(September 23, 2015 at 6:53 pm)Whateverist the White Wrote:

(September 22, 2015 at 8:45 pm)Stimbo Wrote: Not especially. But thanks for asking.

I hate it when sales people hover and keep offering to help.

There's an annoying little box on benefits claim forms which asks "Do you require help to look for work? [YES][NO]
If 'no', why do you not need help?"

I know that Randy isn't going to be the human equivalent.

(September 21, 2015 at 4:48 pm)Randy Carson Wrote: Thanks for actually making an argument for the skeptic position. It's pretty rare than anyone here actually does that, so I appreciate your time and effort.

Actually, Randy, you constant and abject failure as a person, it is infinitely more common than the arguments you have made in favour of yhwh in this thread (and if this thread is indicative which I've no reason to doubt that it is, ever), seeing as you've made a grand total of NO arguments in favour of yhwh.

(September 24, 2015 at 7:38 pm)TheRocketSurgeon Wrote: I don't mention it just as a way of name-dropping, but by way of explaining that A) this is how I know these things, and not from reading internet forums, as has been suggested in one of these recent threads, and B) as a way of pointing out that, once I learned a lot more about first- and second-century culture/history in that region, I was surprised that I ever was able to look at things the way I did while I was a Christian.

This jumped out at me, I suppose, because you're saying you are now in possession of some information that you did not have when you were a Christian - information which has convinced you that Christianity is untrue.

What is that information, specifically?

(September 24, 2015 at 7:38 pm)TheRocketSurgeon Wrote: I don't think the evidence of Jesus from Tacitus and Josephus (even if you include everything that isn't clearly interpolation) is so clear as you're making it out to be, or as Christian theologians like to make it out to be, but I do accept that there likely was an historical Yeshua ben Yosef, son of a carpenter who became a traveling rabbi, though I'm much less certain about the crucifixion narrative.

What Tacitus does say is, christians are followers of Jesus, who got crucified in the times of Pilate. That's what he says and he says that after hearing or talking to christians. And here we are at the fundamental Randy failure to understand that they didn't check and recheck back then. History and oral accounts were taken at face value. So, Tacitus says, christians are followers or Christus of Chrestus, because they told him so or because he heard it say. Not because he himself had any evidence of it.

We were over this about a million times. It just didn't sink in. Same goes for Josephus, by the way. The passages that aren't later forgeries.

Both authors are what we call secondary sources. They retell what others were telling. They weren't there to watch and observe, like Pliny the Younger with Mount Vesuvius. But as opposed to Tacitus and Josephus, we can verify Pliny's account with geology, vulcanology and archeological findings. He's a primary source.

(September 25, 2015 at 9:49 am)abaris Wrote:

(September 24, 2015 at 7:38 pm)TheRocketSurgeon Wrote: I don't think the evidence of Jesus from Tacitus and Josephus (even if you include everything that isn't clearly interpolation) is so clear as you're making it out to be, or as Christian theologians like to make it out to be, but I do accept that there likely was an historical Yeshua ben Yosef, son of a carpenter who became a traveling rabbi, though I'm much less certain about the crucifixion narrative.

What Tacitus does say is, christians are followers of Jesus, who got crucified in the times of Pilate. That's what he says and he says that after hearing or talking to christians.

What is the basis for this claim, abaris? Do you have any evidence or scholarship supporting your statement?

Did Tacitus reveal his source in any of his writings? As Tim O'Neill pointed out in the article to which I have linked many times, Tacitus despised Christianity, and there is little reason to believe that he would have talked to them personally...especially in light of the fact that he would not have trusted them to be reliable in their testimony.

Quote:And here we are at the fundamental Randy failure to understand that they didn't check and recheck back then. History and oral accounts were taken at face value. So, Tacitus says, christians are followers or Christus of Chrestus, because they told him so or because he heard it say. Not because he himself had any evidence of it.

In the absence of any support for your bald assertion that Tacitus interviewed Christians, we cannot just assume that he did so.

Quote:We were over this about a million times. It just didn't sink in. Same goes for Josephus, by the way. The passages that aren't later forgeries.

Both authors are what we call secondary sources. They retell what others were telling. They weren't there to watch and observe, like Pliny the Younger with Mount Vesuvius. But as opposed to Tacitus and Josephus, we can verify Pliny's account with geology, vulcanology and archeological findings. He's a primary source.

Again, please provide some scholarship to support these assertions. Links to articles written by real PhD's and not people like Acharya S who have no academic standing.

Thanks.