Saturday, 23 October 2010
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Not my first rodeo, kids
Earlier I posted an excerpt from my upcoming Skepticon talk, Dear Christian. In came the stalwart defenders of Jesus exclaiming that not all Christians act that way and wondering how I could lump them all together. One commenter snidely mocked my "atheist-atheist" conversation.
Here's the thing: I've spent the last five years speaking with Christians and pretty much know the game backwards and forwards by now. Behold, the following part of the talk (which was written last week):
At this point, many more moderate believers will respond that not all Christians believe the way of those who would refuse medical care to the poor or deny loving couples visitation rights in the name of Jesus. I will counter that I don’t believe it is enough to simply disagree with them. The villains of faith are trying to act in accordance with god’s will, as are you. You just believe god wishes something different. Sadly, your reasons for thinking you are privy to the will of a creator are just as bad as theirs, and I cannot criticize unreason on the one hand while giving it a free pass on the other just because it happens to line up with reasonable conclusions. As Sam Harris concisely put it; we do not need bad reasons to be good, and I will not disrespect you enough to treat you like you do.
It's like that's what Christians almost always say at that point. Weird.
A more apt description would be that if some kid is using a magic 8 ball to answer a question on a test and he gets it right, while another kid uses it to decide to steal another kid's lunch money. We need not act like the bully is misusing the magic 8 ball, nor do we need it to achieve correct answers on tests. Even though it worked in one case, both of their reasons suck. We should do away with the 8 ball and teach kids to study.
The same is true of religion. Sometimes religion gets people to do good things for lousy reasons. Other times it gets people to do positively horrific things for those same bad reasons. But we do not need bad reasons to be good, and you can't expect me to give magical thinking a free pass just because sometimes it lands in a sensible spot - the metaphysical debris that comes following it is too much of a pain in the ass on a societal level.
So despite the insistence by some that I cannot lump all Christians together I can only respond that yes, I can. All of you believe in some dude rising from the dead and walking on water for no good reason. Every single one of you has nothing but shitty reasons for believing in god. This is something you all have in common that needs to change if you care at all about your responsibility to be informed.
A couple more people said that I had ignored the powerful arguments of faith. How often have I heard that stark, depleted line? As usual, it was not followed by telling me what any of these knock-down evidences for god was. I invited one commenter, puella_sapiens216, to tell me just what those arguments are. I'll even go one step further. I promise to post her arguments as a blog post (with my commentary of course, but if the arguments are so good what will that matter?) so the whole xanga world can see them. I'm sure they'll be amazing.
Like I said, I have spent the last five years talking with religious people on a daily basis. Here are the facts of the matter:
1. You all have the same array of arguments you've read from the same authors. You have read no critical literature of them. (I have done both)
2. Most of you haven't read the bible. (I have)
3. Virtually none of you have given any other religion the same fair shake you demand we give the bible. (I have)
4. Polling has confirmed that atheists, on the whole, know more about your faith than you do.
5. You all believe on faith, and always turn to it like it's something to be proud of when all your other arguments have been crushed.
6. When pressed, you can think of nothing that could change your mind.
I could keep going, but that's enough to satisfy me. Think I'm wrong? Throw out some of these amazing reasons.
And lastly, as a preview to my upcoming tussle with puella_sapiens, in answer to her outraged question, "So, I guess all of us Christians are idiotic for having faith and belief that isn't "scientifically proven"?" I can only answer that while not all Christians are idiots, belief in the basic miracle claims/tenets of Christianity is idiotic - not because they lack scientific proof for their beliefs, but because their reasons are lacking no matter what sphere they are pulled from. The very definition of idiotic is believing silly things and/or lacking the mental acuity to liberate yourself from idiotic beliefs. Don't like it? Fine. Hit me with a good reason to believe (and pray to whatever god you like that it's not an idiotic reason, because I will use it to take your words and feed them to you).
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Comments (34)
"So, I guess all of us Christians are
idiotic for having faith and belief that isn't "scientifically
proven"?" I can only answer that yes, all Christians are idiotic.
