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Post by wdmundt on Feb 12, 2008 18:50:29 GMT -4
Considering how strongly I was criticized by others on this forum for making the claim in the first place and considering how strong the resistance was to the idea that there was no evidence, I don't think it is a stretch to say that many people seem to think there is historical evidence of the existence of Jesus. And if people think there is evidence, then it follows that they will be surprised to find out that there is not. (though you are incorrectly rejecting such secular evidence as there is) And this evidence would be...?
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Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
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Post by Jason on Feb 12, 2008 19:01:36 GMT -4
Well the evidence I believe you incorrectly rejected includes those you outline in Reply #7 and that I respond to in Reply #18 on this thread.
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Post by wdmundt on Feb 12, 2008 19:05:31 GMT -4
So you mean that you were surprised because you discovered your assumptions were wrong, not that you are surprised that it didn't happen and think that it's strange? I don't think that my surprise or lack of surprise is at all relevant to whether there is extra-biblical evidence for the existence of Jesus. If you want to make a case that we should expect absolutely no historical evidence, then please do so. I do not see any point in making an issue of "surprise" on the matter. I imagine if you polled the populace of countries populated by Christians, you would find a great deal of surprise that Jesus is not recorded by history. However, I know of no such poll -- so that is just conjecture on my part -- conjecure that is somewhat proven by the response to my initial claim in this thread. I'm also pretty sure that people taking such a poll would run the risk of angering a great many that they surveyed. As to whether we should expect no evidence, my argument is that we should not expect this. Perhaps silence about Jesus could be forgiven, but that is not the entirety of my argument. Silence about everything is my argument. Silence about the fates of the Apostles, silence about those historical happenings that very definitely should have been recorded if the gospels are to be taken as true -- such as Herod killing all the male firstborn in an attempt to kill Jesus as a baby -- which does seem to be something history would have noticed. I have the flu today and if my response seems terse, I apologize.
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Post by wdmundt on Feb 12, 2008 19:10:27 GMT -4
Well the evidence I believe you incorrectly rejected includes those you outline in Reply #7 and that I respond to in Reply #18 on this thread. So you disagree. That is why I say you would accept a blue swan when looking for a black swan. Josephus is widely considered to be fraudulent -- and examination of it from a Jewish perspective also shows it to be fraudulent. Hanging on to Josephus in the face of that seems extreme to me. As to the others, none even mentions a man called Jesus. All were written 60 or more years after the supposed events and there is no chain showing where even this non-evidence originated. I guess we'll just have to disagree on this one.
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Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
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Post by Jason on Feb 12, 2008 19:17:36 GMT -4
There are early church traditions for the fates of nearly all of the apostles. What other evidence would you expect?
Herod's order was to kill all children under two years old in Bethlehem "and in all the coasts thereof" - the surrounding regions. It was not an order to kill all the firstborn sons in all of the Kingdom of Judea or even Jerusalem - it was a much smaller pool of victims over a limited area. Do you think Herod would trumpet the incident in the royal histories and to his Roman masters, or would he take steps to keep it out of official records? We also are unsure as to exactly how successful his attempt was, and how many victims there were, other than Matthew's statement that this was a fulfillment Jeremiah 31:15.
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Post by PhantomWolf on Feb 12, 2008 19:23:44 GMT -4
I didn't intend that it should be, I was more interested in which interpretation of the statement you were meaning.
Except that he didn't, he had all the children under 2 killed in one village, something that even in today's world might make a paragraph in the newspaper if it was a slow news day and there wasn't a better attrocity to mention happening in the country at the same time.
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Post by wdmundt on Feb 12, 2008 19:24:13 GMT -4
The traditions of the fates of the apostles are only traditions. There is no reason to believe them to be true.
Herod's slaughter is not recorded even in the other gospels, so there is also no reason to believe it is anything more than fiction based on the similar Moses story. Josephus does record Herod's cruel acts, but not that one.
I truly have the flu and have to hang this up today. If I'm gone for a while, it is not because I am abandoning this or other discussions. I have minor surgery on Thursday that will keep me home, where I currently have no internet access.
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Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
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Post by Jason on Feb 12, 2008 19:32:04 GMT -4
The traditions of the fates of the apostles are only traditions. There is no reason to believe them to be true. In the absence of other evidence, why should we think they are false? As 'Wolf and I have said, it was over a relatively small area, and may not have been widely known. All of the Gospels have material that is unique to them. This just happens to be one unique to Matthew. I'm sorry you're under the weather. Get better soon.
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