Chockstone Forum

      Sponsored By
      ROCK
   HARDWARE

Chockstone Photography

Australian Landscape Prints

Chockstone Forum - General Discussion

General Climbing Discussion

Topic Date User

OT: Rebelious reopening of locked topic 28-Aug-2010 At 12:10:48 AM dave h.

Message

Is there any reason a 7 page response I wrote wouldn't be accepted by the Forum...?

Edit: apparently not...

pensionerpower,

thanks for your contributions to this thread. I hope you keep challenging homophobia wherever you find it. For my part I apologise for the way some groups within the 'Christian' church place a disproportionate emphasis on homosexuality and act in other ways which encourage people to hate gays (I'm sure we can all think of plenty of examples). The behaviour of a large proportion of Christians in this regard is frequently not Christ-like. I hope it's apparent from my contributions to these threads that, while I may not be able to morally condone homosexuality, I don't harbour any ill-will or animosity to people who are gay. And if that hasn't been apparent then I apologise for that too.

Also I'd like it if you kept contributing - my impression is that Neil is uncomfortable because he thinks religion is private and shouldn't be the subject of public discussion. Sorry if my perception is off-piste there neil.

Wendy -

my point was not that the existence of God can be assumed, but that it's a separate question. And quite frankly one that deserves more attention than I can give it here, with Simey throwing half-baked accusations around.

On the question of the bible being rewritten - with respect I think you're being a little disingenuous. It's not as though we have source documents in Koine Greek, which were then translated into Bulgarian, then German, then French, and then from those French documents we derive an English translation. For instance, the English Standard Version, a recent and well regarded translation, is based on the Masoretic text and the Novum Testamentum Graece - I particularly recommend the text at the heading "Accuracy of the New Testament" on the subject of consistency of documentation. Consistency of documentation is important because it is evidence that individuals reproducing manuscripts have not been making their own changes. The point I'm trying to make is that, as I understand it, modern translations are based on collations of the source documents (IE fragment A, B, C, D, E all overlap and, together are the complete gospel of John, for instance).

Yes, the author did focus on the two pools a fair bit. No, that does not prove that everything documented in the Gospels is accurate. The reason I quoted that article was to respond directly to the Good Dr's link.

The guy on the Good Dr's page said:

"Devastating to historians, there occurs not a single contemporary writing that mentions Jesus. All documents about Jesus came well after the life of the alleged Jesus from either: unknown authors, people who had never met an earthly Jesus, or from fraudulent, mythical or allegorical writings. Although one can argue that many of these writings come from fraud or interpolations, I will use the information and dates to show that even if these sources did not come from interpolations, they could still not serve as reliable evidence for a historical Jesus, simply because all sources about Jesus derive from hearsay accounts."

The author on my page notes, in response to similar remarks made by one Chris Gaffney:

"The statement is misleading on a number of levels. By ‘contemporary references’ Gaffney means documents written during Jesus’ public ministry (AD 28-30). The assumption here is that only evidence written on the spot should count as real evidence. This would pretty much debunk the entire historiographical enterprise in one fell swoop. If contemporaneous record were the test of historicity, we would have to dismiss the existence of most of the people of the ancient world, including most kings, senators and generals, whom we generally only know about through accounts written after the fact."

That was the point I wished to make. I think it's inconsistent for people who question the existence of Jesus to accept the rest of ancient history at face value. If you want to deny the historicity of Jesus, then at least be consistent and get rid of any other historical figure who is attested to by less evidence. At least One Day Hero is consistent. Yes, there's only so much that can be inferred from those two bath-houses. That said that article is not intended to be a comprehensive review of corroborating archaeological evidence.

TonyB -

glad to hear you've had a good 5 years, I hope the next 50 get better :)

Totally agree with your comments about nails through wrists not palms, and legs being broken.

Have to take issue with you about Jesus not dying - first off, the guys who stabbed him were Roman soldiers. Pretty sure everyone agrees Roman Legionnaires knew how to stab a guy - and let's face it, if you're a Roman footsoldier tasked with executing people, and you don't do your job, you're probably going to get in trouble for it. And then let's not forget that he's been flogged (Matt 27:26) and beaten (Matt 27:30) by the Romans several times prior to this. Bearing in mind what we know about Roman floggings (scourges with multiple tails and metal fragments), Jesus is already hurting quite a bit by the time he's on the cross. Then there's the reference in John's gospel to blood and water flowing out of Jesus' body once he's stabbed, which is at least suggestive of pericardial effusion. Overall I have little difficulty in believing that Jesus was dead as a doornail when He was taken off the cross.

On the OT. I think you're overstating what Genesis 6 says about the Nephilim. Gen 6:2 says "the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and married any of them they chose." Gen 6:4 says "The Nephilim were on the earth in those days - and also afterward - when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown."

Nowhere does it say they're 450 feet tall (although Noah's ark is mentioned as being 450 feet long, if that's a possible source of confusion...). Furthermore the reason for the flood is given in Genesis 6:5 - "The Lord saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of his heart was only evil all the time."

Every inclination only evil all the time - a pretty dire state of affairs.

The Good Dr -
your person is an amateur. Apologies for calling a spade a spade. Despite looking on the wider web, and on the NoBeliefs website, I haven't been able to find any information about Mr Walker and whether or not he has a qualification relevant to the discussion. This is not to suggest that only those with degrees in the field can have relevant insights, but merely that he advances a radical thesis, which if accepted would result in us losing a lot of ancient history.

My page was written by someone with a PhD in ancient history and who is affiliated with Macquarie University's department of ancient history. Therefore I think he is more qualified to comment on what is an appropriate methodology for historical study.

Glancing over what wikipedia says about the evidence for Bhudda, IE that it was not written down until 300-400 years after his death, I think I'm justified in concluding that the evidence for Jesus is better, given that the gospels were written within a century of his death (at the latest).

Why is there no evidence of Jesus from after his birth until he was 30? Well for a start you're wrong, because there's a vignette in Luke 2 which details a family trip to Jerusalem for the passover. Well, let's consider this:
- In the ancient world, your writing materials are