Thoughts on the Resurrection

Originally posted by Scriabin
no, I do not think there is anything particularly noble or virtuous about human beings. We flatter ourselves while lying through our teeth, especially to ourselves.

Everything can be justified, we are never to blame. We admit error or confess transgressions only when we can use that for some personal gain. That is human nature and it is what it has alwa u can get 2 billion people to share that belief. None may ride one, nonetheless.

My goodness, how cynical can one get, no i do not believe that every human being lies through their teeth to others or about themselves, nor do i necessarily think that there is no such thing as human virtue, quite the contrary, humans have been and are prepared to die for a principal, and no amount of cynicism nor derogatory language nor vain and feeble attempts to discredit the 'reality', of the divine with references to semantics will spare you this truth, the reality is quite the converse.

take for example the Nazi concentration camps of the holocaust, for you and I both have a vested interest in this, you by virtue of being Jewish, me by virtue of my wife being one of Jehovahs witnesses. were not those people prepared to die, yes, give up their lives for a principle? your assertion therefore to reason is quite erroneous, for the mind would have reasoned, i am going to die, i will therefore, of necessity, in order to preserve my life, sign the Nazi mandate to renounce my faith and I shall walk away free! why were those who suffered the same fate and atrocities of the Jewish people, who in effect had no choice, refuse to do so? because there was higher and more noble principles at work than the violent threats of the Nazis, firstly refusal to hail Hitler, a principle based on the fact that allegiance should be shown only to God, secondly, that it was quite contrary to the teachings of the Christ, to take up arms against a fellow human being, thirdly, that the law of human conscience was inviolable!

these instances, and i am sure there are many others, prove, yes i will say it again, prove that their actions were not based on some ghost, some unreality, some figment of the imagination, no sir, it was firmly and resolutely fixed on realities, on principles which they held to be divine, now you can argue all you like for the case of actual inspiration, but you cannot dispel the reality!

once again i will ask the ladies and the gentlemen of the jury to disregard Mr Scriabins comments, especially the references to flimsy, worn out, no basis in fact and nonsense 🙂

Originally posted by twhitehead
Yet like it or not it is an important point that you clearly would not like to think about. If you wish to show that Jesus astounded his audience then you have at least give reasonable cause for us to believe that the sole reporter of the event (who did not witness it himself anyway) was telling the truth and further based his report on reliable informati f impressed crowds all over the world at any point in history listening to 'old rehash'.

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Yet like it or not it is an important point that you clearly would not like to think about. If you wish to show that Jesus astounded his audience then you have at least give reasonable cause for us to believe that the sole reporter of the event (who did not witness it himself anyway) was telling the truth and further based his report on reliable information and was not embellishing the tale (as is normal in such circumstances).
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You don't know that that Matthew was not an eye witness. Who in the first three centries is on record seriously refuting that the author of Matthew's Gospel was not an eye witness ?

I think you are projecting. You read conspiracy and trickery everywhere in the Gospels. I seriously think you are injecting your own paranoia into an honest account of history. Your reading of exageration and embellishment here and there in the Bible, I think just reflects your own cleverness.

Atheists are usually very clever thinking people. At least they tend to think they are very clever. The problem I have is, should I assume they are wise simply because they are clever? No.

I do not assume automatically that clever people are wise people.


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You seem to have missed the fact that I quite clearly stated that todays people are no different.
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In the teaching on the mount Jesus still points to Himself. You are blessed if you are spoken evil of for His sake.

It may be true that there are similar ethical teachings which sound like things in the Sermon on the Mount. However, those teachings don't focus on the speaker as the centrality of what is being taught.

In the Mount teaching Jesus still points to Himself as the centrality:

"Blessed are you when they reporach and persecute you, and while speaking lies, say every evil thing against you BECAUSE OF ME (my emphasis).

Rejoice and exult, for your reward is great in the heavens; for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you." (Matt. 5:11,12)

Also, apparently it was amazing that Jesus established Himself as the final Judge as to how well His teaching would be kept:

"Not every one who says to Me, Lord, Lord will enter into thekingdom of the heavens, but he who does the will of My Father who is in the heavens.

Many will say to ME in that day, Lord, Lord, was it not in Your name that we prophesied, and in Your name cast out demons, and in You name did many works of power?

AND THEN I WILL DECLARE TO THEM: I NEVER KNEW YOU. Depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness." (Matt.7:21,22)

The is astounding to me if not to the atheist. That is because Christ conveys Himself to be utterly one with the will of God His Father. And so much so to the point that He will accept or dismiss those who come before Him to be judged for thier conduct in relation to His teaching.