It's so nice to see you admit that you believe President Obama is an idiot.
You should consider writing a book at some point. Your write polemics really well. "Blog Post For a Christian Nation"
You ever feel like a broken record?
something happened at the time of Christ's death that requires study. The actions of the apostles after Christ death is a fairly good reason to consider the possibility of a resurrection. Silence of any claims from that time period that Jesus never existed OR that his body is clearly displayed in a grave would be another evidence from silence (not good evidence but atheists almost ALWAYS use it when talking about the historical records). Churches springing up as soon as 40 a.d. under the possibility of persecution or death for converting is enough to make us wonder why that was occurring. The martyrdom of the apostles without the record of any recanting speaks to the veracity of their claims. THEY were not dying for faith.. they were dying either for known fact or for a known lie. That is different than later martyrs. That Jesus Christ was crucified on a cross seems historically verifiable. That a prophet portrays this type of death for the coming savior several hundred years prior to this is in the least worth looking into it. I always say we're really lucky Jesus didn't die by being hit with a donkey cart.. that woulda threw things off a bit. That Paul at least believed he saw Christ seems true. That the disciples believed they saw Christ seems historically more probable than not. That the problem of sin and need for a savior fits well with human experience is at least a bit of evidence. That Christianity is the only religion that says people are bad by nature and not good is at least somewhat different (different doesn't mean true, but it sets it apart). I've seen lives literally change through the gospel of Jesus Christ. I've also seen lives wrecked by the religion of Christianity. The Bible continually speaks to my life in amazingly accurate ways. The Bible even speaks to this conversation (1 Cor 1:18-25). I understand the message of the cross is foolishness to you. I understand it's what people seeking to justify themselves before God stumble over. I get that. So why do I spend time writing this stuff out? Because the gospel of Jesus Christ, that he became for us what we deserve so that in Him we might receive his righteousness, not based upon anything we do ourselves but entirely upon the cross, is a message that has changed the hearts of many. Which is some bit of evidence. My friend Annalise is evidence. My friend Jacob is evidence. My friend Josh is evidence. My friends Jordan, Nick, Matt, Sarah, and Alex are all evidence. These weren't kids in church that got Christianized.. these are names of literally life-changing experiences I've seen the past year and a half as a result of the gospel, most of them happened at Missouri State. They didn't just change habits.. their lives changed. The same might be true for Muslims.. but I honestly don't know any Muslims that had a life-changing (not just habit changing or religion changing) experience. Granted I don't know a whole whole lot of Muslims, but I try to get to know as many as I can.
So those are some reasons I have for my belief in Christ. Are they satisfying to you? I'm almost certain they aren't. I didn't discuss the state of humanity or the observable phenomenon we see around the world. I know you have explanation for these, but when taking in all the evidence before me, I think Christ makes the most sense of the world as I see it. Not ONLY that, but Christ provides the answer to my internal struggling as well. The perfect answer, actually. So, throw that on-top of these other observations and I'm beginning to explain to you some of the reasons for my faith.
Did these reasons come before or after my belief in Christ? Mostly after, but it's not like faith is a yes or no. I suppose it is in one sense, but even as a yes it can be stronger or weaker. And as I see more evidence my faith inevitably grows. When my faith is challenged it may take a step back, but it proves to take two more steps forward when I take the time to view the evidence of any specific problem.
Maybe this would be a better exercise:
Provide for me an evidence that shows God isn't real and we can allow that to challenge my faith in God. What evidence can you provide for me to look at that would make me doubt God is real? Even more specifically.. what evidence do you use that the resurrection didn't happen? If you simply say we've never seen resurrection happen then that's really no historical evidence at all. This is most definitely a unique occurrence in history if it happened. what evidence would we expect to see if Christ didn't raise from the dead and can you show this to be more historically plausible with evidence. I am interested in what you can show me that would make me re-evaluate my belief of what happened at that time. I would actually embrace such a challenge! seriously.
