Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!sdd.hp.com!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!ncar!gatech!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: lindborg@cs.washington.edu (Jeff Lindborg) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Don't mean to be rude, but....... Message-ID: Date: 15 Feb 91 23:47:29 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: University of Washington Computer Science Lines: 84 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article davidbu@loowit.wr.tek.com (David E. Buxton) writes: >Some time ago I read a small book, "Who Moved The Stone", by Frank >Morison. The author was from a German university famous for the >Agnostics that graduated there. Frank was one of them. Instead of >simply intelluctually arguing his pet theories with his friends of like >mind he decided to go one step better. He set out to prove the whole >story of Jesus to be a fraud. If you mean he set out to prove the Jesus did not exist, then he set out on a mission doomed from the start. There are at least two independed secular sources which mention the 'Jesus of Nazareth' (although one was altered by Christian editors and seems to try and indicate the author believed that Christ was the Messiah, which he did not). >He put his analytical mind to work on the Gospels and he also studied >secular literature and documents as well as what ever Jewish sourced >material he could lay his hands on. He started out convinced that the >story of Jesus was a fiction and so he searched the records to prove it >so. Well, the story that rose up around Jesus may quite well be fiction. But the fact that a man named Jesus existed around that time seems well accepted. That has little or nothing to do with the vilidity of Christianity, however. >What is interresting is that there are quite a number of stories of such >critics of Christ who went out to the archaeolical digs and the musty >archives of history who came back from their quest as Christians with a >conviction of that Jesus did indeed live here as the Gospels say He did and >that He is indeed divine as He claims to be. Wrong. He did indeed live at the time stipulated. The question as to the divinity of Christ cannot be answered objectively by written record or other evidence. Remember, the Gospels are biased... they were written some time after the death of Christ. The writers needed to show their audience that Christ was divine and, indeed, the Messiah. Hence, much of what is said to have happened in the Gospels (*none* of which is supported by nonChristian records apart from the mere existence of a teacher named Jesus) must be taken with a grain of salt. Keep in mind that Jesus was not unique in any way. People just like him were common around the time when he lived. Read some of the Jewish writings you refer to and you see that these other teachers had deciples (some many more than 12) and they nearly *all* perfomred healings and other wonders. In fact, it was almost a requirement to be able to heal to be considered worthy. Jesus was unique in that his diciples claimed him to be the messiah (a strange claim since the messiah was supposed to be of the Davidic line and rebuild the temple and kick some butt... i.e. get rid of the Roman empire... none of which happened). This claim, of course, required some fancy footwork in the way of "reinterpretation" of the Tanak to explain why the messiah fulfilled none of the predictions that were set out for him. >And so my challenge to you Agnostics and Aetheists: Go prove what has >not yet been proved. Instead of simply hyping up your theories in the >company of your budies, go out there and really dig up the evidence to >prove the whole story a fraud. I have no need to prove that Jesus did not exist, because I believe he did. It is up to you to prove he was the Messiah. If I said I worshiped pink elephants that lived in my yard, it would be up to me to prove they existed, not you. >Really get into it and I can assure you >that you will return a Christian. I have 'really been into it' for some time and I maintain (more so now than ever) that Christianity (and all other religions) are the product of the minds of men... nothing more. >Stick with your parlour games and you >will never know what you have missed. This is not a spectator sport for >those who wish to toss tomatoes from the bleachers. You have to go dig >up some real evidence one way or the other. > >Go for it! Went for it and found it to be wanting... >Dave Jeff Lindborg