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How does anyone "know" what to believe about anything? Even the non-religious history books contradict eachother.
Look at the teachings about Columbus discovering American...
We don't "know" anything. We believe what we choose to believe, based on what we've heard, read and researched.
Agreed. But each side will argue they have the undisputed truth. Atheist read books that say everything and everybody in the bible is a big lie and they believe it. Religious folks read books that say everything about the bible is true and they believe it. Nothing knew under the sun. shrugs
Technically, Socrates could be considered to have never existed.
After all - he only exists in the writings of other people, ascribing words to him...
One Important difference between the witnesses for Socrates and the witnesses for Jesus is that those who claim to have known Socrates are themselves historical figures known to other contemporary Greek writers. Xenophone wrote an an essay about Socrates. Xenophon is known to history as the leader of the first Greek military expedition into Persia. He wrote a book about the expedition. The witnesses for Jesus, i.e. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, aren't known to history with any more certainty than Jesus is.
The post I was responding to wasn't saying that there is no evidence for Yeshua ben Yosef just like there is no evidence for Socrates. The poster specifically claimed..... "There is much evidence that Jesus was a historical person."
How does anyone "know" what to believe about anything? Even the non-religious history books contradict eachother.
Look at the teachings about Columbus discovering American...
We don't "know" anything. We believe what we choose to believe, based on what we've heard, read and researched.
I could not give you another reputation point but this post is just so true. It is always show "proof" and in reality how many things can you show "proof" of? What one believes is what one believes based on a lifetime of knowledge, learning and being a part of the world. Everyone experience may differ.
I love how believers turn into solipsists and nihilist when it suit their needs. No proof of what we believe? Then asking for proof is stupid because obviously no none can possibly ever know anything so we might as well just believe whatever it is we want.
I'm an atheist, but I have to say that "The God Who Wasn't There" is full of errors, inconsistencies, and flat-out mistakes. There is much evidence that Jesus was a historical person.
I lean in that direction as well, although I also consider the possibility that he was a meld of two people or even a composite of different archetypes.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rafius
One Important difference between the witnesses for Socrates and the witnesses for Jesus is that those who claim to have known Socrates are themselves historical figures known to other contemporary Greek writers. Xenophone wrote an an essay about Socrates. Xenophon is known to history as the leader of the first Greek military expedition into Persia. He wrote a book about the expedition. The witnesses for Jesus, i.e. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, aren't known to history with any more certainty than Jesus is.
It doesn't even get that good.
The Q Document is a reality, and it will eventually be found. That of course means there are at most, only 2 "witnesses" and both are still unknown.
Quote:
Originally Posted by looking4answers12
How does anyone "know" what to believe about anything? Even the non-religious history books contradict eachother.
Look at the teachings about Columbus discovering American...
Those aren't really contradictions as much as they are omissions. You have to look at how it is phrased in the texts.
Some texts falsely state that Columbus discovered America, while others more accurately state that Columbus discovered the Americas, but fail to mention he never set food on the USA, and so impressionable people believe he did, when in fact he did not. There is some evidence that he might have actually seen the coast-line of Florida, but under the circumstances, he would have assumed it to be just another island, and not an huge continent.
You see the same sort of "false implications" in other texts. For example, the texts usually correctly state that Khafre was a successor to Khufu. The small mind doesn't grasp the "a" part.
The "a" is clearly distinguishable from "the."
Clinton was a successor to Reagan, but he was not the successor. The successor was Bush (the Elder).
That's part and parcel of the lies told. Why lie?
Because Khufu's son was Radedef. Does he have a pyramid? Yes. Where is it? 90 miles north of Gizeh at Abu Rashad.
Okay, so if Khufu built the 1st Pyramid, then why didn't Radedef build his pyramid on the Gizeh Plateau as well, since there was tons of space?
Because the pyramids were already built when Khufu became pharaoh and Radedef decided to build his own, instead of appropriating one of the existing pyramids (like Khufu did).