Ahh, atheist call to arms time ... exciting ... I'm looking forward to the news of what comes of this.
@ScottAdmire - You can't be serious. Prove to me that the invisible space yeti that follows me around all day and keeps bad mojo away isn't real. Do it.
You can't pretend a good argument for somethings existence is a lack of definitive proof of non-existence, it is the ultimate argument from ignorance. The correct answer is one most atheists already proclaim - we don't know. We can however disprove certain specific god claims and other religious claims that have a degree of falsifiability (like the efficacy of prayer, the issues of the omnis, and the incoherency of definition). You should know this already.
It is not our responsibility to convince you that the resurrection didn't happen, though medical science and contemporary history of that period are quite telling enough. Our responsibility is to evaluate your claims and establish whether or not to accept them. Until Christianity can show any evidence of the resurrection it is wise to be quite skeptical.
Dear ScottAdmire,
I'm not trying to be rude, but you really need to take an intro to psychology course.Releasing blame from a person is how you treat drug abusers, people who
need counseling, and some mentally ill patients. It's the cure all for
emotional problems, coming to the conclusion that everything isn't your
fault and you can stop wallowing in self pity and put your life back
together. When told that an all powerful man in the sky controls everything, that a bad man in the ground makes you do bad things, that everything can be forgiven, it takes a lot of guilt from a person. It's no longer their fault they use drugs. It's no longer their fault that they steal. It's no longer their fault that they do stupid things. Now, it's the man in the ground's fault.
I would never try to convince you to be an atheist. It's hard. People fear what you have to say, that you will confirm their doubts. Atheists no longer have that comfort of being able to blame someone else for their mistakes, or to be able to say a prayer and think that this action will settle everything. We don't have any book telling us that we are superior to other people, that if we do good things we are rewarded in the end. We actually choose to do good things for the sake of being a good person, not for the reward. And, of course, the big one, we have to be okay with not knowing something right this instant. We have no choice. The answer "God did it." is not good enough for us. Hundreds of years ago we didn't know why the we got sick. Because there was no answer from science, the answer was that it proved God's existence. Now, we have a reason.
Look at it like this. Atheists are like the children who absolutely loved the idea of Santa. He was the epitome of hope. He could give you what you asked for if you were a good kid, and didn't do bad things. In our childish innocence, we wanted to believe so much. But then, we started thinking about how he could fit down the chimney if he was fat. And lets not forget that we don't even have a chimney! And what about the neighbors? They never get nice gifts, but Santa seems to bring their parent alcohol. Why would he do that if he punishes the bad? Why is he no consistent? Eventually, after waiting for Santa by the tree, the truth is revealed. Santa does not exist. And so, when our little brother or sister is so excited about Santa, should we tell them? Save them the shame of believing something that is false? Or should be allow them the comfort; allow them to believe in something we cannot? How nice it must be, to be that younger child, and still have the ability to accept things without question, without evidence, and without reason.
-Sami
@PhiRhoGirl - Thanks for your reply Sami. It's not so easy being a true believer in this day and age either. I think the real easy place to be is someone who claims to be a Christian but doesn't REALLY believe all that crazy stuff like there's actually a Hell and people will be judged. That's the easy place to settle because it's not confrontational. Both of our views are confrontational on some level. You'd be surprised how much pressure I get from everywhere in my life to not be serious about my faith. I can have faith.. I just can't actually live like its true.
And the message of the gospel is something I need, I'll admit it. I've got no shame in that. I'm not a perfect person and I have guilt over things I've done. This doesn't simply take away responsibility.. the Bible does blame the devil for my actions. It blames ME. I'm responsible. But I can be forgiven. If I didn't have responsibility Jesus wouldn't have to die for MY sin. However, the message of the gospel doesn't end simply with our sins forgiven (no prayer solves everything by the way.. that whole accepting Jesus into your heart prayer business isn't in the Bible.. kinda an internal debate I have with the Christian culture of today).. but faith in Christ results in living Christ-like. No we'll never be perfect, but it's basically a call to strive to be like Christ the rest of your life and ask God to help you to change when you fall short, knowing that you are forgiven and made righteous only through Christ. Our actions don't save us and can't save us, but they prove our faith. That's why James says faith without works is dead, meaning someone that claims to be a Christian but never strives to love people are not really Christian at all (also 1 John 3:17-19).
