I'm still waiting for a shred of evidence supporting your position. You have offered no evidence to substantiate your claim that they are just making things up.

I said, "You claim to be identifying a pattern based on evidence ("people with a doctrinal ax to grind...to invent a narrative"). Let's see what you have. Present your case and we can discuss it." I've received nothing from you.

I said, "then what does? What is the component you are looking for that shows a piece of writing to be historical? What are you expecting that Luke doesn't have? Let's talk." I get nothing in reply.

It is apparent you have nothing.

> under the assumption that Luke cannot be anything except

I have given you the lists of evidence, twice, with no rebuttal from you. It is apparent you have nothing.

> avoid on all accounts even ADDRESSING the idea that folks like Luke (and other members of the early Church) could have been the first (or second or third or fourth) century's equivalent of L. Ron Hubbard or Joseph Smith.

Give me your evidence. Without it I'm left to assume you have nothing.

> I can't even get you to TALK about it.

I've given you the lists, twice. I have begged you to talk about it, with no reply. I'm left to assume you have nothing.

> Yet you can't even TALK about it for your religion.

I've given you the lists, twice. I've begged you to give me your evidence, and yet all you do is call names and verbally abuse. I'm left to assume you have nothing.

> You keep parroting the same thing over over and over with nothing to back it up except the circular reference: "Luke was on the up and up as evidenced by my references to Luke".

So give me your case. Show me your evidence. Without it, I'm left to assume you have nothing.

> The overwhelming evidence of a spherical Earth doesn't count, your "sources" all reference themselves, and the concept that you could be wrong about all this and the Earth being round just isn't even in your vocabulary.

So give me your case. Show me your evidence. Without it, I'm left to assume you have nothing.

> Then you have completely misunderstood and distorted my way of thinking.

Of course I haven't. Don't be ridiculous. I used the same methodology you invoked. The difference is that you don't have the same emotional attachment to "Spiderman is real" that you do to "Christianity is true".

> Luke, on the other hand, was intending a historical account (Lk. 1.1) on the basis of facts transmitted by eyewitnesses and others who had legitimate experiences (Lk. 1.2) giving full regard to scholarly research and reliable historiography (Lk. 1.3).

Except that you're STILL operating under the assumption that Luke cannot be anything except just an honest guy trying to explain what he saw. You've been trained (or trained yourself) to avoid on all accounts even ADDRESSING the idea that folks like Luke (and other members of the early Church) could have been the first (or second or third or fourth) century's equivalent of L. Ron Hubbard or Joseph Smith. I can't even get you to TALK about it. This is what strikes the rest of us non-Christians as being so nonsensical. We could sit down over a beer and laugh at how insane L. Ron Hubbard sounded. We can have another round and move onto how Joseph Smith duped the masses. This model of charlatan(s) trick masses into training their children to produce a religion is overwhelmingly evidenced and clearly at the start of religions. Yet you can't even TALK about it for your religion. You keep parroting the same thing over over and over with nothing to back it up except the circular reference: "Luke was on the up and up as evidenced by my references to Luke".

It's like talking to a flat-earthist. The overwhelming evidence of a spherical Earth doesn't count, your "sources" all reference themselves, and the concept that you could be wrong about all this and the Earth being round just isn't even in your vocabulary.

Then you have completely misunderstood and distorted my way of thinking. There primary and significant difference between Spiderman and the Gospel of Luke is the intent of the authors and what they were trying to accomplish. Steve Ditko was intending to write a fictional comic book set in New York City. Even though he uses a factual setting, there is nothing about his work that he intends to be anything but entertainment and fiction. Luke, on the other hand, was intending a historical account (Lk. 1.1) on the basis of facts transmitted by eyewitnesses and others who had legitimate experiences (Lk. 1.2) giving full regard to scholarly research and reliable historiography (Lk. 1.3). His intent is not to entertain but rather to educate (Lk. 1.4).

>How do I know Christianity didn't do the same thing? Because of it's corroboratable historical references.

I can prove to you that New York exists, that it survived terrorists attacks, that it's crime rate has gone down, and that there are people in the city who fanatically worshipped Spiderman (dressed up as him, defended his character against detractors, congregated together in ceremonies (conventions), and created art about him). If we go by your way of thinking, this should be enough to prove that Spiderman was a "real" person.

OK, it's your turn. If this doesn't qualify for historical narrative:

1. Recording historical events faithfully in a way that is corroborated by other writers
2. Writing with a style intended to convey historical content rather than fictional or mythological content
3. Including verifiable historical elements that are faithful to the culture and context

...then what does? What is the component you are looking for that shows a piece of writing to be historical? What are you expecting that Luke doesn't have? Let's talk.

