Why Christianity?

[Randy Carson]

1. This is an old and not uncommon attack on Christianity. Consequently, a lot of scholarship and research has been put into evaluating the validity of the "copy-cat" accusation. The bottom line is that Christians have nothing to fear from those who claim that the disciples simply borrowed ideas from gods that existed prior to Jesus' day. The fact is that while there are a few parallels here and there, there is no ancient god who provided the prototype for Jesus. In point of fact, the claims of dying and rising gods actually appeared in these other religions AFTER Jesus. Gods who died and rose with the seasons or who continued to live on but in another world, etc. are NOT the same as Jesus who died and physically rose to life again ONCE in this world before ascending to heaven.

2. Now, I am well aware of the fact that you may have read books and/or Internet postings that claim the opposite of this, but as Dr. Yamauchi (a legitimate scholar in this area of specialization) has noted, none of these authors have real academic credentials. There are plenty of good books refuting this nonsense which you can read if you are so inclined.



3. Agreed. That's why I proposed that you start with the largest and work your way down the list till you get to something that makes sense to you.

4. Okay, thanks. What has the FSM actually revealed about itself? I ask because apart from any revelation, the FSM would be a deistic god and not a theistic one because if you don't know that it has interacted with creation, you have to conclude that the silence is intentionally deistic.
It also seems reasonable that if we accept that the FSM exists, then it must have certain characteristics that any religion would ascribe to its god(s), and these would form the basis of some theological doctrines however limited they might be.

5. Believe me, there's not going to be enough substantive material in this forum to keep you occupied. If you're an adult who still laughs at fart jokes, however, you may fit right in.

1. I was not claiming that anyone borrowed anything from anyone. All I was pointing out was that you are wrong when you said no god was ever purported to have resurrected before Jesus. Are you claiming that every single god I mentioned did not supposedly resurrect before Jesus? We can go through each one and see if that is true.

2. I don't need to read anything except the list I posted earlier to know that you are an idiot.

Is this the first time we have interacted? 'Cause it didn't take long for you to go from friendly conversation to personal attack, did it?

3. Since when did my "sense" make things true?

4. He has revealed many things to me. Would you like me to list a few?

Absolutely!

5. I haven't encountered any fart jokes yet, but my eyes are peeled.

For that and worse. Shouldn't take long...

[Cyberman]

So your response to the accusation of having no interest in real interaction on here at all is to prove that point?

Are you suggesting that I should post MORE frequently, Steve?

I'm sure the other members of the forum will be thrilled to hear you've encouraged me...

I'm sure they would also see as little point as I do in that, given the level of interaction you already demonstrate.

And please refrain from winking at me, if you don't mind; I'm not Catholic myself.

[Shuffle]

[quote pid='1025398' dateline='1439942676']
2. I don't need to read anything except the list I posted earlier to know that you are an idiot.

Is this the first time we have interacted? 'Cause it didn't take long for you to go from friendly conversation to personal attack, did it?

4. He has revealed many things to me. Would you like me to list a few?

Absolutely!

5. I haven't encountered any fart jokes yet, but my eyes are peeled.

For that and worse. Shouldn't take long...
[/quote]
2. Can you please answer my points and get past my ad hominem?

4. OK:

• He is the creator.
  
• He loves me.
  
• He brought down his sons and daughter, whom we call meatballs, to bring us pleasure and joy to our tastebuds.
  
• He created christians for our entertainment.
  

5. Now that I have encountered you, I don't think I am going to find anything much worse.

Oops, another ad hominem. Hopefully that won't get in the way of answering my arguments this time instead of dodging them.

[T.J.]

Man, it's been forever since I had to multi-quote a single post. I feel old.

To which post and question are you responding?

The OP. Sorry for the confusion, but typically if I'm not quoting individual posts in a thread you can usually assume I'm responding to the OP.

Hardly. EVERYONE is biased; the question is whether you are aware of your bias or not. The authors of the gospels WERE biased, but then, so are the authors of textbooks about biology or the origin of the universe. What matters, Tori, is whether you can recognize the bias (yours and theirs) and sort the facts from the fiction, so to speak. Professional historians do this all the time, and yet, they have no problem with accepting the gospels are historical documents which provide important information about the life of Jesus of Nazareth.

