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Author Topic:   The Existence of Jesus Christ
ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 35 of 378 (212180)
05-28-2005 7:08 PM
Reply to: Message 34 by rock4jc
05-28-2005 6:59 PM


Who says anybody is actually answering your prayers? What objective evidence do you have that shows your prayers are answered, and if they are answered, that they are answered by 'Jesus Christ'?

This message is a reply to:
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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 69 of 378 (212301)
05-29-2005 7:09 AM
Reply to: Message 50 by crashfrog
05-28-2005 10:49 PM


Re: .wikipedia.org - useful but (Neutrality)
How far does the stories about someone have to diviate from reality for it to be a legend based on someone, rather than that person?

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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 71 of 378 (212303)
05-29-2005 7:13 AM
Reply to: Message 62 by Kapyong
05-29-2005 1:30 AM


Re: Sceptics abound
My personal opinion, is that Jesus, as described in the gospels, is a myth.
That does not include the possiblity of there being a person or persons that have done some of the things attributed , and inspired the concepts.
This message has been edited by ramoss, 05-29-2005 07:14 AM

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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 79 of 378 (212378)
05-29-2005 3:35 PM
Reply to: Message 75 by CodeTrainer
05-29-2005 11:38 AM


Re: Forum Guidelines Advisory
One problem with the claim about Nero, is the writing was NOT from Nero's time, but from much later. Tacitus was writing in 115 C.E, which is 51 years after the event. There is no way to tell what Tacitus's source was. What is known is that Tacitus was high critical of Nero in many of his writings. Another thing, it is known that Tactitus has
reported a report or rumor that he knew was false (Mellor, 1993, page).
Because of the vaguness of his sources, the fact that Tacitus was known to have reported rumor or reports he knew as false, and because of the fact that Tacitus also had a large contempt, and poor knowledge of anything Jewish/Christian or Egyptian, using Tactitus as evidence is desperate at the very best.

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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 87 of 378 (212643)
05-30-2005 1:16 PM
Reply to: Message 86 by Deut. 32.8
05-30-2005 11:09 AM


Re: Early church
You are making several invalid assumptions. First of all, the Temple based Judaism was not the only one. There was the rabbitical based version, which became dominate when the temple was destroyed by the Romans.
The synoguoge based Judaism would not be using any Greek terminolgoy for their messiah. That indicates that those who started the Jesus cult were
Hellenistic based, and probably gentile converts. Paul appears to have gone after the Gentiles after the native born Jewish people rejected him.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 86 by Deut. 32.8, posted 05-30-2005 11:09 AM Deut. 32.8 has replied

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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 138 of 378 (214467)
06-05-2005 9:21 AM
Reply to: Message 137 by randman
06-05-2005 4:23 AM


Re: the Development of the Christ myth
One point.
You have paul making claims about Jesus natural brothers. So? We have Rowling makign claims about Harry Potters natural parents.
What external source are you using to confirm the letters?
For that matter, 1 Cor 9:5 , we have in the KJV
9:5 Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas?
doesn't look like he is mentioning the natural syblings of Jesus at all.
This message has been edited by ramoss, 06-05-2005 09:24 AM

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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 141 of 378 (214955)
06-07-2005 9:14 AM
Reply to: Message 140 by FormalistAesthete
06-06-2005 2:58 PM


Re: Writers who could/should have mentioned Jesus
1) There are no historians from before 93 C.E. that mentioned Jesus. The major reference in antiquities seems to be a much later interpolition, and not from that time period. One historian that should have written about Jesus if he existed as described in the New testament would have been Philo of Alexandria, who wrote about conditoins in Jerusalum at the time, and actually wrote a letter highly critical of Pontious Pilate.
2) It is possible that an interrent preacher named Y'shua got executed .. lots of people were. However, the events surounding that event would not have matched the description of things in the New testament.
How far to stories have to deviate from reality to have it legend and myth, and not history?