So - "And when Jesus finished these words, the crowds were astounded at His teaching, For He taught them as One having authority and not like their scribes." (v.29)


And I would add, and not like thier, or our own athiests, of this day.

Originally posted by twhitehead
Firstly we must assume that Matthew was telling the truth (not using poetic license etc).
Secondly, his audience was probably mostly poor, illiterate and had not heard very many speeches before. If you give a speach in nearly any part of the world today with poor uneducated folk I am sure you could astound them with almost anything from Shakespere (if yo ...[text shortened]... ther or not he had 'divine authority' has nothing to do with whether his message was unique.

Acts 17:16-21:
Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him when he saw that the city was given over to idols.
Therefore he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and with the Gentile worshipers, and in the marketplace daily with those who happened to be there.
Then certain Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him. And some said, “What does this babbler want to say?” Others said, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods, “ because he preached to them Jesus and the resurrection.
And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new doctrine is of which you speak? For you are bringing some strange things to our ears. Therefore we want to know what these things mean.”
For all the Athenians and the foreigners who were there spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing.
(emphasis added)

Huh. Here, in the "enlightened" confines of Athens--- several years following the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ--- sophisticated people found themselves amazed at the old rehash.

Go figure.

Originally posted by jaywill
You don't know that that Matthew was not an eye witness. Who in the first three centries is on record seriously refuting that the author of Matthew's Gospel was not an eye witness ?

No I don't know that he was not an eye witness, but I am fairly sure that he wasn't.
Who in the first three centuries is on record seriously claiming that he was an eye witness? Why does the opinion of the people in the first three centuries matter?

I think you are projecting. You read conspiracy and trickery everywhere in the Gospels. I seriously think you are injecting your own paranoia into an honest account of history. Your reading of exageration and embellishment here and there in the Bible, I think just reflects your own cleverness.
I think it is you that is projecting. You seem to be quite seriously paranoid about any possible criticism of the Bible. Go back through my posts and see if you can seriously see anything I have written that suggests what you are claiming about me.

Atheists are usually very clever thinking people. At least they tend to think they are very clever. The problem I have is, should I assume they are [b]wise simply because they are clever? No.[/b]
Atheists as a group have almost nothing in common except their lack of belief in a deity. Nobody is asking you to think that I am clever or wise. What has that got to do with anything anyway?

"And when Jesus finished these words, the crowds were astounded at His teaching, For He taught them as One having authority and not like their scribes." (v.29)
Would you at least concede that the crowds being astounded does not indicate in any way that the message he taught was unique? It merely indicates that the crowd had not experienced it before.

And I would add, and not like thier, or our own athiests, of this day.
How is that relevant? Why are you getting so upset about this?

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Huh. Here, in the "enlightened" confines of Athens--- several years following the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ--- sophisticated people found themselves amazed at the old rehash.

Go figure.

Would you also concede that the amazement of the crowd after the sermon on the mount does not indicate that the message was not old rehash? It seems so as instead of arguing against it you looked for further evidence.

As for your further evidence it is far better than jaywills argument.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Acts 17:16-21:
Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him when he saw that the city was given over to idols.
Therefore he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and with the Gentile worshipers, and in the marketplace daily with those who happened to be there.
Then certain Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered ...[text shortened]... Jesus Christ--- sophisticated people found themselves amazed at the old rehash.

Go figure.

The Athenians were definitely aware of similar (not identical to Paul’s) Eastern religious doctrines. Plato’s theory is full of similar approaches; also, at least since the time of Alexander the Great, the communication link between the West and the East was well established.

Furthermore, the historians Strabo and Nicolaus of Damascus note that the Indian sarmana “…Zarmanochegas, a native of Bargosa, had immortalized himself according to the custom of his country”, as it was written on his tomb. This action (the Indian set happily himself on fire in order to have his spirit free) took place in Athens, and his tomb was visible at the time of Plutarch; therefore it is clear that the Athenians had the chance to see and talk to various religious men from India and other Eastern countries before, during and after Jesus’ death.

So it seems to me that the Athenians were not particularly amazed with Paul's gospel -they probably just wanted to pin him down by means of their dialectic dexterity, as they used to do with every "weirdo", and to engage him in a conversation aiming to prove in front of everybody that he was talking nonsense.

Anyway, do you actually remember how did the Athenians reacted actually to Paul's gospel?