But this in no way puts me above ANYone else. Ephesians 2:8,9 tells me that I'm saved by a faith that is not of myself so that I may not boast in anything. Even the faith I have is from God, not me. It's not like I'm here with 'good people' and you're there with the 'bad people'. The Bible real clearly says this: We're ALL bad (Romans 3:23). I'm not better than anyone.. in fact I'm not as 'good' of a person as a lot of atheists. I know my sin more than I know anyone elses.. and it shows me how far off from where I should be. Why would I have a superior attitude over others when the message of the gospel is.. I'm not good and I need a savior. In fact.. I must be worse than people who feel they don't need forgiveness, because I feel like I do a lot. So no, I won't boast in me. And no, I KNOW i'm not better than you. The Bible tells even me that's not the case.
The main problem with your santa clause analogy is this.. we can't look in history and see santa clause. He didn't have masses of people sharing the good news of his chimney intrusions during and directly following his life. It's the same reason we don't have serious discussions about the Easter Bunny. It's a made up story for kids. Christianity is not made up. It's based on a lot of things we can know actually happened in history, with a lot of evidence supporting it. Some of which i talked about in my previous post. My faith is child-like in a sense that I'm faced every day with situations I have to trust my heavenly father.. but like you said it must be nice to trust in a perfect Dad. And it is.. And I won't be ashamed of saying so.
Good Day,
I've found too, that many atheists know far more about the Bible than Christians... (and I'm a Christian.) That's a situation we've created and can fault no one but our selves.
I respect your position on not having the faith required to be a Christian. (That's not meant to sound rude.) Maybe, though I believe 100% that all the Bible is true, we as Christians allow our reliance on our faith to give us a comfort which we use as a reason not to study as those of alternate belief systems do. Why else would atheists and other religions know far more about the Bible than most people who subscribe to believing in this Holy Book? Any way, I hope this is a call to all Christians who may read this or any other postings from non-Christian religions, to wake up and learn the Bible back wards and forwards. Know your apologetics. Our willful ignorance is hurting us in our quest to share Jesus with others.
Have a good day all.
@ScottAdmire - Awesome post. Really liked it.
@ScottAdmire - 1) Santa is based on St. Nicolas who does have historical backing.
2) As long as you know WHY you believe, that's okay with me. Like I said, I don't want to turn you into an atheist. (Ask JT, the above comment is EXTREMELY confrontational for me.) I don't want you to not be religious. I have an issue with people who have faith, but don't really ask themselves why. As long you know you are religious because you need to be, I'm perfectly fine. It's those who have not thought about or will not admit why they have faith.
JT and I are fairly good friends. We disagree on atheism, even though we're both die hard atheists, but he's really a fantastic guy. He's probably one of the sweetest men I know, and he works so hard for atheism for the same reason you and your pastor work so hard for Christianity: you feel like you are making the person better. You feel like you are saving someone's soul, and he feels like he is saving someone from a life of torment, superstition, and unneeded pain to themselves and others. Similar to how you spread the word of God because you love your fellow man, he spreads rationality because he cares about the human race.
My student group is bringing in a historian to talk about Jesus this Thursday. And then we're going to Skepticon III next month. Not to convince you to de-convert, but so that you might see where we are coming from.
Out of curiosity, since christian views vary so widely, what do you think about gays? Your argument for Jesus was that people set up churches even though they faced persecution. Do you think I gay person would CHOOSE to be in the same boat if they weren't simply born that way? (Message me, since it's not really related to this post. I'm just curious, not looking for a debate.
