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What ONE critical piece of information made you decide to believe or disbelieve Jesus rose?

Wandering Monk

Wandering Monk

Well-Known Member
SeekingAllTruth said:
For myself, I could have said

* there were no eyewitnesses to the resurrection

* there is no empty tomb

* history doesn't record a single mention of ANY of the apostles, as if they never existed

* the 4 resurrection accounts are rife with inconsistencies

* the gospels were all written in Greek by anonymous writers 50 to 100 years after the fact

* the original gospels were never preserved

* the earliest full copies of the gospels date to 300 years after Christ's death

* if God had really wanted us to believe Jesus rose he would have given us irrefutable evidence that would completely eliminate all doubt, but he didn't

I could have said any of the above but the one critical piece of information that makes me doubt the resurrection is the fact that outside of a scant mention of "James, brother of Jesus who was called the Christ"--and that doesn't mention the resurrection at all--we have absolutely no mention of the name "Jesus Christ" ANYWHERE in the secular historical record until after Christianity was made the official religion of the Roman empire.

This is the one piece of information that convinces me Jesus never rose from the dead.
Click to expand...

Pretty basic. Truly dead people don't come back to life if they have been dead for three days.
 
sealchan

sealchan

Well-Known Member
SeekingAllTruth said:
For myself, I could have said

* there were no eyewitnesses to the resurrection

* there is no empty tomb

* history doesn't record a single mention of ANY of the apostles, as if they never existed

* the 4 resurrection accounts are rife with inconsistencies

* the gospels were all written in Greek by anonymous writers 50 to 100 years after the fact

* the original gospels were never preserved

* the earliest full copies of the gospels date to 300 years after Christ's death

* if God had really wanted us to believe Jesus rose he would have given us irrefutable evidence that would completely eliminate all doubt, but he didn't

I could have said any of the above but the one critical piece of information that makes me doubt the resurrection is the fact that outside of a scant mention of "James, brother of Jesus who was called the Christ"--and that doesn't mention the resurrection at all--we have absolutely no mention of the name "Jesus Christ" ANYWHERE in the secular historical record until after Christianity was made the official religion of the Roman empire.

This is the one piece of information that convinces me Jesus never rose from the dead.
Click to expand...

I don't find it necessary to believe that Jesus rose from the dead. I am a Christian, however, but I don't see this as an issue. The issue is mistaking spiritual truth--which is truth that is a metaphorical expression of the possibilities of human experience--for literal truth. Whenever we listen or read or watch a fictional story unfold we temporarily accept the fictional world as a simulacrum of our actual reality. The craft of the story-teller helps us greatly in this. We find in these fictional stories great truths that can give us life long inspiration...but we don't have to believe that they are literally true.

Literalism is born of the need of those who want to be in power over others and who create a measure for deciding who is in or who is out of a community based on the extent to which that person is willing to accept non-evidence based truths. Today's Christianity is deeply sown with this sort of spiritual cancer and it is creating, in its wake, a lot of issues in our society. It is not at all important that we believe, despite any evidence, that Jesus rose from the dead...or that he even ever lived. If you read the New Testament and read the various gospels with their differing viewpoints that are not historically reliable...you can still get a deep experience of truth and nurture a life long inspiration to do what is right in the god of Jesus' view.

So for me lack of evidence leaves me in doubt of any miracles or even the existence of Jesus as an actual historical person. But my belief in Jesus comes from a deep feeling for the truths that are told through his life and his words, fictional or no.

As stated by Paul in Martin Scorcese's film version of Nikos Kazantzakos' "The Last Temptation of Christ" The following scene is the essence and sufficiency of faith:


The character played by Willem Dafoe is Jesus and the young girl is the devil masquerading as an angel who is leading Jesus--while he is actually still up on the cross and unconscious--through a vision he mistakes for reality of not having died on the cross.
 
ElishaElijah

ElishaElijah

Return
firedragon said:
I don't find it necessary to believe that Jesus rose from the dead. I am a Christian, however, but I don't see this as an issue. The issue is mistaking spiritual truth--which is truth that is a metaphorical expression of the possibilities of human experience--for literal truth. Whenever we listen or read or watch a fictional story unfold we temporarily accept the fictional world as a simulacrum of our actual reality. The craft of the story-teller helps us greatly in this. We find in these fictional stories great truths that can give us life long inspiration...but we don't have to believe that they are literally true.