Originally posted by robbie carrobie
My goodness, how cynical can one get, no i do not believe that every human being lies through their teeth to others or about themselves, nor do i necessarily think that there is no such thing as human virtue, quite the contrary, humans have been and are prepared to die for a principal, and no amount of cynicism nor derogatory language nor vain and fe bins comments, especially the references to flimsy, worn out, no basis in fact and nonsense 🙂

your ignorance is showing more and more. willful ignorance is the worst kind of moral and intellectual blindness.

you confuse and conflate the Nazi Holocaust with the Spanish Inquisition. The Germans were not interested in having Jews renounce their religion.

The Germans were interested in exterminating a people based on the knowingly erroneous and willful, cynically ignorant presumption that being a Jew is being a member of a race, the Jewish race -- something that does not, in fact, exist.

The Jews and others who died in the Nazi extermination program did not have an option to live. They were there to work as slaves until every last bit of their economic utility to the state was used up, then they were murdered, systematically. None of them were set free simply because they offered to sacrifice their religious or other principles.

It would seem that you simply don't know much about the world, its history, or you prefer at all times to make things up and represent them as fact.

That is sad.

Again, you are merely asserting without evidence that your invisible friend exists.

Perhaps you are suffering from hallucinations, delusions, or some mental disorder.

Or perhaps you are merely willfully ignorant because you prefer to believe in the reality of something that does not, in reality, exist and which you cannot prove using any normal standard of evidence -- you have inference, you have assertion, you have nothing else.

You say "i do not believe that every human being lies through their teeth to others or about themselves,"

Yet, you are lying through your teeth to me and, more sadly, to yourself. Your arguments I anticipated and listed in that long series of posts. Perhaps you ought to begin there so you will get a clue as to why what you use as justification for your beliefs is so old, tired, and long since refuted.

Now if the angel Gabriel, or some other divine emissary, shows up to shake your hand or mine, that would be something new.

But you can no more show anyone that the "divine" exists in this world than you can show that there are Martians living among us.

You are simply afraid to face the world that is the case. So you've invented an invisible friend to help you out.

If you were a child, one could excuse and understand, before correcting you. One is taught to eschew fantasy and embrace the world as it is, however tough that is. Freedom comes with the responsibility to face that which is the case, however hard that is.

Some people can do it -- that young climber who severed his own hand with a pocket knife is an extreme case. He knew that if he did not do what he did, he would die. He chose to live and faced the reality and embraced the consequences of that choice, regardless of the horror and the pain of it.

That is not some abstract "principle" at work; that is courage to face the truth when it is hard. That is why some Jews knew what was in store for them, but for the sake of others walked into the gas chamber with their heads high saying out loud the prayer that identified them as Jews to their fellow victims.

The brave man and the coward both die in the end. What matters, what distinguishes one from the other is that the brave man faces his death and looks it in the eye, he does not cower and seek solace in that which does not exist -- in short, the brave man is free and the coward is a slave.

presumably you should have put away childish things by now.

More's the pity.

Originally posted by Scriabin
your ignorance is showing more and more. willful ignorance is the worst kind of moral and intellectual blindness.

you confuse and conflate the Nazi Holocaust with the Spanish Inquisition. The Germans were not interested in having Jews renounce their religion.

The Germans were interested in exterminating a people based on the knowingly erroneous and ave.

presumably you should have put away childish things by now.

More's the pity.

oh saddened one, i have humored you enough, ignored your insults and references to ignorance etc etc each and every statement you have made has been thoroughly refuted, the Jewish people had no choice, they were not martyrs, those other persons did have a choice, they were martyrs, martyrs for a cause, a noble and virtuous cause and they readily died rather than compromise their cherished principles, based on a reality!!! please do not negate this through ignorance, it is unjust and unworthy of your learning to do so!

i provide an excerpt from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, which you will find online

Jehovah's Witnesses endured intense persecution under the Nazi regime. Actions against the religious group and its individual members spanned the Nazi years 1933 to 1945. Unlike Jews and Sinti and Roma (Gypsies), persecuted and killed by virtue of their birth, Jehovah's Witnesses had the opportunity to escape persecution and personal harm by renouncing their religious beliefs. The courage the vast majority displayed in refusing to do so, in the face of torture, maltreatment in concentration camps, and sometimes execution, won them the respect of many contemporaries.

http://www.ushmm.org/education/resource/jehovahs/jehovahsw.php

so now please no more references to ignorance, nor negation of these facts, nor references to mental health, delusions nor willful ignorance nor lies, it is simply no becoming a man of your learning nor a gentleman for that matter.