Sometimes, for any number of reasons, we don't want people to ask questions.
Another good example is the Cuban Missile Crisis. US textbooks always start in the middle of the story...with the deployment of Soviet missiles to Cuba.
That gives the false impression that Americans were just minding their own business and were victims of some heinous communist plot.
If you tell the story from the beginning, then the US puts missiles in Turkey and Italy that can hit every Warsaw Pact capital city, and the Soviets put missiles in Cuba in response to the US deployment of missiles to Italy and Turkey.
See that alters people's perspective and leads them to [correctly] believe that the US was the aggressor, and not the victim.
So, sure, history texts are replete with omissions of facts and often stretch the truth for propaganda purposes.
The situation up through about the 19th Century was that politics and religion were inseparable. They were one in the same, and naturally the story will always be skewed to fit a certain agenda, and you can clearly see that in the Old Testament, mainly because it spans a longer time frame than the New Testament.
I'm an atheist, but I have to say that "The God Who Wasn't There" is full of errors, inconsistencies, and flat-out mistakes. There is much evidence that Jesus was a historical person.
No, there's really not. Unless something brand new has come to light in the past few days, I have to disagree with you.
I love how believers turn into solipsists and nihilist when it suit their needs. No proof of what we believe? Then asking for proof is stupid because obviously no none can possibly ever know anything so we might as well just believe whatever it is we want.
I lean in that direction as well, although I also consider the possibility that he was a meld of two people or even a composite of different archetypes.
It doesn't even get that good.
The Q Document is a reality, and it will eventually be found. That of course means there are at most, only 2 "witnesses" and both are still unknown.
Those aren't really contradictions as much as they are omissions. You have to look at how it is phrased in the texts.
Some texts falsely state that Columbus discovered America, while others more accurately state that Columbus discovered the Americas, but fail to mention he never set food on the USA, and so impressionable people believe he did, when in fact he did not. There is some evidence that he might have actually seen the coast-line of Florida, but under the circumstances, he would have assumed it to be just another island, and not an huge continent.
You see the same sort of "false implications" in other texts. For example, the texts usually correctly state that Khafre was a successor to Khufu. The small mind doesn't grasp the "a" part.
The "a" is clearly distinguishable from "the."
Clinton was a successor to Reagan, but he was not the successor. The successor was Bush (the Elder).
That's part and parcel of the lies told. Why lie?
Because Khufu's son was Radedef. Does he have a pyramid? Yes. Where is it? 90 miles north of Gizeh at Abu Rashad.
Okay, so if Khufu built the 1st Pyramid, then why didn't Radedef build his pyramid on the Gizeh Plateau as well, since there was tons of space?
Because the pyramids were already built when Khufu became pharaoh and Radedef decided to build his own, instead of appropriating one of the existing pyramids (like Khufu did).
Sometimes, for any number of reasons, we don't want people to ask questions.
Another good example is the Cuban Missile Crisis. US textbooks always start in the middle of the story...with the deployment of Soviet missiles to Cuba.
That gives the false impression that Americans were just minding their own business and were victims of some heinous communist plot.
If you tell the story from the beginning, then the US puts missiles in Turkey and Italy that can hit every Warsaw Pact capital city, and the Soviets put missiles in Cuba in response to the US deployment of missiles to Italy and Turkey.
See that alters people's perspective and leads them to [correctly] believe that the US was the aggressor, and not the victim.
So, sure, history texts are replete with omissions of facts and often stretch the truth for propaganda purposes.
The situation up through about the 19th Century was that politics and religion were inseparable. They were one in the same, and naturally the story will always be skewed to fit a certain agenda, and you can clearly see that in the Old Testament, mainly because it spans a longer time frame than the New Testament.
How do you know which texts are accurate and which ones are not?
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But each side will argue they have the undisputed truth. Atheist read books that say everything and everybody in the bible is a big lie and they believe it. Religious folks read books that say everything about the bible is true and they believe it. Nothing knew under the sun. shrugs
