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[Acerbic]

I want to make something clear. When I speak about people who have a feeling as though god is in the room, I'm not suggesting that they are hallucinating. I believe they're under the suggestive influence of religion, similar to how a placebo makes you feel healthier.

The people who I think are hallucinating are those that hear or see god.

Every religion has the exact same qualities in this regard. They all see, hear, and feel things. It's not unique to Christianity.

> There are a few indisputable facts: (1) Jesus's disciples taught he was raised from the dead and appeared to individuals/groups, (2) Jesus's disciples intended for us to interpret the resurrection as an actual event; (3) the world was changed.

Actually I think there are only two indisputable facts. One of that the bible fragments exist. Two is that the religion spread very quickly. The disciples may very well be made up, just like Jesus could have been made up. Even if they were real, their intent to portray the Resurrection as an actual even isn't proof it happened. Their intention could have been to lie.

> shared hallucinations

Shared Delusion disorder. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folie_%C3%A0_deux

Even if I'm being hasty here, I'm not even really claiming that people are having a shared delusion. I'm just saying it exists. I'm saying that people have a delusion or hallucination about the same topic, like religion. People see the cross and iconic picture of Jesus. They read the book and learn the stories. Then when the hallucination hits and their brain tries to make senses of it, they mistake the hallucination for the iconic figure, and the brain feeds off of that, furthering the imagine in their minds. I'm not saying they're all hallucinating the same thing. I was merely giving that one example with the sun.

> Tacitus: "Christus, had been put to death by the governor of Judea, Pontius Pilate, when Tiberius was emperor."

This was also 100 years after the fact. He could have easily taken the explanation directly from the bible or the present day stories at the time. He wasn't trying to authenticate Jesus, he merely wanted to know the reason why the Christians were burning Rome, and I don't see why he would reject the story that he was burned. I've heard some people bolster the credibility as, "he would have had access to records" but he may not have cared to double check some 100 year old scroll in Judea.

The rest suffer from the same or similar issues. That being said, it certainly does seem like it was at least worth writing about, but early Christians were a plucky cult, so that's not really surprising, but you certainly have no evidence of a resurrection, just a bunch of people saying he died. Personally I lean more towards Jesus having existed. As some have said, for the time this is actually quite a lot of evidence.

> Embellishment? Jesus fed 5000 people with a single lunch box of food. There were eyewitnesses. The miracles he did were in public. It's tough to embellish when you do things publicly.

On the contrary, if 5,000 people see a thing, you'd expect more people to write about it... not just the apostles that were already in his fan club.

> make up some story about it and see how well it flies

You act like there haven't been any new religions in a while. There have been cults where people kill themselves in mass. There have been tax exempt religions that have sprung up. That's just in the US too. We only have 5% of the world population. I'm sure there have been plenty of other cults and religions that have sprung up. Those would have to be fictional, right?

> we can't just assume Jesus is a hoax and walk away thinking we've done a good job.

I'm certainly not doing that, nor am I advising anyone else to do that.

> Actually we have 4 books that were written as 4 books, from which we have thousands of later manuscripts. Hermas, in about AD 100, alludes to the existence of 4 Gospels.

One of the things I dislike about Christianity is the scholars. It's a group of people who read the manuscripts and decipher it, but it's 2020, where can I see them? They're the basis of your holy book. Pictures of the books really ought to be somewhere in some online database for the world to see. I have low trust that the so called scholars are even trust worthy. I've heard plenty of stores about how other so-called religious artifacts were actually just fakes. How do we know that those "thousands" are not actually fakes? Perhaps they were implanted and revised over time to subtly change text.

> No, we do know better. The disciples started preaching the resurrection 7 weeks after Jesus's crucifixion.

Based on what? And why seven weeks? And if they wanted to, don't you think they could have moved the body? I get that supposedly guards were placed at the door of the tomb, but for seven weeks? And does that part of the story even make sense? Jesus was such a high profile criminal that he needed guards placed at his door? The NT doesn't even make sense when you think about it. Jesus goes around healing the sick and doing miracles in front of thousands of people in a small enough area that he'd have gain some fame, but he pisses off a few high ranking people, and some how they convince a sea of observers that they ought to kill Jesus instead of a murderer. These priests had quite a lot of influence while Jesus apparently had none. Of course this all gets ignored because the point was for him to die so even if you have a legitimate concern about why people would behave the way they did, you can just appeal to god as some sort of ultimate manipulator.