When I talk evidence from unbiased sources I mean something that can hold up under scrutiny. The longer it holds up and doesn't contradict itself, the more likely that it's true. I mean, there was a time we thought the Earth was flat and the sun revolved around the Earth. Then it was proposed that the Earth was actually round and that was proven to be true beyond personal bias since we can actually see the Earth and how it's shaped. That doesn't stop people from still claiming the world is flat, but they're not taken the least bit seriously because of all the overwhelming evidence against them.

Hmmm...if you were sitting on a jury listening to a murder trial, you might determine in your mind that the evidence presented by the prosecutor had proven the guilt of the accused beyond a reasonable doubt. But would this mean that you knew with absolute certitude that the person on trial had committed the crime? Or would it simply mean that the probability that the defendant was guilty had reached the level of being much more probable than his innocence?

Is our understanding of Christianity any different? Aren't we making a decision about what we believe to be more probable than not?

Except, Christianity isn't anymore probable than all the other religions out there. It's on the same exact footing of probability.

Not really. We put our faith in God based upon what we know about God. There's nothing wrong with gathering the data and making an informed decision to believe and trust God.

Do you hold the same view for people who come to the opposite conclusion? Because I know plenty who lose faith based on what they know about God.

Maybe it's worth taking a second look now that you're older.

I don't know. My dad read the bible seven times and he hasn't been able to make anymore sense out of it and he's been a Christian since the eighties.

[Cyberman]

We put our faith in God based upon what we know about God. There's nothing wrong with gathering the data and making an informed decision to believe and trust God.

What do you know about "God" and how do you know it?

[Silver]

What do you know about "God" and how do you know it?

He knows the concept and that others believe in it. Nothing more. Theists are such simple creatures, thinking they have the answer en-mass when all they have is cluelessness with a particular concept attached to it that goes by the name of god.

[Randy Carson]

Are you suggesting that I should post MORE frequently, Steve?

I'm sure the other members of the forum will be thrilled to hear you've encouraged me...

I'm sure they would also see as little point as I do in that, given the level of interaction you already demonstrate.

And please refrain from winking at me, if you don't mind; I'm not Catholic myself.

If by "interaction" you simply mean trading insults, no.

But I'm always happy to engage in a discussion when someone has something substantive to say.

[Randy Carson]

[quote pid='1025398' dateline='1439942676']
2. I don't need to read anything except the list I posted earlier to know that you are an idiot.

Is this the first time we have interacted? 'Cause it didn't take long for you to go from friendly conversation to personal attack, did it?

4. He has revealed many things to me. Would you like me to list a few?

Absolutely!

5. I haven't encountered any fart jokes yet, but my eyes are peeled.

For that and worse. Shouldn't take long...

2. Can you please answer my points and get past my ad hominem?

4. OK:

• He is the creator.
  
• He loves me.
  
• He brought down his sons and daughter, whom we call meatballs, to bring us pleasure and joy to our tastebuds.
  
• He created christians for our entertainment.
  

5. Now that I have encountered you, I don't think I am going to find anything much worse.

Oops, another ad hominem. Hopefully that won't get in the way of answering my arguments this time instead of dodging them.

Heh...yeah, just link me to them and I'll see what I can do.

[Shuffle]

Heh...yeah, just link me to them and I'll see what I can do.

Post 219.

[Brakeman]

.. the Bible is not one single book...it is 73 books by 40+ authors over a 1,500-year period. And the NT specifically is 27 different books with the four gospels providing independent, multiple attestation from eyewitnesses, ..

So according to you, about a hundred works were written under the claim of godly guidance yet absolutely none of these claims of spirits telling people what to write were investigated and validated by any scrutiny even to the point of signing one's name at the bottom? Not one of these hundred or so texts had a verifiable chain of custody. Somehow anonymous author' stories in unauthenticated texts claimed to be written under completely unverifiable godly interference becomes evidence of a creator because sometimes the texts agree and because sometimes they don't agree, depending upon the theists argumentative needs at the time. The fact that the textual inclusions have been screened and edited many times by competing churches under competing ideologies has completely been dodged.

100  conversations with god lasting hours long were not observed by thousands of people but were created in secret requiring sheep to "believe" rather than "observe".

No logical rhyme or reason is given for the choices of who was picked to receive the actual spoken words of god in a time before scientific evidence was understood. Curiously, all of these book downloads from god occured long before science could record separable from the propagandic lies from WOO salesmen. Today all christians have to depend on telepathic "warm feelings" from god, they are no longer privy to actual information from their god. God has become a dumb mute.