(August 14, 2015 at 8:26 pm)KevinM1 Wrote: Except that the apostles' deaths are mostly shrouded in mystery, AFAIK.

Oh, give it a rest. To be dead one has to be alive before. Not even that is proven.

Randy likes to pull what he calls facts out of brother anus. So the whole OP is the expected product of it's source.

(August 14, 2015 at 8:50 pm)abaris Wrote:

(August 14, 2015 at 8:26 pm)KevinM1 Wrote: Except that the apostles' deaths are mostly shrouded in mystery, AFAIK.

Oh, give it a rest. To be dead one has to be alive before. Not even that is proven.

Randy likes to pull what he calls facts out of brother anus. So the whole OP is the expected product of it's source.

Oh, I know that.  The thing is, I have no problem allowing that these people actually existed because it doesn't help his argument at all.  The biggest flaw with his approach is that he's essentially saying:

If all these other things are true, then it's likely this last thing is true.

Except, those other things aren't really related to that last thing (what do people's changed outlooks have to do with someone coming back to life?  if their outlooks even changed at all (where's the proof?)?), and they're also subjected to different standards of supporting evidence needed to make the claims plausible, let alone likely.  

A local cult leader who constantly ran afoul of the local authorities, got betrayed by one of his own, and was killed via crucifixion is a much more mundane claim than the guy was actually the son of god and was resurrected on the third day after his death.  And what sparse evidence points to the former does not automatically point to the latter, no matter how much Randy demands it.

So, yeah, I'm willing to accept, for argument's sake, that the apostles were real people because their existence is immaterial to the matter at hand.  We don't know how they died, or what threats they lived under while alive (if they were indeed alive), so the standard apologist wish casting and psychoanalysis of straw men still doesn't get him anywhere.

(August 14, 2015 at 8:50 pm)abaris Wrote:

(August 14, 2015 at 8:26 pm)KevinM1 Wrote: Except that the apostles' deaths are mostly shrouded in mystery, AFAIK.

Oh, give it a rest. To be dead one has to be alive before. Not even that is proven.

Randy likes to pull what he calls facts out of brother anus. So the whole OP is the expected product of it's source.

Bbbbbut NT scholars Abaris! What's YOUR theory??

-_-

I think it's sad that Randy pulls out atheist scholars to show how reliable they are when they believe in all the "facts" he wants to establish, and then quickly shoves them under the bus before any of us notice that all this understanding still doesn't cause them to believe in the resurrection. This second part validates our position, using his own chosen historians.

Why are Ehrman and O'Neil still atheists, if you respect their historical study so much?

(August 14, 2015 at 9:05 am)Randy Carson Wrote:

Quote:Actually, this is the same thread all over again.
In the end, it can be broken down to:

'BBBBBUT THE TOMB WAS EMPTY!!!!1!1!1 WHAT'S YOUR THEORY HUH?!?!?!!'

All the objections to this line of thinking notwithstanding. I guess they're not in his scenario.

The apostles began to preach the resurrection of Jesus in Jerusalem where Jesus was crucified and buried.

If the tomb wasn't empty, why didn't the authorities simply take the body from the tomb, parade it through the streets, and silence the Apostles?

Since the Gospels were written years and decades after the alleged events by unknown authors who were almost certainly not eyewitnesses, there is no reason to believe in their literal truth. 

Heya Chas

The fact that you can no longer see a six mile high bean stalk is evidence that it was cut down, therefore jack and the bean stalk is true.

Odins defeat of the ice giants is proved by the continued non-existence of ice giants.

An empty tomb (that on one can find) somewhere in the middle east is evidence for a series of improbable events as mention ad nauseum by our favourite whatever Randy is.

(August 14, 2015 at 9:54 pm)KevinM1 Wrote: So, yeah, I'm willing to accept, for argument's sake, that the apostles were real people because their existence is immaterial to the matter at hand.  We don't know how they died, or what threats they lived under while alive (if they were indeed alive), so the standard apologist wish casting and psychoanalysis of straw men still doesn't get him anywhere.

The "matter at hand" is whether these "real people" conspired with regard to what they reported:

1. that Jesus was crucified, dead and buried,
2. that Jesus appeared to them alive again after his death
3. that Paul, the persecutor of the early Church, was converted
4. that James, the unbelieving brother of Jesus, was converted
3. that Jesus' tomb was found empty.

The Conspiracy Theory states that the apostles agreed to lie about all of these points.

Do you believe that this theory is the best explanation for the five points listed above?

If not, what is?