RE: Jesus did not rise from the dead -- My debate opening statement.
January 12, 2017 at 10:37 pm
(January 12, 2017 at 11:01 am)Drich Wrote:(January 11, 2017 at 6:50 pm)Jehanne Wrote: I still don't understand why you think that your religion is to be believed beyond all others, say, Islam or Hinduism. But, I agree with you, that the existence of God (in particular, the Christian God) is independent of aliens abducting individuals from this World. But, still, I find the evidence for the so-called resurrection of Jesus from the dead to be poor, at best. I see no reason whatsoever to take it seriously, and given that the evidence for alien abductions is far greater than that of Jesus' resurrection, I see no reason to take it seriously at all.
If Jesus truly raised people from a state of clinical death back to life, then someone like Josephus would have taken note of it. He took notice of a whole plethora of other events and happenings in Palestine, "idle gossip" to quote one scholar. Why didn't Josephus, in his 21 volumes, mention Jesus more, other than a few passing references???
How do you know he didn't mention Jesus more?
Such a mention would have to be in those portions of his works that did not survive into the modern era; however, no such quotes exist among the pre-Nicene Church fathers that allude to such "missing quotations", which means that the only references from Josephus about Jesus are the ones that are available today. In any case, it is clear that Josephus was clearly unimpressed with Jesus and his so-called "miracles", just as he was unimpressed with the so-called Roman and Jewish miracle-workers.