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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 152 of 378 (216400)
06-12-2005 10:42 AM
Reply to: Message 148 by valerieelliott
06-12-2005 7:53 AM


Re: Did Jesus exist
The Case for Christ is a bunch of second rate poorly written drivel who took all the appoligist arguements that have been rightfully demolished by others, and put them in one book without any kind of balanced viewpoint on them. If you looked at the evidence as presented, you will see, amoung other things, items that are strongly indicated to be forgeries being presented as real (such as antiquities 18), and items taken out of context. It never presented the opposite point of view in any valid way.

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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 167 of 378 (216670)
06-13-2005 2:43 PM
Reply to: Message 166 by Phat
06-13-2005 5:43 AM


Re: Jesus was real
If you attribute this spirit you thought you encountered with Jesus, why do you think other people in other cultures do not feel it is Jesus. If they believe they felt this spirit, and don't feel it is Jesus, why should you?
Why do you associate the belief you felt this spirit with the historical Jesus?

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Replies to this message:
 Message 168 by Phat, posted 06-13-2005 2:54 PM ramoss has replied
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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 172 of 378 (216778)
06-14-2005 9:27 AM
Reply to: Message 168 by Phat
06-13-2005 2:54 PM


Re: Jesus was real
Actually, I question the validity of all beliefs equally, including, sometimes, the ones I own.
I am glad you admit you are filling in what you feel about the spirit with what you have been taught. However, if you are using the context
of christian teaching, isn't that 'corrobaration' circular, since you are using your preconceptions to form your intepretation of your experiances to begin with? And, since this is a subjective experiance, (in other words, it is entirely within you),how does this demonstrate the existance of Jesus Christ? Does this subjective experiance show you a Jesus Christ in the spritutal sense? Or do you feel it points to the physical existance of a Jesus? If so, how does it point to the literal truth of things?
In my opinion, your experiance was shaped by your expectations that you were taught, and then because it was shaped by what you were taught to expect, it reinforced what you were taught to expect. This is the same as the Hindu's, the Muslims, the Buddhists, and all the other religions in the world.

This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
 Message 173 by Phat, posted 06-14-2005 4:05 PM ramoss has replied

ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 174 of 378 (216852)
06-14-2005 4:33 PM
Reply to: Message 173 by Phat
06-14-2005 4:05 PM


Re: Jesus was real
quote:
Well would that not explain why you are now an atheist? You have concluded that all belief is subjective. My experience was shaped largely through the times that I was changed. Perhaps your experience with christianity was concluded to have been entirely subjective (arising totally internally) by you. Once you believed that the Bible was conceived by man, you had no reason to entertain the idea that God could impart His Spirit. I am not as trusting in regards to human wisdom as are you.
Partly. My days as an atheist started long before I thought about belief being subjective. I became an atheist about the time I figured out the tooth fairy was my parents, and that the easter bunny and santa claus were just stories (that was prior to my going to kindergarden). At that time period, I really didn't have the intellectual maturity to think about belief from a philosphical point of view.
as for 'human wisdom'.. what does the subjective or objective belief in a supernatural diety have to do with 'human wisdom' at all? What does trust/suspection have to do with it at all? I am just saying that
your interpretation of your experiances is shaped by your beliefs, just as those of other religions interpret the same feelings otherwise as what they are trained to expect.

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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 176 of 378 (216934)
06-14-2005 7:46 PM
Reply to: Message 175 by CodeTrainer
06-14-2005 7:11 PM


Re: Jesus was a myth
You certainly are full of misinformatin. According to mainstream modern biblical scholarship, none of the gospels were written by eye witnesses.. and there is plenty of evidence for that point of view.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 175 by CodeTrainer, posted 06-14-2005 7:11 PM CodeTrainer has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 177 by randman, posted 06-14-2005 8:30 PM ramoss has replied
 Message 190 by CodeTrainer, posted 06-18-2005 12:31 PM ramoss has replied

ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 178 of 378 (216948)
06-14-2005 8:39 PM
Reply to: Message 177 by randman
06-14-2005 8:30 PM


Re: Jesus was a myth
They weren't really very good facts. They were the standard group of appolist claims that aren't evidence for the historical Jesus at all.
It looks like it was take straight from 'The case for Christ' or something.
However, if you really want, I can deconstruct each claim one at a time.