[jimwalton]

> One of that the bible fragments exist

This is true.

> Two is that the religion spread very quickly.

Yes. Correct again.

But you have skipped the two I brought up that are undeniable: (1) Jesus's disciples taught he was raised from the dead and appeared to individuals/groups, (2) Jesus's disciples intended for us to interpret the resurrection as an actual event.

The works of Paul in undisputed. The books of Acts has tremendously widespread respect for historicity based on corroborative evidence.

> The disciples may very well be made up

• There is solid historical evidence for Peter and Paul. Peter's martyrdom is reported by Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Dionysius of Corinth, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Eusebius, and more. Paul is solidly established as historical. Ignatius of Antioch, in about 110, writes that Paul was martyred.
• Polykarp (AD 70-160) mentions a band of apostles of Jesus who were killed for their faith.
• Clement of Alexandria (AD 150-215) mentions James's death.
• Polycrates of Ephesus (130-196) mentions the apostle Philip.

Other than that we have traditions, but no solid evidence. There's enough between all of these sources that the existence of the apostles is both possible and plausible if not probable.

> just like Jesus could have been made up.

There is no reasonable doubt that Jesus existed as a man. He was a Galilean Jew who was born between 7 and 4 BC and died between AD 26-36. Most scholars hold that Jesus lived in Galilee and Judea, did not preach or study elsewhere, was called Christos in Greek, had a brother named James, and that he spoke Aramaic and may have also spoken Hebrew and possibly Greek. It is believed even from non-Christian sources that he had both Jewish and Gentile followers, and that Jewish leaders held unfavorable opinions of him. Although there are great differences (outside of the Gospels) trying to reconstruct the details of his life, the two events whose historicity is subject to "almost universal assent" are that he was baptized by John the Baptist and shortly afterwards (within several years) was crucified by the order of the Roman prefect, Pontius Pilate.

> Shared Delusion disorder.

And you're claiming that 11 men, on various occasions, shared this delusion? That a woman, on a separate occasion, also shared it. That two men walking down the road on a different occasion, also shared it. That up to 500 people at a time on one occasion shared it.

You know, that's not the nature of this disorder. You are not matching the diagnosis to the situation. Secondly, this syndrome doesn't account for multiple people hallucinating the exact thing things at the same time.

There was a paper by Jake O'Connell suggesting that it's possible for 2 or more people to experience at least "similar" hallucinations at the same time or place, given certain conditions: (1) the visions were expected and not spontaneous; (2) they were accompanied by fainting; (3) the vision was not shared by all who were present, but just some; (4) the vision was perceived differently by those who saw it; (5) a person in the vision never spoke with the group.

As you can tell right off the top, this does not fit the situation of Jesus's resurrection appearances.

In addition, several themes prevalent in the Gospels' group appearances cannot be accounted for by the hallucination hypothesis; in fact, claiming group hallucinations actually creates an insurmountable problem.

1. Several times when people encountered the resurrected Jesus, they didn't recognize him. If they were hallucinating, they would have. Since hallucinations are projections of one’s mind and are drawn from the content of one’s mind, collective hallucinations do not explain why there is this prominent theme (non-recognition) across multiple Gospels.

2. New information was given by Jesus, different in different situations.

3. Jesus on at least one occasion ate with the people.

These factors reduce the believability of the mass hallucination theory to an implausible explanation.

> Tacitus: This was also 100 years after the fact. He could have easily taken the explanation directly from the bible or the present day stories at the time.

Tacitus is considered to be one of the greatest Roman historians whose reliability cannot be seriously questioned. Remember that he also wrote 100 years after some the Roman emperors he wrote about, yet no one is ready to discredit those because of the time lapse.

Second, there's no reason to think Tacitus would have read the Bible (or even been aware of it) or had access to it.

