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Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticPhD Given the tediousness of writing in that era expecting books of many hundreds of pages is simply ridiculous.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chint
Given the tendentiousness of writing in that era - written from the viewpoint of a tiny group in an echo chamber.
I have to agree with Chint, Mystic. I think you're attempting to attach way more relevance to these "books" than they deserve. The fact the gospels are at tremendous odds with each other in pertinent facts such as Jesus' year of birth, his genealogy, his nativity, his resurrection, his sermon, his trial, his feeding 4000 or 5000 people, and numerous others make them practically worthless as solid "history" and much more relevant as mere curiosities of what writing from that era might have looked like. Let's not forget these dramas were written up to a century or possibly longer after the events by writers we know nothing about and their importance stays well within the Christian community and not farther than that if we're talking reliable historical reference.
For someone so practical and not under the thumb of fundamentalists, you surprise me, Mystic.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticPhD Given the tediousness of writing in that era expecting books of many hundreds of pages is simply ridiculous.
I have to agree with Chint, Mystic. I think you're attempting to attach way more relevance to these "books" than they deserve. The fact the gospels are at tremendous odds with each other in pertinent facts such as Jesus' year of birth, his genealogy, his nativity, his resurrection, his sermon, his trial, his feeding 4000 or 5000 people, and numerous others make them practically worthless as solid "history" and much more relevant as mere curiosities of what writing from that era might have looked like. Let's not forget these dramas were written up to a century or possibly longer after the events by writers we know nothing about and their importance stays well within the Christian community and not farther than that if we're talking reliable historical reference.
For someone so practical and not under the thumb of fundamentalists, you surprise me, Mystic.
One of the problems I have is that some of the miracles done by Jesus -- a major point -- garner no more than a paragraph.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MysticPhD Given the tediousness of writing in that era expecting books of many hundreds of pages is simply ridiculous.
I have to agree with Chint, Mystic. I think you're attempting to attach way more relevance to these "books" than they deserve. The fact the gospels are at tremendous odds with each other in pertinent facts such as Jesus' year of birth, his genealogy, his nativity, his resurrection, his sermon, his trial, his feeding 4000 or 5000 people, and numerous others make them practically worthless as solid "history" and much more relevant as mere curiosities of what writing from that era might have looked like. Let's not forget these dramas were written up to a century or possibly longer after the events by writers we know nothing about and their importance stays well within the Christian community and not farther than that if we're talking reliable historical reference.
For someone so practical and not under the thumb of fundamentalists, you surprise me, Mystic.
yeah, chint has a point. we can't agree with everything anybody says.
For me, the relevant point is is believing a guy died, rose, and went "wherever" for our sins". And the book was written by something other than people. after that, its just anther central theme and links us through time our forefathers. It shows we arent that much different. thats powerful.
The book is fine. Its people that cause all the trouble. actually, people like you thrill. i was arguing with people like you for years. I am glad that you woke up and I can't wait till the angry at yourself passes.
But why did you fight so hard for a clearly less valid claim? and should we be addressing the people doing the same you did? or should we be addressing how to reach the people like you? (before you changed)?
How could a guy like me reach a guy like you back in '95? i was the same jerk in 95.
I have to agree with Chint, Mystic. I think you're attempting to attach way more relevance to these "books" than they deserve. The fact the gospels are at tremendous odds with each other in pertinent facts such as Jesus' year of birth, his genealogy, his nativity, his resurrection, his sermon, his trial, his feeding 4000 or 5000 people, and numerous others make them practically worthless as solid "history" and much more relevant as mere curiosities of what writing from that era might have looked like. Let's not forget these dramas were written up to a century or possibly longer after the events by writers we know nothing about and their importance stays well within the Christian community and not farther than that if we're talking reliable historical reference.
For someone so practical and not under the thumb of fundamentalists, you surprise me, Mystic.