Literalism is born of the need of those who want to be in power over others and who create a measure for deciding who is in or who is out of a community based on the extent to which that person is willing to accept non-evidence based truths. Today's Christianity is deeply sown with this sort of spiritual cancer and it is creating, in its wake, a lot of issues in our society. It is not at all important that we believe, despite any evidence, that Jesus rose from the dead...or that he even ever lived. If you read the New Testament and read the various gospels with their differing viewpoints that are not historically reliable...you can still get a deep experience of truth and nurture a life long inspiration to do what is right in the god of Jesus' view.

So for me lack of evidence leaves me in doubt of any miracles or even the existence of Jesus as an actual historical person. But my belief in Jesus comes from a deep feeling for the truths that are told through his life and his words, fictional or no.

As stated by Paul in Martin Scorcese's film version of Nikos Kazantzakos' "The Last Temptation of Christ" The following scene is the essence and sufficiency of faith:


The character played by Willem Dafoe is Jesus and the young girl is the devil masquerading as an angel who is leading Jesus--while he is actually still up on the cross and unconscious--through a vision he mistakes for reality of not having died on the cross.
Click to expand...
When you say you are a Christian, what do you mean by that? You try to live by what Jesus taught but don’t believe you need to be born again or believe in the resurrection of Jesus and can pick what parts of Scripture to accept or reject? Please clarify
 
J

John1.12

Free gift
sealchan said:
I don't find it necessary to believe that Jesus rose from the dead. I am a Christian, however, but I don't see this as an issue. The issue is mistaking spiritual truth--which is truth that is a metaphorical expression of the possibilities of human experience--for literal truth. Whenever we listen or read or watch a fictional story unfold we temporarily accept the fictional world as a simulacrum of our actual reality. The craft of the story-teller helps us greatly in this. We find in these fictional stories great truths that can give us life long inspiration...but we don't have to believe that they are literally true.

Literalism is born of the need of those who want to be in power over others and who create a measure for deciding who is in or who is out of a community based on the extent to which that person is willing to accept non-evidence based truths. Today's Christianity is deeply sown with this sort of spiritual cancer and it is creating, in its wake, a lot of issues in our society. It is not at all important that we believe, despite any evidence, that Jesus rose from the dead...or that he even ever lived. If you read the New Testament and read the various gospels with their differing viewpoints that are not historically reliable...you can still get a deep experience of truth and nurture a life long inspiration to do what is right in the god of Jesus' view.

So for me lack of evidence leaves me in doubt of any miracles or even the existence of Jesus as an actual historical person. But my belief in Jesus comes from a deep feeling for the truths that are told through his life and his words, fictional or no.

As stated by Paul in Martin Scorcese's film version of Nikos Kazantzakos' "The Last Temptation of Christ" The following scene is the essence and sufficiency of faith:


The character played by Willem Dafoe is Jesus and the young girl is the devil masquerading as an angel who is leading Jesus--while he is actually still up on the cross and unconscious--through a vision he mistakes for reality of not having died on the cross.
Click to expand...
You cannot be born again apart from believing the Gospel. The Gospel which is explained in a nut shell in 1cor 15,1-4 .
If you never believed the resurrection, then you are not a Christian according to the bible.
 
nPeace

nPeace

Veteran Member
SeekingAllTruth said:
Even the Bible doesn't mention what 9 of the apostles did after Jesus' supposed ascension or how they died. Neither does secular history mention any of the apostles.

What textual proof do you use to prove these assertions that 9 of the apostles died martyrs?
Click to expand...
The Bible does mention what the eleven apostles did, after Jesus' ascension. See Acts Chapters 1 and 2

Why would the Bible need to mention their deaths?
The apostle Paul's letter were to the congregations for building them up in the faith. He included details of the Christian activity. There was no need to record deaths. Otherwise, he might as well just talk about all the persecution they faced, but that was not the purpose of his, nor Peter, James, and John's letters.

