You seem to miss the irony. ALL CAPS or repeating that you think I’m wrong doesn’t give any evidence for your claim. I’ll try again…
Why do you think the biblical texts are not contemporary to eyewitnesses? Give evidence.
Mine is given: Acts does not mention the temple destruction, death of James, or death of Paul. The temple was destroyed in AD 70. James was killed in AD 62. So I’m saying Acts came before AD 62 because it doesn’t mention these very significant events. I grant it’s not ironclad, nothing is in antiquity. Let’s weigh the information I’ve provided with some from you, but you’ll have to put something on your end of the scale. Otherwise, it’s like I’m playing teeter-totter by myself. Not very interesting.
Your logical progression: @christianapologist is wrong because…
I said so.
I used capital letters.
Try again. Maybe this will help…
YOUR CLAIM:
YOUR EVIDENCE:
[empty cavern of misapplied definitions, capital letters, and repeated presupposition]
My points about the demonic haunted house were only intended to demonstrate the nature of hoaxes . . . not a specific argument that “Christianity is false,” and was not intended to “prove” or “disprove” the religion.
The main disagreement that we seem to have is that someone who claims something is the one obligated to show evidence for the claim . . . not the interloucutor (or audience) to disprove the claim.
Otherwise, I could claim that leprechauns live in my garden, and it’s up to my audience to prove me wrong rather than me showing reasons why I believe leprechauns are living in my garden.
By some criteria, leprechauns are a lot more plausible than God.
Bro, did you read the article? It lays out evidence/reasons for three different perspectives on the date of the Book of Acts: early (exactly what I laid out), middle, or late (what you copied and pasted). It does not make a case for late dates only. Shall I paste the sentences supporting my view from your article? Ok…
“The range of proposed dates for Acts is quite wide, from c. 60 CE-150 CE. Within this range of dates, three are prominent in the scholarly literature: an early, an intermediate, and a late date.”
“Some scholars prefer an early date, i.e., the early 60’s of the first century. It is believed that Paul’s arrival in Rome, described in Acts 28, must have occurred between 58-60 CE. But the author of Acts, who wrote that Paul went to Rome to be tried before the emperor, provided us with no description of the trial or its outcome. Why so? Perhaps because the book was written before the trial took place.”
“The significance of an early date for Acts lies in the apparent advantage it gives to the historian of this period. If the author was a companion of Paul, who accompanied him on some of his travels, then those sections of Acts that deal with Paul may be regarded as eye-witness reports…”
And, here’s a response to the “late date” arguments made in the article:
“Acts seems to be unknown before the last half of the second century.”
This is really vague… “unknown” to whom? Christianity was a small, persecuted movement within Judaism in the beginning. Its original writings by eyewitnesses would most certainly remain unknown to ruling parties in Rome, for example, until it gained enough momentum that they had to respond to it.
“the author of Acts was acquainted with… Josephus…”
I would be really interested to hear if someone can provide what evidence indicates this claim. It could be a good point for a later date if substantiated.
“recent studies have revised the judgment that the author of Acts was unaware of the Pauline letters.”
I would agree that the author knew some of Paul’s letters. Some of them were written before Acts and the author of Acts traveled with Paul–he may have been there while they were written!
"Paul’s letters date even earlier than the four canonical Gospels. Interestingly, there is today considerable scholarly consensus that Paul was indeed the author of many of the Pauline epistles and that they date very early. The so-called undisputed epistles include 1 Thessalonians, Galatians, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Philippians, and Romans. These all date to the early to mid-50s.
What’s interesting is that Paul provides a great number of details about the life and teaching of Jesus, all being proclaimed within about twenty years of the life of Jesus—easily within the lifetimes of the eyewitnesses."
Paul Gould, Travis Dickinson, and Keith Loftin, Stand Firm: Apologetics and the Brilliance of the Gospel (Nashville, TN: B&H Academic, 2018), 76–77.
Ok. So your story about a hoax in this thread was just a tangent. Got it. We now covered the nature of hoaxes, which you do not intend to apply to Christianity in any way… except you did when you said this…
How about responding to the dating of the Book of Acts and the specific ways I have tried to show we have eyewitness testimony and eyewitnesses could have testified against these writings since they were contemporary? I didn’t have that information earlier when you first responded. Now it’s out there to be evaluated.
How many times do you think you can ignore those facts before you are accused of mendacity?
No it was analogous, and it objectively evidences the fact that those who champion superstition have dealt in chicanery and hoaxes. Can You provide any objective evidence that a deity or anything supernatural is possible? Each time this goes unanswered is a large clue as to that answer…
Third hand hearsay, hmm.
Oh dear, and this evidences eyewitness how? Even if you did have claims by people to have “witnessed magic” from an epoch of extreme ignorance and superstition, so what? How many religions have identical claims?
