the stories about him to favor their side of the argument rather than the Christians’, and this is exactly what happened. "

Ghosty:

As for things like “hanged” being used, that is simply a Jewish term for crucifixion. Another common historical account is that he was “nailed to a tree” for example.

I’ll grant you that.

Ghosty:

I’m not familiar enough with the other accounts to address them, but I will say that it is my opinion that it is a far greater camel to swallow to say that Jesus did not exist given the sheer number of independent, though contradictory, accounts of his life and the lives of his followers.

I’m curious. Which accounts are you talking about? Which followers?

clarkal

 

[clarkal]

Ghosty:

I would also add that most professional historians without a religious agenda believe that Jesus existed; the major question is what he taught.

I don’t know the numbers, but you are correct. Jesus Mythers are in the minority, but growing. This doesn’t mean that they are incorrect, though.

 

[clarkal]

Della:

Then you are deliberately blinding yourself to many such historians who study the world of the 1st century. Do you really think all the universities in the world have been hoodwinked by Christians into thinking that Jesus of Nazareth existed and that he founded the Christian religion? If so, you and those you believe correct are the ones living on blind faith, not Christians.

You may still stand by your statements, but I should have said that, in this case, regarding the existence of the apostles, I would not trust a religious person’s analysis.

 

[Della]

clarkal:

You may still stand by your statements, but I should have said that, in this case, regarding the existence of the apostles, I would not trust a religious person’s analysis.

But you don’t see the fatal flaw of only trusting those with an anti-faith bias? Only anti-faith people can be trusted because only they will tell the truth? Really? And why is that? Are you telling us they have no personal agenda and/or that they are incapable of lying? You certainly seem to think people of faith have an agenda or are liars or you wouldn’t say that sources that come from people of faith are not to be trusted. No, don’t answer me, instead think seriously about what you are saying and thinking.

 

[clarkal]

gardenswithkids:

It is evidence that saintly people know that a Higher Power exists. You don’t seem to even acknowledge that.

I don’t acknowledge that because I don’t think your argument is right. For example, what about moral atheists? Is that evidence atheism is true?

gardenswithkids:

You really do seem argumentative. I did not take the quote out of context; I found some common ground by agreeing that in the end the evidence does matter. However, I disagree with the assessment that the evidence favors atheist so I didn’t include that part of the quote.

I apologize.

gardenswithkids:

If you don’t want to believe, that is your choice. In the end, I’ll either die and never know I was wrong, or you will die and find out you were wrong. No matter which one of us is right, I’d rather be me.

Why does Pascal’s Wager, in one form or another, always get thrown around on this forum?

If anything, it will either frustrate or make non-believers laugh. It is not a convincing argument.

clarkal

 

[clarkal]

Della:

But you don’t see the fatal flaw of only trusting those with an anti-faith bias? Only anti-faith people can be trusted because only they will tell the truth? Really? And why is that? Are you telling us they have no personal agenda and/or that they are incapable of lying? You certainly seem to think people of faith have an agenda or are liars or you wouldn’t say that sources that come from people of faith are not to be trusted. No, don’t answer me, instead think seriously about what you are saying and thinking.

Umm… where did I say that I only trust those with an “anti-faith” bias? I don’t. And one can usually detect such a bias. Are you saying that all non-believers have an anti-faith bias? That’s silly.

Yes, all human beings are prone to lying. It has been my experience, however, that, when interpreting religious items, non-believers are more often than not the most objective. Recall the James ossuary fiasco.

I’ll ignore the rude comment.

clarkal

 

[Ghosty]

First of all, the passage in question appears nowhere in earlier copies of Josephus until the beginning of the fourth century. Are you sure that you have the non-interpolated editions or simply what you “think” are non-interpolated editions?

There are NO copies of the text that predate the 10th Century, actually. You are thinking of the first outside reference to this particular passage. None of our modern copies are older than 1000 years. This is actually of very little historical concern, as this is the case with most ancient historical texts. And yes, I’m certain there are non-interpolated editions in Arabic that date back to the 10th Century. I quoted one in the thread specifically on this topic. My paraphrase is taken from the Arabic edition.

As for the Talmud, my point is that the article is making absurd asseritions. The article admits that the Jews had an oral tradition, and this tradition predates the Talmud by centuries, it then says that the Rabbis who wrote down the oral tradition were in no position to deny the existance of Jesus. I’m sorry, but if their oral tradition did NOT acknowledge the existance of Jesus, they wouldn’t have recorded that it did. They were citing their own oral record, not writing to a Christian audience; they weren’t compelled to admit the existance of anyone. Jews do not, for example, take Islamic claims of historical figures at such face value. When someone didn’t exist, or their tradition says something happened differently, they’ve never been afraid to say so. The fact that they contradict the details of the actual Christian accounts rather than challenging Christians on a theological level (i.e. Jesus arguments couldn’t have been true because…) is proof in itself that they had an oral tradition of the existance of this man, though their accounts of his actions are somewhat different. Incidently, these accounts WERE excised from the Talmud for centuries, and were recently put back in after the discovery of older, purer copies, so there WAS an attempt to simply deny Jesus at one point, though it came much later and was actually a breaking of Jewish Oral Tradition.

I’m curious. Which accounts are you talking about? Which followers?

One example off the top of my head is that of a man named Jacob who was performing healings, and how a man who had died because he refused to be healed by this heretic was to be praised (Abodah Zarah 27b). There are several accounts of the heretical Jewish followers of Jesus, mostly from that same tractate.

 

[Della]

clarkal:

Umm… where did I say that I only trust those with an “anti-faith” bias? I don’t. And one can usually detect such a bias. Are you saying that all non-believers have an anti-faith bias? That’s silly.

It is obvious from your comment that you would not trust a source written by a person of faith. It’s your comment, it’s up to you to defend it. Why should I accept your personal assessments at face value?

Yes, all human beings are prone to lying. It has been my experience, however, that, when interpreting religious items, non-believers are more often than not the most objective. Recall the James ossuary fiasco.

I challenge your assertion that non-believers are, per se, more objective than persons of faith. What evidence/documentation can you produce to prove this?

I’ll ignore the rude comment.

What “rude comment”? That I asked you take seriously the implications of your own comments? Surely not.

 

[Paris_Blues]

YES HE EXISTED!!! But it takes A LOT OF FAITH!!

 

[clarkal]

I think this will be my last post for now. I have the flu and not the energy to keep up with y’all at the moment.

Della:

It is obvious from your comment that you would not trust a source written by a person of faith. It’s your comment, it’s up to you to defend it.

And you misinterpreted it to mean that I trust only those with an “anti-faith” bias. That’s not true.

Della:

I challenge your assertion that non-believers are, per se, more objective than persons of faith. What evidence/documentation can you produce to prove this?

Christian history is full of pious fraud. Take a look at the dishonesty in regards to the James Ossuary debacle.

If St. Paul lied for the glory of God, why should I expect any different from modern Christians?

clarkal