Paul did relate the time he was part of the persecution of Christians, when Stephen was put to death (Acts 7), and Luke recorded persecution which resulted in James' death, and the arrest of Peter. (Acts 12:1-5)

Later, historians reported on Persecution against Christians, and the death of some.
Persecution of Christians - Wikipedia
The persecution of Christians can be historically traced from the first century of the Christian era to the present day. Christian missionaries and converts to Christianity have both been targeted for persecution, sometimes to the point of being martyred for their faith, ever since the emergence of Christianity.

See ...
Persecution of Christians - Wikipedia
Persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire - Wikipedia

Why would we expect secular history to mention the apostles? That would be abnormal and strangely interesting.
Just as we don't expect the media to mention me, and the eight million worshippers of the JWs, it is not expected that the apostles would earn any special mention by secular sources.
Maybe if they were a cult like Jim Jones' group, or David Koresh, who did something to call attention to their activity, or they were Celebrates, with special interest to TMZ, they woul make it into secular history ... like Jesus did.

The ones who we expect would record their history, would be historians of Christianity... and that is what we find... many textural documents, written by historians with interests in Christians and their activity.
Besides the letters of Luke, Paul, and others, we have...
Papias of Hierapolis - Wikipedia
Polycarp - Wikipedia
Ignatius of Antioch - Wikipedia
...and more

There was also the Roman historian Pliny the Elder - Wikipedia who mentioned the Christians.

When we are gone, would anyone living a century later know that we even existed?
Only if your name was Donald J. Trump, or Michael Jackson... or as I look forward to the new world under Jesus' thousand year rule, then I would be remembered... by name, and activity. :)
 
Shadow Wolf

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
MatthewA said:
Many people do not believe this, and they also have problems with this type of thinking. Which is alright. Thank you for sharing that viewpoint because people do believe that, and with agreeing with you believe that Satan was with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden ~ And Adam, Eve, had made mistakes and blamed each other even with Eve blaming the devil for her own actions. Adam pointing the finger at God saying well you gave me Eve! Also with Eve blaming the Serpent had beguiled her by lies.
Click to expand...
It's these beliefs that affirmed me leaving. Satan was not at the Garden. The Christians inserted him there.
ElishaElijah said:
Where did He say that?
Click to expand...
Do you want to be educated in the Bible by a Satanist?
ElishaElijah said:
Of course there are more believing scholars than atheist scholars. Believing scholars have a big advantage, they have the Spirit of God to assist in properly interpreting what God meant by what is said in the Scriptures. You’re assumption is that anything atheists say is automatically dismissed, that’s not correct. The false interpretation of Scripture is what is dismissed no matter who brings it. I don’t take anything as fact without testing anymore, at least try not to. Too much false information out there now to believe anything now days.
Cheers friend
Click to expand...
That argument does not work because I have the same understanding, knowledge, amd interpretation of the Bible that I had when I was "filled with the spirit."
That's nothing more than an excuse to dismiss criticism from others (not just atheists, this comes from theists as well) so you don't have to actually consider it.
 
Shadow Wolf

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
Hockeycowboy said:
Are you forgetting Job 1 and Job 2?

He is not portrayed as “one of Yahweh’s most....loyal and obedient angels.”

(He is powerful, alright....he’s got most of the world thinking he doesn’t even exist.)
Click to expand...
That is only according to Christians. The devil never existed prior to Christianity. Literally. There are no references to this character prior to the invention of Christianity where we find Satan has been reinvented from obedient angel of god to the enemy of god.
I am not forgetting about Job. I am understanding it, however, based on how the story goes which is Satan doing his god-ordained job of tempter and adversary (Satan is, afterall, a verb that means "to oppose"), who found a point to test the faith in Job given his life was good. And don't forget, Satan did nothing in that story without first being given instruction and permission from god.
 
