Hi Mriana,
Elaine Pagels is certainly a favorite of mine as well. The Origin of Satan was probably my favorite. The Gnostic Gospels ranks number two, and her most recent book Why Religion is at #3.
Personally, I was a devout Christian for over 40yrs. It wasn’t until I started working in Pediatric Oncology that I started to question my faith. After years of research, I no longer have an imaginary friend.
That’s good, because I can’t imagine worshiping a deity that doesn’t do anything to help people.
As a historical document isn’t the New Testament reliable?
The New Testament is not a “historical document”, it’s a religious doctrine. It is not an account of “what happened” and was never intended to be so. It value is as a basis for religious belief. There is no document ever found which both contains accounts of magical happenings and is considered to be “historically reliable”. So no, the New Testament is not reliable as a historical document. It was compiled from a group of religiously motivated scrolls by a church for the purposes of solidifying the doctrine of that church. It was not compiled by historians from a group of historical accounts for the purpose of verifying history.
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John did Not write any of the gospels. They were written by unknown authors. There are zero first hand accounts of Jesus. Jesus native language was Aramaic. The bible was written in Greek ? Less than 2% of the population could even read or write during that time period. If it wasn’t for Constantine and the Nicea Council, Jesus would have never reached divine stardom.
We are products of our environment and most of us inherit our religion from our families.
Perhaps you might find the attached videos useful. I’ve posted them in the past.
Why am I in moderation?
Blaire said; Why am I in moderation?When a post is large or has several links, it is flagged for examination by a moderator, perhaps for viruses, etc..
All my “moderated” posts have passed and appeared the next day.
That’s interesting. From what I’ve heard from apologetics the New Testament was more reliable than other greek documents such as homer.
“The New Testament is not a ‘historical document’, it’s a religious doctrine.”
Just because it’s religious doctrine, how does that diminish its status as a" historical document?"
It is not an account of “what happened” and was never intended to be so.
how? It’s literally a narrative of people trying to retell a the death of Jesus. How do you know the author’s intentions for the document?
It value is as a basis for religious belief.
It is a religious text, so therefore the author are lying? (liars make bad martyrs, assuming the unknown authors would die for their faith. The 12 did though)
There is no document ever found which both contains accounts of magical happenings and is considered to be “historically reliable”. So no, the New Testament is not reliable as a historical document.
I don’t think the academic community will consider any supernatural event to be reliable based on pieces of paper. I can’t prove that it is sooo… However, what about the talmud and Jesus’s detractors claiming that his miracles were from demons and magic. Doesn’t that imply that even his enemies believe his supernatural abilities were real and that there were witnesses to supernatural events?
It was compiled from a group of religiously motivated scrolls by a church for the purposes of solidifying the doctrine of that church. It was not compiled by historians from a group of historical accounts for the purpose of verifying history.
What about copies that date back way before Constantine and the Dead Sea scrolls? What about documents of Josephus and the talmud stating that Jesus was a jewish man that actually died?
From what I’ve heard from apologetics the New Testament was more reliable than other greek documents such as homer.You're first mistake is to take apologetics as scholarship.
Just because it’s apologetics, how does that make it false?
It doesn’t. Show me the merits of your arguments.
Just because it’s apologetics, how does that make it false?It doesn't make it false just by being apologetics, but apologists are not scholars. Make a real argument and I'll respond to it. Homer was also mythology, so I don't even know what you mean by "reliable".
Hi, the three best books on the resurrection of Christ are "The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, " by Habermas and Licona. The former (Gary Habermas), is considered by many to be the world’s leading expert on the evidence for the resurrection of Christ. The latter (Mike Licona), is a New Testament scholar and wrote, “The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach.”(This book is over 700 pages).
William Lane Craig wrote, “Assessing the New Testament Evidence for the Historicity of the Resurrection of Jesus.”
There are very good reasons to believe Jesus rose from the dead.
Al said; There are very good reasons to believe Jesus rose from the dead.Do you mean this literally or metaphorically? If you mean this literally, you have some explaining to do, because I am sure none of those books address the actual circumstances by which any human could rise from being dead in a clinical context.
Clinical death
Clinical death is the medical term for cessation of blood circulation and breathing, the two necessary criteria to sustain human and many other organisms' lives. It occurs when the heart stops beating in a regular rhythm, a condition called cardiac arrest. The term is also sometimes used in resuscitation research. Stopped blood circulation has historically proven irreversible in most cases. Prior to the invention of cardiopulmonary resuscitation, defibrillation, epinephrine injection, and other treatments in the 20th century, the absence of blood circulation was historically considered to be the official definition of death.With the advent of these strategies, cardiac arrest came to be called “clinical death” rather than simply “death” to reflect the possibility of post-arrest resuscitation; for medical purposes, it is considered to be the final physical state before permanent death. At the onset of clinical death, consciousness is lost within several seconds. Measurable brain activity stops within 20 to 40 seconds. Irregular gasping may occur during this early time period, and is sometimes mistaken by rescuers as a sign that CPR is not necessary.
During clinical death, all tissues and organs in the body steadily accumulate a type of injury called ischemic injury.
Write4U, I agree that it is impossible for a person to rise from clinical death, naturally speaking. But if Jesus was who he claimed to be, and if a theistic God exists, then resurrection and other miracles are most certainly possible.
Widdersin said: “No historian or scientist anywhere has found any corroborating evidence of Jesus or anyone else going all Harry Potter on history.”
My Response: This is one thing I don’t like about mythicists and atheists. They overstate their claims. The Epistle to the Galatians (New Testament) is considered by scholars (conservative and liberal) to be genuinely pauline (St. Paul actually wrote it). Paul says in Galatians that he met Peter, James, and John. He refers to James as “the Lord’s brother.” (Galatians 1:19). The atheist Richard Carrier (a mythicist) admitted that this passage is the strongest evidence for the historical Jesus.
Widdershins wrote:“The New Testament is not a ‘historical document’, it’s a religious doctrine.”
My Response: Where is the evidence for the claim? The N.T. is written in the genre of Greco-Roman biography. And even if it were “religious doctrine,” that it no way proves it is not historical. Read “The Historical Reliability of the Gospels,” by Craig Blomberg.
People should not reference Richard Carrier as an authority on Jesus or the New Testament. He is not a New Testament scholar or a recognized Jesus scholar. His “mythical Jesus” view is fringe. See this article by Larry Hurtado. He discusses Richard Carrier.
"Write4U, I agree that it is impossible for a person to rise from clinical death, naturally speaking. But if Jesus was who he claimed to be, and if a theistic God exists, then resurrection and other miracles are most certainly possible."That's a tautology that explains nothing. It is true, but so trivially true that it has no explanatory value.
You are, in effect, saying, “If a god that could do miracles existed then it could do miracles.” Replace the word “god” with any other noun and the statement is exactly as true. (Try it with ‘raisin’, ‘star’, ‘octopus’ or ‘poster of Justin Bieber’, to see what I mean.)
So I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m just saying that the fact you’re right is irrelevant. [If you already knew this, sorry for stating the obvious.]
@Al
Elaine Pagels is the Harrington Speare Paine Professor of Religion and Theology at Princeton Divinity. She is regarded in biblical acadamia as the Elite! She does Not believe in supernatural Jesus.
Think about this. Why is it your job to defend God? Isn’t he large enough to defend himself? He can’t even prove his existence on his own ?
There is no reason to assume existence in god without evidence. You do not get to imagine possibilities.