I am NOT defending them so much as undermining the absurd idea that there is some significant difference in these ancient writings from any others in that era. It is NOT rational to compare them to modern writings using standards that simply do NOT apply to them. We can not even approximate the mindsets of those ancients in our modern, civilized, literate, educated minds.
yeah, chint has a point. we can't agree with everything anybody says.
For me, the relevant point is is believing a guy died, rose, and went "wherever" for our sins". And the book was written by something other than people. after that, its just anther central theme and links us through time our forefathers. It shows we arent that much different. thats powerful.
The book is fine. Its people that cause all the trouble. actually, people like you thrill. i was arguing with people like you for years. I am glad that you woke up and I can't wait till the angry at yourself passes.
But why did you fight so hard for a clearly less valid claim? and should we be addressing the people doing the same you did? or should we be addressing how to reach the people like you? (before you changed)?
How could a guy like me reach a guy like you back in '95? i was the same jerk in 95.
I'm not angry at Christianity anymore than I could be angry at a brick that fell off a ledge and hit me on the head. I could be angry at the guy who inadvertently put the brick on the ledge but who is that? I am angry at myself for not realizing at a much younger age that I should never have gone wandering through a construction site without a hardhat.
I read of people in their teens and early 20's who were raised in Christianity and had the good sense to say "This is a lot of baloney. I can't see how people with a lick of common sense can fall for this balderdash." I wish I had been that smart at that age instead of throwing my life away on Christianity and hauling that monkey around on my back for 60 years.
I used to wonder if Jesus and the apostles had homosexual relations and suffered such guilt over that and wondering if God would send me to hell for even thinking such a thing. Now I couldn't care less if Jesus was a flaming gay or not and I don't worry about hell in the least. The monkey is off my back. That is what I am trying to save young people from who wander in here with questions about whether they should join Christianity or not. I'm trying to scream at them,
"DONT EVEN THINK ABOUT JOINING CHRISTIANITY!!!!!!! RUN, DON'T WALK AWAY FROM IT!!!!! IT WILL CAUSE YOU MISERY AND GUILT SUCH AS YOU'VE NEVER DREAMED"
I am NOT defending them so much as undermining the absurd idea that there is some significant difference in these ancient writings from any others in that era. It is NOT rational to compare them to modern writings using standards that simply do NOT apply to them. We can not even approximate the mindsets of those ancients in our modern, civilized, literate, educated minds.
The difference old son are the claims. If we have stories of a military leader winning a great battle then that is easy enough for us to take on board as being true because a military leader winning a battle is not an extraordinary claim, especially when we can cross reference that battle from other sources but if the claim is that Alexander walked on the sea to win Tyre, or his troops had no food but Alexander spirited food for the whole army out of nowhere or was killed in the battle but miraculously came back to life, then that is a lot harder to swallow and needs greater investigating and evidence before we can believe it.
We know, for example, that Alexander won Tyre (despite the Bible saying it would be Nebuchadnezzar), the battle is well documented in history even though the battle may not have been written about for 100 years after it happened. It may be that he won the city on Monday but the record has it as Thursday. That is not really that important. What is important is that Alexander was there and fought in the battle for Tyre. In the case of your man-god we have nothing for the extraordinary claims made by people that were not even there at the time. That is why the verifiable evidence must be stronger and, frankly old mate, the verifiable evidence for you man-god existing is zero and that's before we even start on the verifiable evidence for the claims about him.
I am NOT defending them so much as undermining the absurd idea that there is some significant difference in these ancient writings from any others in that era. It is NOT rational to compare them to modern writings using standards that simply do NOT apply to them. We can not even approximate the mindsets of those ancients in our modern, civilized, literate, educated minds.
I agree. It is not reasonable to compare them to modern writings and standards that generally apply to documents that are considered historic. And that is the problem...a problem that we atheist continually point out...although perhaps you said it better than we do. And yes, we cannot approximate the mindsets of those ancients. And that is another problem. We cannot understand the mysticism of the era, and as a result we cannot accept miracles that have never been repeated in more modern historic time.
What you folks have left is not sufficient to meet the standards of historical fact.
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