Does a God exist?

[SteveII]

I have never heard a reasonable  plausible scenario that took into account: 

1) that all 8 authors were mistaken that miracles were happening as they followed Jesus around for 3 years, they were mistaken that he rose from the dead after his crucifixion, and how they worked out the common details in time to start writing to

This is nothing but tradition and speculation masquerading as fact.

2) the pre-existing churches who mistakenly believed the same basic thing (of which were not in close proximity to the authors)

A culture of stories coevolved with a developing religious movement.  That puts no constraints whatsoever on the original events.

3) the well educated Luke (Luke and Acts account for over a quarter of the NT) went to Jerusalem and wrote a historical narrative of Jesus' life and what follows (read Luke 1:1-4). He was not 'originally mistaken' like the rest would have been yet he was convinced that the events were real after reviewing documents and interviewing witnesses. 

Luke was a collector of stories.  Nothing about his doing so precludes him collecting stories that had already developed into myth.  This again puts no constraint on the original events.

4) that Paul, who was not part of the original mistaken, changed sides and was thoroughly convinced of the truth of which he wrote.

This is a 'fact' which needs accommodating?  No, people adopt religious beliefs all the time.  His doing so is no evidence for the original events.

5) the content of the mistaken details were somehow weaved into a complex doctrine that was entirely unexpected, yet eloquent and a 'finished' product so early on, not by scholars, but by fairly common people. In addition, it was not a stand-alone religion, it was thoroughly connected to the OT in that the messiah had come--not as expected, but far better because what is better than a political messiah? a spiritual messiah (more productive, lasts longer). Not only did it connect to the OT, it did not contradict the OT. Not bad for a bunch of uneducated fishermen and a former pharisee to plan so thoroughly that they nailed, not just the foundation, but the entirety of Christianity on the first try and in such a way as to have 2.3 Billion people still believing 2000 years later with no basic alteration. 

That explains the Gnostics then, huh?  This is bullshit.  It's only coherent in hindsight.  This is more tradition masquerading as fact. 

Simply saying that all these people were mistaken is far easier than accommodating all the facts. 

You haven't given me a list of facts that need to be explained.  All you've done is wrap up a bunch of assumptions that developed over time into a ball of presuppositions.  The normal methods by which folklore evolves is more than adequate to explain these 'facts'.  Which is another option besides true or mistaken -- or did you forget the false dichotomy charge.

On the other hand, if you believe that it is possible that God exists, the fact is, it is a much more plausible scenario that it happened just as the NT described. Weird huh?

No, rather mundane actually.  When you use assumptions and tradition as evidence for the miracle stories of Jesus, all you get is an absurd conclusion.  Funny how that works -- garbage in, garbage out.

How could all those things be "tradition/assumptions" and the mistaken, yet sincere, writings of the authors? I didn't list any miracles for you to object to yet it seems you are still denying that the NT contains truth even about the non-miracle content. Why isn't assigning the non-miraculous content to "tradition/assumptions" and not "fact" the same thing as saying the authors were lying. Or do you believe all the documents were later substantially altered from some lost original non-miracle containing versions? If so, what is your evidence? If you don't have clear evidence, all you have another theory (conspiracy) to support your mistaken theory. Seems thin.