Originally posted by robbie carrobie
oh saddened one, i have humored you enough, ignored your insults and references to ignorance etc etc each and every statement you have made has been thoroughly refuted, the Jewish people had no choice, they were not martyrs, [b]those other persons did have a choice, they were martyrs, martyrs for a cause, a noble and virtuous cause and they read ...[text shortened]... nce nor lies, it is simply no becoming a man of your learning nor a gentleman for that matter.[/b]

Jehovah's Witnesses?

ah, that explains everything.

I had no idea you were so afflicted, err, persuaded.

no more point in discussing these issues with you than to ask a blind man to advise a house painter on what color to use. Your disability is rather similar.

Originally posted by Scriabin
Jehovah's Witnesses?

ah, that explains everything.

I had no idea you were so afflicted, err, persuaded.

no more point in discussing these issues with you than to ask a blind man to advise a house painter on what color to use. Your disability is rather similar.

my goodness man, what is it with you, if you were not so amusing.. i dunno, anyhow, i want to discuss something with you, its my theory on atrocities and acts of sheer and utter criminality, the like of which you mentioned earlier, with regard to the Taliban and the killing of those two would be lovers who tried to run away to Iran, i need someone with at least some insight on these matters, so seeing that I like you despite you're inane rants and rabid ravings I will lay it on you, as the Americans are want to say, (one must admire them for their brevity and economy of launguage), anyhow, at the Nuremberg trials the IV principle to be established was

The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him.

now what i want to establish from you, is, why in the case of the Nazis, why in the case of the Taliban and why in the case of every other type of injustice and atrocity is this conscienceless demeanor manifest, what happens?

one of the prosecutors at the Nuremberg trials, the Frenchman De Menthon used an interesting, but in my opinion, vague and ill defined term, please note,

The French prosecutor, M. De Menthon, has pointed to the 'demoniacal" undertaking of Hitler and therewith pronounced a word which had necessarily to be brought up in a discussion which is dedicated to the investigation of events forming the background of these Trials. It is the natural endeavor of intelligent people to analyze the reasons for events which have deeply touched the fate of mankind in these days. If these events deviate from the regular happenings and the natural course of things so much that they sharpen our imagination, we take our refuge in metaphysical powers. I ask you not to consider the pointing to such metaphysical forces as an attempt to evade responsibility. We are all still under the impression of the attempt by a single man to lead the world from its course. I should not care to be misunderstood: The "demoniacal" is an incomprehensible yet extremely real power. Many call it "fate." If I speak of fateful, metaphysical powers, I do not mean the fate

my theory is, that what indeed happens is that the human capacity for the free exercise of conscience somehow becomes marred and like a carcinogenic cell which replicates a healthy one, the cancerous ideology feeds on it, overcomes it, destroys the host and eventually itself, how else are we to explain these things? i appeal to you in earnest, yes one may analyze the general reasons for this and that in retrospect, but on an individual level, what is happening, how can a man kill his own son or daughter on the basis of family honor?, how can someone watch women and children, mothers and grandmothers mercilessly die, i refuse to believe that humans are so bad, i cannot come to terms with it?

Originally posted by robbie carrobie
my goodness man, what is it with you, if you were not so amusing.. i dunno, anyhow, i want to discuss something with you, its my theory on atrocities and acts of sheer and utter criminality, the like of which you mentioned earlier, with regard to the Taliban and the killing of those two would be lovers who tried to run away to Iran, i need someone wi cilessly die, i refuse to believe that humans are so bad, i cannot come to terms with it?

first of all, it is a tradition in my family to make fun of religion, including our own. We laughed throughout the passover seder when I was a kid -- not so much at my aunt's house.

"If you want
special illumination,
look upon a human face:
see deeply,
within laughter,
the essence
of ultimate
truth..."

Mevlana Jallaludin Rumi

My father loved to see Jehovah's Witnesses come to the door. He'd lead them by the nose and then, after they got all earnest and thought they were getting somewhere, he'd smile gently and say something just to see their faces fall like a brick. He didn't discriminate -- once, actually, a guy came around selling cemetery plots door to door (can you imagine?). My father acted all interested and enthused to get the jerk to launch into his pitch and start filling out an order form -- until my father said, "oh, and for my wife, she wants to be buried standing up .... on her head ... facing West." The guy's pen slowed as he completed that one, and his face showed the dawn breaking at last as he looked up.

We can't help it. If you can't laugh, what else are you going to do? You cannot, absolutely cannot take all this seriously.

I told you the truth was hard. Now you are trying to invent some convenient, comfy little explanation that shifts the blame from where it belongs to something "demoniacal."

That rhetoric is political speech designed to play to the mentally challenged who like to invent or believe in supernatural causes for simple, mundane, run of the mill human criminality and brutality.

People who lead these criminal and brutal movements are motivated by a thirst for power. Those who follow them are ignorant, uneducated for the most part, or complicit in their quest for power and material gain.

We lie a lot to ourselves to avoid responsibility for things we do, say or think. Fortunately, as least so long as we are not economically deprived or starving, we can limit those lies so we cannot imagine excusing criminality or brutality on our part.

That isn't the case everywhere for everyone. You have to look at each separate context; there is no easy, one size fits all, cow dung answer related to the supernatural.

These acts, however shocking, are the product of real world human behavior, not something abstract, something true of all, everywhere. They are products of specific situations among specific people driven by different influences at different times.

No one promised you a rose garden.

Originally posted by twhitehead
No I don't know that he was not an eye witness, but I am fairly sure that he wasn't.
Who in the first three centuries is on record seriously claiming that he was an eye witness? Why does the opinion of the people in the first three centuries matter?

[b]I think you are projecting. You read conspiracy and trickery everywhere in the Gospels. I seriously n athiests, of this day.
How is that relevant? Why are you getting so upset about this?[/b]

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Would you at least concede that the crowds being astounded does not indicate in any way that the message he taught was unique? It merely indicates that the crowd had not experienced it before.
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I will concede this. This is not the only set of teachings which could be viewed as strikingly impressive. I would have to acknolwledge, for example, that the teachings of Confucius have had a huge effect on history, obviously. And there are some parallels which could be drawn between the "sermon on the mount" and other ethical teachings.

And important difference is that Jesus taught that He Himself would be there to arbitrate judgment to those who heard what He taught:

"Many will say to ME ... in that day, Lord, Lord, was it not in Your name that we prophesied, and in Your name cast out demons, and in You name did many works of power?

And then I will declare to them: I never knew you. Depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness." (Matt. 7:22,23)

I don't think you will find such a parallel either in Muhammed's teaching or in that of Confucious. Confucious said some very wise things. I don't believe that he added "And one day you'll have to answer to ME about these things I am teaching."

Originally posted by Scriabin
first of all, it is a tradition in my family to make fun of religion, including our own. We laughed throughout the passover seder when I was a kid -- not so much at my aunt's house.

"If you want
special illumination,
look upon a human face:
see deeply,
within laughter,
the essence
of ultimate
truth..."

Mevlana ...[text shortened]... by different influences at different times.

No one promised you a rose garden.

oh Scriabin, please, i am completely A-political, have never voted nor ever will, you must note that i found the term demoniacal vague and ill advised. I just think there must be something more to it than stupidity, or wanton cruelty, or self serving or whatever. So i take it you don't buy my theory of conscience and its suppression and subversion, oh well, as Wile E Cayote said, back to the old drawing board!

Originally posted by robbie carrobie
oh Scriabin, please, i am completely A-political, have never voted nor ever will, you must note that i found the term demoniacal vague and ill advised. I just think there must be something more to it than stupidity, or wanton cruelty, or self serving or whatever. So i take it you don't buy my theory of conscience and its suppression and subversion, oh well, as Wile E Cayote said, back to the old drawing board!

Some say that Nasrudin lived in the time of the great conqueror Tamerlane, and was one of his advisers.

One day, so goes the tale, Timur the Lame called the Mullah and said:

'Nasrudin, the Empire is full of slanderers. How can we stop their evil work?'

'You can never stop crime unless you punish all the criminals,' said Nasrudin.

'You mean the slanderers?'

'And their accomplices - those who listen to them,' the Mullah reminded him.

Originally posted by robbie carrobie
oh Scriabin, please, i am completely A-political, have never voted nor ever will, you must note that i found the term demoniacal vague and ill advised. I just think there must be something more to it than stupidity, or wanton cruelty, or self serving or whatever. So i take it you don't buy my theory of conscience and its suppression and subversion, oh well, as Wile E Cayote said, back to the old drawing board!

Nasrudin entered the Land of Fools.

'O people,' he cried, 'sin and evil are hateful!'

He did the same thing every day for some weeks.

One day as he was about to start his lecture, he saw a group of Foolslanders standing with folded arms.

'What are you doing?'

'We have just decided what to do about all this sin and evil you have been talking about all the time.'

'So you have decided to shun it?'

'No, we have decided to shun you.'