It's Gettin' Silly Up In Here

Getting back to my circular reasoning argument: Why are the only stories of Jesus from the Christian point of view? Where is the public record which takes into account the miracles he performed? Where are the non-Christian stories of Jesus from that time? Where is the archaeological evidence to back up the claims? There simply are none.

This isn't strictly true, as a quick Google search for extra biblical writings Jesus can easily demonstrate. It's true that there are no detailed accounts of his life from non-Christian sources, but that's not to say that there's no information about Jesus from extrabiblical writings.

I have to confess a certain amount of amusement here, Mike. Right in the middle of an argument against the reliability of eyewitness testimony, you ask for more (albeit extrabiblical) eyewitness testimony! You then say you want archaeological evidence of said miracles, but then you completely discard without careful consideration the extant archaeological evidence (i.e. historical documents). This is starting to get silly.

There aren't any relics to back up your claims. Like I said before, the gospels were made decades after, and the oldest fragment of the gospels we have is dated to 117-138 AD which is almost 100 years after the life of Jesus.

I think you're missing the point here. The point is not that documents are bad and relics are good; the point is that relics are better than documents. What kind of relic would suffice to demonstrate that lots were cast for Jesus' clothing while he hung on the cross (in fulfillment of Psalm 22:16-18)?

I believe the stories of Jesus HAVE been forged or corrupted.

The key word here is, of course, "believe." You are free to believe what you want, Mike, but that doesn't mean that your belief necessarily correlates with reality, right? Since we're discussing physical attestation (relics) of truth claims, what document evidence do you rely upon to support your belief that the narratives of Jesus' life are corrupted?

You have acknowledged that the writings of Jesus were written decades after the event.

Yep, I sure have. And that beats the pants off of any other ancient document...and I don't see anyone complaining about the hundreds or even thousands of years that separate extant copies of other ancient documents and their authors.

I have already stated that I believe the gospels to be secondary sources at best.

There's that word again...."believe."

I demonstrated that this is just plain untrue in my last post, Mike, but you've not directly interacted with my answer. This feels a lot like evasion.

Considering all of the sources we have for Jesus' life are in the New Testament, NONE of the sources are independent.

Interesting. A few posts ago, you argued that Matthew and Luke "contradicted" one another in their respective geneaologies of Jesus; now you're arguing that they're really not independent writers. You're arguing against yourself here. Either Matthew and Mark wrote indepenently of one another or they colluded with one another and are thus not independent sources. Which is it?

If you are trying to claim your leader is the foretold Messiah, your stories are most absolutely biased and motivated to saying he is who you claim he is.

Again, you're reading too much into the text you quoted. It says there is a tendency towards bias. I'm biased. You're biased. Cory's biased. We all have a bias--only objects are truly objective. But that's not to say that all biases are equal, nor does it necessarily follow that all biases are bad.

The rest of that point talks about "opposite motivations." Does the following sound like a good reason to write a bunch of lies...and to continue to teach them in the midst of such treatment?

Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was pelted with stones, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea, I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my fellow Jews, in danger from Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea; and in danger from false believers. I have labored and toiled and have often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked. Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure of my concern for all the churches. Who is weak, and I do not feel weak? Who is led into sin, and I do not inwardly burn?
1 Corinthians 11:24-29

I honestly don't see what bias you're seeing. My experience has shown that skeptics typically point an accusatory finger at the horrible shortcomings of its characters, but you seem to be implying here that the writers were biased to "pump up" the characters to make them look larger than life--superhuman, even. I wonder...have you read about Noah getting drunk? David's murder and adulterous affair with Bathsheba? Elijah running scared from Jezebel? Peter continually sticking his foot in his mouth and denying his relationship with Jesus three times? Paul's stubborn insistence to go to Jerusalem in Acts 20-21 and his appeal to Caesar that got him thrown in jail? The Bible paints pictures of its "heroes" with warts and all...which is hardly the type of literature one would see from a biased source. We certainly don't see these kinds of accounts from ancient Egyptian records, for example--when the pharaohs lost battles, they had those records expunged. Not so in the Bible--every time the Israelites got their butts handed to them or their leaders fell (e.g. Samson), it was all written down.

Again... the gospels were written by the followers of Jesus. They are absolutely biased sources in terms of making claims of him being the Messiah.

This really hearkens back to the first point I made about asking for evidence that you won't accept, but I'll bite anyway. In your opinion, who would be a credible source for demonstrating that Jesus really did fulfill the prophesies of the promised Messiah?

-dan