)
@musterion99 - Dear musterion99, I think it is very good that you have faith in things without evidence or reasons to support them. I am currently in Nigeria for my great uncle Colonel Dossou's funeral, and I found that he has left me 300 million Naira (2 million dollars), from the sale of his rural lands to the government through a military contract. Unfortunately, dear Christian brother, my wife has become very ill and is not able to travel, if you could assist me in transferring the money into your country, I could make special travel arrangements for her, once the money is converted into your currency. I need only a small sum of two thousand dollars to pay for the probation of the will. I have faith in you as a fellow believer to be honorable in handling these monies on my behalf, and am willing to give you 20% for your assistance in the transfer process, as it will no doubt be somewhat difficult to get the government ministers here to permit such a flow of funds. Thank you good sir for your faith. which I also share.
@Undesired_thought - The invisible space yeti.. ok. Do we have any documents about the space yeti I can check out? Did anyone claim he exists and what was the basis of their claims. Does their story check out? Do historians say there was a time invisible yetis roamed the earth?.. do we have foot-print fossils or anything like this? If this is a legitimate claim there are steps we can take to see if there are any reasons why we should believe it. And there could be a point where we could confidently say.. more than likely he made this up.
OR.. did you just make that up to try to prove a point? I mean.. seriously. I'm not asking you PROVE anything false. I want to know what evidence you have evaluated that lead you to the conclusion that resurrection is more likely false than true so that I can take that evidence, compare it to other evidences of a historical event that has impacted our lives 2000 years later.. and try to get at the bottom at what really went down. I can't simply say resurrection didn't happen because I've not seen it happen. Plenty of people claimed it did and a whole movement got started because of it, so lets evaluate their claims and ask what happened. And when people say there's NO evidence they're showing their bias or ignorance.You ever feel like a broken record?
something happened at the time of Christ's death that requires study. The actions of the apostles after Christ death is a fairly good reason to consider the possibility of a resurrection. Silence of any claims from that time period that Jesus never existed OR that his body is clearly displayed in a grave would be another evidence from silence (not good evidence but atheists almost ALWAYS use it when talking about the historical records). Churches springing up around the 40s under the possibility of persecution or death for converting is enough to make us wonder why that was occurring. This is obviously early enough for people to say Jesus didn't exist, or to point to a body. The martyrdom of the apostles without the record of any recanting speaks to some level the veracity of their claims. THEY were not dying for faith.. they were dying either for known fact or for a known lie. That is different than later martyrs. That Jesus Christ was crucified on a cross seems historically verifiable. That a prophet portrays this type of death for the coming savior several hundred years prior to this is very interesting. I always say we're really lucky Jesus didn't die by being hit with a donkey cart.. that woulda threw things off a bit. That Paul at least believed he saw Christ after death seems true. That the disciples believed they saw Christ seems historically more probable than not... these evidences we can take and evaluate.
Let's do away with the burden of proof and ask this: with an honest view of evidence not based on our presuppositions what do we think most probably happened that started the movement of Christianity? Have you evaluated thoroughly the historicity of what happened to Jesus of Nazareth during and following his life and what is your answer based on our historical evidence? I'm not asking to prove or disprove anything. Simply asking.. what the heck happened? And what evidence lead you to your conclusion. That's a fair question. I can take that evidence and look into and see that maybe you're right. Here's my claim.. the resurrection makes more sense than any other explanation.. and I say that mainly because of how the church got its beginning after the death of Christ. It's unique to any religion.. and its historical. It doesn't stop there, though. There's a number of reasons I believe. I guess you all want me to list all of them every time you ask for reasons for belief in Christ?
There are SEVERAL more reasons to believe in Jesus Christ than an invisible yeti... or santa.. or the easter bunny.. or leprechauns. I just wrote out some reasons. They may not be convincing in and of themselves.. but they're there. Right there. Stop saying there's no reasons. It's not true. Even if I just put one reason forward.. it would be more than we have for your yeti.