> He wasn't trying to authenticate Jesus

Correct, and this bolsters the case that he didn't have a horse in the race. He couldn't care less about Jesus, but we have his record that Jesus existed and was crucified as the Gospels say he was.

> I've heard some people bolster the credibility as, "he would have had access to records" but he may not have cared to double check some 100 year old scroll in Judea.

Tacitus's sources are the official minutes of the sessions of the Senate and a collection of the acts of the government and news of the court and capitol. He also read collections of emperors’ speeches (Tiberius and Claudius). He cites some of his sources directly: Cluvius Rufus, Fabius Rusticus, and Pliny the Elder. He also uses collections of letters from those who were antithetical to the emperor.

> you certainly have no evidence of a resurrection

It seems you're not paying attention. There is evidence of the resurrection. The tomb was empty, the disciples's lives were changed, and the church grew (when there is no other justifiable explanation).

> On the contrary, if 5,000 people see a thing, you'd expect more people to write about it... not just the apostles that were already in his fan club.

The problem is that we have lost the majority of what was written. We have only half of Tacitus's work. All but a fragment of Thallus's Mediterranean History is gone. The writings of Asclepiades of Mendes are gone. Nicholas of Damascus (the secretary of Herod the Great) wrote his Universal History in 144 books: none have survived. Papias's work is lost. Josephus's originals are gone (except for what we have through Eusebius). Quadratus wrote to Emperor Hadrian—all lost.

We can't claim something is fictitious because no one else wrote about it. So much is simply gone.

> You act like there haven't been any new religions in a while. There have been cults where people kill themselves in mass.

Of course there are new religions all the time, but not ones based in historical events and the evidence at hand. They are junk like Heaven's Gate and cults like Jim Jones.

> It's a group of people who read the manuscripts and decipher it, but it's 2020, where can I see them? They're the basis of your holy book. Pictures of the books really ought to be somewhere in some online database for the world to see.

They're online. I look up a bunch of them online to see them. Papyri, manuscripts, fragments. These pieces of the Bible are housed in museums all over the world. There's a new Bible museum in Washington, D.C. But the oldest manuscripts are housed in the museums that paid a lot of money for them: Some of the Dead Sea Scrolls are in Jerusalem, Sinaiticus and Alexandrinus are in London, Vaticanus is in Rome, p1 is in Philadelphia, p2 is in Florence, p3 in Vienna, p4 is in Paris, etc.

Many of them are viewable online. That's where I see them. I don't have money to travel the world.

> Pictures of the books really ought to be somewhere in some online database for the world to see.

A copy of the Septuagint is online. An online version of Sinaiticus is presently being prepared, nearing completion.

Libraries are also resources for this stuff. If you're near a large university, they may have the books you're after.

> I've heard plenty of stores about how other so-called religious artifacts were actually just fakes.

No, through the years I've seen pictures and talked with plenty of scholars. The stuff is real. (Well, I guess it depends what you're talking about. If you mean that a church in Italy has a sliver of the manger, well, duh, no.)

> How do we know that those "thousands" are not actually fakes?

These things have been studied more than anything else. The Bible is the most studied document in history. They do Carbon 14 tests, linguistic analyses, papyrus assessment—the whole 9 yards every time. This is a big deal.

For instance, recently (within the past few years) a team of researchers made a surprising find when examining a papyrus-wrapped mummy mask—they found what they believe to be the oldest-known copy of a gospel in existence: a fragment of the Gospel of Mark that was thought to date back to about AD 90. There was an article in Live Science (https://www.livescience.com/49489-oldest-known-gospel-mummy-mask.html). It was the subject of intense study because it really matters. The last I heard it was determined that it wasn't from the 1st century, but instead from the 2nd or 3rd (http://www.thetextofthegospels.com/2018/05/first-century-mark-finally-but.html). You can see a picture of here.

>> The disciples started preaching the resurrection 7 weeks after Jesus's crucifixion.
> Based on what?

The book of Acts, chapter 2. And it was 7 weeks after because that was the day of Pentecost in Jerusalem.

