seriously!?

[scifes]

it's simply unreasonable to doubt Jesus's existence, considering the amount of people -of human history- who believe in his existence.

i know when you get too deep in atheism it gets hard to see, but it's so freaking unreasonable.


(- all of humanity believed the world was flat, doesn't change that it was reasonable to think so given the circumstances of that time. till we create a time machine to expose the myth of jesus, it's pretty dumb not to believe in him, and by dumb i mean preeeeeety dumb, uh, pardon the frankness.

-this isn't an ad populum)

 

[Arioch]

Just like it's unreasonable to doubt the existence of Santa Clause considering the incredible number of people, throughout human history, who believe in his existence.

 

[Rhaedas]

The amount of believers in the past didn't make other religious figures any more true.

And Christians are holding at around 25-30% maybe of the world's population belief. So that's not a majority, not that majority would make anything truer anyway.

 

[Rhaedas]

That's a little more than the percentage of Americans who think the Sun goes around the Earth.

 

[scifes]

Just like it's unreasonable to doubt the existence of Santa Clause considering the incredible number of people, throughout human history, who believe in his existence.

is your world an elementary school?

The amount of believers in the past didn't make other religious figures any more true.

And Christians are holding at around 25-30% maybe of the world's population belief. So that's not a majority,

all abrahamic faiths believe in jesus, so add to them jews and muslims.

not that majority would make anything truer anyway.

that's opposite to common sense.

That's a little more than the percentage of Americans who think the Sun goes around the Earth.

interesting, you remember the source for that?

 

[Balerion]

it's simply unreasonable to doubt Jesus's existence, considering the amount of people -of human history- who believe in his existence.

i know when you get too deep in atheism it gets hard to see, but it's so freaking unreasonable.


(- all of humanity believed the world was flat, doesn't change that it was reasonable to think so given the circumstances of that time. till we create a time machine to expose the myth of jesus, it's pretty dumb not to believe in him, and by dumb i mean preeeeeety dumb, uh, pardon the frankness.

-this isn't an ad populum)

While I do believe there probably was an historical person upon whom the Jesus myth was built, I don't believe it simply because a bunch of other people do. That's no reason to believe in anything.

 

[Rhaedas]

all abrahamic faiths believe in jesus, so add to them jews and muslims.

For simple existence, maybe. Not for divinity. So if you're suggesting that a historical man named Jesus might have existed, then sure, it's possible. Lots of things are possible, that's why we look for more correlating evidence to make it more possible. Belief by itself based on religious texts that have been altered many times isn't very strong.

interesting, you remember the source for that?

Just google, there have been surveys before. It's unfortunately common that Americans have terrible track record in the science education.

 

[Rhaedas]

The amount of believers in the past didn't make other religious figures any more true.

To clarify for you. Lots of people in the Greek times believed in the Greek gods, right? Did they exist?

 

[spidergoat]

it's simply unreasonable to doubt Jesus's existence, considering the amount of people -of human history- who believe in his existence.

i know when you get too deep in atheism it gets hard to see, but it's so freaking unreasonable.


(- all of humanity believed the world was flat, doesn't change that it was reasonable to think so given the circumstances of that time. till we create a time machine to expose the myth of jesus, it's pretty dumb not to believe in him, and by dumb i mean preeeeeety dumb, uh, pardon the frankness.

-this isn't an ad populum)

No, it's not unreasonable, in fact it's quite reasonable. There is no record written around the time he is said to exist that would confirm it.

You might want to watch this:
http://www.thegodmovie.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_God_Who_Wasn't_There

Also, the world did not believe that the Earth was flat, especially anyone who would have been on the oceans and seas.

 

[scifes]

While I do believe there probably was an historical person upon whom the Jesus myth was built, I don't believe it simply because a bunch of other people do.

when that bunch is most of humanity, it's the logical thing to believe.
and the illogical thing not to.(without a reason)

That's no reason to believe in anything.

you a solipsist?

For simple existence, maybe. Not for divinity.

jesus's existence IS his "divinity", otherwise it isn't jesus.

