Religious Background

[SteveII]

I appreciate the discussion. Thanks!

I. Your comparison continues to be ineffective on two levels.  The first is the 'no evidence' nonsense. Comparing what one person reports is very different than what thousands upon thousands saw over three years. The second, an alien abduction is not claiming anything but naturalistic events--all thing under the purview of science. The NT is claiming supernatural events. Science cannot in any way comment on whether miracles can or do happen so therefore believing them does not require anything science tells us 'to be wrong' (at all). 

II. It is your claim of 'no evidence' that is special pleading. You accept every other historical account as evidenced but exclude this one. There are no similarities between the claim of alien abduction and the most attested to series of events in ancient history: the life of Jesus, so no special pleading on my part.

III. And so you should. Good thing we have all the evidence of the churches, letters, and gospels outlining what thousands of people believed immediately following the life and death of Jesus. It may be that that is not enough evidence for you, but that is a personal decision and not an objective one. 

IV. How in the world would you know any of that? How do you account for the churches all across the Roman empire that existed before Paul stared writing? Your belief is fringe at best (and that is quite generous).

V. You throw the phrase 'corroborating evidence' in there to make you position sound reasonable, but, what does that even mean? Multiple accounts? Other writings illustrating that people believed the events really happened? The existence of churches shortly after in disparate locations that believed the events really happened?  Your comment is clearly circular reasoning: The NT can't be evidence of miracles (magic as you call it) because you have never seen evidence of miracles, and your claim there is no 'corroborating evidence' is just putting window dressing on a bad argument. 

Perhaps the problem is in definitions.

• Evidence refers to pieces of information or facts that help us establish the truth of something. Proof is a conclusion about the truth of something after analyzing the evidence. Evidence is suggestive of a conclusion. Proof is concrete and conclusive.
  
• The churches spread throughout the empire within 15 years of Jesus' death, the 27 different authenticated writings discussing Jesus and his teachings, and ancillary works and references throughout the first century is certainly evidence that Jesus did what the people claim he did and said the things they claim he said.
  
• Proof can have different thresholds. Anywhere from more likely than not (preponderance of the evidence), to beyond a reasonable doubt, to absolute. These are all arrived at by considering evidence. So, to say that my list is not evidence is simply wrong. What you mean is that in your opinion, it is not proof. That's fine--that is the threshold you chose.
  

1. It would be foolish and wrong to read everything 'literal'. That word actually means to determine meaning without critical thought, source, context, style, or any other number of inputs that go into the writing of anything. Genesis was never intended to be a science book. It was intended to teach the truths that needed to be understood to the Jewish people for whom it was written in the time it was written. Whatever truths we can glean from it today must be understood in that context. 

Regarding the recording of miracles anywhere in the Bible, there is no logical basis on which you can rest your conclusion that miracles didn't, couldn't, or don't still happen. If someone (ancient or modern) describes an obvious miracle, you can either believe of not believe. You cannot use logic or science to determine the truth of the matter. 

2. The alternative of taking things 'literal' is definitely not 'individual interpretation'. Hermeneutics and the complete exegesis of passages is quite thorough and certainly can put a stop to "Making anyone's interpretation as valid as any other and interpretations". 
 

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeneutics
  
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exegesis
  

I would say that more than 95% of the teachings of the NT are not ambiguous at all. So, to rephrase your objection, maybe 5% of the doctrines of the NT are open for interpretation. These are not 'individual interpretations', but different ways of taking a passage or a group of passages and how they fit into an overall systematic theology. In other words, they are well thought out and have an entire structure to consider. Your objection seem to be another straw man. 

3. Your premises are faulty so any conclusion you draw from them is invalid.

I) special pleading

II) I don't automatically accept any and all other "historical" accounts. Straw man

III) appeal to consensus. A lot of people believing something only tells me that they believe it. It says literally nothing about the validity or accuracy of their beliefs

IV) Paul founded the Christian church. So how does one explain the existence of multiple sects of a religious cult running around the Middle East? Pretty easy, they believed the tales/legends/myths being presented to them

V) magic doesn't exist. Sorry to break that to you

*evidence refers to a piece of information that logically connects to a conclusion. There is no evidence of supernature or supernatural processes

**and the churches of Scientology, Islam, Mormonism, etc, all spread within either the lifetime of their messiah or shortly after their death. Once again, all this tells us is that people believed it. Not that what they believed is true. If the spread of an idea is more likely to be true the closer the spread is to the lifetime of the messiah, then Christianity would lose to those previously mentioned. You going to convert to Scientology based on your logic here?

1) miracles aren't really, sorry. Magic still doesn't exist, sorry. And when it comes to a god spreading their message via stories that require interpretation (with no direction this is the case nor any guidance as to how to correctly interpret them as evidenced by the conflicting interpretations out there), that's a rather stupid way for a perfect being to spread their message. It makes much more sense that ignorant humans wrote a series of myths because that's what humans had been doing and continued to do.

2) theological bs doesn't convince me of anything other than the ability for people to argue and debate over fictional stories. You can see literally the same thing on any given message-board for any other fictional universe (lord of the rings, Harry Potter, etc). Once again, a god divining information to primitive humans and expecting them to write a message that would apply to humanity 2,000 years later, requires some special pleading (something you constantly accuse me of but appear to engage in regularly). Why would a god choose these ignorant humans for spreading its message via stories that some take literal, and others don't? (and those that don't will have multiple conflicting interpretations)

I don't care about the "teachings" of the NT. I care about the context of these stories and the accuracy and validity of the whole story. I can get meaningful life lessons from Harry Potter but that doesn't mean I think Harry Potter was real.

3) you're straw men of my arguments are tiring and boring. You should refrain from so many logical errors

Cheers
TheBeardedDude

I don't like to repeat myself more than once so for most of this I am content to let you have the last word. 

However, I will point out one last time your special pleading about the facts surrounding the NT does not constitute evidence that God works in the world. Starting with your words, 'evidence refers to a piece of information that logically connects to a conclusion', I would certainly agree BUT there certainly is a component that the conclusion does not have to be proven--because really, most things cannot be proven and we rely on all kinds of thresholds of proof to assess truth in our everyday life. We are always left with a subjective assessment of the strength of the evidence. Denying that the churches, letters, gospels and subsequent events are not evidence that Jesus said and did the things people report is simply silly and juvenile. 

Again, I don't care if you don't find the evidence compelling. Billions and billions of people have and do--which before you say is an appeal to popularity, I am simply pointing out a huge example of the subjective nature of assessing evidence.