[Neognosis]

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I'm confused. If you don't believe that the time and manner of Jesus' birth is an historical event - then what is your definition of "historical" data?

Well, the bible is not, nor does it pretend to be, a historical record. We don't even know if Jesus existed, so the time of a potentially fictional character's birth is not a historical event. Historical events are things we have evidence for. we dont have evidence for the birth, life, and death of christ, not even direct eyewitness accounts.

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What that shows is that at least one of the accounts is incorrect.

I don't like "incorrect" and "correct" applied to an occurrence of faith. What it shows is an insight into who wrote them, when, and possibly what their motives were.

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As for the significance of John being killed before Jesus - I'm not entirely sure there is any, apart from as a storytelling device.

I wonder if it is written that way to fulfill a jewish prophecy. I wonder if there's somethign about the voice in the wilderness being extinguished before HIS mission begins or something?

Or to eliminate the possibility of a "cult of john" rising up and proclaiming John as the savior?

[Tiggs]

Neognosis, on 09 November 2009 - 07:41 PM, said:

Well, the bible is not, nor does it pretend to be, a historical record.

I'd disagree. I think that most Christians are of the opinion that the gospels of the New Testament are eyewitness account's of Jesus' life, as told by the apostles.

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We don't even know if Jesus existed, so the time of a potentially fictional character's birth is not a historical event. Historical events are things we have evidence for. we dont have evidence for the birth, life, and death of christ, not even direct eyewitness accounts.

In that respect, we definitely agree.

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I don't like "incorrect" and "correct" applied to an occurrence of faith. What it shows is an insight into who wrote them, when, and possibly what their motives were.

I expect we'd agree that the versions of the synoptic gospel were tailored for their intended audience.

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I wonder if it is written that way to fulfill a jewish prophecy. I wonder if there's somethign about the voice in the wilderness being extinguished before HIS mission begins or something?

Or to eliminate the possibility of a "cult of john" rising up and proclaiming John as the savior?

Possibly. If so, I'm not aware of any such prophecy.

[Neognosis]

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I'd disagree. I think that most Christians are of the opinion that the gospels of the New Testament are eyewitness account's of Jesus' life, as told by the apostles.

I would agree, except not as told to the apostles. The apostles were dead by the time the gospels were written. Most of them if not all.

I think it's an account of jesus's life, obviously written for specific audiences after the fact, and I consider myself something of a christian. But to each his own...

the historical accuracy means nothing in light of the overall message, which I believe the overwhelming majority of christiand completely miss anyway.

[Tiggs]

Neognosis, on 09 November 2009 - 09:13 PM, said:

I would agree, except not as told to the apostles. The apostles were dead by the time the gospels were written. Most of them if not all.

I think it's an account of jesus's life, obviously written for specific audiences after the fact, and I consider myself something of a christian. But to each his own...

the historical accuracy means nothing in light of the overall message, which I believe the overwhelming majority of christiand completely miss anyway.

I think Christianity started as a messianic sect of Judaism, the idea of which was then taken by Paul and taught to the Gentiles. The first gospel is an anti-Jewish polemic written around AD 70 by a follower of Paul, who we'll call Mark for the sake of argument, after the destruction of the Jewish temple to illustrate that the Messiah had given up on the Jewish people.

Almost every single element of Mark's Gospel can be reconstructed from various snippets of the Apocalyptic texts of the Old Testament.

I think that Jesus, as a real, living person never existed. But to each his own...

[SpiderCyde]

A real scientific fact for religion? That's simple really, it ties up people's time, which in turn makes them less likely to get in trouble with the law during the hours spent at church. There ya go. LOL

This post has been edited by SpiderCyde: 09 November 2009 - 10:39 PM

[marabod]

Tiggs, on 10 November 2009 - 10:29 AM, said:

I think Christianity started as a messianic sect of Judaism, the idea of which was then taken by Paul and taught to the Gentiles. The first gospel is an anti-Jewish polemic written around AD 70 by a follower of Paul, who we'll call Mark for the sake of argument, after the destruction of the Jewish temple to illustrate that the Messiah had given up on the Jewish people.

Almost every single element of Mark's Gospel can be reconstructed from various snippets of the Apocalyptic texts of the Old Testament.

I think that Jesus, as a real, living person never existed. But to each his own...

Can I suggest one correction? "Jesus as he is described in NT never existed". This would be more true, as we do not know if real Jesus existed, but the integrity of the philosophy, presented in the Gospels, allows to suspect there was a real single author to it. But certainly, Jesus of Christianity was created by Paul's fantasy - mainly because Paul never saw Jesus himself. He visualised to himself some perfect image of man-God, who does not have sex or go to the toilet, and persuaded the followers that this was Jesus.

[Beckys_Mom]

SpiderCyde, on 09 November 2009 - 10:39 PM, said:

A real scientific fact for religion? That's simple really, it ties up people's time, which in turn makes them less likely to get in trouble with the law during the hours spent at church. There ya go. LOL

A scientific fact or facts to back up IE the bible the events that took place and it's many characters...

PS science dont go out to prove how many like to spend time going to churches LOL