Belief by itself based on religious texts that have been altered many times isn't very strong.

belief in history passed down through generations of humans till it became part of who we are and become is as strong as can be.

it's logical for a source to lie.
not unheard of two, pretty rare for three. almost impossible for 10 sources to lie the same lie.
count the sources, independent of time and place, which believe and confirm jesus's identity.
remember all abrahamic faiths believe in jesus.

Just google, there have been surveys before. It's unfortunately common that Americans have terrible track record in the science education.

when you state a fact or quote a statistic you are the one who should state its refrence, it's not me who should look for it for you.

To clarify for you. Lots of people in the Greek times believed in the Greek gods, right? Did they exist?

compare the size of the population of humans who believed in the greek gods, and their demographical area, to the eras and lands, which believed and still do in jesus. that difference is everything.

why did greek gods reach us as myths and jesus reach us as reality?

 

[spidergoat]

why did greek gods reach us as myths and jesus reach us as reality?

Emperor Constantine of Rome. That's the only reason, an accident of history.

 

[scifes]

No, it's not unreasonable, in fact it's quite reasonable. There is no record written around the time he is said to exist that would confirm it.

you're missing the whole point here. it is absolutly NOT reasonable to not believe in everything that doesn't have a record written down around the time said thing is said to exist.

you don't ask for a written record that there's disney land in california when everybody's talking about it.

it's absolutely unreasonable, and i'm not surprised you're blind to it,along with most if not everybody here, that it's inconceivably weird and strange and downright dumb, to disbelieve in simply the most known man in the history of mankind. if some guy named Zork climbed everest, shouted in a voice that could be heard in a 1000 mile radius circle, parted the clouds around the mountain and peed into the sky and his pee solidified to create another moon, and there were no cameras to capture it, but people spoke about it for centuries and saw the yellow moon overhead and passed down stories of what the man looked like and what he said and his life and how he died etc etc..
..it would be illogical to doubt the story.
until we send a satellite to that moon and analyze it and find it wasn't pee, and that it existed gazillions of years before the alleged story took place. then we can refute it. till then, it stands.

 

[scifes]

Emperor Constantine of Rome. That's the only reason, an accident of history.

try to seriously and deeply think about what i said. bible contradictions and no proof for god aside.

 

[Rhaedas]

jesus's existence IS his "divinity", otherwise it isn't jesus.

Then you'll have to take Judaism and Islam out of your percentage. One of the major things that separates them from Christianity is who they think Jesus was.

belief in history passed down through generations of humans till it became part of who we are and become is as strong as can be.

it's logical for a source to lie.
not unheard of two, pretty rare for three. almost impossible for 10 sources to lie the same lie.
count the sources, independent of time and place, which believe and confirm jesus's identity.

Not talking about intentional lying. Ever place the game "Telephone"? A biblical example...why do the four gospels differ?

remember all abrahamic faiths believe in jesus.

See above on "all" of the faiths.

when you state a fact or quote a statistic you are the one who should state its refrence, it's not me who should look for it for you.

My point was it wasn't a hard number, just something easily found. But if you insist.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/3742/new-poll-gauges-americans-general-knowledge-levels.aspx

Four out of Five Americans Know Earth Revolves Around Sun
Probing a more universal measure of knowledge, Gallup also asked the following basic science question, which has been used to indicate the level of public knowledge in two European countries in recent years: "As far as you know, does the earth revolve around the sun or does the sun revolve around the earth?" In the new poll, about four out of five Americans (79%) correctly respond that the earth revolves around the sun, while 18% say it is the other way around. These results are comparable to those found in Germany when a similar question was asked there in 1996; in response to that poll, 74% of Germans gave the correct answer, while 16% thought the sun revolved around the earth, and 10% said they didn't know. When the question was asked in Great Britain that same year, 67% answered correctly, 19% answered incorrectly, and 14% didn't know.

compare the size of the population of humans who believed in the greek gods, and their demographical area, to the eras and lands, which believed and still do in jesus. that difference is everything.

