Hi, I'm a Christian. Help Me Disprove My Religion!

[TheRocketSurgeon]

[Whateverist]

Good luck to you, OP. There must be at least 50 ways to leave your religion. [Just substitute "religion" for "lover".]


https://youtu.be/298nld4Yfds

[robvalue]

Wishful: Good to see you back! I must say I'm really impressed with your quest to get to the truth, and how you've listened to everyone.

I have one more thought: if the bible is accurate, God is a hideous immoral monster. He can't be trusted, he lies in his own book. I see no reason to worship such a foul being, if he is anything like as written. I could highlight all the reasons I feel this way, if it would help. This is my moral argument about not wanting anything to do with Christianity, regardless of its truth. As it happens, I am as certain as it's sensibly possible to be that the bible is a work of fiction. If the bible is not accurate, we know nothing about God and the idea he would demand our worship is ridiculous.

My general mantra is that if God is good, he will respect me living my life as well as I am able. If he is bad, I don't want to worship him and I can't trust him. No being worthy or worship would ever demand it.

[Aractus]

[pocaracas]

Hey, WT. Welcome aboard!

At its base, you do not disprove christianity. You merely watch as the faithful fail time and time again to prove it.

Belief in a tale is no proof of the truthfulness of such tale.
All books in the bible are written by believers... believers in the accounts of others, at best... believers in the made up accounts of themselves, at worst... none were written by actual witnesses of the events... even if some do claim to be.

Thanks for the welcome porcaracas!

Now, I understand that you are in no way obligated to do this, as the burden of proof is on Christians who believe the bible is accurate, not the other way around, but how do you know the books weren't written by the folks that were there (even if they were written a few decades after Christ's death)? Is it that we don't have any evidence that says they did, or that we have evidence that says they didn't? Again, no need to answer this questions if you don't want to.

From what I gather (and this comes mainly from reading Ehrman and the wiki), none of the books is written in the first person and none has an accompanying "written by so-so".
The attribution comes after the fact.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Matthew:

Most scholars believe the Gospel of Matthew was composed between 80 and 90 CE, with a range of possibility between 70 to 110 CE.[2] A pre-70 date remains a minority view.[3] The anonymous author was probably a male Jew, standing on the margin between traditional and non-traditional Jewish values, and familiar with technical legal aspects of scripture being debated in his time.
[...]
The Gospel of Matthew is anonymous: the author is not named within the text, and the superscription "according to Matthew" was added some time in the second century.[14][15] The tradition that the author was the disciple Matthew begins with the early Christian bishop Papias of Hierapolis[...]
The consensus is that Papias does not describe the Gospel of Matthew as we know it, and it is generally accepted that Matthew was written in Greek, not Aramaic or Hebrew.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Mark:

The Gospel of Mark is anonymous.[5] A persistent tradition which begins in the early 2nd century with bishop Papias (c.AD 125) ascribes it to Mark the Evangelist, a companion and interpreter of the apostle Peter, but most modern scholars do not accept Papias' claim.[6] The book was probably written c.AD 66–70, during Nero's persecution of the Christians in Rome or the Jewish revolt, as suggested by internal references to war in Judea and to persecution.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Luke

Luke-Acts does not name an author.[5] According to Church tradition this was the Luke the Evangelist, the companion of Paul,[6] but the majority of scholars reject this identification due to the many contradictions between Acts and the authentic Pauline letters.[7] The most probable date for its composition is around 80-100 CE, and there is evidence that it was still being substantially revised well into the 2nd century,[8] the author taking for his sources the gospel of Mark, the sayings collection called the Q source, and a collection of material called the L (for Luke) source.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_John:

John identifies its author as "the disciple whom Jesus loved." Although the text does not name this disciple, by the beginning of the 2nd century, a tradition had begun to form which identified him with John the Apostle, one of the Twelve (Jesus' innermost circle). Although some notable New Testament scholars affirm traditional Johannine scholarship,[8][9] the majority do not believe that John or one of the Apostles wrote it,[10][11][12][13][14][15] and trace it instead to a "Johannine community" which traced its traditions to John; the gospel itself shows signs of having been composed in three "layers", reaching its final form about 90–100 AD.[16][17] According to Victorinus[18] and Irenaeus,[19] the Bishops of Asia Minor requested John, in his old age, to write a gospel in response to Cerinthus, the Ebionites and other Jewish Christian groups which they deemed heretical.[20][not in citation given] This understanding remained in place until the end of the 18th century.

