Raf

Apologies for my unusual lack of wordiness. Yes, that is what I meant by bzzt. Moving on from Die Hard: Bonnie Bedelia Presumed Innocent Greta Scacchi

It's an argument against the historicity of the resurrection. Anyone who suggests it actually happened in history is interested in the evidence for it. For the birth of Christianity, all that is required is that people believed it. That is not in dispute.

*Your. And yes: Christianity cannot simultaneously refer to the resurrection as the most historically significant event of all time and say there would be inadequate evidence for it unless you accepted it as a precondition for seeing the "spiritually attained" evidence. That is inconsistent with the alleged arguments of the earliest Christians and only comes now when people recognize how inadequate the actual evidence is. The contradictory, mutually exclusive and clearly fictional accounts of non-witnesses written a generation or two after the alleged events took place and citing "evidence" (such as the empty tomb) that no one could possible check decades later is not adequate evidence. What kind of evidence would be valuable: eyewitnesses. We have none. We have fourth and fifth hand accounts of people whose very existence is questionable (why did Mary Magdalene disappear? What happened to Jesus' mother? Where was Arimathea, and why was Joseph the only one in history from there? Where did most of the 12 go?) Records? We have none. The records we DO have contradict the gospel accounts. Jews didn't hold trials on the day of Passover (as implied in Matthew, Mark, and Luke). Pilate never had a tradition of releasing a condemned prisoner on Passover. Pilate would sooner put down a mob than succumb to its demands to execute someone for heresy. And if the Jews convinced him Jesus was an insurrectionist, he would not have needed any further convincing to execute him. There was no Arimathea. Crucified men were not given private tombs. There was no earthquake. There was no darkness covering the land. Graves didn't open up and release their dead. The funny thing is, any one of those things is more likely than a dead man getting up three days later. But we know they did not happen. Yet we're too believe the resurrection, the least plausible element of the story, is history. Bunk.

yes. Gods do not exist independently of the societies that create them. If you would like to argue that point, start a new thread. It is off topic on this one.

of course independent societies have come up with gods. My point is that no two independent societies have ever come up with the same God.

I think I need to be clear here. Whatever is behind religion was most certainly created by man. Whether you can boil it down to a single person is debatable, and you almost certainly cannot identify that person. But it was certainly people who came up with the gods. I've often said that if people did not come up with gods, then the same gods, actually existing, would have had the power to make themselves known to multiple groups of people. Europeans would have landed in the New World and told the natives here about Jesus, and the natives would have said, Jesus? We know him. Son of God, raised by a carpenter. We know all about Jesus. Crucified, right? Yeah. You mean you've been to Israel? WOW! What's that like? No two independent societies have ever concocted the same God with the same name and the same set of rules and worship requirements/preferences. But archetypes? Archetypes are elements that good stories have in common. People don't "come up with them in the explicit sense. They come up with stories.

Not what anyone said. Myths follow a basic pattern. The story of Jesus follows that pattern. Period. We cannot conclude the story of Jesus is a myth merely because it follows the pattern, nor can we rule out that possibility. That we don't know the identities of the people who invented the earliest stories does not mean they were not developed by people. All without exception were.

Might even win a prize

I was anticipating a "how could Jesus fit Campbell's mythic hero archetype when Campbell didn't come up with it until the 20th Century" argument. It is significant to note Campbell merely identified the archetypes. They didn't originate with him. Like Isaac Newton developed a theory of gravity; he didn't create gravity.

I understand, but it needs to be said out loud. Trust me on this one.

George Lucas JK Rowling JRR Tolkien Homer Siegel & Schuster Campbell merely identified the elements. He didn't invent them.

Russell Crowe Charles Laughton

No one is suggesting there were no believers in the first century. I would even go so far as to concede these two people existed, although there is no extra-biblical reason to make that assumption. So what? Paul talked them into Christianity. What does that prove? L Ron Hubbard talked oodles of people into Scientology. Why did they believe? because Scientology is true? Or because they were gullible as f? The existence of believers does not establish the authenticity of what they believed. If it did, literally all religions would be true!

No dispute there. There are people who believe Muhammad ascended into heaven on a winged horse, that joseph Smith received the book of Mormon on golden plates, that L. Ron Hubbard had ascertained spiritual information leading to the development of Scientology. The fact that people believed those things doesn't make them true. It doesn't mean they happened.

BELIEF doesn't mean it happened

Christianity cannot have it both ways. The most significant event in the history of the world should have a more reliable footprint than the contradictory accounts of non witnesses writing mutually exclusive stories two or three generations after the events allegedly transpired!

I don't disagree.

Because if something actually happened, especially something of historical significance, there should be more evidence of its occurrence than a fairy tale concocted by a fiction writer (or four). One should expect that the evidence for a significant event that actually took place should be of greater weight than the "evidence" or indicators it did not.

But there should be.

Making sure we stay on topic: what is the evidence that would lead a reasonable person to conclude that Jesus rose from the dead?

To be clear: If you are claiming tht YOUR SIT is genuine, then according to the Bible, you are producing a language. Can you establish, through evidence, what that language is? If so, you might have some claim to some spiritual connection. If not, you're full of sh*t and I am under no obligation to believe otherwise. Anyone can fake tongues. If you claim to not be faking it, then the burden is on you to prove it. What''s the language? That's the thing. If you make a testable claim, then that claim is subject to testing. Like, if I say I have a time machine, it's not YOUR obligation to DISprove it; it is my obligation to PROVE it. You claim to speak in tongues. Prove it. What's the language? Cue the excuses.

Yeah. Sumbitch witnessed to me and was convincing. In seriousness i blame myself and no one else

I blame WordWolf

That was meaningless. Seriously. You're babbling.

David Oyelowo Anthony Perkins Geoffrey Rush