(July 7, 2016 at 1:42 pm)SteveII Wrote:

(July 7, 2016 at 12:29 pm)Constable Dorfl Wrote: No you want to redefine belief because pretending your beliefs are evidence based is easier than going out and finding whether your beliefs can be confimed by evidence or not.

I'm certainly not going to argue further over a definition of a word that can be looked up.

Nothing on the other thing?

Please present your scholarly backup for: "the fact that singificant early documents were destroyed because they didn't agree with later invented orthodoxy and even that significant events depicted in the current bible were fabricated to support this later orthodoxy." (when I say scholarly, something more than a 1-off, Christian bashing, obviously biased, never been published in academic journals, popular level book-writing, author). Then we can discuss it.

Steve, why appeal to scholarly work anyway? It's not like your views regarding the history of the early church are in line with the mainstream scholarly view anyway.

Now it's likely, as far as mainstream scholarly views go, that there were no intentional fabrication of significant events. But it's clear through analysis of the texts that certain events (such as the nativity events) were added later on to indeed support later orthodoxy. This does not imply fabrication, however, in the deliberate sense. More that later authors (e.g., "Matthew" and "Luke") heard about some additional stories about Jesus, and without verifying it for themselves in a proper skeptical manner, included them in their texts.

(July 7, 2016 at 2:20 pm)Irrational Wrote:

(July 7, 2016 at 1:42 pm)SteveII Wrote: I'm certainly not going to argue further over a definition of a word that can be looked up.

Nothing on the other thing?

Please present your scholarly backup for: "the fact that singificant early documents were destroyed because they didn't agree with later invented orthodoxy and even that significant events depicted in the current bible were fabricated to support this later orthodoxy." (when I say scholarly, something more than a 1-off, Christian bashing, obviously biased, never been published in academic journals, popular level book-writing, author). Then we can discuss it.

Steve, why appeal to scholarly work anyway? It's not like your views regarding the history of the early church are in line with the mainstream scholarly view anyway.

Now it's likely, as far as mainstream scholarly views go, that there were no intentional fabrication of significant events. But it's clear through analysis of the texts that certain events (such as the nativity events) were added later on to indeed support later orthodoxy. This does not imply fabrication, however, in the deliberate sense. More that later authors (e.g., "Matthew" and "Luke") heard about some additional stories about Jesus, and without verifying it for themselves in a proper skeptical manner, included them in their texts.

I don't need scholarly or published articles... I mostly look for something however, that provides the factual details, which the conclusion is based on and can be collaborated or attested by other evidence.  

As to the nativity, I think that you are neglecting a couple options, that Mark may have been aware, but simply chose not to include it in his Gospel.  Or it is possible that Mark was not aware, but the Matthew and Luke where made aware by their sources.  In his book "Cold Case Christianity" by J. Warner Wallace; he points out that witnesses often do not always provide the same details (some may focus on one thing, that others do not).  Likewise a witness (especially one who is aware of others testimony) may not provide all the details, that they think your already know and rather focus on what they can add.

On what basis of the nativity narrative not being in Mark, but being included in Matthew and Luke, do you conclude,  "later authors (e.g., "Matthew" and "Luke") heard about some additional stories about Jesus, and without verifying it for themselves in a proper skeptical manner, included them in their texts"?

(July 7, 2016 at 2:20 pm)Irrational Wrote:

(July 7, 2016 at 1:42 pm)SteveII Wrote: I'm certainly not going to argue further over a definition of a word that can be looked up.

Nothing on the other thing?

Please present your scholarly backup for: "the fact that singificant early documents were destroyed because they didn't agree with later invented orthodoxy and even that significant events depicted in the current bible were fabricated to support this later orthodoxy." (when I say scholarly, something more than a 1-off, Christian bashing, obviously biased, never been published in academic journals, popular level book-writing, author). Then we can discuss it.

Steve, why appeal to scholarly work anyway? It's not like your views regarding the history of the early church are in line with the mainstream scholarly view anyway.

Now it's likely, as far as mainstream scholarly views go, that there were no intentional fabrication of significant events. But it's clear through analysis of the texts that certain events (such as the nativity events) were added later on to indeed support later orthodoxy. This does not imply fabrication, however, in the deliberate sense. More that later authors (e.g., "Matthew" and "Luke") heard about some additional stories about Jesus, and without verifying it for themselves in a proper skeptical manner, included them in their texts.

In what ways are my views of early church history not in line with mainstream scholars (I'm not saying they are, just trying to define what you mean by 'mainstream')? I agree that the editors of the gospels had common sources that they used along with original work. 

My point for pages and pages has been that the NT is either originally true or they were originally intentionally false. People like to throw up objections that are not backed up (like they were altered from a more 'mild' version). Universal 'honest mistaken-ness' also does not seem to be plausible.

How about if they were just the writing down of folk tales that were floating around?
Common source: the people.
Witnesses: "the people".
Later additions: by the people.

(July 7, 2016 at 6:38 am)Constable Dorfl Wrote:

(July 6, 2016 at 2:45 pm)Ignorant Wrote: ALL this demonstration shows is that while some things, RIGHT NOW, depend on the existence of other, simultaneously existing, more fundamental things, something must exist without that or any such condition. It simply exists, and would exist if nothing else existed at all. Call it whatever you want.

And that thing you talk about is the universe, ni god included nor needed. [1]

Oh and the reason I used creatard is because when I boiled out all the nonsense word salad from your previous post, all I got was a badly worded version of Paley's argument from design, [2] which was refuted in On the Origin of Species.