I'm no scholar, but when the majority of scholars consistently reject the classical author attribution... then they may have a point.

Now, Paul... Paul was not an eyewitness. At best, he witnessed his own conversion... but that means squat in terms of the actual divine Jesus. However, Paul did shape much of what would become the catholic church and they are the compilers of the bible.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authorship...e_epistles:

There is wide consensus, in modern New Testament scholarship, on a core group of authentic Pauline epistles whose authorship is rarely contested: Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon. Several additional letters bearing Paul's name lack academic consensus: Ephesians, Colossians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 & 2 Timothy, and Titus. Scholarly opinion is sharply divided on whether the former two epistles are the letters of Paul; however, the latter four - 2 Thessalonians, as well as the three known as the "Pastoral Epistles" - have been labeled pseudepigraphical works by most critical scholars.

Finally
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Revelation

The author names himself in the text as "John", but his precise identity remains a point of academic debate. Second century Christian writers such as Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Melito the bishop of Sardis, and Clement of Alexandria and the author of the Muratorian fragment identify John the Apostle as the "John" of Revelation.[1] Modern scholarship generally takes a different view,[2] and many consider that nothing can be known about the author except that he was a Christian prophet.[3] Some modern scholars characterise Revelation's author as a putative figure which they call "John of Patmos". The bulk of traditional sources date the book to the reign of the emperor Domitian (AD 81-96), and the evidence tends to confirm this.

Out of the 27 books of the NT, only 7 can be attributed to the alleged author... and this author was not present at the time of Jesus.

PS: those wiki articles have their own sources and you are more than welcome to delve into them, if you want more accurate reasons why scholars reject the classical authorship of the texts.

[Aractus]

Out of the 27 books of the NT, only 7 can be attributed to the alleged author... and this author was not present at the time of Jesus.

There is no doubt that Paul wrote Galatians, 1-2 Corinthians, Romans, Ephesians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon. He isn't an "alleged author" he is "the" author of those works without doubt.

James and Judas were brothers of Jesus and therefore they were present at the time. They were not however followers of Jesus while he was alive.

From what I gather (and this comes mainly from reading Ehrman and the wiki) none of the books is written in the first person

Incorrect. Acts 13-28 is in the first-person. All the epistles - Paul's, the pseudo-pauline ones, Hebrews, James, Jude, 1,2,3, John, and 1,2 Peter are all written in the first-person.

and none has an accompanying "written by so-so".

Incorrect, Paul claims authorship for all of his epistles. James, Jude, and Peter claim authorship for their epistles (note some are disputed). "John" claims authorship of Revelation.

The wikipedia articles you quoted contain numerous errors:

"The neutrality of this article is disputed. Relevant discussion may be found on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved."

"Most scholars believe the Gospel of Matthew was composed between 80 and 90 CE, with a range of possibility between 70 to 110 CE."

That sentence is nonsensical.

Have a look at the cited bibliographies - well over half of the material is out of date, and much of it isn't of any academic value.

[The Grand Nudger]

There is no doubt that Paul wrote Galatians, 1-2 Corinthians, Romans, Ephesians, Thessalonians 1, and Philemon. He isn't an "alleged author" he is "the" author of those works without doubt.

Nothing tells us that the author Paul and the character Paul are one in the same.  

Incorrect. Acts 13-28 is in the first-person. All the epistles - Paul's, the pseudo-pauline ones, Hebrews, James, Jude, 1,2,3, John, and 1,2 Peter are all written in the first-person.

-but this hardly matters..you'll find 1st person narratives in Dracula as well.  Nestled within that quoted comment is every reason you need to understand why the narrative POV is irrelevant, both "Paul" and Psuedo-pauline epistles are written in the first person.........clearly this POV is a device that various authors used to lend weight to the narrative.   

Incorrect, Paul claims authorship for all of his epistles. James, Jude, and Peter claim authorship for their epistles (note some are disputed). "John" claims authorship of Revelation.

-and as above, Jonathan Harker (as well as many other characters) claims authorship of some portion of Dracula.  Other portions are claimed -within the narrative- to be the diaries of the characters in question.

