5 reasons to suspect Jesus never existed...

[_Calculus Crusader]

Did Jesus exist? Quite possibly.
Are the gospels historical? Not so much.

Simple answer.

This is, quite simply, a simple answer from a simple mind.

[_SteelHead]

Did Jesus exist? Quite possibly.
Are the gospels historical? Not so much.

Simple answer.

This is, quite simply, a simple answer from a simple mind.

Says the man who thinks the gospels are accurate accounts of Jesus's life.

[_Calculus Crusader]

Says the man who thinks the gospels are accurate accounts of Jesus's life.

Yes. I am burdened with actual knowledge of the subject. If only I were as blissfully ignorant as you are on this and other topics!

[_SteelHead]

Please do tell, how 0 primary sources translates into actual knowledge.

My 4 year old niece is burdened with actual knowledge of the tooth fairy.

[_KevinSim]

I emphatically say yes. Implying that there isn't is like questioning whether there's such a thing as a good application of chemistry by referring to the limits of alchemy, or questioning whether there's such a thing as a good application of philosophy by referring to the shortcomings of Plato or Descartes, or questioning whether there's such a thing as a good application of logic by referring to the disproven speculations of David Hilbert.

Well, I can't be emphatic about it, but I think not. I think you may have your first analogy backwards. I think you may be able to question that there is not a good application of alchemy due to the more reliable knowledge of modern chemistry.

Philosophy and Logic are academic studies that depend on new ideas to advance thought in these subjects. Like the sciences in general, they grow with the discovery of new viewpoints.

Religion depends on emphasizing standardized beliefs that are thought to represent the complete truth. When there are so many different religions with so many different truths, how could any theological reason be considered better (good) than any other competing theological reason?

Perhaps the problem is that we have a different understanding of the word theological. If religion does indeed depend "on emphasizing standardized beliefs that are thought to represent the complete truth," then I think I would draw a distinction between religion (defined that way) and good theology. Theology for me is just reasoning about some deity. There is certainly a lot of reasoning about deities out in the world. Most of it makes little sense to me. That does not mean that it's impossible to reason about deities in a way that makes sense.

[_Calculus Crusader]

Dr. Cam plagiarizes an unnamed source... Should see familiar to Christians! Please see below.

Flavius Josephus

The problem with Fr. Farley's article in response to Ms. Tarico's article is that is portends to be a scholarly rebuttal when in fact it is little more than a personal attack on Ms. Tarico written for the benefit of a Christian audience.

Where Fr. Farley's article fails academically is on the issue of historiography. Historiography is the study of how historical documents are produced and how they can be used to verify authenticity.

It may or may not be true that first year history students are aware of Flavius Josephus. Third year history students with a specialty in Roman history are certain to have read his works. The short paragraph cited as proof of Jesus's hysterical existence is so famous or infamous that there is a special word for it: the testimonium.

The same third year history students who will have read the testimonium will also be aware of the historiographical problems with it. The first and foremost problem is that many early church defenders who are certainly aware of Book 18 of the Antiquities by Josephus never sited the testimonium. Most conspicuous would be Origen who sites Josephus's Book of Antiquities at least five times in connection to his commentary on the book of Matthew and his work Contra Celsum yet fails to mention the testimonium when it would obviously help his case.

The first church apologist to cite the testimonium was Eusebus c.324. There are then 11 other church defenders after Eusebus who site Josephus but failed to mention the testimonium. It is not until Jerome in the fifth century do we see the next mention of the testimonium. The lack of its mention in other historical documents of the first four centuries suggests that the testimonium is a forgery that did not exist until several centuries after Josephus completed his works.

Furthermore the testimonium states that Jesus was the Christ. As a loyal Pharisaic Jew this is something that Josephus could not have brought himself to write. What is more, is that the section of Josephus works where the testimonium can be found breaks the continuity of his narrative where in he lists a series of riots.

Inasmuch as there is strong evidence that the testimonium is a forgery Ms. Tarico's first point is still academically sound.

Historiography continues to damage Fr. Farley's position in regards to the gospels. Even if any of the Gospels actually claimed to be eyewitness accounts the four chosen to represent church Canon in the New Testament were written well after the supposed events. The earliest of the four Gospels was Mark, written no earlier than 30 years after the Christ event. Matthew Luke and the acts of the apostles were written at least 45 years after the event. We use historiography to analyze the language used and the style of pros employed in order to place a document within a given timeframe. The later the document is written the less likely it stands to be an eyewitness account. The Gospel of John, which is written in the first person, was written no earlier then 300 years after the event. It's style is vastly different from the other three Gospels and few academic historians place any historical value on it. Excepting this preserves Ms. Tarico's third reason to doubt a historical Jesus.

