Jesus never existed.

[Cell]

I think the point is that the existence of Jesus is a lot less certain than is widely believed. True, many historical reconstructions depend upon sometimes very indirect evidence, but the point stands. Jesus might, for instance, have been a composite of various persons.

To reiterate; the certitude with which the existence of Jesus is usually asserted is insufficiently grounded in evidence to justify that certitude.

He started the movement known as Christianity and was killed by those that opposed him due to their fears of an uprising. Jesus' followers then went around and spread his theology.

That is agreed upon by most historians. A lot of ancient history is based on things that are second hand. We just sort of have to accept it because there isn't anything else to go on. The issue is whether or not Jesus was superhuman. Jesus the man did exist and start the movement. It had to start somewhere.

True, if something "began" it must have begun "somewhere". But just exactly where, or exactly how, is not always as obvious as it might seem. There are various possibilities. Just because the most usual accounts of this particular "beginning" are more less in agreement with each other does not guarantee that these accounts are correct.

This is a logical fallacy known as argumentum ad populem; "It must be true because everybody says it is."

The Bible refers to many, many historical truths. Plagues, wars, fires, births, deaths, laws, etc. For one example -- contrary to what the topic starter believes -- there is historical evidence concerning the trial of Jesus and release of Barabbas by Pontius Pilate...

The Bible refers to many untruths too. Far more, I would say, than it does to truths. The Bible is a potpourri of disparate Bronze Age materials, which have subsequently be translated, retranslated, edited and in some instances fraudulently altered, bowdlerized and suppressed. Unsurprisingly, most of it really makes no sense at all.

And again, the baseless claim that religious people are only religious because they were "brainwashed" while they were children.

You call it “brainwashing”; I call it child abuse. Exploiting and preying on ignorance is a common religious tactic used to propagate the survival of the meme (which includes Christianity). Being infected with that religious and dogmatic concept of course, you wouldn’t see that. A faulty mind cannot diagnose itself (or others (ill) logically identical to it) after all.

Again, don't try comparing whatever god you believe in to the Christian god. You either don't understand the Biblical concept of salvation, or intentionally manipulate or ignore it.

First of all we don’t need to believe in any god that you or anyone conjures up. And, rather then other people not understanding your Biblical point of view, I suggest that it is your holy tripe that makes absolutely no sense. How many people have you seen walking on water these days all by themselves? How many “resurrected” bodies have you seen walking around the streets waiting to be magically lifted into “heaven”? Or, how many starving people have you seen being feed with magical bread and fish that have spontaneously appeared out of nowhere? How many blind people have you seen lately being cured of their blindness with nothing more then the wave of a person’s hand? And you actually think that this garbage makes any sense!? As you can see it would be impossible for us (logical people) to *understand* you. We don’t live in lala land after all. We live in the real world.

We all do things wrong (called "sins") -- all of us, even one little thing wrong -- and that's enough to keep us out of God's presence (remember, this is the Biblical God). Since we cannot keep from doing wrong things, we must be forgiven. Instead of paying for our sins (since there are only two places to live eternally, Heaven or Hell, and no sinners can enter God's presence in Heaven), Jesus paid for our sins, so that we didn't have to -- because we can't. So since we can't "earn" our way to Heaven (or, rather, out of Hell) by doing "good" things, we must be forgiven for the "bad" things we've done.

Bullshit logic again. If we have no choice but to sin then we have no moral responsibility for those sins. If god chose to create us this way then that's his problem. Therefore we do not need to be forgiven. Sacrificing Jesus is a complete waste of nails and wood, we do not need him to "pay" for our sins even if this was possible, which it isn't.

Consider people like cookies, and God wants us to be sugar cookies. Let's say God's allergic to chocolate -- can't eat it, can't touch it, can't even be around it. We all started out as sugar cookies, but throughout life, we get chocolaty, some more than others. You may be a sugar cookie with one chocolate sprinkle, or you may be an entire chocolate cake with chocolate chips and chocolate filling and chocolate icing and chocolate crust and chocolate milk on the side (did I miss some chocolate?), but either way, you're not a sugar cookie. Jesus was the only sugar cookie. And only Jesus can take all of the chocolate out of us and make us sugar cookies again, no matter how much we have, so God can ... eat us, I guess. C'mon, I'm trying to explain Christian spirituality and salvation with cookie analogies, gimme a break. Maybe cookies wasn't the best idea ... but it's understandable, right?.

Personally I think of myself as filled with creamy goodness, fibre for substance and added vitamins, T in particular.

Let me see if I have the hang of this one; nailing a sugar cookie onto some handy nearby woodwork causes all the chocolate cookies in the world to go white with fear (but only if they choose freely be terrified)? Hmm.

While no true Christian (or believer of any religion, I'd imagine) condones the "fire insurance" following of their religion, at least it's a way to, hopefully, get the person to consider what the beliefs entail, learn about them, and possibly consider joining them. Followers of most beliefs and ideals, religious or not, use a similar tactic. Hell, look at the "Global Warming" nutjobs. Regardless of whether you believe it or not, Al Gore spouting that the earth is going to melt and burn today and flood and freeze tomorrow gets you thinking. I assume Al Gore is lying whenever he opens his mouth because of the Law of Averages (if he's usually lying, he's probably lying now), but his presentations have made even me look into the topic. Whichever path I chose to follow, at least Al Gore and others who think alike have brought the issue to the table, made a serious confrontation about it, and gotten people to consider the issue. While movies like "An Inconvenient Truth" (which was very inconvenient, and nowhere near truth) and "Day After Tomorrow" present extremes that are unrealistic and only push people away from the issue, they do the same thing that "soapbox preachers" and the typical ignorant "OMG ur goin 2 heck!" kids do. The difficult part is sorting out which present a serious issue in a pathetic manner, and which just present a pathetic issue.

