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From: arnold@ucsfcgl.UUCP (Ken Arnold%UCB)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Who rose from the dead?
Message-ID: <379@ucsfcgl.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 7-Nov-84 21:56:21 EST
Article-I.D.: ucsfcgl.379
Posted: Wed Nov  7 21:56:21 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 11-Nov-84 19:46:50 EST
References: <1376@pucc-h> <256@qantel.UUCP> <222@pyuxd.UUCP> <1485@qubix.UUCP> <233@pyuxd.UUCP> <289@qantel.UUCP>
Reply-To: arnold@ucsfcgl.UUCP (PUT YOUR NAME HERE)
Organization: UCSF Computer Center
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Summary: 

In article <289@qantel.UUCP> ken@qantel.UUCP (Ken Nichols@ex6193) writes:
>
>Rich says,
>
>> Did Jesus rise from the dead?  Or do some documents simply *say* that Jesus
>> rose from the dead?
>
>Most of human history is written down in documents.  I guess we can't
>believe any of those documents either.  So we must not know anything
>about history.  Why study it then?  Why try to learn from past mistakes
>in history?  It could all be a lie.
>
>As far as I know, the Bible is the most historicaly acurate, and well
>documented books on the earth.  If it doesn't have any credibility,
>then either does any other historical document.
>--
>Ken

If this is as far as you know about history or historical study, remind
me not to take your history course.

Let us start with an old example.  Julius Ceaser's autobiography is
merely a book.  Standing alone, there is no particular reason to
believe even the broadest facts, such as his invasion of Gaul.
However, we have other evidence that J. C. did, in fact, invade Gaul.
We have corroborating texts from both allies and enemies, we have
extant monuments, we have expectable consequences (such as French being
a Latin-derived language, or evidence of subsequent Roman rule of
Gaul).  In short, if you were to claim that J.C. did NOT invade Gaul,
you would have to explain all this in a way which is more probable than
the current explaination.

Since the questions of authenticity have been directed towards the New
Testament, please either come up with the equivalent of the above
extra-Biblical sources or stop saying it is historicaly acurate and
well documented.

If you seriously wish to support your statement that it is THE most
historically accurate, etc., book, I highly recommend that you read,
say, Jaworski's or Dean's Watergate books, Gibbon's "Decline and Fall
of the Roman Empire", or, maybe, the Oxford English Dictionary, to name
a few.  A much higher percentage of specific statements are referenced
to indpendent texts in these (and most modern history) books than the
Bible.

		Ken Arnold