@ScottAdmire - your faith sounds both convenient and functional. I'm glad that it works so well for you, but unfortunately for the purposes of this blog, that doesn't add an ounce to the argument for evidence. There is no objective evidence for virtually anything in the bible happening as it is said to have happened. Some of it is vaguely historically accurate, but the miraculous circumstances surrounding those events is purely speculation. The gospels were written between 70 and 300 years after a potentially existent Jesus of Nazareth would have lived, and they were initially transcribed of mostly hearsay from primarily illiterate nomads who thought that thunderstorms meant someone hadn't sacrificed their lamb to the genocidal sky man correctly... They were written long AFTER Jesus would have died, by people who never actually knew him, and translated, edited, and transcribed literally hundreds of times by people with varying political and social agendas. These people clearly wrote the new Testament to coincide with the prophecies that are found in the old Testament. But I digress from the original topic, which is that whether or not this faith serves a purpose for you, it is no more and no less true. A child believing in Santa will be more likely to behave, but this contributes nothing to the validity of his existence. And before you go bashing kids for believing in Santa, at least he has actual real estate to operate from...
JT and others here have already conceded in this very post that faith can serve a positive purpose, as well as negative ones (which makes me doubt if you're actually reading any of their responses, or just using this as a platform for godbotting and spouting off about your personal beliefs for your personal reasons). However, this does nothing to substantiate any of the claims that religions/faith systems make, and whether or not your faith WORKS for you is irrelevant to its historical legitimacy.
OH, and of COURSE your faith system tells you you're better than everyone else - why else would you get to go to an eternal sky party in gullible land, while those "doubting Thomas" types who have actually served human progress will be cast into an infinite shithole to wish they could be up where you are until the galaxy dies? And have you ever thought of what kind of omniscient being would create everything, only to cast the majority of it into eternal torment? I mean, even the non-historical arguments don't stand up to even the most basic criticisms, man...
You want to believe things that make you feel warm and fuzzy, fine. Just don't expect rational people to believe them until you can give us a better reason than "but it feels SO GOOD".
OH, and PLEASE don't turn this into some long, exhausting, redundant argument for historical legitimacy, because the books you will inevitably cite are BULLSHIT when they're looked at through an unbiased lens... Anyone who approaches 'history" with a blatant confirmation bias has already stripped all of their credibility.
and (2) I know JT's a great guy. He's very respectful, a great leader, and has a genuine concern for his friends. I'll get on that message. Good question, by the way.
@fav23poem - gracias
@ScottAdmire
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. I thought it was quite hypocritical to denounce the yeti example that was presented for lack of proof, yet make the claim that you believe resurrection was the most likely cause of the flourish of Christianity.
Firstly, I think RationalPrimate has already pointed out the problem with using a text that is known to have been so heavily edited throughout its history. But I would make another point. The flourish of Christianity may have been unlikely, but it was in no sense extraordinary.
Let me explain with the example of a dealing out a deck of cards (an example often used effectively against creationism I might add). If you looked at the probability of the cards coming out in that order it would appear astronomically low, yet here are the cards. My point being that humans have evolved to favor religion (or at least favor personality traits that lead to religion). If it wasn't Christianity, another (probably pagan) religion or combination of religions would have grown in its place. Then I believe you would be looking back to there origins and using the same argument that something incredible must of happened. I don't believe your "evidence" of the apostles actions, which is highly dubious, acts as anything more as a form of conformation of this pre-existing mindset.
@faithfulathiest, @RationalPrimate - The cards are what they are. Sure we could think of a number of possibilities (we see it in almost every culture with religion springing up), but we gotta play with what we are dealt.. so to speak.
Study some text criticism of the New Testament, its obvious both of you have your facts from extremely biased sources. Even the most liberal of scholars never place the gospels as late as 300. And to say it has been edited through history requires a HUGE explanation of what you mean. What evidence lead you to believe that? Did you know even extremely skeptical scholars say we can have a high-level of confidence that over 90% of the bible as we have it today is the same text of the original manuscript? Most of the possible editions are almost always listed in the Bible! They're not trying to trick you. It's text criticism.
