(March 12, 2015 at 3:25 am)TimOneill Wrote: There is nothing in the evidence compelling me to think that they made this guy up.To the best of my knowledge, nobody has suggested that anyone made this guy up.
Quote:Take away the miracles from the synoptics' accounts and you're left with the story of an apocalyptic preacher who did some exorcisms.Take away Zeus and the other Greek gods from the Iliad and you have a war between two states. You could simply remove the supernatural from the Iliad and claim we have a historical account of the war that destroyed Troy. Indeed, the relatively recent movie starring Brad Pitt did just that, make a secular version of the Iliad (as well as change a number of things like Paris surviving for no apparent reason but don't get me started on that topic). Does that mean we regard the Iliad as a "historical document" that tells us anything reliable about the Trojan War?
The Gospels are, at best, religious propaganda and, at least, mythology, hardly anything that any rational society should put any stock in. No doubt, if the Greek gods had prevailed in theology and become the dominant religion, scholars would combing through the Iliad and the Odyssey trying to find grains of truth in the sacred scriptures.
But I do get a smile every time I hear an apologist or a historist holding up the Bible and saying "historical documents". It reminds me of that Tim Allen movie where an alien race sees and Earth TV show and thinks the same thing.
Atheist Forums Hall of Shame:
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist