Hi, I'm Jeff, I'm a recovering Catholic. Thank you for this. No longer confused. There is a beautiful serenity in rejecting the psychopathy of both "testament"s.
Hey Jeff I recovered from catholicism in the mid 70s . It was peaceful leaving that in my rearview . I had 5 aunts who were nuns and 2 uncles and a cousin who were priests and they couldn't keep me in the faith. I've had a much better life and am not worried about dying
I don't believe in human sacrifice. That's the reason I started questioning Christianity. In High school we were studying Mayan history and the gruesome practice of torturing humans to death in order to "save humanity". A light bulb came on and I remember thinking; damn! that's what I've been taught is great. I re-evaluated my morals and believe I have a better perspective on life now.
+ChipArgyle Fitzgerald, Carrier, and Robert Price (who I hope TTA will have on in this present series) have many presentations on TH-cam and each has their own set of blogs and podcasts. Bob Price's podcasts are just exceptionally rich intellectually as well as entertaining. I have to be careful though because I studied religion and philosophy so it's my thing. Enjoy.
When I was a fundamentalist, I also experienced reading the bible in a linear fashion rather than in parallel. Every Easter, for example, we'd read the resurrection story from exactly one gospel, and it would simply be a different gospel every year. Many churches still do this. I love asking Christians on the week after Easter what happened at the empty tomb, and then telling them what gospel they heard from that Sunday. If the stories matched, it shouldn't be possible to guess the gospel based on the story.
+Supernova Kasprzak When I was a fundamentalist pastor, I didn't look forward to the easter sermon because inevitably someone would bring up one of the contradictions in the gospel accounts and I dreaded having to march out the same thin sounding explanations.
Seth, this is a REALLY REALLY good series, some of the best you're produced (and you've produced a bunch of really good stuff!!). These guys are no-nonsense, lucid and very, very direct which is what I love! Keep it up sir!!!
I might take issue with one point: the idea that Christianity could not survive mythicism. There is an actual Catholic priest named Thomas L Brodie, who still believes in God - yet he maintains the Jesus is just a legendary allegory. But is actually A priest.
First time I've heard that the debate between Ehrman and Price was back on. Simply cannot wait. As much as I like, rate and respect Bart Ehrman, I find his defence and justification for an actual real jesus figure far from convincing. And I see the supposed consensus as not nearly as solid as some would try to suggest. Unless believing in entirely different jesus figures counts somehow as a consensus.
My first problem was when I was a Christian and other Christians used to create scriptures that didn’t exist in the Bible. I used to call it the unofficial version but to say that Atheists know the Bible more than God’s followers made me choke on my coffee as I have gotten more truth out of the Bible from Atheists than from my ex-community of Christians. I am still perturbed though if it’s the infallible word of God then why don’t they study it? Lol how hilarious. In all honesty the Atheist’s talks have made this transition so much easier as this can be a painful road. Thank you all for your research and the humor.
My hero!! I enjoyed Nailed, soooo much. Your epiphany at 7:00, was exactly the same as mine. Can't wait for your next book.You are " pure as the driven snow ". Good luck
I have actually seen somebody claiming that evolution is CLEARLY illustrated in Genesis, because of the phrase "let us make man in our own image." His position is that the only way this sentence makes sense is if man already existed, but was not in our current image. Thus, God was taking something that already existed and EVOLVING it into a man.... like, holy shit!!
Nonsense. Genesis clearly states God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. God of the Bible did NOT EVOLVE MAN. You pervert science in attempt to explain the ignorance of ancient men and their ridiculous creation fables. The obvious falsity of creating light on Day 1 along with the Earth and the Sun on Day 4 utterly destroys biblical creation fables. Evolution states man evolved over 4 billion years beginning with a process called abiogenesis. Man is the result of evolutionary branches of common ancestors, many looking very similar to apes of today.
Every rabbi in the last 50 years has told those who ASK, that the Bible was not History, and in Judaism's own teaching, "There is no 'before' or 'after' in the Torah. The 'Gospels' have never been addressed at the level they should be: Pagan myth, slanders, libel, blasphemy, and Lies of the boldness of Paul's now-expired licentiousness.
His deconversion sounds very similar to mine: one day I just told myself to stop making assumptions, and about 5 minutes later I decided I was an atheist. But there was definitely a lot of internal conflict prior to that, and I guess the evidence became too overwhelming for my brain to ignore it at that point.
+Matt H. Same here, basically. Humorously, I first had to convince myself that a loving god wouldn't condemn me for such intellectual honesty. And yup I was an atheist within just a few minutes.
bpansky For me, I realized that observable reality did not conform to the creation story and had to reconcile that lying is not proper behavior for a deity who proclaims himself to be "Truth." Once I realized that the Bible was fallible, the entire thing fell apart in my hands. Bye-bye religion.
Fitzgerald, near the end, talks about Christianity's evolution and adaptations, and I think he's dead on. I think that it was doing that from the very beginning. In my personal research of the topic, I think it might been Irenaeus who first did it - combining doctrines that were completely inconsistent with one another in his canon (The 4 gospels + Paul). When I realized that, I kept thinking "why the hell would a guy who spends his whole life calling everyone heretics combine texts that are so inconsistent with each other?" And I think the answer is basically that it was the birth of Christian Chameleon-ism.
I always wonder why some atheists think the Bible is a good book. Even as a christian I felt it was one of the worst collection of books I have ever read.
What he was saying about how it keeps changing is like what I've told people before, if you look at history you can see that Christianity seems to go through 3 main stages. Science will discover something and Christianity will say it is completely wrong and against god, later they will say that some of it is true or it is partially true, then eventually they say it is the absolute truth but god made it that way, even though they used to say it went against god.
After a dozen years of hardcore faith, I "woke up" fairly quickly,. Took about a week. All I did was stop reading the Bible, praying and going to church. One week or so.
+216trixie Actually I've found the best way to lose belief is to read the bible, the more you know about the bible the easier it is to see the fallacies
Luckystrike True for many. But I studied the Bible for a dozen years. Bible major in college. Street evangelist, worship leader, youth pastor. I knew the Bible inside and out. I didn't see the problems though. Not while I still had faith.
+216trixie It happened pretty quickly for me, too. I was in the Army, I was about to get deployed to Turkey, so I read the Quran. After reading *that* jumbled, genocidal, megalomaniacal book, I found myself wondering why anyone believed it. Then I realized the same applied to me, I read the Bible with my blinders off, and started comparing and contrasting the two. After about two weeks of waffling, I found myself forced to admit I was an atheist. The books are too brutal, too superstitious in ways that we currently aren't, and too obsessed with the murder and destruction of others. Not to mention slavery and rape. But for me, it was reading an outsider's holy book and then comparing it to my own that finally snapped my belief. But I bullshitted myself for a long time. Once I stopped doing that, the change happened quickly. Sorry for writing a tiny novel, but I felt for ya.
Premium stuff , Seth. I'm intrigued at the thought of Bart Ehrman and Robert Price crossing swords in the near future. Ultimately, I have to believe that's for the good of understanding and debunking of the bible ... and ultimately, the debunking of the carpenter-turned-rabbi from ... which was it, Nazareth or Bethlehem??? [wry chuckle!] Regardless, many thanks!
It never occurred to me before but in the N.T. Jesus could hardly walk down the street without being accosted by poor unfortunates possessed by demons but I can't think of a single case of demonic possession in the O.T.
If I recall correctly, Joseph Wheless covered a lot of the contradictions in the Bible and Gospels. Though I would hardly call his work scholarly by today's standards, _Is It God's Word?_ and _Forgery in Christianity_ still make interesting reading.
Is the power to forgive outright without demanding blood sacrifice a power worth having?As a parent of (rather fine but not invariably perfect) children, I'd think this power indispensable to functioning well within a family, not to mention wider society. Seems rather odd to say that an all-powerful moral agent somehow lacks the power of bloodless forgiveness. Ah, well.
You guys just gave me an idea. We should create a bible reading guide that makes the reader come across the contradictions on the same day, then we can just add it to sites that have lists of the guides or put it on book marks and leave them on bus seats etc
Interesting statics about the correlation between fraud, porn, violence and religion. When you can be _absolutely right_ by an act of will, as is required to swallow religion whole, perhaps it flows over into behavior.
Yeah, we should indeed be honest with ourselves, no matter what we truly believe. If we lie to ourselves, we can never be truly good, since we're always hiding from the truth and trying to subsequently cover up our guilt or being dishonest. So many people fight over this, and they indeed fight faithfully over things that they don't know, or sometimes that they don't even believe. People want so hard to do what is right, but in religions, no one ever says "who is like God?" They might actually change their attitudes. You can't expect yourself to do what's impossible to yourself, and you can't expect to force people to think and believe things that you yourself don't know or believe.
Mathew's gospel is the most "Jewish" of the 4 gospels. This gospel was written after the roman- Jewish war, the temple cult was gone for good. The principals in the sermon on the mount are the same as rabinical judaism.
11:02 It was from a television program where I first heard this. Jesus was able to change his shape and look like a different person, so this was the reason Judas needed to identify him. Google "Jesus, shape-shifting"
"Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise. During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution." James Madison
Interesting stuff, at one point David just cuts Seth off mid-sentence while he was asking a question. He's very enthused. Ehrman doesnt get too close to the mythicists because deep down he must know how lost that battle is. Many of the arguments he uses actually show, or are, the opposite of what he claims. Others, he just ignores. Its irrelevant that Jesus ranks higher than Hercules on Raglan's _hero scale._ I suggest people read *Bart Ehrman and the Quest of the Historical Jesus of Nazareth.* by Carrier, et. al.
the real jesus was probably a charismatic but understated oddball, who wanted to spend his life in contemplation rather than work, who found he had a talent...
Why believe in a "real" Jesus ? A "real" Jesus would be nothing whatsoever like the Jesus of the bible to the extent that he isn't the Jesus of the bible. The gospels are fiction. You may as well talk about the real Harry Potter, a guy who lived in England around the year 2000 who wore glasses and did magic tricks, he may have not been called Harry even, but he really existed, he was just a lot more low key than the guy in the books, and of course he didn't do any of the supernatural stuff
to answer Seths question about finding a debate on Jesus the man vs Jesus Myth - best I have seen is Carrier versus Zeba Crook - you can find it on youtube.
At 6:50) that was basically my moment of realisation that Christianity was bullshit. If all the religions say they're correct, and only one can be right really, then which one is the right one. Then all you have to do is see just how many religions there are, let alone the plethora of different Christian denominations. You realise just how stupid all of this is. That was my enlightenment moment.
Christianity will adapt quite easily to Mythicism - if Mr. Fitzgerald is correct, it was the *original* Christianity! Of course they wouldn't call it "mythicist" because of the way we use the word "myth" to mean "falsehood." They'd just view Jesus as a channeled entity like "Seth" or "Ramtha" in the New Age movement, or even "Jesus" in A Course in Miracles. Mythicism would let Christians say the whole Bible is parable and allegory. At one stroke, they no longer have to defend abominable Bible passages and easily-debunked claims about science and history. "Well, the Lord didn't REALLY kill all the firstborn sons of Egypt, that's just an allegory for [insert some "nicer" meaning]." There are plenty of non-Evangelical Christians (e.g. Bishop Shelby Spong) who are already at least 90% of the way there. Heck, if I didn't have a conscience, and I had the charismatic, manipulative personality a good con artist needs, I'd get out in front and start preaching "Ascended" (or "Spiritual" or some other shiny term to replace "Mythicist") Christianity today.
When David talks about christianity evolving, isn't this _all_ religions? Don't we see the same thing in the first century where temple judaism mutates into rabbinical judaism and christianity? Don't all religions just change what they believe when it becomes untenable? God lived on the mountain, and then we climbed the mountain, and so he lives in the clouds, and we learned to fly, and so now he's in another dimension or out in space? Is it just christianity, or is it all of a piece? We tend to ignore the transitional periods. The early christians were jews. Very likely the early muslims were a christian sect that didn't believe in the divinity of Jesus. All of these things grow out of a common religious impulse.
+No Way Yup, I love that "tree of religions" picture which resembles the biological evolution tree! www.google.ca/search?q=tree+of+religions&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&gws_rd=cr&ei=ZxAgVrC6AsbGogTv2o2oDw
+bpansky Thanks you, as a former christian, you have just pushed me another million miles away although not like there was any chance of going back. It's one thing to have a pretty decent grasp on the history of religions but seeing in it so well demonstrated in a tree is just..................................disgusting. Revealing also comes to mind. Thanks again and much love and peace to you and yours.
Interesting that Dante is mentioned because in his case the “hell” described in his poetry is closer to the Islamic interpretation of Hell -- interesting also that Islam is the off shoot and inheritor of the Arabic speaking Jews and Christians EXCEPT that, unlike Western Christianity, Islam is “Toranic observant.”
The assumptions of Christianity also pervade the study of crucifixion which is a tiny field compared to New Testament Studies, chiefly because it's a field of scholarly interest only to Christians (and others outside of academia whom the scholars don't hear from or listen to). Hence we have mishaps in devotional eenactment such as The Crucifixion of Sebastian Horsley (google it here on You Tube).
It's time to stop the silly Jesus myth! Historians agree that the gospels (written in Greek, by unknown authors, from 70 to 140CE) portray Jesus as famous far and wide, a prophet and healer, with great multitudes of people who knew about him, including the greatest Jewish high priests and the Roman authorities of the area, and not one person records his existence during his lifetime? If the poor, the rich, the rulers, the highest priests, and the scribes knew about Jesus, who would not have heard of him? Amazingly, we have not one Jewish, Greek, or Roman writer, even those who lived in the Middle East, much less anywhere else on the earth, whoever mention him during his supposed life time. This appears quite extraordinary, and you will find few Christian apologists who dare mention this embarrassing fact.
Or the disciples or as far as I know and surprisingly Paul as he went around making a nuisance of himself and travelled everywhere. John the Baptist is apparently a real figure.
And the first CANONICAL gospel, Mark, is an edited and redacted version of an extinct gospel called The Memoirs of the Apostles. Matthew is based on both. Luke is based on both and the Memoirs / Gospel of Peter. Thomas is based on an extinct "collection of the sayings of our lord" by a certain "Matthew".
I think the christ figure is pure myth. 2000+ years ago the world was radically different from now, especially as far as media is concerned. Not only did the internet, cable, tv, radio, etc. not exist, even printing was impossible. Books had to be hand written and hand copied. Considering the current human love for entertainment, it's hard not to believe that "religion" back then was more theater than real even to the more devout. Making up a character from nothing but imagination would be no more odd than today's Harry Potter. Also, there were very few people that took history seriously; so, there was little distinction between fiction and non-fiction. I think Tracie Harris was the first I heard call the bible fan fiction. It seemed appropriate to me. The danger comes when these idiots delusion reaches the level of actually believing Darth Vader is real.
here is another thought folks. let's assume jesus is real and will come back to earth one day. look at christians and the crosses they wear. does anyone think jesus would want to see another cross? just saying...
J ateabug you are right. had forgotten where i heard it. still does not make it any less valid. and i think mr hicks would care less if i used quotations or not...
"The creator of the entire universe was constrained, by the prevailing culture, from decreeing". HELL FUCKING NO......God can do what ever he/she/it wants. Now,if you can tell someone to not eat shellfish,wear mixed fabrics or work on a certain day,you can say don't enslave someone.END OF DEBATE......
What about the Gnostic gospels?? They were written in the early first century and they mention Jesus all over? There is good arguments for the non existence and the existence of Jesus. It’s interesting there’s no archeological evidence of him yet he is mentioned in the Gnostic gospels. If he did not exist as a man than why would the Christian movement even have happened??
Why do we not see those that put forth the notion of a mythical Jesus do so within the academic community? Why are they not writing papers and articles for peer review in the historical journals? Do we not mock and ridicule the anti evolution proponents for the same thing?
+conantroy1 If you listen to Dr. Carrier's talk with Seth, he talks about his books being peer reviewed. I also think Dr. Price's books have been peer reviewed. However, even if they weren't, theology isn't a science. One can do research, but there are no "experiments" to conduct and be confirmed. One just has the conclusions based on the research. Hardly the same.
+conantroy1 You make an excellent point that those who have replied so far haven't really answered. Those in the academic community ignore Richard Carrier because the evidence that he cites and the arguments that he makes do not convince those who are experts in the relevant fields. David Fitzgerald (who, by the way, makes a far better presentation here than the one by Carrier) is writing only for popular audiences. He identifies himself as a historical researcher, but he doesn't claim the scholarly credentials that Carrier and Price have. If any of these writers could make a compelling case, those in the academic world would be glad to engage them and even build on their work. If you read the complete edition of Schweitzer's book The Quest for the Historical Jesus, you'll discover that most of what today's mythicists are saying has been around for a hundred years. Even though today's writers update these claims to a certain extent, they're really not offering anything new. As the two earlier replies note, Carrier likes to tout the fact that his books are peer-reviewed, but that doesn't mean those who reviewed the book find his arguments convincing.
RhondaH This isn't theology, but history. And actually both are peer reviewed. But staying on the topic of history, there are peer reviewed journals that any of these authors could submit their work to. To name but a few for the discipline of Ancient Near Eastern history, which is where the Biblical Text would be classified; American Journal of Ancient History, Journal of Near Eastern Studies Published Quarterly by University of Chicago Press, or the Journal of the History of Philosophy, Published Quarterly by The Johns Hopkins University Press. While you can't test these as one would a scientific experiment.You can verify claims based on evidence found in not only the ancient sources, but the archaeology. I'll give you and example. The Book of Mormon claims that there were Roman settlements in North America during the time of the 1st century CE. There is no archaeological evidence that has ever been discovered to support this claim at all (i.e. ruins of construction, building, roads, barracks, no pottery, no weapons or utensils, nothing within the text that ever states that the Romans ever came this far. We can dismiss this claim based on the lack of evidence. A second example coming from the Bible shows that the Exodus and the subsequent conquest did not happen exactly as described. There is evidence though, but it suggests a different chain of events. Ones that most likely were inspirations for a later retelling. One that paints Israel in a better light than what the evidence suggests. This is not the same as saying it's complete fiction. Same could be said for the evidence for the Historical Jesus. Perhaps you should read more of what the professional historians have to actually state in this regards (neither Carrier or Fitzgerald are professional historians. Of those in the mythicist movement, Robert Price is the only one that can make this claim).
BigplayerAA Actually no it wasn't. It was self published. It was reviewed by some professional historians, mostly due to the level of exposure that Dr Carrier has within the Atheist community. This is not the same as being peer reviewed. Dr Carrier has submitted several papers for peer review. Most notably, "“Whence Christianity? A Meta-Theory for the Origins of Christianity.” Journal of Higher Criticism 11.1 (Spr 2005): 22-34." and "“The Guarded Tomb of Jesus and Daniel in the Lion’s Den: An Argument for the Plausibility of Theft.” Journal of Higher Criticism 8.2 (Fall 2001): 304-18." The Journal of Higher Criticism was a peer reviewd journal that didn't last very long. It's primary editors where Darrel Doughty and editor in chief, Robert Price. Both mythicists. Michael Behe did the exact same thing. He created his own "journal" and funneled intelligent design papers through it to make ti seem as they were peer reviewed. The secular community called them out for this. Why is it different with the mythicist camp? Could it because they are telling a story that most of us Atheists find compelling?
Okay,so let's lay out verse that shows that Jesus fully supported the OT. He therefore supported slavery. Here is one verse from the OT. "4 “‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly."-Leviticus 25:44-46 First the definition of slave from Google search: "a person who is the legal property of another and is forced to obey them" Now, you are just flat out lying if you say the bible didn't support slavery. What about the New Testament? "5 Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ."-Ephesians 6:5 I will for brevity list just a few more; Luke 12:47-48 1 Timothy 6:1-2 Tell close this out: “For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass the law until all is accomplished. Whoever then relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but he who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” - Matthew 5:18-19 “It is easier for Heaven and Earth to pass away than for the smallest part of the letter of the law to become invalid.” (Luke 16:17) “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest part or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place.” (Matthew 5:17) “Did not Moses give you the law, and yet none of you keepeth the law” (John7:19) Jesus FULLY SUPPORTED EVERYTHING in the Old Testament. Now, it takes real mental gymnastics to dance around this.
He's right that there's not a whole lot of evidence about Jesus outside of the gospels, but what there is is solid enough to at least say that he preached and was crucified. That's the virtually unanimous consensus of nearly all Bible scholars anyway.
+Julian Duncan Make your case for your claims. The point is not who agrees on what the point is what evidence can they present. The romans executed lots of people and yes many people were preaching. So we have dozens of characters if not hundreds that fits this description. When one says we agree he had a drving licencse and he got a parking ticking this is a totally meaningless agreement as this fits for nearly everyone.
My comment here is on part 1. Couldn't place this comment there for some reason. As much as I love his discourses on historicity of Jesus, his take-down of Joseph Atwill's work is unfair, and that in-depth reply to Atwill's work residing on his blog, is nothing more than a straw man argument.Totally misrepresents what Atwill is saying I'm not going to go into depth... but here's a hint. Right in the interview he said that Atwill claims that Josephus wrote the Gospels to pacify the Jews. That is NOT what Atwill claims at all. He doesn't know who crafted the Gospels specifically, but has a short list of usual suspects, and Josephus' History or the Jewish Wars was used as a template. Very different claim. I was actually looking for a skillful take down of Atwill's "Ceasar's Messiah", but Carrier hasn't done one. Unfortunately, Fitzgerald is on Carrier's bandwagon against Atwill.
Christianity does NOT approve of slavery, read things in there historical context and they tend to make a lot more sense. Apply the same standards and logic to every other book you read!
+Aaron Kolenc EXODUS 20:20-21 - "Anyone who beats their male or female slave with a rod must be punished if the slave dies as a direct result, but they are not to be punished if the slave recovers after a day or two, since the slave is their property." So..."You can kick your slave's ass." -The Bible
+Aaron Kolenc I'm afraid mr. Andrews is correct in this instance. You have to understand that from our point of view as former christian, the bible condones slavery... and remember the bible is considered the divinely inspired word of God. You have to understand, we were christian once and we also believed in the bible and regardless of what many christian's think, I, +TheThinkingAtheist and many others do not "hate god" but simply cannot correlate anymore our society morality and knowledge with that exposed in a ancient barbaric, murderous etc.. book that is supposed to be the actual will of God in written form.
+Aaron Kolenc Yeah it does. There is no context where owning another person for any period of time and having a right to beat them is acceptable or ethical. Stop trying to apologize for God's word. It should be able to stand on its own two feet, regardless the context. It was supposedly written by an omniscient immortal all powerful perfect being.
+Aaron Kolenc That was then, this is now. If it weren't for the Quakers, we might still be owning slaves because the Quakers viewed abolition as a Christian duty. Abolition wasn't an atheist movement, it was a Christian movement.
So TTA hosts mythicists AGAIN with nobody arguing the other side? Mythicism is very much a fringe position and one that severely damages the image of skepticism as it is pure wishful thinking.
![PASULOL รามเกียรติ์ ตอนที่ 4 นนทกพบรัก [Ramakien Ep.4: Nonthok in love]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/tMUQgmZzf_A/mqdefault.jpg)
Hi, I'm Jeff, I'm a recovering Catholic. Thank you for this. No longer confused. There is a beautiful serenity in rejecting the psychopathy of both "testament"s.
Hey Jeff I recovered from catholicism
in the mid 70s . It was peaceful leaving that in my rearview . I had 5 aunts who were nuns and 2 uncles and a cousin who were priests and they couldn't keep me in the faith. I've had a much better life and am not worried about dying
I don't believe in human sacrifice.
That's the reason I started questioning Christianity.
In High school we were studying Mayan history and the gruesome practice of torturing humans to death in order to "save humanity". A light bulb came on and I remember thinking; damn! that's what I've been taught is great.
I re-evaluated my morals and believe I have a better perspective on life now.
Yep. Christianity is a primitive blood cult.
Yup... Love does not requirement atonement and the cross is nothing but atonement:)
You are not alone in this kind of experience. Substitutional atonement is also immoral and impossible. 🌺
Both of these are Top Notch ('Carrier and Fitzgerald). A Series of these with scholars would make an invaluable study.
This gentleman was quite an engaging speaker. I'd love to see him give a presentation instead of just a back and forth interview.
Agreed. I read his book, which is very good, but his informal explanations here are more digestible.
+ChipArgyle Type his name in the TH-cam search bar. There you will find many presentations.
+ChipArgyle Fitzgerald, Carrier, and Robert Price (who I hope TTA will have on in this present series) have many presentations on TH-cam and each has their own set of blogs and podcasts. Bob Price's podcasts are just exceptionally rich intellectually as well as entertaining. I have to be careful though because I studied religion and philosophy so it's my thing. Enjoy.
When I was a fundamentalist, I also experienced reading the bible in a linear fashion rather than in parallel. Every Easter, for example, we'd read the resurrection story from exactly one gospel, and it would simply be a different gospel every year. Many churches still do this. I love asking Christians on the week after Easter what happened at the empty tomb, and then telling them what gospel they heard from that Sunday. If the stories matched, it shouldn't be possible to guess the gospel based on the story.
+Supernova Kasprzak When I was a fundamentalist pastor, I didn't look forward to the easter sermon because inevitably someone would bring up one of the contradictions in the gospel accounts and I dreaded having to march out the same thin sounding explanations.
Great interview. You asked some great questions Seth. Really enjoyed it. Thanks for continuing to share wisdom.
26:35... "So it's not a religion, it's a relationship."
"A relationship... with bullshit."
^ lol yes
"Your video content is simply outstanding! The way you present information is engaging and informative. Always looking forward to your next upload!
Seth, this is a REALLY REALLY good series, some of the best you're produced (and you've produced a bunch of really good stuff!!). These guys are no-nonsense, lucid and very, very direct which is what I love! Keep it up sir!!!
Table for 26 please.
But there's only 13 of you.
Yea, but we're only going to use one side of the table.
gamesbok best comment
I might take issue with one point: the idea that Christianity could not survive mythicism. There is an actual Catholic priest named Thomas L Brodie, who still believes in God - yet he maintains the Jesus is just a legendary allegory. But is actually A priest.
David Fitzgerald is so awesome!
First time I've heard that the debate between Ehrman and Price was back on.
Simply cannot wait. As much as I like, rate and respect Bart Ehrman, I find his defence and justification for an actual real jesus figure far from convincing.
And I see the supposed consensus as not nearly as solid as some would try to suggest. Unless believing in entirely different jesus figures counts somehow as a consensus.
Ehrman is protecting his income.
I fucking lost it when David said, "A relationship with Bullshit" ahahahahaha it was the way he said it XD
My first problem was when I was a Christian and other Christians used to create scriptures that didn’t exist in the Bible. I used to call it the unofficial version but to say that Atheists know the Bible more than God’s followers made me choke on my coffee as I have gotten more truth out of the Bible from Atheists than from my ex-community of Christians. I am still perturbed though if it’s the infallible word of God then why don’t they study it? Lol how hilarious. In all honesty the Atheist’s talks have made this transition so much easier as this can be a painful road. Thank you all for your research and the humor.
My hero!! I enjoyed Nailed, soooo much. Your epiphany at 7:00, was exactly the same as mine. Can't wait for your next book.You are " pure as the driven snow ". Good luck
awesome interview 👍 much respect to Fitzgerald
Seth and David, I enjoy the work of both of you. Excellent interview.
This video is awesome. David Fitzgerald is a very enlightened human. I will buy his book.
I have actually seen somebody claiming that evolution is CLEARLY illustrated in Genesis, because of the phrase "let us make man in our own image." His position is that the only way this sentence makes sense is if man already existed, but was not in our current image. Thus, God was taking something that already existed and EVOLVING it into a man.... like, holy shit!!
VideoAudioDisco09 I guess there's that small redemption, haha!
That is supporting the apologetics that causes the problem of religion.
Nonsense. Genesis clearly states God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. God of the Bible did NOT EVOLVE MAN. You pervert science in attempt to explain the ignorance of ancient men and their ridiculous creation fables. The obvious falsity of creating light on Day 1 along with the Earth and the Sun on Day 4 utterly destroys biblical creation fables.
Evolution states man evolved over 4 billion years beginning with a process called abiogenesis. Man is the result of evolutionary branches of common ancestors, many looking very similar to apes of today.
What a great interview, thank-you for the upload.
you had me at "Christianity... is a Darwinian mother [f*er]".
Every rabbi in the last 50 years has told those who ASK, that the Bible was not History, and in Judaism's own teaching, "There is no 'before' or 'after' in the Torah. The 'Gospels' have never been addressed at the level they should be: Pagan myth, slanders, libel, blasphemy, and Lies of the boldness of Paul's now-expired licentiousness.
Wait... so, the gospels are basically fanfiction?
His deconversion sounds very similar to mine: one day I just told myself to stop making assumptions, and about 5 minutes later I decided I was an atheist.
But there was definitely a lot of internal conflict prior to that, and I guess the evidence became too overwhelming for my brain to ignore it at that point.
+Matt H. One does not decide that they are an atheist, but REALIZES that they are one.
+BlackEpyon Good point, rather shoddy word choice on my part.
*****
Just looking out for my fellows :D
+Matt H. Same here, basically. Humorously, I first had to convince myself that a loving god wouldn't condemn me for such intellectual honesty. And yup I was an atheist within just a few minutes.
bpansky
For me, I realized that observable reality did not conform to the creation story and had to reconcile that lying is not proper behavior for a deity who proclaims himself to be "Truth." Once I realized that the Bible was fallible, the entire thing fell apart in my hands. Bye-bye religion.
Fitzgerald, near the end, talks about Christianity's evolution and adaptations, and I think he's dead on. I think that it was doing that from the very beginning.
In my personal research of the topic, I think it might been Irenaeus who first did it - combining doctrines that were completely inconsistent with one another in his canon (The 4 gospels + Paul). When I realized that, I kept thinking "why the hell would a guy who spends his whole life calling everyone heretics combine texts that are so inconsistent with each other?" And I think the answer is basically that it was the birth of Christian Chameleon-ism.
I always wonder why some atheists think the Bible is a good book.
Even as a christian I felt it was one of the worst collection of books I have ever read.
What he was saying about how it keeps changing is like what I've told people before, if you look at history you can see that Christianity seems to go through 3 main stages. Science will discover something and Christianity will say it is completely wrong and against god, later they will say that some of it is true or it is partially true, then eventually they say it is the absolute truth but god made it that way, even though they used to say it went against god.
I would love to see this series of talks extended - quite a few more scholars with info to add on the topic.
Judith Sanders ii
Great interview!
After a dozen years of hardcore faith, I "woke up" fairly quickly,. Took about a week. All I did was stop reading the Bible, praying and going to church. One week or so.
+216trixie Actually I've found the best way to lose belief is to read the bible, the more you know about the bible the easier it is to see the fallacies
Luckystrike True for many. But I studied the Bible for a dozen years. Bible major in college. Street evangelist, worship leader, youth pastor. I knew the Bible inside and out. I didn't see the problems though. Not while I still had faith.
+216trixie It happened pretty quickly for me, too. I was in the Army, I was about to get deployed to Turkey, so I read the Quran.
After reading *that* jumbled, genocidal, megalomaniacal book, I found myself wondering why anyone believed it.
Then I realized the same applied to me, I read the Bible with my blinders off, and started comparing and contrasting the two.
After about two weeks of waffling, I found myself forced to admit I was an atheist.
The books are too brutal, too superstitious in ways that we currently aren't, and too obsessed with the murder and destruction of others.
Not to mention slavery and rape.
But for me, it was reading an outsider's holy book and then comparing it to my own that finally snapped my belief.
But I bullshitted myself for a long time. Once I stopped doing that, the change happened quickly.
Sorry for writing a tiny novel, but I felt for ya.
GoodAvatar Nice post, thanks!. I feel like I "woke up". This was twenty five years ago. Life keeps getting better!
Premium stuff , Seth. I'm intrigued at the thought of Bart Ehrman and Robert Price crossing swords in the near future. Ultimately, I have to believe that's for the good of understanding and debunking of the bible ... and ultimately, the debunking of the carpenter-turned-rabbi from ... which was it, Nazareth or Bethlehem??? [wry chuckle!]
Regardless, many thanks!
Christianity......Marketing......Marketing :)
It never occurred to me before but in the N.T. Jesus could hardly walk down the street without being accosted by poor unfortunates possessed by demons but I can't think of a single case of demonic possession in the O.T.
This is very faire. The references are so clearly demonstrated even for the case for the other side. Very good.
If I recall correctly, Joseph Wheless covered a lot of the contradictions in the Bible and Gospels. Though I would hardly call his work scholarly by today's standards, _Is It God's Word?_ and _Forgery in Christianity_ still make interesting reading.
I loved the Jesus: Mything in action books series! You learn allot about history & the writing of the new testament overall.
I love how in Joshua 8 the Israelites take the stuff that belonged to the people of Ai. What about “Thou shalt not steal"?
Thou shall not steal from your fellow Israelites but it it ok to steal from everyone else.
Is the power to forgive outright without demanding blood sacrifice a power worth having?As a parent of (rather fine but not invariably perfect) children, I'd think this power indispensable to functioning well within a family, not to mention wider society. Seems rather odd to say that an all-powerful moral agent somehow lacks the power of bloodless forgiveness. Ah, well.
You guys just gave me an idea. We should create a bible reading guide that makes the reader come across the contradictions on the same day, then we can just add it to sites that have lists of the guides or put it on book marks and leave them on bus seats etc
Interesting statics about the correlation between fraud, porn, violence and religion. When you can be _absolutely right_ by an act of will, as is required to swallow religion whole, perhaps it flows over into behavior.
Yeah, we should indeed be honest with ourselves, no matter what we truly believe. If we lie to ourselves, we can never be truly good, since we're always hiding from the truth and trying to subsequently cover up our guilt or being dishonest. So many people fight over this, and they indeed fight faithfully over things that they don't know, or sometimes that they don't even believe. People want so hard to do what is right, but in religions, no one ever says "who is like God?" They might actually change their attitudes. You can't expect yourself to do what's impossible to yourself, and you can't expect to force people to think and believe things that you yourself don't know or believe.
Mathew's gospel is the most "Jewish" of the 4 gospels. This gospel was written after the roman- Jewish war, the temple cult was gone for good. The principals in the sermon on the mount are the same as rabinical judaism.
11:02 It was from a television program where I first heard this. Jesus was able to change his shape and look like a different person, so this was the reason Judas needed to identify him. Google "Jesus, shape-shifting"
I get to be First? Yay! I am convinced that you can get DR. Ehrman to be your guest. Keep trying Sir. :) This is an excellent interview.
Good interview by the way.
4:23
I literally laughed out loud!
Even better than part one.
"Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise. During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution." James Madison
"Darwinian motherfucker on steroids" -David Fitgerald. That's the only quotation anyone will ever need from this interview.
Here’s my take: the people who wrote the gospels did not expect them to become serious books, that’s why they were sloppy in their story details.
Interesting stuff, at one point David just cuts Seth off mid-sentence while he was asking a question. He's very enthused. Ehrman doesnt get too close to the mythicists because deep down he must know how lost that battle is. Many of the arguments he uses actually show, or are, the opposite of what he claims. Others, he just ignores. Its irrelevant that Jesus ranks higher than Hercules on Raglan's _hero scale._ I suggest people read *Bart Ehrman and the Quest of the Historical Jesus of Nazareth.* by Carrier, et. al.
Great interviews and well stated evidence.
Interesting video
the real jesus was probably a charismatic but understated oddball, who wanted to spend his life in contemplation rather than work, who found he had a talent...
Why believe in a "real" Jesus ? A "real" Jesus would be nothing whatsoever like the Jesus of the bible to the extent that he isn't the Jesus of the bible. The gospels are fiction. You may as well talk about the real Harry Potter, a guy who lived in England around the year 2000 who wore glasses and did magic tricks, he may have not been called Harry even, but he really existed, he was just a lot more low key than the guy in the books, and of course he didn't do any of the supernatural stuff
to answer Seths question about finding a debate on Jesus the man vs Jesus Myth - best I have seen is Carrier versus Zeba Crook - you can find it on youtube.
At 6:50) that was basically my moment of realisation that Christianity was bullshit.
If all the religions say they're correct, and only one can be right really, then which one is the right one.
Then all you have to do is see just how many religions there are, let alone the plethora of different Christian denominations.
You realise just how stupid all of this is.
That was my enlightenment moment.
Christianity will adapt quite easily to Mythicism - if Mr. Fitzgerald is correct, it was the *original* Christianity! Of course they wouldn't call it "mythicist" because of the way we use the word "myth" to mean "falsehood." They'd just view Jesus as a channeled entity like "Seth" or "Ramtha" in the New Age movement, or even "Jesus" in A Course in Miracles. Mythicism would let Christians say the whole Bible is parable and allegory. At one stroke, they no longer have to defend abominable Bible passages and easily-debunked claims about science and history. "Well, the Lord didn't REALLY kill all the firstborn sons of Egypt, that's just an allegory for [insert some "nicer" meaning]." There are plenty of non-Evangelical Christians (e.g. Bishop Shelby Spong) who are already at least 90% of the way there. Heck, if I didn't have a conscience, and I had the charismatic, manipulative personality a good con artist needs, I'd get out in front and start preaching "Ascended" (or "Spiritual" or some other shiny term to replace "Mythicist") Christianity today.
When David talks about christianity evolving, isn't this _all_ religions? Don't we see the same thing in the first century where temple judaism mutates into rabbinical judaism and christianity? Don't all religions just change what they believe when it becomes untenable? God lived on the mountain, and then we climbed the mountain, and so he lives in the clouds, and we learned to fly, and so now he's in another dimension or out in space? Is it just christianity, or is it all of a piece? We tend to ignore the transitional periods. The early christians were jews. Very likely the early muslims were a christian sect that didn't believe in the divinity of Jesus. All of these things grow out of a common religious impulse.
+No Way
Yup, I love that "tree of religions" picture which resembles the biological evolution tree!
www.google.ca/search?q=tree+of+religions&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&gws_rd=cr&ei=ZxAgVrC6AsbGogTv2o2oDw
bpansky Hadn't seen those. Great share, thank you.
+bpansky Thanks you, as a former christian, you have just pushed me another million miles away although not like there was any chance of going back. It's one thing to have a pretty decent grasp on the history of religions but seeing in it so well demonstrated in a tree is just..................................disgusting. Revealing also comes to mind.
Thanks again and much love and peace to you and yours.
how did different writers get together to write about the same theme and to perpetuate it ?
The gospel writers copied Mark, which was the first gospel written.
The same reason why you know what happened to Bat Man's parents.
Interesting that Dante is mentioned because in his case the “hell” described in his poetry is closer to the Islamic interpretation of Hell -- interesting also that Islam is the off shoot and inheritor of the Arabic speaking Jews and Christians EXCEPT that, unlike Western Christianity, Islam is “Toranic observant.”
I see no reason why Christianity couldn't survive as the very mystery religion the speaker claims it originally was.
The assumptions of Christianity also pervade the study of crucifixion which is a tiny field compared to New Testament Studies, chiefly because it's a field of scholarly interest only to Christians (and others outside of academia whom the scholars don't hear from or listen to). Hence we have mishaps in devotional eenactment such as The Crucifixion of Sebastian Horsley (google it here on You Tube).
To be fair seth, all the disciples had beards so picking out that jesus bloke might have been a struggle...
Great "big picture" guy.
that word does not mean the same thing as it did when Paul was writing about it.
He reminds me of Tarintino
I hold water... but then I pee it out, like humanity has to do with religion.
You are NOTgiving Dr. Price any credit... he did parallels to Christ it was a wonderful series!! Bart Erhman is good also. But I love Dr. Price.
Religion is ridiculous, and, an embarrassment of humanity.
It's time to stop the silly Jesus myth!
Historians agree that the gospels (written in Greek, by unknown authors, from 70 to 140CE) portray Jesus as famous far and wide, a prophet and healer, with great multitudes of people who knew about him, including the greatest Jewish high priests and the Roman authorities of the area, and not one person records his existence during his lifetime? If the poor, the rich, the rulers, the highest priests, and the scribes knew about Jesus, who would not have heard of him?
Amazingly, we have not one Jewish, Greek, or Roman writer, even those who lived in the Middle East, much less anywhere else on the earth, whoever mention him during his supposed life time. This appears quite extraordinary, and you will find few Christian apologists who dare mention this embarrassing fact.
Or the disciples or as far as I know and surprisingly Paul as he went around making a nuisance of himself and travelled everywhere. John the Baptist is apparently a real figure.
And the first CANONICAL gospel, Mark, is an edited and redacted version of an extinct gospel called The Memoirs of the Apostles. Matthew is based on both. Luke is based on both and the Memoirs / Gospel of Peter. Thomas is based on an extinct "collection of the sayings of our lord" by a certain "Matthew".
did Papias tell you that? I heard from a chronic christian liar called Eusebius that he was a man of little worth.
I think the christ figure is pure myth. 2000+ years ago the world was radically different from now, especially as far as media is concerned. Not only did the internet, cable, tv, radio, etc. not exist, even printing was impossible. Books had to be hand written and hand copied. Considering the current human love for entertainment, it's hard not to believe that "religion" back then was more theater than real even to the more devout. Making up a character from nothing but imagination would be no more odd than today's Harry Potter. Also, there were very few people that took history seriously; so, there was little distinction between fiction and non-fiction. I think Tracie Harris was the first I heard call the bible fan fiction. It seemed appropriate to me. The danger comes when these idiots delusion reaches the level of actually believing Darth Vader is real.
here is another thought folks. let's assume jesus is real and will come back to earth one day. look at christians and the crosses they wear. does anyone think jesus would want to see another cross? just saying...
+hellshade2 If you are going to quote Bill Hicks, at least use Quotations.
*****
Heelshade2's comment about Jesus not wanting to see a cross when he returns was from a Bill Hicks comedy routine.
J ateabug
you are right. had forgotten where i heard it. still does not make it any less valid. and i think mr hicks would care less if i used quotations or not...
hellshade2
I am just one of those people who like to see credit go where it is due. Wasn't trying to rain on anyone's parade.
Bible invented by man then problem started.
"The creator of the entire universe was constrained, by the prevailing culture, from decreeing". HELL FUCKING NO......God can do what ever he/she/it wants. Now,if you can tell someone to not eat shellfish,wear mixed fabrics or work on a certain day,you can say don't enslave someone.END OF DEBATE......
What about the Gnostic gospels?? They were written in the early first century and they mention Jesus all over? There is good arguments for the non existence and the existence of Jesus. It’s interesting there’s no archeological evidence of him yet he is mentioned in the Gnostic gospels. If he did not exist as a man than why would the Christian movement even have happened??
Agnostic Christian apologetics could write a "good parts version". First draft: Eliminate and explicitly renounce the old testament.
What about evolution and original sin?
Ted Archer What does one have to do with the other? Science vs fiction
Lol!
heaven and hell are the same place.
Jesus used to wear a mask, that's why Judas had to point him out😉
Why do we not see those that put forth the notion of a mythical Jesus do so within the academic community? Why are they not writing papers and articles for peer review in the historical journals? Do we not mock and ridicule the anti evolution proponents for the same thing?
+conantroy1 If you listen to Dr. Carrier's talk with Seth, he talks about his books being peer reviewed. I also think Dr. Price's books have been peer reviewed. However, even if they weren't, theology isn't a science. One can do research, but there are no "experiments" to conduct and be confirmed. One just has the conclusions based on the research. Hardly the same.
+conantroy1 Richard Carrier did get his book through peer review in 2014. It's in part 1.
+conantroy1 You make an excellent point that those who have replied so far haven't really answered. Those in the academic community ignore Richard Carrier because the evidence that he cites and the arguments that he makes do not convince those who are experts in the relevant fields. David Fitzgerald (who, by the way, makes a far better presentation here than the one by Carrier) is writing only for popular audiences. He identifies himself as a historical researcher, but he doesn't claim the scholarly credentials that Carrier and Price have. If any of these writers could make a compelling case, those in the academic world would be glad to engage them and even build on their work. If you read the complete edition of Schweitzer's book The Quest for the Historical Jesus, you'll discover that most of what today's mythicists are saying has been around for a hundred years. Even though today's writers update these claims to a certain extent, they're really not offering anything new. As the two earlier replies note, Carrier likes to tout the fact that his books are peer-reviewed, but that doesn't mean those who reviewed the book find his arguments convincing.
RhondaH This isn't theology, but history. And actually both are peer reviewed. But staying on the topic of history, there are peer reviewed journals that any of these authors could submit their work to. To name but a few for the discipline of Ancient Near Eastern history, which is where the Biblical Text would be classified; American Journal of Ancient History, Journal of Near Eastern Studies
Published Quarterly by University of Chicago Press, or the Journal of the History of Philosophy, Published Quarterly by The Johns Hopkins University Press.
While you can't test these as one would a scientific experiment.You can verify claims based on evidence found in not only the ancient sources, but the archaeology. I'll give you and example. The Book of Mormon claims that there were Roman settlements in North America during the time of the 1st century CE. There is no archaeological evidence that has ever been discovered to support this claim at all (i.e. ruins of construction, building, roads, barracks, no pottery, no weapons or utensils, nothing within the text that ever states that the Romans ever came this far. We can dismiss this claim based on the lack of evidence. A second example coming from the Bible shows that the Exodus and the subsequent conquest did not happen exactly as described. There is evidence though, but it suggests a different chain of events. Ones that most likely were inspirations for a later retelling. One that paints Israel in a better light than what the evidence suggests. This is not the same as saying it's complete fiction. Same could be said for the evidence for the Historical Jesus. Perhaps you should read more of what the professional historians have to actually state in this regards (neither Carrier or Fitzgerald are professional historians. Of those in the mythicist movement, Robert Price is the only one that can make this claim).
BigplayerAA Actually no it wasn't. It was self published. It was reviewed by some professional historians, mostly due to the level of exposure that Dr Carrier has within the Atheist community. This is not the same as being peer reviewed.
Dr Carrier has submitted several papers for peer review. Most notably, "“Whence Christianity? A Meta-Theory for the Origins of Christianity.” Journal of Higher Criticism
11.1 (Spr 2005): 22-34." and "“The Guarded Tomb of Jesus and Daniel in the Lion’s Den: An Argument for the Plausibility of
Theft.” Journal of Higher Criticism 8.2 (Fall 2001): 304-18."
The Journal of Higher Criticism was a peer reviewd journal that didn't last very long. It's primary editors where Darrel Doughty and editor in chief, Robert Price. Both mythicists. Michael Behe did the exact same thing. He created his own "journal" and funneled intelligent design papers through it to make ti seem as they were peer reviewed. The secular community called them out for this. Why is it different with the mythicist camp? Could it because they are telling a story that most of us Atheists find compelling?
Okay,so let's lay out verse that shows that Jesus fully supported the OT. He therefore supported slavery. Here is one verse from the OT.
"4 “‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly."-Leviticus 25:44-46
First the definition of slave from Google search:
"a person who is the legal property of another and is forced to obey them"
Now, you are just flat out lying if you say the bible didn't support slavery. What about the New Testament?
"5 Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ."-Ephesians 6:5
I will for brevity list just a few more;
Luke 12:47-48
1 Timothy 6:1-2
Tell close this out:
“For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass the law until all is accomplished. Whoever then relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but he who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” - Matthew 5:18-19
“It is easier for Heaven and Earth to pass away than for the smallest part of the letter of the law to become invalid.” (Luke 16:17)
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest part or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place.” (Matthew 5:17)
“Did not Moses give you the law, and yet none of you keepeth the law” (John7:19)
Jesus FULLY SUPPORTED EVERYTHING in the Old Testament. Now, it takes real mental gymnastics to dance around this.
A personal relationship with bullshit.
Lol
26:44
lol "cluster"
He's right that there's not a whole lot of evidence about Jesus outside of the gospels, but what there is is solid enough to at least say that he preached and was crucified. That's the virtually unanimous consensus of nearly all Bible scholars anyway.
+Julian Duncan Please elaborate. I think I know exactly what you will reference but I would like you to at least back up your statement
+Julian Duncan Make your case for your claims. The point is not who agrees on what the point is what evidence can they present. The romans executed lots of people and yes many people were preaching. So we have dozens of characters if not hundreds that fits this description. When one says we agree he had a drving licencse and he got a parking ticking this is a totally meaningless agreement as this fits for nearly everyone.
Is Seth a mythicist??
666 manger street, hahahaha
My comment here is on part 1. Couldn't place this comment there for some reason. As much as I love his discourses on historicity of Jesus, his take-down of Joseph Atwill's work is unfair, and that in-depth reply to Atwill's work residing on his blog, is nothing more than a straw man argument.Totally misrepresents what Atwill is saying
I'm not going to go into depth... but here's a hint. Right in the interview he said that Atwill claims that Josephus wrote the Gospels to pacify the Jews. That is NOT what Atwill claims at all. He doesn't know who crafted the Gospels specifically, but has a short list of usual suspects, and Josephus' History or the Jewish Wars was used as a template. Very different claim.
I was actually looking for a skillful take down of Atwill's "Ceasar's Messiah", but Carrier hasn't done one. Unfortunately, Fitzgerald is on Carrier's bandwagon against Atwill.
Paul Christian the chameleon
Amen😈
Christianity does NOT approve of slavery, read things in there historical context and they tend to make a lot more sense.
Apply the same standards and logic to every other book you read!
+Aaron Kolenc EXODUS 20:20-21 - "Anyone who beats their male or female slave with a rod must be punished if the slave dies as a direct result, but they are not to be punished if the slave recovers after a day or two, since the slave is their property."
So..."You can kick your slave's ass." -The Bible
+TheThinkingAtheist That isn't slavery .... it's just indentured beat your assery
+Aaron Kolenc I'm afraid mr. Andrews is correct in this instance. You have to understand that from our point of view as former christian, the bible condones slavery... and remember the bible is considered the divinely inspired word of God.
You have to understand, we were christian once and we also believed in the bible and regardless of what many christian's think, I, +TheThinkingAtheist and many others do not "hate god" but simply cannot correlate anymore our society morality and knowledge with that exposed in a ancient barbaric, murderous etc.. book that is supposed to be the actual will of God in written form.
+Aaron Kolenc Yeah it does. There is no context where owning another person for any period of time and having a right to beat them is acceptable or ethical. Stop trying to apologize for God's word. It should be able to stand on its own two feet, regardless the context. It was supposedly written by an omniscient immortal all powerful perfect being.
+Aaron Kolenc That was then, this is now. If it weren't for the Quakers, we might still be owning slaves because the Quakers viewed abolition as a Christian duty. Abolition wasn't an atheist movement, it was a Christian movement.
Love does not require atonement. That does not mean "evolution" is "true":) Don't replace one cult with another:)
So TTA hosts mythicists AGAIN with nobody arguing the other side?
Mythicism is very much a fringe position and one that severely damages the image of skepticism as it is pure wishful thinking.
Tim O'Neil absolutely wrecked Nailed - it's really quite a bad book