> And if they wanted to, don't you think they could have moved the body?

It's not plausible. You need motive, means, and an opportunity.

1. Motive. First, the Gospels say the disciples were scared to death and in hiding. Second, resurrection was not an expectation in their theology, not an expectation in their experience, and not a possibility in their theology. There's no motive.
2. Means. The temple is guarded by armed guards who face the death penalty if they fail in their duties.
3. Opportunity. The disciples were not expecting Jesus's crucifixion; Pilate even expressed the notion of releasing him. So from his burial at sunset on Friday until his pre-dawn resurrection on Sunday, they would have about 36 hours to make a plan and execute it successfully. And why would they do this? They're not expecting Jesus to rise again.

> I get that supposedly guards were placed at the door of the tomb, but for seven weeks?

No, the guards were only there for about 30 hours, if that.

> Jesus was such a high profile criminal that he needed guards placed at his door?

He wasn't a high-profile criminal. Rather, he was a threat to the system.

> Jesus goes around healing the sick and doing miracles in front of thousands of people in a small enough area that he'd have gain some fame, but he pisses off a few high ranking people, and some how they convince a sea of observers that they ought to kill Jesus instead of a murderer.

This is actually quite realistic. Haven't you ever seen someone fired at work because someone had it in for them, spread lies, undercut them with the boss? All it takes is a few people in the right positions to undermine good people.

> These priests had quite a lot of influence while Jesus apparently had none.

Correct, except Jesus had the following of the people. I don't know what country you live in, but you must be aware of the impeachment process of President Trump. Nancy Pelosi was reluctant to press forward with the impeachment at one time because she didn't think the majority of the people in the country would be for it and that it would turn out to be a negative move for the Democrats. Besides what the House is doing, she is waging a war int he press to get the American people on board. What the people think counts.

> you can just appeal to god as some sort of ultimate manipulator.

I'll be honest—you lost me with this one.

[Acerbic]

This has branched into so many directions.

There is no evidence that the apostles were real. They could have simply been mentioned because of the scriptures, which were obviously copied as many times as possible. Is there any ancient historian that personally met them? I don't think so, so it is entirely possible that they were a fake story. It's the same for Socrates. Was he a real person or an invention by Plato? For Socrates it doesn't matter, but for Jesus it does because of the self sacrifice and resurrection.

I never said that the people in the bible had a mass delusion... I specifically said the opposite.

To state that tacitus never had access to the bible sounds asinine. He would have been about 10 years old when the Christians burned Rome. So the idea that there were no bibles in rome sounds farfetched.

I stand corrected. You have no evidence of the resurrection outside of the gospels, which is a second-hand eyewitness account with anonymous authorship, pieced together by people whose entire livelihood rests on the sale of the book.

> Of course there are new religions all the time, but not ones based in historical events and the evidence at hand, like Christianity. They are junk like Heaven's Gate and cults like Jim Jones.

This is flat out dismissive and biased. You don't have great history of Jesus compared to Joseph Smith, and perhaps the reason Joseph Smith isn't as believable is because he had to deal with superior record keeping.

> . Motive. First, the Gospels say the disciples were scared to death and in hiding. Second, resurrection was not an expectation in their theology, not an expectation in their experience, and not a possibility in their theology. There's no motive.

Pretend for a second that these guys aren't saints. Just pretend they are ordinary guys. Maybe they're good sometimes. Maybe they're bad sometimes. They lie from time to time. Now suppose their messiah was just killed for being a cultleader. So they put together a story about how their leader resurrected. Maybe they hid the body, and they told everyone to go look, and sure enough it was gone. Their motivation was the satisfaction of being right to spite the people that killed their leader. Seems plausible to me.

> Means. The temple is guarded by armed guards who face the death penalty if they fail in their duties.

Why would they care enough to guard it? And suppose they did care, you think they would guard it for weeks? I think the guards are an embellishment. They probably turned the body over to the people watching the crucifixion, and they were the ones who put him in a tomb. There were no guards. Why would the nation that just executed him give him such an honor? If the Romans were going to give every prisoner that they executed a tomb, then jesus wouldn't have been the only one. I think this covers the means and opportunity. The guards were simply a made up explanation about why nobody could take the body. If they did exist, it was an embellishment. In all likelihood jesus's body was literally just given to the followers.