Appeal to authority fallacy, people’s subjective religious beliefs are not objective evidence.
I don’t think you know what contemporary means, but there are no contemporary accounts of anything about the Jesus character, not one word was written while he was alive.
You seem to be ignoring facts you don’t like, now why would that be?
Just as you ignored this response to your earlier claims.
I won’t labour the point any further, but your credibility takes a hit every time you roll past arguments challenging yours as if they haven’t been offered, and move on to a new raft of claims…
FYI:
“The earliest possible date for Luke-Acts is around 62 AD, the time of Paul’s imprisonment in Rome,[14] but most scholars date the work to 80–90 AD on the grounds that it uses Mark as a source, looks back on the destruction of Jerusalem, and does not show any awareness of the letters of Paul (which began circulating late in the first century); if it does show awareness of the Pauline epistles, and also of the work of the Jewish historian Josephus, as some believe, then a date in the early 2nd century is possible.”
Maybe contemporary doesn’t mean what you think it means?
Thank you very much for seeing my point. I sometimes have problems communicating because of my autism . . . and the answers I get from Christianpologist makes me wonder if I’m communicating well.
Surely the mere fact that there exist substantive doubts about the timeline for the texts in question, counts as a black mark against their purported provenance?
Lets be factual here, by his own admission “Paul” whoever he was, never encountered the jesus figure in the flesh.
Everything Paul wrote in his epistles was from his dreams or visions. He was a gnostic schismatic who made up his own version of the jewish messanaic stories espoused by some jews and gentiles who had converted to judaism. He was writing some 25 - 40 years after the supposed death of the jesus figure and inspired entirely by hearsay.
If the accounts were to be believed, “Paul” was in fact, declared apostate by James (who some claim to be the half brother of the jesus figure) from the Upper Temple. That alone sabotages any credibility the writer of the Epistles may have had, never mind the psychotic episodes that inspired his writings. .
Relying on the epistles to prove the existence of an anonymous fan fiction writer whose dates vary from the mid 1st to mid 2cnd century is pathetic at best, or the very definition of gullibility.
Errr, Jesus never died, not properly, he was resurrected, learn the basics dude…
Fnarrr, who listens to apostates mun?
H-E-R-E-S-Y…
Oh their gawwwd…narrow is the path, and easy the way sunny Jim…you’ll change your ways when old Nick is prodding your brown starfish with a hot poker, yesssssirrr…
I’ve just finished a cheap Aussie Shiraz (they’re the best, and fuck those snail snuckers), now on to some Vodka. Big day tomorrow, Wales playing England in Twickers in the 6N…eye am noyvous…to put it mildly…
Oh, and if that doesn’t address the thread OP sufficiently I don’t know what to say… Since eyeaman an atheist, and eyewuz being honest…tadah!
Not if all you are looking for is validation fo theistic belief, obviously, but clearly you know this, whereas people selling snake oil either don’t or can’t…
I terms of Paul’s visions I wonder if a regimen of spiradone or some other anti psychotic may have changed the course of christianity? Or why, when Jesus appeared he didn’t give him a story that would hold water and would cover some of the events Cog pointed out. It seems that Pauls visions didn’t serve the cause very well.
As an aside christianapologist’s last post was number 69 in this thread this is 83 I’ve heard of “kicking a guy when he’s down” but not “kicking a guy when he’s gone”. AWW the internet is a wonderous thing by making the impossible easy.
@Cognostic Your entire list is a misunderstanding of genre. The books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were evangelistic biography (so to speak). They told the account of the life, teaching, and actions of Jesus arranged in ways meant to persuade the reader to respond. The Book of Acts gives a historical account of the growth of the early Christian church. Paul wrote letters. They were written to specific churches and addressed specific questions, issues, and relationships.
Even with the above being said, Paul does know some things you claim he doesn’t. He talked with eyewitnesses to the resurrection, for example. In fact, he would know of #5-14 by talking with one man: Peter. Did they meet and talk? Yes! So Paul talked with a man physically present for #5-14, but didn’t write about these events because he was writing letters, not biographies.
#15: Paul did not think the Jews crucified Jesus, but that they persuaded the Romans to crucify him. #16: Paul’s theology and references to Jesus are consistent with the Gospels. #17: Strange statement. Are you implying that you believe Jesus was a spirit without a body?
#1-4: I don’t have anything to add here. I agree that Paul does not write about these events in biographical detail. He makes theological references to biographical events as it makes sense for the purposes of his letter (if the church had a question or debate on the topic).
I was waiting for that, I almost felt guilty waiting for the sword of Damocles to fall.
now on to some Vodka. Big day tomorrow, Wales playing England in Twickers in the 6N…eye am noyvous…to put it mildly…
