My boss and I debated history of the bible yesterday.
Offline "It is a history book" Him
"No, it is a history of claims" me.
"Jews and Muslims believe he existed" Him
"So, and most of the world at one time believed the earth was flat".
He thinks I haven't heard these arguments before. And he got into the "gotcha" crap when I hesitated or misspoke.
While it is true SOME Jews believe he existed, they do not believe he is the missiah(sp) and while the Koran mentions Jesus to, that is way after the fact, not to mention that I brought up that none of the gospels were contemporary. And the historians outside of the bible were also after the fact.
He keeps missing my point that the Jesus character IS NOT mentioned before his alleged existence and the earliest book is 70 years after his alleged existence.
There is absolutely NO evidence outside the bible DURING this time period in question, everything about the Jesus character is AFTER THE FACT.
And I also brought up that it wouldn't matter to me if he did exist, it takes two sets of DNA to make a baby thus blows away his magical birth.
THIS is why I stick to attacking the fantastic claims and avoid the history crap. The victors in history are to some degree will always put themselves in a good light.
The fact is that the Hebrews were a spinnoff of the divine family of El during the Ugartic period Yahweh got elevated from underling god to being the only god as a way to streamline the region and tribes politically.
I have no doubt that there was an early Christian cult who were merely Jews wanting to compete with the older Jews in ushering in the super hero, thus creating this Jesus (even if inspired by a real man) in order to draw people away from the old Jews to become new Jews.
And to say that the Koran mentions Jesus is laughable if you are trying to bolster your position that Christianity is the one true religion.
OF COURSE Jews and Muslims will say that he existed, BUT NOT FOR YOUR BENIFIT, but to compete with you.
AND NONE OF THIS PROVES that any of these god/s exist or that humans can preform magic tricks. Again, if argument from popularity made something true then the earth would be flat.
The Torah, Bible and Koran are only history books in the sense that they leave a record of the cultural myths of the people of those times. But in no way do they prove that there are a chosen people, or that a cosmic gigantor with a magic wand cares about any of the three, much less 6 billion of us.
Are there any books of early Christianity and early Hebrews that are available online that have source quotes from historians with credible records? Most of what I am seeing on line are apology sites run by the religious.
This is frustrating because it seems that the internet(not a conspiracy) but the climate of religious majority may seem to be putting pressure on media to not print or make widely available anything that claims the god/s of Abraham are merely a spin off of polytheism.
I know it isn't a conspiracy as much as it is human nature to ignore a minority even when they are pointing out reality to you. Like I said, it does not surprise me that today, at least, more and more Muslims and Jews are saying he exists. Yea, they have to just like Coke and Pepsi have to compete, but Coke and Pespi don't claim their sodas make your dick 50 feet long, even if I agree that they both are sodas.
His argument would be if I am not finding it widely online, then maybe Jews/Muslims/Christians are telling the truth and I am wrong.
I would argue, that it is not popular, and the truth is quite often not popular.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
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"Would be" ...what?
Do you still have a job?
Brian,
One site that has translations of early christian books also has links to comments by various scholars. It can be helpful to give you perspective. Some of the scholars are probably christian apologists I'd guess, but not all of them. This site has many of the pseudo-graphic books not in the canons as well. - http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/
I'm not quite sure what it is that you are really looking to find.
____________________________________________________________
"I guess it's time to ask if you live under high voltage power transmission lines which have been shown to cause stimulation of the fantasy centers of the brain due to electromagnetic waves?" - Me
"God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, - it says so right here on the label. If you have a mind capable of believing all three of these divine attributes simultaneously, I have a wonderful bargain for you. No checks please. Cash and in small bills." - Robert A Heinlein.
Brian37, what's this about SOME Jews believe Jesus existed?? You mean some JEWS think he was mythical too?? You would think they'd want him to be true since he's part of their mythology too.
It's INSANE to say just because Muslims and Jews think Jesus it real it helps the credibility of his existence in ANY way. Buddha said the Hindu trinity of Vishnu(Krishna), Shiva, and Brahma is real so they're real too right? The Incas, Aztecs and/or other native tribes didn't deny Quetzalcoatal was real so he's a real god too?? You can say the same thing for many other native American and African gods!
Click here to find out why Christianity is the biggest fairy tale ever created!! www.nobeliefs.com/exist.htm www.JesusNEVERexisted.com
My parents told me Santa Claus existed. I read about him in the newspapers and heard where he was on Christmas Eve. I told my parents hurry and get home so I could go to sleep. Otherwise he wouldn't come to my house. Shows how easy we want to believe myths.
Religion Kills !!!
Numbers 31:17-18 - Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.
http://jesus-needs-money.blogspot.com/
History is written, and erased, by the victors. It's very, very difficult to ever determine what actually happened after the fact. For the most part, the entire academic dicipline of history is little removed from politics; unpopular interpretations do not prevail. History is not a science.
It is neither possible to say that Jesus did or did not exist as an inspiration for the stories that are told, but it is possible to use actual science to discount the miracles and other claims in the bible as unrealistic and therefore almost certainly false, and the use deductive logic aside from that to discount the existential and metaphysical claims.
I tried to tell him this, it wouldn't matter if he existed or not, magic isn't real.
But there is ABSOLUTELY no evidence of him DURING his alleged time frame. All accounts in the bible and outside the bible are after the fact. The Romans would have written something about this alleged guy, considering his blasphemy of the state and claims of miracles, DURING that alleged time frame, if he existed.
Nothing in the OT mentions the name Jesus, no mention of him during his alleged time frame, and all accounts in and outside the bible are after the fact.
THIS is why I hate arguing history with people. The magical claims and invisible friends are what really matter, not what some culture claims happened, but what science can prove.
He even used that stupid, "We know George Washington existed", It happened so fast but I didn't get to respond, "Yea, but no sane person claims he could fart a Lamborghini out of his ass".
This is frustrating.
Akenaton's Attempt to create his monotheism was almost erased completely and most certainly was censored after his reign until the fall of the Egyptian empire.
What scares me is that when you go to UVA's library online, you have to DIG for Thomas Jefferson's blasphemous quotes and what they make easy to get to is this contributions to the government, and his "religious" views that put him leaning towards a fundy. But when you take into account his personal views vs role of religion in government, it is clear that he would hate people like Falwell.
It scares me to think someone would try to hide or even destroy his letters because they don't like his message. But if the Egyptians did it, humans today wouldn't be any different.
Andrew Jackson committed government sanctioned genocide and that asshole is on our $20 bill.
It scares the shit out of me that humans, throughout history care more about protecting a club than insuring that their own claims are credible.
Humans can be very compassionate, but they can also be very delusional.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Yah, I can see how that would be frustrating.
If the chance comes up again, ask him if it is true that Washington chopped down his father's cherry tree or if Washington ever really threw a silver dollar across the Potomac river.
Those examples are relevant because they did not enter into the story until about thirty years after Washington actually died. In fact, they were supposedly based on interviews with those who personally knew Washington but in reality, they are know to have been added by Mason Weems who has an existing history of adding stuff to stories based on the idea that it sounded good.
I can give you plenty of real stories about Washington if you want but the idea that bullshit stories about the man started at about the same time frame as stories about Jesus did should be telling.
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