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Atheists Pressure MI School District to Stop Treating the Birth of Jesus as Fact

IndigoChild5559

Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
I'm on board with the consensus of scholars.

On the other hand, you are the one who continues to use words like "eyewitnesses" and attributes the authorship of the gospels to actual people actually named Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Those are not the views of the consensus of scholars. Maybe they were 150 years ago - not today.
You are correct. On that issue there is no consensus. And on that issue I go with the view that the text began with an eyewitness account, to which subsequent legends and myths and theological editings were added.
 

ecco

Veteran Member
And on that issue I go with the view that the text began with an eyewitness account,
Why? Why do you assume there was an eyewitness account? Why do you prefer that concept to the more realistic idea of people just making up stories?

But even if it started with an eyewitness account, if this eyewitness account...
I saw a guy over on the hill preaching about poor people going to heaven or something.
...got embellished by subsequent writers to become the 2000+ word Sermon on the Mount, what's it worth. There were a lot of iterant preachers then just as there are now.
 

Bob the Unbeliever

Well-Known Member
They are perfectly able to maintain their traditional beliefs, yet remain objective when they examine the evidence.

That turns out to not be the case, if "most scholars believe jesus existed historically" as you claim.

Why? Because there simply isn't any-- historical evidence, that is. Without a predisposition to believe? There is no sane reason to conclude there was such a person.
 

IndigoChild5559

Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
Why? Why do you assume there was an eyewitness account? Why do you prefer that concept to the more realistic idea of people just making up stories?
Because the probability of it is simply far more likely. Most legends have a truth at their core. At its core, the gospels tell the story of a Jewish man who followed Judaism, who went around teaching Torah, and arguing for bet Hillel halakhah against bet Shammai halakhah in a time where that was extremely common.
 

IndigoChild5559

Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
That turns out to not be the case, if "most scholars believe jesus existed historically" as you claim.
I disagree. If I am able to maintain my beliefs of Judaism while scholasticly remaining obective, then it follows they can do similar. This is the mark of a true academic.
 

Shad

Veteran Member
The standard is so absurd most of history would be dismissed. I guess the endorsement of a religion argument didn't work without a legal threat?
 

ecco

Veteran Member
Because the probability of it is simply far more likely. Most legends have a truth at their core. At its core, the gospels tell the story of a Jewish man who followed Judaism, who went around teaching Torah, and arguing for bet Hillel halakhah against bet Shammai halakhah in a time where that was extremely common.
If anything the probability is that the stories were cobbled together from the travels of numerous thirty-something preachers trying to make a name for themselves and getting a following.

As relates to the thread, there is zero evidence that a god was born 2018 years ago.
 

Bob the Unbeliever

Well-Known Member
Because the probability of it is simply far more likely..

More likely based on.... what? Faith? Hardly qualifies for the lofty status of "likely".

Your view requires a Magical SuperBeing.
Most legends have a truth at their core. .

Citation Needed. Speculation.
At its core, the gospels tell the story of a Jewish man who followed Judaism, who went around teaching Torah, and arguing for bet Hillel halakhah against bet Shammai halakhah in a time where that was extremely common.

Making **all** of the "gospels" very UNlikely to be accurate or relevant to anyone or anything.
 

ImmortalFlame

Woke gremlin
You are correct. On that issue there is no consensus. And on that issue I go with the view that the text began with an eyewitness account, to which subsequent legends and myths and theological editings were added.
The point being that what we currently have are not eye-witness accounts.

If I witness an event, I can give an eyewitness account. If I give an account of the events to a friend of mine, and this friend of mine writes it down, embellishes it, and then passes their written account on to you, you do not have an eye-witness account. To say it "began" with an eyewitness account is meaningless, because the account that we have - that is, the account which is the only actual source of any information we have on the matter - is not an eyewitness account.

We have enough evidence/information to reasonably conclude "there was most likely a man named Jesus of Nazareth who lived around 2,000 years ago who came to play a significant role in the foundation of the religious movement which came to be known as Christianity", but really not much beyond that.
 

IndigoChild5559

Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
If anything the probability is that the stories were cobbled together from the travels of numerous thirty-something preachers trying to make a name for themselves and getting a following.
Ridiculous. You aren't going to have the twelve original disciples willing to be martyred for story cobbled together. They were faithful to a historical person.
 

Subduction Zone

Veteran Member
Ridiculous. You aren't going to have the twelve original disciples willing to be martyred for story cobbled together. They were faithful to a historical person.


What evidence do you have that twelve original disciples were martyred? I do not think that that claim is well accepted today. And it appears that you are counting Judas as a martyr. I guess he is the unsung hero of the story.
 

ecco

Veteran Member
Ridiculous. You aren't going to have the twelve original disciples willing to be martyred for story cobbled together. They were faithful to a historical person.

My emphases...
Apostles - Wikipedia
Of the twelve Apostles to hold the title after Matthias' selection, Christian tradition has generally passed down that all but one were martyred, with John surviving into old age. Only the death of James, son of Zebedee is described in the New Testament.
Please show evidence that the original disciples were martyred. Christian Tradition is not evidence.
 

IndigoChild5559

Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
More likely based on.... what? Faith? Hardly qualifies for the lofty status of "likely".

Your view requires a Magical SuperBeing.
Hardly. I've been told that I'm an agnostic monotheist, so while I'm a believer in God, I possess a highly skeptical mind. If I went atheist, I would still hold this position.


Citation Needed. Speculation.
Such as the case where skeptics believed that that the Iliad was entirely made up out of whole cloth... UNTIL we found the city of Troy. Now we must admit that we don't know where the dividing line is between the historical and the myth.

Making **all** of the "gospels" very UNlikely to be accurate or relevant to anyone or anything.
Not at all. I for example find the gospels interesting from a Jewish perspective, as part of the caldron of ideas from which Rabbinic Judaism emerged. There are for example, some links to what became established Oral Law, and arguments in the same tradition as are set down in the Talmud.

At any rate, all of it, the historical and the fiction, is interesting if for no other reason than it became the dominant religion on the face of the earth, all starting with the life of one Jewish man. We Jews have disavowed him because he has been the cause of such great and persistent suffering for us. But if we stop and think about it, he was the most influential Jewish man in history. And if you pull back the layers of legend, all he really wanted to do was teach Torah.
 

IndigoChild5559

Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
Which "scholars", from what "universities"?
Dr. Robert Eisenmann, Cal State Long Beach, an atheist (known mostly for his ground breaking work on the Dead Sea Scrolls, author of "James, the brother of Jesus") He saw Jesus as historical, a kind of religious revolutionary. I had forgotten him. I studied under him. He is quite the brain.
 

IndigoChild5559

Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
Except... do you really?
Yes, I am confident that, as an agnostic monotheist, I do. Remember that Judaism is all about orthopraxy, not orthodoxy. I loved being Orthodox, but I left it for Conservative Judaism because I simply did not believe a lot of what was taught. I am very comfortable in my shoes being an observant Jew who is open to science and research. It just doesn't threaten me. All truth belongs to God.
 
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