Re: The score

On May 29, 11:18 am, Zoe <muz...@xxxxxxx> wrote:
On 28 May 2007 14:52:19 -0700, "Von R. Smith" <trakl...@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:





On May 28, 2:14 pm,Zoe<muz...@xxxxxxx> wrote:
On 28 May 2007 10:24:40 -0700, "Von R. Smith" <trakl...@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

On May 28, 8:14 am,Zoe<muz...@xxxxxxx> wrote:
On Mon, 28 May 2007 03:31:14 GMT, bdbry...@xxxxxxxxxxx (Bobby Bryant)



I think you can see where the discussion is likely to lead from
there: What if anything makes the Gospels objectively better evidence
than "some old book?"

well, this is a whole new track, but I'll answer.

The Gospels recount fulfilment of prophecies made hundreds of years
before their time. For instance, the exact date and manner of
Christ's birth, life, and death was fulfilled.

That's quite a trick, since we don't know the exact date of Jesus'
birth or death.

historically, we know the dates for Caesar Augustus' reign, and since
Jesus was born during the time of his decree for registering all those
under his jurisdiction, that begins to narrow things down.


Well, it might if we actually knew if and when such a decree was ever
issued, which we don't. Luke mentions that Quirinius was governor of
Syria at the time, which would put the date around 6 A.D., but that
probably isn't correct, and contradicts Matthew (see below).



Also, the Gospels state that Jesus' birth occurred near the end of
Herod the Great's rule.


Actually, only one gospel states this: Matthew. Luke doesn't mention
Herod at all, nor a flight to Egypt, nor a massacre of the innocents
(and he puts the census ten years after Herod's death).


The Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus, notes
Herod's death as in the spring of 4 B.C. (Antiquities of the Jews,
Josephus, Book 17, Chpt. 8) So apparently, the birth of Jesus must
have taken place some four years before what is now considered the
traditional date.


Or five years. Maybe even six. The chronology in Matthew isn't fine-
grained enough for us to know.


Using those time lines, his crucifixion falls at
exactly the time predicted by the prophecy in Daniel.


Estimated dates for the crucifixion generally range from 30 to 33
A.D., so there is no way to say this.


Daniel gives a
starting time (457 B.C.)


Or 538 B.C., or 445 B.C., depending on who's interpreting. It would
have helped if that first Messiah had shown up at the end of the
seventh "week" like he was supposed to.


for the timeline of 483 years until the start
of Jesus' public ministry.


No, Daniel gives us a time at the end of which a Messiah will be "cut
off", which is generally interpreted as meaning "killed". The temple
is also supposed to be destroyed at this time. But Jesus wasn't "cut
off" until 30-33 A.D., and the Temple wasn't destroyed until 70 A.D.


.
At any rate, you seem to have forgotten that one of the points at
issue is whether we should believe that the remarkable events
described in the Gospels ever actually happened. Citing those alleged
events and pointing out that they were prophecy fulfillments isn't
evidence for anything other than the authors' agenda.

you can go the route of conspiracy theories, and claim that billions
of Christians worldwide are misled, and have been lied to, and that
only a relatively small handful of scientists know the truth, but
that's a minority position.


Minority among what? Christians? And where did the "handful of
scientists" comment come from?

Nor is there any need to talk about massive conspiracies to deceive
the multitudes of the world. In case you forgot, we are talking about
whether one should credit an account in "some old book" of a
remarkable event, such as a resurrection from the dead. It doesn't
take a massive conspiracy to write a book claiming bogus prophecy
fulfillments.

As for those poor billions of Christians that you needlessly dragged
into this discussion: as Bobby Bryant pointed out, doesn't your
position entail claiming that multitudes of non-Christians have been
lied to by their respective holy books? Why would that be a more
respectable position?



Besides, what if, based on a similar ground of disbelief, I should say
that there is a conspiracy among scientists to forward their own
agenda through lies and deceit. Where does that get us?

First, I am not suggesting any sort of massive conspiracy, just a
handful of "true believers" relaying a rumor as fact to a credulous
audience. Scientists generally use first-hand reports from the team
that actually made a given observation and will question these
colleagues closely about it. They also usually insist on independent
replication and confirmation of results whenever possible before
accepting them, especially for really surprising or unlikely-sounding
results. With such procedures in place, there probably *would* need
to be a conspiracy to keep the lie alive for any length of time. In
the case of the Gospels, however, no such safeguards were in place, so
it wouldn't have taken much of a conspiracy to keep the story alive
and embellish it once it got started.

Second, you have no "similar ground of disbelief". Nobody has asked
you to accept a report of a phenomenon that is implausible on its face
(you might find scientists' *conclusions* to be implausible and not
accept them, but I am talking about their actual reports of
observations). No one is asking you to believe, for example, a report
that Johansson saw Lucy's skeleton rise up and walk around on its own
to demonstrate to him that she was bipedal.

Nobody is asking you to accept a scientific observation, the only
reports of which were written decades after the fact by people other
than those who saw it, which accounts contradict one another in
numerous important details, and the texts of which even show signs of
having been subsequently edited and tampered with by unknown hands.

I could go on with the disanalogies, but these will do for now.



The movie "The Seventh Sign" describes prophecy fulfillments, too.
All that proves is that its writers were familiar with the prophecies
and wished to depict fulfillments of them.

There apparently was
a study conducted by a Dr. Peter Stoner, former chairman of the
department of mathematics, astronomy and engineering, at Pasadena
College in California, who worked with 600 students for several years,
applying the principle of probability to the prophecies of the
Messiah's coming. They chose just eight out of some 125 prophecies
about the coming Messiah, and finally decided that the chances of all
eight being fulfilled in one man in a lifetime was 1 in
1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. And that was just
eight out of the 125 prophecies that were fulfilled.

Did they also calculate the odds that it never happened, and that the
evangelists merely claimed that it did and embellished their stories
to bolster that claim?

you do realize that if you accuse certain writers of lying that that
does not exempt you from similar charges with regard to the writings
of scientists? If you live in a world in which deceit and
embellishment is rampant, then that would have to include scientists,
too, for they are not above human frailities.


Indeed, and the odds of a particular find being fraudulent are
considerably better than 1 in 10^33. Wouldn't you agree?




But don't take my word for it. I'm sure you mathematicians can
calculate the statistics for that yourselves.

I would recommend that, unless you want to say that writers in New
Testament times made up the Old Testament predictions, you consider a
chapter like Psalms 22, in which the crucifixion was described in very
plain words, and see if you don't think it was truly prophetic.

Did you consider the possibility that Matthew knew Psalms 22 and might
use it as a trope to describe the events in question? AFAIK, the
Psalms aren't normally considered prophecies.

then you should read Psalms 22. Also, Isaiah 53, which was found
amongst the writings of the Dead Sea Scrolls -- writings done long
before the time of the writers of the New Testament.


I have read Psalms 22. It isn't self-evidently a prophecy. Do Jews
consider it to be a prophecy? And the Dead Sea Scrolls date to the
1st century A.D., which is hardly "long before the time of the writers
of the New Testament"



Now, you certainly are free to say that the writers of the New
Testament made up the story of Jesus, based on Old Testament
prophecies, but just be aware that with the kind of skepticism that
considers everyone a liar who does not agree with one's own position,
you will become trapped in a box so small that you could never grow or
increase in true knowledge.


You are not in a position to criticize other people for being stuck in
a box and unwilling to learn.

.

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