1) That is fine, but realize that by making this asserting the universe rather than god as 'subsistent being', you have accepted the conclusion of the argument as true. I have already said you may call it whatever you want, you've chosen 'universe'. So you don't disagree with the argument, you merely disagree with the identification of the conclusion with god. I'll take that.

2) If it was a poorly worded version of Paley, that is because it isn't Paley AT ALL. If it had been a well worded Paley argument, I would have horribly failed to adequately describe my actual argument. It's nice to know I wasn't a complete failure. This is not a teleological argument. If anything, it is a poor version of the contingency argument (which is NOT the Kalam, which brings to much temporal baggage) which has never been about the causal history of things nor their telos.

I don’t think belief has anything to do with it

“James 2:19” Wrote:Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble

Where the god of the bible is concerned, it is faith, not belief the biblical writers decided to require of us.

”Hebrews 11:6” Wrote:For without faith it is impossible to please god

I’m not splitting hairs. There is a difference between belief and faith

”Hebrews 11:1” Wrote:Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

Faith involves an element of hope and trust. One of you has a signature that describes why we need faith to be Christians

Quote: We use faith to justify god’s absence from our reality

Mere belief could never hold up under the realities of the world we live in. it is faith that allows Christians to ignore the people who were killed in South Carolina, keep believing that an all-powerful god rules the world with justice even though in this world the bad guy often wins. Babies suffering, children dying of cancer, just rulers being assassinated, politicians lining their pockets with money meant to aid the poor, natural disasters destroying the innocent while the PTB sit in safety, etc. faith sweeps it all under the rug so theists can keep trusting the god that no one has seen.

(July 7, 2016 at 1:42 pm)SteveII Wrote:

(July 7, 2016 at 12:29 pm)Constable Dorfl Wrote: No you want to redefine belief because pretending your beliefs are evidence based is easier than going out and finding whether your beliefs can be confimed by evidence or not.

I'm certainly not going to argue further because I'm getting my arse handed to me.

Fixed your post.

(July 7, 2016 at 2:47 pm)RoadRunner79 Wrote:

(July 7, 2016 at 2:20 pm)Irrational Wrote: Steve, why appeal to scholarly work anyway? It's not like your views regarding the history of the early church are in line with the mainstream scholarly view anyway.

Now it's likely, as far as mainstream scholarly views go, that there were no intentional fabrication of significant events. But it's clear through analysis of the texts that certain events (such as the nativity events) were added later on to indeed support later orthodoxy. This does not imply fabrication, however, in the deliberate sense. More that later authors (e.g., "Matthew" and "Luke") heard about some additional stories about Jesus, and without verifying it for themselves in a proper skeptical manner, included them in their texts.

As to the nativity, I think that you are neglecting a couple options, that Mark may have been aware, but simply chose not to include it in his Gospel.  Or it is possible that Mark was not aware, but the Matthew and Luke where made aware by their sources.  In his book "Cold Case Christianity" by J. Warner Wallace; he points out that witnesses often do not always provide the same details (some may focus on one thing, that others do not).  Likewise a witness (especially one who is aware of others testimony) may not provide all the details, that they think your already know and rather focus on what they can add.

Except the argument about witnesses providing different factual details due to different perspectives and backgrounds is irrelevant here, because the differences in the nativity stories aren't due to those factors. If that was the case, the proportion of similarities in the elements of the nativity stories should've still been much higher, and the contradictions wouldn't be so apparent. But what we see instead is that the nativity stories were written exactly as if "Matthew" and "Luke" weren't aware of each other's writings. The similarities we do see are those to do with later key doctrines regarding the birth of Jesus: such being born of virgin and being born in Bethlehem. But the nativity stories are just considerably different from each other in most elements.

As for "Mark", most likely when that was written, the whole idea of Jesus being born in Bethlehem and of a virgin had not yet been popularized if at all  surfaced at the time. This specific lack of details about Jesus' birth is also noticed in the writings of Paul. Something like the virgin birth of Jesus should've been mentioned by Paul in at least one of his epistles, but it's nowhere there.

(July 7, 2016 at 3:05 pm)SteveII Wrote:

(July 7, 2016 at 2:20 pm)Irrational Wrote: Steve, why appeal to scholarly work anyway? It's not like your views regarding the history of the early church are in line with the mainstream scholarly view anyway.

Now it's likely, as far as mainstream scholarly views go, that there were no intentional fabrication of significant events. But it's clear through analysis of the texts that certain events (such as the nativity events) were added later on to indeed support later orthodoxy. This does not imply fabrication, however, in the deliberate sense. More that later authors (e.g., "Matthew" and "Luke") heard about some additional stories about Jesus, and without verifying it for themselves in a proper skeptical manner, included them in their texts.

In what ways are my views of early church history not in line with mainstream scholars (I'm not saying they are, just trying to define what you mean by 'mainstream')? I agree that the editors of the gospels had common sources that they used along with original work. 

My point for pages and pages has been that the NT is either originally true or they were originally intentionally false. People like to throw up objections that are not backed up (like they were altered from a more 'mild' version). Universal 'honest mistaken-ness' also does not seem to be plausible.

Think of it this way, Steve. Do you know of any secular Bible scholar who accepts the virgin birth doctrine? I'm aware of quite a few Christian Bible scholars, usually Catholic, who actually don't accept that Jesus was born of a virgin.

And for your last point, again, false dichotomy. You're wasting pages over a false dichotomy, ok? And yes, what you call 'honest mistaken-ness' is plausible. Your biases just won't allow you to see that.