Why Yahweh? (Or Allah, or Zeus, etc.)

[Minimalist]

Why is it that the earliest christian documents are not considered canonical anyway?

Because the story morphed over time to meet the political needs of the church.

I highly recommend Bart Ehrman's "Lost Christianities" for a discussion of what happened.

[FallentoReason]

The earliest Christian documents were the Pauline and pseudo-Pauline epistles. They don't mention a single miracle Jesus did except for the resurrection. That puts Jesus on par with the countless other gods that resurrected prior to him. Not very impressive!

Why is it that the earliest christian documents are not considered canonical anyway? Jesus didn't do enough miracles in them? I mean, Mohammed not performing miracles is being used against him, so maybe they tossed out the only partly inaccurate texts in favor of fully edited ones.

But they are considered canonical, hence why the epistles I mentioned are in the Bible. Maybe you meant to say the Gnostic documents? I've read that they weren't accepted because they didn't focus on Jesus' "humanity" enough.

[Darkstar]

But they are considered canonical, hence why the epistles I mentioned are in the Bible. Maybe you meant to say the Gnostic documents? I've read that they weren't accepted because they didn't focus on Jesus' "humanity" enough.

So, as usual, christians cherry pick the good bits from the bible and pretend the rest doesn't exist. Only in this case they literally denied that it was part of the bible, though I doubt it had much to do with whether the documents were accurate or not; in fact they may have been more accurate.

[Mystic]

To add to the Islamic perspective, it also has an anecdotal experience to confirm the truth, that God will shown the signs of the soul and "horizons" (translated as universe, but really can be spiritual in meaning):

سَنُرِيهِمْ آيَاتِنَا فِي الْآفَاقِ وَفِي أَنْفُسِهِمْ حَتَّىٰ يَتَبَيَّنَ لَهُمْ أَنَّهُ الْحَقُّ ۗ أَوَلَمْ يَكْفِ بِرَبِّكَ أَنَّهُ عَلَىٰ كُلِّ شَيْءٍ شَهِيدٌ {53}
[Shakir 41:53] We will soon show them Our signs in the Universe and in their own souls, until it will become quite clear to them that it is the truth. Is it not sufficient as regards your Lord that He is a witness over all things?

It also has another argument, that if there are no contradictions in Quran, then it's from God.

So it has three ways to know.

1) Quran being unique implying it's divine.
2) No contradictions implies it's divine.
3) A witnessing of the signs of the self and horizons will make one know Islam is the truth (spiritual witnessing).

As for there being no contradictions implying it's divine, I think it's very weak, but perhaps in it's defence, since people of those times seem to be not perfect in logic, it seems almost bound for them to contradict each other. Perhaps it's not that humanity can never write a book without contradictions but to write such a complicated book, from people of that time, would certainly result in a contradiction.

However, the Quran to me at least seems to have many contradictions.

The reality I feel, is people don't have faith due to any of this, but rather have faith in these arguments or the anecdotal experience, due to faith in the religion that is there for other various factors.

[FallentoReason]

But they are considered canonical, hence why the epistles I mentioned are in the Bible. Maybe you meant to say the Gnostic documents? I've read that they weren't accepted because they didn't focus on Jesus' "humanity" enough.

So, as usual, christians cherry pick the good bits from the bible and pretend the rest doesn't exist. Only in this case they literally denied that it was part of the bible, though I doubt it had much to do with whether the documents were accurate or not; in fact they may have been more accurate.

Well, at the time of all these documents being penned there was no "Bible" as such because the documents weren't canonized yet and therefore there was no "NT" yet. It's simply another case of humans using their own judgement to portray this wishful thinking that we are infact special and that some Jew really died for us. It's no different to Christians today using their own moral compass whenever they realise the OT is barbaric and they therefore need to tone it down through mental backflips. In a nutshell, the moral of the story is that there is no "Holy Spirit" guiding any of them.

[John V]

The earliest Christian documents have Jesus performing miracles.

The earliest Christian documents were the Pauline and pseudo-Pauline epistles. They don't mention a single miracle Jesus did except for the resurrection.

So, the earliest documents reference the resurrection. They also show Paul performing miracles himself. The earliest Muslim documents show no miracles performed by Muhammed.

[FallentoReason]

The earliest Christian documents were the Pauline and pseudo-Pauline epistles. They don't mention a single miracle Jesus did except for the resurrection.

So, the earliest documents reference the resurrection. They also show Paul performing miracles himself. The earliest Muslim documents show no miracles performed by Muhammed.

Paul speaks of a spiritual being. That's no better than Attis dying and being resurrected.

[John V]

Paul speaks of a spiritual being. That's no better than Attis dying and being resurrected.

No, Paul speaks of Jesus as a real flesh and blood man. One example:

Galatians 4
4 But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law,

[FallentoReason]

Paul speaks of a spiritual being. That's no better than Attis dying and being resurrected.

No, Paul speaks of Jesus as a real flesh and blood man. One example:

Galatians 4
4 But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law,

Spot on. And what does that sound like? The OT to be exact i.e. a revelation he has recieved through the prophets (OT) and Spirit.

Why does he fail to name the woman? It doesn't align with any "Gospel story" the way he goes about describing Jesus' supposed life.

[John V]

No, Paul speaks of Jesus as a real flesh and blood man. One example:

Galatians 4
4 But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law,

Spot on. And what does that sound like?

It sounds like he's speaking of a real flesh and blood man.