Let's put that into perspective. Were not the Greeks a large part of the western world then? It's not valid to compare Greek population then with todays 7 billion.

why did greek gods reach us as myths and jesus reach us as reality?

The Roman Empire embraced Christianity as its religion. Might makes right.

 

[spidergoat]

you're missing the whole point here. it is absolutly NOT reasonable to not believe in everything that doesn't have a record written down around the time said thing is said to exist.

Yes it is. People have been writing things down for a long time. There are contemporaneous records of the Roman emperors, but the earliest records about Jesus date to about a hundred years after he is said to have existed. That's like me writing about someone in 1911. The thing people believe isn't the man if they had never seen him. They believe the stories about the man.

you don't ask for a written record that there's disney land in california when everybody's talking about it.

That's only because it's not that important to me. But if it did become important, I'm sure it would not be hard to find rooms full of historical documents about Disneyland.

it's absolutely unreasonable, and i'm not surprised you're blind to it,along with most if not everybody here, that it's inconceivably weird and strange and downright dumb, to disbelieve in simply the most known man in the history of mankind. if some guy named Zork climbed everest, shouted in a voice that could be heard in a 1000 mile radius circle, parted the clouds around the mountain and peed into the sky and his pee solidified to create another moon, and there were no cameras to capture it, but people spoke about it for centuries and saw the yellow moon overhead and passed down stories of what the man looked like and what he said and his life and how he died etc etc..
..it would be illogical to doubt the story.
until we send a satellite to that moon and analyze it and find it wasn't pee, and that it existed gazillions of years before the alleged story took place. then we can refute it. till then, it stands.

So all stories can be considered true as long as enough people believe it? That's just about the stupidest thing I've ever heard.

 

[spidergoat]

try to seriously and deeply think about what i said. bible contradictions and no proof for god aside.

I have thought about it. But I guess you haven't. If the Emperor didn't embrace Christianity, it would have died out like so many other cults from the same era. The Bible wasn't even written by the disciples, did you know that? The various gospels are just named after them.

I'm willing to consider that there was a Jesus, mostly for the purposes of arguing about Christianity. But there didn't have to be. There was, for instance, no Lao Tzu, the alleged author of the Tao Te Ching, a book that has defined Taoism for centuries.

 

[Balerion]

when that bunch is most of humanity, it's the logical thing to believe.

But believing something just because others believe it is not logical. You're making a decision to believe in something for a reason unrelated to that thing.

and the illogical thing not to.(without a reason)

Well, wait. Who said there wasn't a reason not to? Everyone believing in something does not imply that there is no reason to believe otherwise. Everyone believed the world was flat, but there was evidence to the contrary. Everyone believed the Earth was the center of the universe, but there was evidence to the contrary.

 

[Balerion]

I have thought about it. But I guess you haven't. If the Em

I'm willing to consider that there was a Jesus, mostly for the purposes of arguing about Christianity. But there didn't have to be. There was, for instance, no Lao Tzu, the alleged author of the Tao Te Ching, a book that has defined Taoism for centuries.

I'm not sure how you mean the part in bold. Do you mean that there did not have to be an historical Jesus for Christianity to begin, or there did not have to be an historical Jesus for Christianity to work? If you mean the former, I can agree.

 

[spidergoat]

I guess Christians would care whether there was a historical Jesus, but in many other religions, the philosophy speaks for itself. I don't care if there was a historical Socrates, for instance, we have the words, and it's the ideas that count. I do think Christianity works for Christians whether or not Jesus was real. Their "having a relationship with Jesus Christ" is all in their minds.

As to whether Christianity could begin without Jesus, it did begin without Jesus. Jesus was a Jew, not a Christian. If there wasn't a Jesus, it could be that Christian legends are based on another person, or an even older myth, or based on the stories of several people that were combined into one over time. I don't think there was a Moses, either.

 

[AlexG]

it's simply unreasonable to doubt Jesus's existence, considering the amount of people -of human history- who believe in his existence.

Ditto the Easter Bunny.