If you read the bible without a skeptical mind you will find it makes sense. Of course they wanted to kill jesus, he was a threat to the system. Of course they needed to guard the tomb, jesus was a threat to the system. Of course the guards wouldn't shirk in their duty, they would have been killed. Of course the apostles wouldn't lie, they were Christians. Of course the bible survived long enough and was never altered. But that is just a whole lot of assumptions.

[jimwalton]

> There is no evidence that the apostles were real.

There actually is. We have solid evidence for Peter and Paul. In Paul's writings, which are not doubted, we have references to the 12 apostles (1 Cor. 15.5, 7). And in Acts, which has proven historical reliability, there is mention made of the apostles (Acts 1.2, 13). Frankly, we have no palpable reason to doubt the apostles, unless you can support your position with any evidence.

> Is there any ancient historian that personally met them?

Which historians do you have in mind? I mentioned in my last post that most of the writings of the era have been lost. We just have pieces at best of what once existed.

> don't think so, so it is entirely possible that they were a fake story.

It's NOT entirely possible, and that's what I'm showing you. Paul and the book of Acts in particular have been proven to be reliable sources. They are not legitimately discreditable.

> It's the same for Socrates. Was he a real person or an invention by Plato? For Socrates it doesn't matter, but for Jesus it does because of the self sacrifice and resurrection.

You're right, we don't know about Socrates. But Jesus we do.

> [Tacitus] would have been about 10 years old when the Christians burned Rome. So the idea that there were no bibles in rome sounds farfetched.

The NT was only then being written. Paul's works all existed, but had not been assembled into a collection yet. There were no New Testaments when the Christians burned Rome. By the time Tacitus was writing (around 105-117), the NT was beginning to be assembled and recognized as a collection—just beginning. It's not at all safe to say that Tacitus had ever seen one (if there was one) or that he would have had access to it.

> You have no evidence of the resurrection outside of the gospels

No written evidence, no.

> which is a second-hand eyewitness account with anonymous authorship

I tend to differ with this assessment. I am convinced Matthew and John's (in particular) accounts are eyewitness accounts. Mark may have had some exposure to Jesus (he lived in Jerusalem and his family were believers). The Church Fathers tell us that Mark got most of his information from Peter. Luke was definitely not an eyewitness; he researched his book.

> with anonymous authorship

Yes, technically, but the authors were unanimously affirmed by the church as having been Mt, Mk, Lk, and Jn. There are no competing theories, there are no alternatives offered. There are no copies with any other attribution. So it's not totally honest to say it's "anonymous authorship" if by that you are saying we don't know who wrote them. Yes, they're anonymous, but we pretty much know who wrote them.

> pieced together by people whose entire livelihood rests on the sale of the book.

Oh, goodness, there's nothing true about this. The SALE of the book? There is NO evidence that the early copies of the Bible were ever sold. Boy, if you have evidence of this, I'd love to see it. No one's livelihood depended on it. The Bible wasn't "pieced together" at all. It was recognized from its writing as having authority. The authority of the majority of the NT books is never doubt. It's true they are later assembled into one volume, but that's to be expected. They were never then sold on the open market (or even the black market).

> You don't have great history of Jesus compared to Joseph Smith, and perhaps the reason Joseph Smith isn't as believable is because he had to deal with superior record keeping.

The problem with this theory is that so much of the history that's in the Gospels and Acts is confirmable, and zero from the book of Mormon is confirmable.

> Pretend for a second that these guys aren't saints

They're not saints. It doesn't take any pretending. They're normal guys, just as you're saying.

> Now suppose their messiah was just killed for being a cultleader.

That's pretty much what happened, except that the real reason is because he claimed to be God.

> So they put together a story about how their leader resurrected.

Why would they do this? It just sounds ridiculous. There was no expectation of it. It wasn't possible in Jewish theology. It wasn't possible in Roman theology. It wasn't possible in real life. There's no reason they would claim this if it weren't true. It doesn't help their case if they want to start a new religion. They could have started it on the teachings, as most religions start. They were just killing their chances of success by claiming a resurrection—if it weren't true.