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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 179 of 378 (216954)
06-14-2005 8:58 PM
Reply to: Message 175 by CodeTrainer
06-14-2005 7:11 PM


Re: Jesus was a myth
Lets look at the claims one at a time.
quote:
three books written by the hand of eyewitnesses--based on all objective criteria for research in ancient writings--and another by one who took lots of first-person testimony, which books are corroborated by other contemporary references to those times that followed almost immediately, relatve to historical time lines.
There is no evidence any of the books were written by eye witnesses. The consenus of the majority of mainstream christian biblical scholars is that we don't KNOW who wrote the synoptic gospels for example.. and it is clear from the internals of them they were NOT written by eye witnesses.
quote:
HOMER'S "ILIAD": The earliest copies that we have in known existance today of Homer's "Iliad", dating to the thirteenth century. Iasion has possibly read the English translation of this book, and undoubtedly did not question his teacher as to whether this was an invention of some ninth-century fiction writer.
JULIUS CAESAR, "GALLIC WARS": The earliest copy of "Gallic Wars", written by Julius Caesar, dates to one thousand years later than the original. The only corroborating historical reference to his authorship that I was only able to find was one, Suetonius.
== COMPARE==> Until recently, the earliest known NT document is a fragment from the book of John, found in Egypt 1920, written on both sides, and dated to between AD 125 and AD 150, which would be 35 to 60 or 90 years after the original. Now come the Lukan papyrus, in a Paris library now, a fragment predating that one by 20-30 years, and now a fragment from the book of Mark found among the *Qumram scrolls* (7Q5), thus written sometime before 68 AD.
First when ti comes to the numbers of copies of various books. That does not mean anything. ALl it means is that the believers had more motivation to make lots and lots of copies. As for the DDS fram 7Q5,
it is certainly not believed by all, or even MOST scholars to be a fragment of mark. The fragment is so small, and in such poor condition
that many of the letters are disputed. Here is a small article that
discusses it.
http://encycl.opentopia.com/term/7Q5
quote:
This Suetonius, by the way, also refers to Nero's 64 AD persecution of Christians, as in, "Punishment by Nero was inflicted on the Christians, a class of men given to a new and mischievous superstition." (__Someone had said that Tacitus was the only such reference__) Also, Suetonius makes reference to Claudius expelling the Jews out of Rome after a time of some agitation, an event also mentioned in Acts.
Let us look in Suetonisu 'Lives of the Ceasars', written in about
120 C.E.
quote:
"Since the Jews constantly made disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus [Emperor Claudius in 49 CE] expelled them from Rome." (Claudius 5.25.4)
First of all, the name Chrestus is an actual Greek name, and not yeshua or jesus. It appears to be someone who was actually IN rome
at the time, doing the instigation, so that rules out it being Jesus.
Suetonius was talking about Jews. Even if he was talking about Christians, all that would mean that there were christians in rome in the latter half of the first century, not that there was a person named Jesus of Nazareth from the first half of the century.
So much for evidence. A bunch of assertions that are meaningless, the logial fallacy of numbers, and taking suetonius out of context.
{Fixed 1 quote box. - AM}
This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 06-15-2005 12:41 AM

This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
 Message 182 by randman, posted 06-15-2005 12:41 AM ramoss has replied
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ramoss
Member (Idle past 612 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 08-11-2004


Message 185 of 378 (217062)
06-15-2005 8:02 AM
Reply to: Message 182 by randman
06-15-2005 12:41 AM


Re: Jesus was a myth
The point is that this phrase is taking a Greek name 'chretus', and assuming it is 'christ'. It is taking a similar name, and assuming a typo. That is why the 'evidence' for a historical Jesus in Suetonius is not 'evidence' for a historical Jesus.

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