Here's the response to that.. "even if it's the original it doesn't mean what they wrote actually happened." of course not, but i'm specifically addressing the claim that the Bible is not a trustworthy document. All of Paul's letters are dated before 62 c.e. His letters correspond to the teaching of the gospels (though not extremely thoroughly, he definitely references gospel traditions).. so there were already commonly spreading stories about Christ very early on that were maintained through the penning of the gospels. Some place Luke before Paul's death as well because Luke told the story of Paul in Acts. Yet, he ends it before Paul's death in Rome. It seems only logical to tell what happened to Paul in a biography, leading many scholars to believe it was written before he died. Acts and Paul's letters correspond.. we see letters written to churches it said he started in Acts. Some of this stuff is really historically undeniable.. and really soon after Jesus died. Paul probably started his ministry in the 30s.
Just.. really look into it. Don't go to google and search "critique of historical Jesus," read a blog, then think you've found evidence.
I'm working on a masters in Biblical Studies. There's still a ton I don't know.. and atheist scholars who know more than me. but I can tell you're somewhat misinformed. I don't blame you.. it's a lot of work to look into this stuff, but we're gonna all get ourselves in trouble if we act like experts on topics we don't know much about.
So if you say that Christianity is legit because so many disciples followed it so devoutly after Jesus' death, then can't we say the same about any other religion that has a mass amounts of followers?
What makes the ancient Aztec religion less valid then your own? What makes Scientology less valid than Christianity? It has some high profile people that make a lot of money. So obviously they are blessed with a great life because of their belief in Scientology.
In the end, the burden of proof is on those who are making the claims for the extraordinary as said above. Any shred of potential evidence has been scientifically disproved or not proven. Why is the shroud of turin only around 1000 years old? why is there no evidence of Noah's ark? How did two people form all of humanity without serious problems of incest? All of these things directly contradict the Bible. Why can't people understand that the Bible is a compliation of stories that promote some moral. Many of the stories are not even exclusive to the Christian Bible.
@ScottAdmire - "The martyrdom of the apostles without the record of any recanting speaks to the veracity of their claims."
Lots of people are martyred for their beliefs. From all sorts of religions. Remember the Japanese dying for the divine emperor?
David Koresh and his compound, anyone? That people were willing to die for David means he really was the second coming of Jesus? You don't think the apostles could have falsely believed Jesus was divine (or a prophet, depending on which source you go by)?
"Silence of any claims from that time period that Jesus never existed OR that his body is clearly displayed in a grave..."
You don't think it more plausible that most people of the time just didn't care enough about the claims of a minor cult to make a major deal of debunking it?
We know there are major inconsistencies in the biblical story and that it doesn't mesh with other historical accounts of the time period. If no body were found, why weren't the Romans turning the countryside upside down for the escaped traitor? The Romans did have a reputation for persistence...
And there's that story about Jerusalem being overrun by zombies for a while too. Yet no one else at the time seems to have noticed. You'd think someone would.
As far as the prophecies being answered, that doesn't seem to prove much of anything. The stories of the prophecies being answered were written by people who knew of the prophecies in the first place. And the story of Jesus returning to Jerusalem on the donkey even includes in the story that Jesus specifically arranged to fulfill the prophecy that he would have been well aware of. Fulfilling prophecy when you know of the prophecy is not difficult and certainly doesn't require anything supernatural.
@ScottAdmire - I'm too busy to make a real reply (sorry), but replace ISY with any actual religion that isn't your own and I think my actual point is more clear. How do you discern the validity of Christianity while falsifying Islam and other religions. For all you and I are aware there very well could be a very devout group of individuals with historical books claiming the existence of my ISY, I just don't believe a book validates any truth claim (especially exceptional claim). Godsperm, virgin birth, zombification, etc are all extremely suspect claims that must be validated outside of a single book.
I could put 2+2=4 in a book I write and it wouldn't mean everything else in the book was true as well. Even if it could be established that a person fitting parts of Jesus' description existed at the supposed time it would be a far stretch for anyone to conclude his mystical qualities as anything but fictitious.