J

John1.12

Free gift
Shadow Wolf said:
That is only according to Christians. The devil never existed prior to Christianity. Literally. There are no references to this character prior to the invention of Christianity where we find Satan has been reinvented from obedient angel of god to the enemy of god.
I am not forgetting about Job. I am understanding it, however, based on how the story goes which is Satan doing his god-ordained job of tempter and adversary (Satan is, afterall, a verb that means "to oppose"), who found a point to test the faith in Job given his life was good. And don't forget, Satan did nothing in that story without first being given instruction and permission from god.
Click to expand...
Christians were only first named in the book of Acts .
 
nPeace

nPeace

Veteran Member
Deeje said:
Where in the Bible does it infer that Jesus rose through the stratosphere to be with his Father in outer space? That sounds like a bad bit of science fiction, not to mention a complete misreading of the scriptures....and this is exactly what happens when you reject what it says in favor of your own take on things. You have a little "Jesus" in your belief system, but he is nothing like the Jesus of the Bible....your other prophet gets center stage and leaves Jesus almost completely out of the picture as the Savior who was sent into the world to save mankind.

If Jesus was "put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit" as Peter said (1 Peter 3:18) then Jesus was not flesh and blood when he rose from the dead. As a spirit being who could not take a human body to heaven, Jesus materialized human form as other spirit beings had already done in the past and recorded in the scriptures. (The three angels who visited Abraham, two of which were sent to get Lot out of Sodom before God destroyed it. Gabriel too materialized as a man to both Daniel and Mary)

It was forbidden to Jews to communicate with spirits, so angelic beings always materialized so that God's earthly servants could see and feel a physical presence. When their mission was finished they went back to where they came from. Jesus too went back to his former position at God's right hand, as "The Logos". (God's spokesman)

When Jesus ascended, it was a cloud that hid him from their vision as he dematerialized and went his way to that realm where God dwells....what he called "heaven". (Matthew 6:9; Acts 1:1-11) The angels that appeared to the apostles after Jesus had left, said that he would come again in the same "manner" as he left.....only his closest companions witnessed it....the world at large was unaware of it.
Click to expand...
You know what's amazing to me Deeje.
Dark matter - the idea of it, is that it cannot be seen, nor detected, except... you ready for this... Its presence is implied in a variety of astrophysical observations, including gravitational effects that cannot be explained by accepted theories of gravity unless more matter is present than can be seen. For this reason, most experts think that dark matter is abundant in the universe and that it has had a strong influence on its structure and evolution. Dark matter is called dark because it does not appear to interact with the electromagnetic field, which means it does not absorb, reflect or emit electromagnetic radiation, and is therefore difficult to detect.

I think that very much puts that matter to rest, because any form of energy beyond man's understanding can go undetected, and unobserved by them.
I would like to envision how man thinks gravity can affect one of these... Exodus 3:2 ; Judges 13:20

Man believes it will be possible to teleport, and yet they deny a life form of energy that ability.

200.gif
25912831.gif

Why?
The only conclusion that I can come to, which makes sense to me, is that man (some) believes only what he physically can see, or what scientists tells him.
If scientists can accomplish it, it is fine, but to them, there is nothing beyond the scientists ability.

That's not reasonable, because, scientists can and do discover things beyond their knowledge, and ability. Because they have not discovered it, does not mean it is impossible.
That makes sense, doesn't it @SeekingAllTruth?
 
robocop (actually)

robocop (actually)

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
SeekingAllTruth said:
For myself, I could have said

* there were no eyewitnesses to the resurrection

* there is no empty tomb

* history doesn't record a single mention of ANY of the apostles, as if they never existed

* the 4 resurrection accounts are rife with inconsistencies

* the gospels were all written in Greek by anonymous writers 50 to 100 years after the fact

* the original gospels were never preserved

* the earliest full copies of the gospels date to 300 years after Christ's death

* if God had really wanted us to believe Jesus rose he would have given us irrefutable evidence that would completely eliminate all doubt, but he didn't

I could have said any of the above but the one critical piece of information that makes me doubt the resurrection is the fact that outside of a scant mention of "James, brother of Jesus who was called the Christ"--and that doesn't mention the resurrection at all--we have absolutely no mention of the name "Jesus Christ" ANYWHERE in the secular historical record until after Christianity was made the official religion of the Roman empire.

This is the one piece of information that convinces me Jesus never rose from the dead.
Click to expand...
What makes me believe in the resurrection is that He seemed so perfect in life, if anyone could do it it would be Him.
 
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