> How do I know Christianity didn't do the same thing? Because of it's corroboratable historical references.

Except that doesn't work if you're dealing with a work of historical fiction. You need something more to determine that. You cannot just say "Even though every religion I've ever seen aside from mine is full of BS and created by people with a doctrinal ax to grind, mine is immune to that."

> What a terrible and dishonest comparison to make? You're going to compare seeing a specific bird to miracles?

First of all, the fisher is a mammal (Pekania pennanti). Secondly, the point I was making is that just because I don't have enduring or testable physical evidence doesn't mean something didn't happen. That's all. There's nothing terrible or disingenuous about it. I'm only stating that some things can't be verified by scientific means.

> something can ONLY be a miracle if it contradicts what we already know to be true and has no evidence supporting it.

This is not true at all. Some miracles are miracles of timing, not of incident. Take the walls of Jericho, for instance. Jericho lies on a geological fault. There are earthquakes there all the time. The city has been destroyed by earthquakes at various times through history. But on this particular day, after the Israelites marched around the city 7 times, and just at the precise moment they blew their trumpets, there was an earthquake of the right magnitude and placement to cause part of the wall to collapse and let the Israelite army enter. That doesn't contradict anything we know to be true, nor is it eschewing evidence.

> Setting aside that there's ZERO evidence for ANY of the miracles

This is not true, either. There is evidence for the resurrection. It is one miracle for which there is material evidence. Now, of course, it's a 2000-yr-old cold case, but we can still examine the incident as a cold case.

But there are other miracles for which there is evidence. 2 Chr. 32: the Assyrians did not conquer Jerusalem. I can look for others if you want, but 2 are enough to show that your case isn't airtight.

> Suppose I were hiking a trail in Vermont with some friends, and the three of us saw a fisher (Pekania pennanti) cross the path in front of us. He was there and gone so quickly that none of us were able to take a picture. When we go back to the house eager to tell our story, other family members may want to see the evidence. We have none, but we each saw it and testify to it. Does that mean we didn't see one?

What a terrible and dishonest comparison to make? You're going to compare seeing a specific bird to miracles? Why would you say something so disingenuous? Here: let me fix that for you:

> Suppose I were hiking a trail in Vermont with some friends, and the three of us saw a fisher (Pekania pennanti) cross the path in front of us, burst into flames, be completely consumed by said sourceless flames, and then reconstitute itself from its own ashes to fly away again as though nothing had happened. It happened so quickly that none of us were able to take a picture. When we go back to the house eager to tell our story, other family members correctly point out that birds don't burst into flame and then rise back to life from their own ashes. We have no evidence, but we each saw it and testify to it. Naturally, our family members don't believe us because they're sane rational people. The only people we can get to believe it is our small children. To ensure they carry on this tradition, we make it a point of pride that they believe the burning bird story without evidence and plant the seeds that they should feel guilty if they use common sense to doubt it.

To be sure, something can ONLY be a miracle if it contradicts what we already know to be true and has no evidence supporting it. Otherwise, it's not a miracle! By definition you HAVE to have those two criteria or you're not talking about a miracle. Saying "The only way to show that miracles are impossible is to disprove the existence of God" is textbook example of this shifting the burden of proof fallacy.

So, by definition, miracles default to "false". This is the problem with calling Christianty true (as opposed to accurately calling it a work of historical fiction). Setting aside that there's ZERO evidence for ANY of the miracles, said miracles evidence only one thing: that the people writing the story were making things up. Because that's what people who create religions do. Christianity is no different.

> If by "nothing" you mean the tens of thousands of supernatural claims made by thousands of religions

So it's the miracles that are the barrier to you? Why didn't you say so? If you want to talk about miracles, glad to.

The miracles of the Bible are more like a rainbow in the sky than they are like pottery hidden in the soil. There is no lasting effect and no possible proof for later generations to find. If it's true that Jesus walked on the water, what artifact do you expect an archaeologist to dig up, or writings from anyone other than the twelve who saw it? In our courts of law, if twelve witnesses confirmed an event, a jury would give strength to that unanimity of testimony. But more to the point is: Does the lack of lasting evidence prove it didn't happen?

The way science generally works is that a hypothesis is stated and an experiment is designed to test the hypothesis. Depending on the hypothesis, specimens are gathered or facts are measured and repeated and documented. Through trial and error the technique and instrumentation necessary are refined to give the information sought, and patterns are established to help eliminate spurious ideas (or specimens) and measuring mistakes. How is any of this possible in the event of a spontaneous miracle?

Suppose I were hiking a trail in Vermont with some friends, and the three of us saw a fisher (Pekania pennanti) cross the path in front of us. He was there and gone so quickly that none of us were able to take a picture. When we go back to the house eager to tell our story, other family members may want to see the evidence. We have none, but we each saw it and testify to it. Does that mean we didn't see one?

What enduring evidence does one expect of the feeding of the 5,000, walking on the water, or Jesus healing a lame man? Certainly nothing an archaeologist can find, and obviously not a phenomenon a scientist can test and confirm. Asking for scientific proof of Jesus's miracles is like asking a doctor to use a stethoscope to verify that I had a bout with hiccups last week.

Much more important to the discussion of miracles is the identity claims that Jesus made. Jesus claimed that the miracles he performed were signs of his deity. If there is no such thing as God, we would expect miracles to be a ridiculous imaginative mistake that people make based on wishful thinking or legend building. But if God is a real being, miracles are no problem. Indubitably, the Creator God, having been the designer and creator of the laws of physics, has the freedom and power to use those laws or supersede them at His desire and to serve His purposes.
If there is such a being as God, and if Jesus was His incarnation on earth, it would not at all be improbable for God to empower Him to do miraculous signs. The question is more properly focused on the identity of Jesus than on the rationality of miracles by His hand.

Alvin Plantinga asks what the problem is in believing in miracles—why should anyone object to it? "Why can't the causal continuum be rent by the interference of supernatural, transcendent powers? Why are miracles necessarily incompatible with modern science? They are only incompatible if it can be proved that nature is a closed continuum of cause and effect, and closed to intervention or interference on the part of beings outside that continuum, including God himself." In no way does the predictable character of nature exclude the possibility of miraculous events. Science cannot prove that the universe is all there is, meaning that our universe is verifiably a closed causal system. "Natural laws offer no threat to special divine action."

The only way to show that miracles are impossible is to disprove the existence of God, a task that is both logically and scientifically impossible.

> The debate is how do you know the person you've proven is writing Luke (whether it's Luke or someone else) is writing the truth versus the first century's equivalent of scientology?

1. I've given evidence that Luke intended to write history, not historical fiction (Lk. 1.1-4)
2. I've given evidence that Luke is a reputable and accurate historian, having yet to be proved wrong about anything he has written.
3. I've given evidence that Luke is not writing in with a fictional or mythological style or with fictional or mythological content.
4. Therefore, we can infer the most reasonable conclusion that Luke is writing the truth vs. the first century's equivalent of scientology.

> Mormonism

I agree with your assessment of Mormonism. There is no historical corroboration of any of it. Contrast Christianity, which has thousands of historical corroborations.

How do I know Christianity didn't do the same thing? Because of it's corroboratable historical references. The book of Mormon was written millennia after the purported events; The New Testament was written during the time of the eyewitnesses. There's a world of difference between the two.

> This is no argument. This is no evidence. In other words, you have nothing.

If by "nothing" you mean the tens of thousands of supernatural claims made by thousands of religions... zeus making lightning, thor making thunder, Osiris coming back from the dead, etc... then yes. I have "nothing". But it's okay. It's been made abundantly clear to me that this is a hostile audience so I've given up on expecting intellectual honesty. So if it makes you feel better, sure. You can pretend that there aren't throngs of Scientologists who think thetans are a thing or millions of Mormons wearing magic underwear dreaming of ruling their own planet.

You do you.

> Pardon me? I didn't assume it, I showed it with evidence.

You did no such thing. Why would you lie about that? You showed that you THINK that Luke was written by the person who's identified as Luke in the NT, but that's not what we're discussing. You're assuming that the new testament authors just wanted to write down what was true. You can't say "this is how we know WHO wrote something" AND have it mean "this is how we know they had no bias / didn't have a doctrinal ax to grind / were motivated by truth and nothing else". Remember what's being discussed here: you've made the knee-jerk reply of "LET ME DEFEND THE HISTORY". That's not the debate we're having. The debate is how do you know the person you've proven is writing Luke (whether it's Luke or someone else) is writing the truth versus the first century's equivalent of scientology? I just don't understand how you can be so cavalier about your assertion about their motivation in light of seeing religions like Scientology & Mormonism conjure believers out of obvious falsehoods.

Look at Mormonism. Joseph Smith had access to Christian & Jewish religious writings (the NT and OT) and created a mythology that took in and continues to take in millions. He took the Christian religion and just added onto it by conjuring a piece of historical fiction. Now we have the benefit of being able to say "There never was any such civilization in the Americas as Smith implied"... but two things: first, how do you know that Christianity didn't do to Judaism in the first century what Mormonism did to Christianity in the 1800's? Second, if you wanted to know "Was the book of mormon a work of historical fiction" and I went on and on about how we know it was written by Joseph Smith, would you think that an acceptable answer?