> Maybe they hid the body

Whoa, not so quick. Why would they do this? How would they get at the body, since the tomb was guarded by soldiers? What would their motive be (power? fame? money? sex?)? They don't have motive, means, or opportunity to steal the body. This isn't a plausible hypothetical situation.

> Their motivation was the satisfaction of being right to spite the people that killed their leader. Seems plausible to me.

Now wait. After preaching the resurrection, did they gain power? prestige? privileges? Nope. James was killed (would you die for what you knew was a lie?). Peter was killed. Paul was stoned, beaten, flogged, jeered. Would you do this for what you knew was a lie? And you're telling me that all 12 of them held this conspiracy together for all the days of their lives? Not one of them cracked for what they knew was a lie? That's not plausible.

> Why would they care enough to guard it?

Matthew is the only one who tells about the guard (Mt. 27.64-66). He says the Jewish religious leaders wanted the tomb guarded so the disciples couldn't come and steal the body and claim a resurrection—your exact theory. So Pilate approved a guard and the tomb was sealed with an official seal. So the Romans knew where the tomb was.

> And suppose they did care, you think they would guard it for weeks?

No, only for days. The claims of the resurrection (Sunday) came within 48 hours of the crucifixion (Friday).

> They probably turned the body over to the people watching the crucifixion, and they were the ones who put him in a tomb.

One of the members of the Jewish Sanhedrin asked to bury the body and was given permission. So the Jewish leaders knew where the tomb was. And some of the followers of Jesus watched them bury Him, so his followers knew where the tomb was. So, yes, his followers buried him.

> There were no guards.

How can you say this? Where's your evidence?

> Why would the nation that just executed him give him such an honor? If the Romans were going to give every prisoner that they executed a tomb, then jesus wouldn't have been the only one.

It wasn't an honor. Crucified victims were often thrown in a common pit grave, or left on the cross for the birds and animals to consume (the utmost disgrace in their culture).

But there were times when crucified victims were buried. There was a strong Jewish concern not to desecrate the Sabbath with an unburied body. Rabbinical and Qumran texts attest to the Sanhedrin taking responsibility for the burial of executed criminals, making Joseph's actions to bury Jesus plausible.

In War 4.238-270, 316, Josephus reports how the Idumeans slew the chief priests. They cast their bodies out without burial although, Josephus writes, the Jews were extremely careful about funeral rites, and even buried before sunset those who were crucified.

According to Roman law. Ulpian, a Roman jurist of the 3rd century, says: "The bodies of those who are capitally punished cannot be denied to their relatives. At this day, however, the bodies of those who are executed are buried only in case permission is asked and granted; and sometimes permission is not given, especially in the cases of those who are punished for high treason. The bodies of the executed are to be given for burial to any one who asks for them."

Archaeologists have even found the remains of a crucified victim ("Yehohanan") buried in an ossuary (a bone box) with the nail spike still lodged in the ankle bone.

There's no real reason to doubt the burial story of Jesus.

> Of course they wanted to kill jesus, he was a threat to the system.

Yep, he was.

> Of course they needed to guard the tomb, jesus was a threat to the system.

Yep.

> Of course the guards wouldn't shirk in their duty, they would have been killed.

Yep. Roman law.

> Of course the apostles wouldn't lie, they were Christians

People are liars, for sure. But would you allow people to torture you and kill you for what you knew was a lie, or would you 'fess up when the pressure was on?

> Of course the bible survived long enough and was never altered.

There are plenty of manuscript discrepancies, but we have so many manuscripts and fragments that we can figure out what the original text was to about 99% accuracy. So, yeah, the Bible has survived long enough—hey, it's still in existence today!

> But that is just a whole lot of assumptions.

Not really. We pretty much know what happened. There aren't a whole lot of assumptions to it. On what grounds do you doubt the record the writers of the Gospels give us? We're all about evidence. Have you read things in there that have been proved to be untrue? Do you have any evidence?