You are commenting on the literary convention of Paul, Epistles are the work of the literary convention of Paul...and this is what is rarely disputed.  Tell me, is "Paul" in Tacitus, Pliny or Josephus?  Could we get some contemporaneous rabbinical tracts denouncing this wayward star pupil?  If I wrote -myself- into a book...would you refer to the character Rhythm and the author Rhythm interchangeably?  What if I claimed it to be autobiographical, and it mostly was...but I smoothed over a few details here and there?  Say, in my book I won every argument, convinced everyone set before me mass-production style, and chit-chatted with kings, queens and potentates from the corners of my known world?  If we're talking about narratives, considerations of narrative style, form, and purpose ought to have a -bit- more weight.  "Paul", whomever he was...writes to convince, not record.  "Paul", as an author..whomever he was, -if- he was at all, and the character of Paul as expressed in the narratives are different animals entirely.  Even the character of Paul is a different beast from one narrative to the next.  This doesn't seem to be a problem for the narrative, at least as far as the compilers and current followers are concerned...they include all of the different Pauls.  It's only a problem for a historical Paul, set aside the literary convention of Paul.  These narratives are informative with regards to the convention, but not with regards to historicity....because they are narratives - not historical documents.  The subject here is narrative, not history.

[Aractus]

Nothing tells us that the author Paul and the character Paul are one in the same. 

Yes it does - modern scholarship tells you that. Just like Luke-Acts is written by the one author.

-but this hardly matters..you'll find 1st person narratives in Dracula as well.  Nestled within that quoted comment is every reason you need to understand why the narrative POV is irrelevant, both "Paul" and Psuedo-pauline epistles are written in the first person.........clearly this POV is a device that various authors used to lend weight to the narrative.

Rhythm you have a clear lack of textual criticism knowledge. The POV is not a "device" for anything, it's what scholars determine when asking whether a narrative is contemporary or historic and has more to do with whether it's written in the first-person-narrative or the third-person-narrative.

Tell me, is "Paul" in Tacitus, Pliny or Josephus?

Why would they write about Paul? The only undisputed part of Josephus where he mentions Jesus is where he uses him to clarrify which James he's talking about, and he has almost nothing to say about James. He has nothing to say about Peter or Barnabas either Rhythm, so why would he mention Paul when he only mentions one of the early Christian leaders?

Even the character of Paul is a different beast from one narrative to the next.

So what? I already said that. Historians have little idea about the character of Shakespeare you know, but that doesn't mean he didn't write plays. Historians have different opinions on how to characterise Hitler's character, but they don't doubt the actions that he took or the political ideology that he belonged to.

And by the way you don't even know what you're talking about, because we do get a consistent character from his writings. But he isn't writing about himself.

[pocaracas]

Out of the 27 books of the NT, only 7 can be attributed to the alleged author... and this author was not present at the time of Jesus.

There is no doubt that Paul wrote Galatians, 1-2 Corinthians, Romans, Ephesians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon. He isn't an "alleged author" he is "the" author of those works without doubt.

James and Judas were brothers of Jesus and therefore they were present at the time. They were not however followers of Jesus while he was alive.

All authors are "alleged authors". Of all, only 7 are considered to have actually been written by the "alleged authors".

From what I gather (and this comes mainly from reading Ehrman and the wiki) none of the books is written in the first person

Incorrect. Acts 13-28 is in the first-person. All the epistles - Paul's, the pseudo-pauline ones, Hebrews, James, Jude, 1,2,3, John, and 1,2 Peter are all written in the first-person.

and none has an accompanying "written by so-so".

Incorrect, Paul claims authorship for all of his epistles. James, Jude, and Peter claim authorship for their epistles (note some are disputed). "John" claims authorship of Revelation.

You're right... I exaggerated on some things I wrote...
It's what happens when I write from whatever is in my mind, instead of looking things through beforehand.

The wikipedia articles you quoted contain numerous errors:

"The neutrality of this article is disputed. Relevant discussion may be found on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved."

"Most scholars believe the Gospel of Matthew was composed between 80 and 90 CE, with a range of possibility between 70 to 110 CE."

That sentence is nonsensical.

Have a look at the cited bibliographies - well over half of the material is out of date, and much of it isn't of any academic value.

Are you saying that the "most scholars" they mention have changed their minds, since?
I was drawing attention to that detail... and the sentence you mention seems to me like a value with some error bars on top. I agree that it's not a normal way of putting things, but... oh well, it's the wiki... a starting point for those who want to go further.

[TheRocketSurgeon]

The wikipedia articles you quoted contain numerous errors:

"The neutrality of this article is disputed. Relevant discussion may be found on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved."

I'm not saying I disagree with you, Aractus, but pretty much every article on Christianity on Wiki is "disputed", because every Christian that sees anything that doesn't agree with their dogma will report it as disputed.