@ScottAdmire - I'm sorry for getting the exact nature of the history of the gospels wrong, and I was speaking in less precise terms than I wish I could, having only listened to several biblical scholars give lectures on this topic... Although I'm not surprised at the discrepancy of your "facts" within the same community. Additionally, it was a mistake to lead the conversation in the direction of historical validity in the first place, because it distracts from the relevant points that several others have already made quite articulately, and that my discussion of biblical validity has surely only served to blur. I'll give you that perhaps the dates vary - but you must surely concede that NONE of them were written immediately upon the death of the alleged Jesus, or were authored by the "apostles" themselves. THAT was the point - which was understandably dodged - that it is illogical and foolish to organize your life around something that today, in any setting or circumstance, would be dismissed as absolutely illegitimate evidence of anything whatsoever. I think that if you apply the same incredulity that you would in every other part of your life to those parts which you consider "sacred" or "holy", your mind would surely reach a less biased conclusion about the validity of a book that belongs in the FICTION section of every library.
But even IF the member of a cult were to write something down, in person, and everything were to be historically verifiable, that would be no less valid than any of the other miracle/prophetic/divine/psychic/apocalyptic claims being made today, by thousands of people around the world. If validity of the author is the determining factor, then you need to change your faith immediately. After all, Islam has a much more recent and well documented beginning - how do you feel about pork and virgins?
Again, none of this is the actual point - and I apologize for blurring the lines of debate and giving you pause in response to the well articulated questions and counter-arguments raised by several quite rational bloggers here, which I would encourage you to respond to in detail, if you can.
@ScottAdmire - I would love to see the evidence you were talking about. There's no hard evidence of Jesus' birth or of his crucifixion. The New Testament doesn't even have anything on the birth of Jesus and that the building block of your religion. Your very own Holy Scripture doesn't have crucial information to prove his existence to future generations. Jesus is said to be crucified by Pontius Pilate, but no date was given. For a religion that hold sacred the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, there seems to be a glaring hole where vital information about Jesus' birth and death should be.
There are never any dates inside of the Bible. Everything is written down as descriptions of events without giving specific dates of the occurrence. History relies on dates. Without it, no one can accurately lay out events in chronological order or compare its accuracy to contemporary history of its time. Roman records don't show the existence of Jesus. Perhaps it was lost with time. But for the Bible to neglect to keep hard evidence of Jesus it's like they wanted you to believe Jesus existed. Oh wait, that's exactly what they want you to do: believe. You don't need hard evidence of Jesus' birth, life, death and rebirth because you have faith to support a God and a piece of scripture that lacks hard evidence to prove.
You can not definitively say that something does not exist unless you process full observation of the entire universe for all time, and with the possibility of a multiverse, the question becomes, not “Does god exist?” but “Do you know Him?” There are means by which an individual can test and prove God's will.
On your other points . .
1. I read your blog don't I?
2. I have read the Bible and am in it daily.
3. I started not as a Christian, now that I found what is authentic, there is no reason to waste time on the counterfeit.
4. I do not remember being polled so it is likely not accurate as it pertains to me. If you are any indication of an atheist who "knows more" about my faith than I do, maybe you can elaborate on your claim that "the bible is clear that the universe was created for us" and why you think it nullifies Colossians 1:16 where Paul states that "—all things have been created through Him and for Him."
5. All beliefs are faith. Little if any science you like to cite is something that you have witnessed first hand, but only what you have read or been taught.
6. How about this: If I die and I don't end up in God's presence, then you win.
@shalb - This reminded me of another significant discrepancy between the gospels.
Some of them say Jesus was born at the time of the Roman census, and others during the rule of Harad(?). Events that are historically documented as being, as I recall, 10 years apart. Eh, I guess I'm forgetting the exact details. But I do know that historically it's years apart.
One of many serious discrepancies that make it sound a lot more like legend than documented history. If they got those details wrong, how do we know others were right?