Ignorance and the Bible

[Cypress]

Agreed. What's weird is the militant atheists only use that line of argument for the Bible, not other historical writings from other religions and cultures. Weird!

It's probably because none of the New Atheist celebrities and atheist podcast stars were historians. They were philosophers, biologists, political commentators, podcasters.

Therefore they wouldn't have actually realized they were selectively applying a hyper-skeptical standard to the Bible that they never apply to other quasi-historical writings from antiquity.

 

[gmark77]

Using that standard, we would also have to throw out Herodotus, The Norse Icelandic Sagas, the Anglo-Saxon chronicles as completely pointless and useless to the study of ancient and Medieval history

And it's a good thing no one was suggesting that in any way except you.

I said explicitly to you that there is much in the Bible that I value. So obviously you weren't talking about me.

I am still struggling to understand why, of all the things that could just be made up, you fight tooth and nail against the resurrection story being anything but true as written (save for the supernatural parts).

And it's telling that you won't ever address the following narrative where Jesus flew up into heaven. Interesting cherry picking you do there. For what reason, I have yet to figure out.

 

[Margot]

Paul and all the apostles had the same hallucination?

I've always wanted to get beyond the simplistic explanations that all those people were hallucinating, mentally ill, and/or lying. That is not a very strong explanation. Romans and Galatians do not seem like the works of an insane person.

You and I have discussed the possibility Jesus survived the crucifixion. I suppose it's remotely possible he met up with Paul three years later outside Damascus.

Grasping at straws

 

[Margot]

Possibly. But I think there is some information we are missing about what happened to Paul. I don't know anybody who had a drug or alcohol induced hallucination who didn't realize it later, even people who had their drinks spiked with LSD involuntarily without their knowledge.

Then there is the strange fact that he went from an enthusiastic Christian-persecuting Pharisee overnight to a person willing to die for belief in Christ. I mean, this guy was willing to endure beatings, stonings, whippings, shipwrecks, pirates, imprisonment, and finally execution by the State.

The surviving testimony of Paul seems to be mostly important for Christian belief, practice, ethics, theology. Paul talks about himself at a personal level not very much. He might have written letters to friends which don't survive, or had discussions which were not written down, elaborating more on his personal experience and the motivations for his life transformation.

Drugs wear off,the Holy Spirit keeps getting stronger and stronger

 

[Margot]

You were already shown that Jonestown was murder, not martyrdom.
They were also crazy. Crazy and unstable people are prone to delusion and manipulation. That's almost the definition of cults.

Frantically Googling for cults is not going to improve your argument.

The author of Romans and Galatians does not strike me as insane, and his life and martyrdom does not strike billions of people as analogous to a mass murder-suicide.



But we've made a lot of progress with this.

In your past iterations, you and many other JPP atheists were adamant that Jesus himself might have been just a mythical figure, and the authors of the NT knowingly conspired to fabricate a resurrection story decades later.

You all have been tip-toeing closer to the argument I've always made, and now there is near universal consensus that the Jesus and the crucifixion were historical events, and the apostles genuinely came to believe they saw Jesus after the crucifixion. The only question is whether they were hallucinating, mentally ill, or something else.

There weren't any coordinated conspiracies or agreements to blatantly lie.

Orange Kool Ade has drove MAGA into madness! They think a convicted felon con man,is their Orange Messiah!

 

[Margot]

The core story of the arrest, trial, and crucifixion are all there.

Virgin birth? Two attestations is a lot weaker than five in in eyes of the historian.
Also weakening these two attestations is the fact a miraculous virgin birth is never mentioned by our two earliest Christian authors, Mark and Paul.

You get really stressed out about the birth narrative, when it is not central to the core Christian beliefs in ethics, grace, and salvation.

Even the great atheist New Testament scholar and noted skeptic Bart Ehrman says there is nothing in the New Testament which requires belief in a miraculous virgin birth, and that most of his Christian friends think the story is allegorical.

The great atheist New Testament scholar and noted skeptic Bart Ehrman categorically disagrees with you. He unequivocally believes the New Testament can be mined for historical information than that.


The great atheist New Testament scholar and noted skeptic Bart Ehrman categorically disagrees with you. He unequivocally believes the New Testament can be mined for more historical information than that.

Ancient writers did not have the 21st century standards of analytical history and biography that some of us naively come to expect of all authors throughout human history.

The New Testament, the Norse Icelandic Sagas, the Historia of Herodotus, the Anglo-Saxon chronicles all have historically valid information existing along side myth that the careful person can mine using the methods of literary criticism and historical context.

I contend you can't truly be an atheist and a New Testament scholar.

 

[Margot]

Yes, I agree, I believe the birth narrative in Luke was written to make a theological point.

Paul was writing 30 years before Luke, and Mark had access to the apostle Peter and wrote about 15 years before Luke

A miraculous virgin birth is so extraordinary, it's hard to fathom why Paul, Mark, John never mention it.

That YHWH would become a man live a life ,only to be murdered in a conspiracy between government and organized religion of its time is much more extraordinary than a virgin birth.

 

[gmark77]

I contend you can't truly be an atheist and a New Testament scholar.

Why not?

 

[Margot]

Why not?

Because you're on the outside looking in! Without the Holy Spirit, no one can truly comprehend the Bible.

 

[gmark77]

Because you're on the outside looking in! Without the Holy Spirit, no one can truly comprehend the Bible.

That makes the Bible useless then. If God can’t make a holy book that can bring people to him I guess he isn’t all powerful

 

[Margot]

That makes the Bible useless then. If God can’t make a holy book that can bring people to him I guess he isn’t all powerful

Jesus died so he could send the Holy Spirit, not to write the Bible.
Which is basically a hand book. But it's so misinterpreted it makes it hard to use as A source. I use the Bible 5% to 95% the Holy Spirit!
But I was trained for the office of Melchizedek not with the Bible but by the Holy Spirit.

 

[IBDaMann]

I've never had to consult Google over anything you wrote here.

You simply consulted the many links Google provided.

You read my posts and frequently keep a Google search engine open to verify and augment the information you read on my posts.

Omnisicience delusion.

Frantic Googling and knee-jerk reacting to other people's posts is a poor way to be adequately informed, and it doesn't motivate you to see the forest through the trees.

Why are your posts all based on common internet misconceptions? Why is it that you aren't able to discern the errors from correct information? Why do you simply believe everything you read on the internet that aligns with your opinions?

You actually have to do the hard work of reading books, taking classes, watching podcasts - and not just from other atheists. That's confirmation bias.

Please explain the bias that can be expected from someoneone's lack of belief.

You have to be willing to impartially listen to legitimate Christian, Jewish, Buddhist scholars, in addition to atheists.

Did you just say that he has to obediently accept the totally partial Christian, Jewish, Buddhist advocacies, in addition to people who are impartial?