The discrepancies in the narratives of the various Gospels is compounded when one considers that the four canonical Gospels are the few selected by the church out of more than eighty Gospels known to be in existence. The Gospels of Matthew Mark Luke and John were selected because they supported the church's doctrine of the divinity of Jesus. Other Gospels such as those of Thomas Peter or Mary Magdalene were rejected because the discrepancies in their narratives were irreconcilable or their accounts of Jesus regarding his divinity were not in line with church doctrine. The multiplicity of Gospels and the wide discrepancies in their narratives continues to be a cause for doubt in their significance as historical documents. So again, the fourth reason to doubt the historicity of Jesus rings true academically.

Ms. Tarico's article is not ignorant or misinformed. It is in fact, academically sound. The church need only be threatened by this if it continues to require the faithful to believe that the events described in the Bible are literal and factual. Instead it is time that we all recognize that the Bible's purpose is not historical and that originally it was meant to uplift people and enhance the human experience. Desperately clinging to ancient dogma despite empirical data is the behavior of flat-earthers.

The church has an unfair disadvantage in this discussion because it's faith requires that the events be historically true. Historians have no such requirement. Instead they produce the best theory possible given the data at hand. Inasmuch as The data available makes the historical existence of Jesus extremely unlikely the only viable academic position is to hold the events surrounding Jesus suspect. It is possible that there is some yet unrevealed data that indeed proves the historicity of Jesus. Until such time as said data becomes revealed historians will be perfectly academically justified in saying that Jesus's existence is doubtful. In the meantime it is left to the faithful to pray for the revelation of such data. But then you wouldn't have a "faith" anymore.[/color][/b]

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So on and so forth. This is why the cost-to-benefit ratio is always to the disadvantage of the not-insane person. The amount of effort it takes to cogently rebut wild yammerings just isn't worth it after a while.

Dr. Dimbulb's cut-and-paste is a fine demonstration of his circumscribed intelligence but nothing else. (Who is the idiot behind it? Carrier?) Someone should read this to him.

[_KevinSim]

IHaveAQuestion, surely you could have found a better word to use than bitchy. Bitchy, like bastard, while not always used to talk derogatorily about women and illegitimate children, are still sufficiently connected to those concepts that use of those two terms is always in very bad taste in my opinion.

Can I just say something since the remark was made about me?

Point 1: My screen name is true.

Point 2: If I didn't take offense to what IHAQ posted to me, then why are you?

Jersey Girl, I'm glad to hear you didn't take offense "to what IHAQ posted to" you. I'm not sure that I really took offense; I just think using the word bitchy or bitch is in bad taste, and I told IHAQ so.

Point 3: Are you going to lecture me for saying he was acting like a "hyperbolic dick"?

No; in fact I thought your response was, at least in some sense, pretty appropriate. IHAQ can hardly expect you to refrain from disparaging and offensive terms when he was the original person to use disparaging and offensive terms.

Point 4: The remark wasn't made about you. The remark was made about me. If your opposition to the language is some sort of attempt to protect me from a poster posting profanity to me, I can take care of myself. See Point 1.

Your point is duly noted. I will not make any further attempts to protect you "from a poster posting profanity to" you.

[_KevinSim]

Why is it that you couldn't tolerate such things?

General rundown:

1. Fake people.
2. Thoughtless people.
3. People who demean LDS.
4. Obnoxious building campaign.
5. People who were more concerned about what was taking place inside the church than they were about what was taking place outside the church.

Jersey Girl, are we talking about some church other than the LDS Church, that you exited?

[_KevinSim]

I'm apologize in advance, but I can't let this pass.

IHaveAQuestion, surely you could have found a better word to use than bitchy. Bitchy, like bastard, while not always used to talk derogatorily about women and illegitimate children, are still sufficiently connected to those concepts that use of those two terms is always in very bad taste in my opinion.

Why are you referring to children as "illegitimate"?

I'm not talking about children in general. What I meant was that the term bastard refers to a child that is illegitimate, and I guess I have a problem with people using a derogatory word that indicates there's something wrong with a child just because of something that child's parents did or didn't do. I don't like the term bastard at all.

[Guest]

So, IHaveAQuestion, help me out on this. Why exactly do you think I owe you an apology?

You tried associating my interaction with Jersey Girl as someone calling women bitches and orphan children as bastards.
You were, as you can see from my reply and from that of Jersey Girl, completely misplaced in your attempted prudish and unwelcome interjection. Furthermore, the person who introduced the term 'bastard' to this thread was you, nobody else.

If you cannot see that merits an apology I suggest you are beyond further help from anyone but a trained professional.