Evidently you believe that Al Gore tells more lies than anything else. Tough to back that up with evidence. Presumably that's why you didn't do so. Please feel free to remedy the situation. Bring lots of data. Lots and lots. Most of Gores public utterances in fact. Or you could withdraw the allegation...

The difference is that "scientists" and lobbyists like Al Gore support issues like "Global Warming" (is that different from the Global Cooling scare 30 years ago, or do they just call it Global Climate Change now?) for their personal financial and political gain, while most Christians have nothing to gain from spreading their beliefs..

Nothing to gain? Not even credits for admission to your mythical heaven? Perhaps we have been exposed to different bibles. The one's that I hear about are shrill with imprecations about spreading the word of god and what the consequences might be for failing to heed that same word of god. Perhaps they have nothing to gain, but in their eyes, "most christians" have a lot to lose. More fool them.

You're misinterpreting the process of belief.

Well it was completely flawed to begin with so what’s your point exactly?

In Christianity, Jesus has already died for our sins, past, present, and future. Before then it was pretty much difficult for any man to get into heaven or hell. Once Jesus sacrificed himself for all of mankind it made it easier on those very same souls who are decent people to enter heaven despite any sins they commit. The understanding within that historical event was it actually made it easier for one to CHOOSE to accept Jesus as their savior [hence him becoming a martyr] and lead a selfless life devoted to that deed in which will allow you to enter the gates of heaven.

This is a good example of what I mean by not making any sense at all. How can somebody "die for my sins"?

How is it possible for somebody other than the actual guilty party to repent a bad deed? If I am sentenced to spend time in jail I can't send somebody else to serve my sentence for me. The idea is preposterous unless you are sun-addled Bronze Age primitive who believes that human sacrifice has some effect on the universe apart from the death of the unfortunate victim.

Very interestingly, we note that Jesus is supposed to have died for our sins in some cases as much as 2000 years in advance of their actual commission. Wither free will? So often it is claimed that God gave us "free will" so that our love for him would be unconstrained. This seems inconsistent with the "fact" that we are doomed to be sinners no matter what we do or do not do. Can't have it both ways I'm afraid.

You know, the most ignorant and biggest mistake I see anti-Christians and atheist alike is the misconception that God is a wrathful being. He's not a just or unjust God, but a merciful God. The difference between what ignorant people tell you or what snippets of verses you read of who God really is is the fact we have a choice. If God was TRULY a wrathful being that wanted everyone to believe in him [or Jesus in this case], he would NOT give you the ability to CHOOSE to believe in him. That's what people mistake these days. The fact we have the CHOICE is evident enough that what the majority of ignorant anti-Christians THINK they believe is wrong. You know what though? How about I give YOU an example of how mericful God is?

I find it hard to understand this logic, much less abide by it with my life. Leaving aside for the moment the question of whether god is wrathful or not, why should it be necessary to have to choose whether to believe in god or not? I'm not faced with the choice of whether or not to believe in my own existence. The fact that the existence of "god" is not blindingly obvious suggests to me that there can be no such thing as "god". Why would the certain knowledge of the existence of god prevent anyone from loving god "freely"? I am fairly certain of the existence of many people but this knowledge does not prevent me from loving at least some of them. In fact I seriously doubt that it would be possible for me to love somebody that I had never even met or spoken to. Why would any rational god expect me to make an exception for him? It would mean that I would have to invent a completely different definition of the word "love" than has ever been used before.

The short of it is that this argument from "free love" is an abuse of language. It is nonsense.

Alright, let's presume Christianity is real and every historical event regarding supernatural occurrences is true. In my example, let's say God didn't create the flood and allowed millions of people continue to rape, pillage, and kill each other. Fast forward today, what do you think the world would be like? Or hell, would there be any world left with so much chaos? Would you be alive today sitting at your computer and writing any of this out or would you be held at gun point by somebody who wants to use your body? With so much pain, suffering, and misery in that world do you really believe it was wrath that God brought upon his people?

Now of course I could probably ask question after question, but I think you [hopefully] get my point. If it wasn't mercy God gave this world in that time then I don't know what was.

*Rubbing eyes in complete disbelief*

The world as we find it is a happy little paradise because the Biblical flood rid us of evil people? Behemoth, are there newspapers and stuff like that where you live? We know you have access to the Internet. How have you missed the fact that the world is a horrible, fucked up, evil place full of pain, suffering, death, misery, cruelty, disease, humiliation, subjugation and advertising?

So much so in fact, that it forms one of the main arguments against the existence of god sometimes known as the "problem of evil". This problem is so grave that many theologians have felt compelled to produce what are known as "theodicies" which are elaborate attempts to explain this problem away. Suffice it to say that nobody has succeeded so far.

Short version; what kind of a "merciful" god would create Satan? (Arguments from "free will" will not be entertained; please refer to my previous remarks on the subject). Also, if this “god” you enjoy preaching about was as perfect as you seem to think it is then all this nasty stuff you’ve described wouldn’t have existed or been necessary to begin with. As any one with half a brain can see this world is far from perfect. And if this god is supposedly meant to be omnipresent it could not be itself perfect, and thus it is flawed; therefore, it could not be considered “omnipotent” - a term which itself is logically contradictory with “omniscience” (you either know the future and are powerless to change it, or you can change the future and not know it for certain). Lacking these vital (and contradictory) necessities required for god-hood, we can deem that this imaginary thing we’re talking about cannot be a “god”.

What's even funnier is those same science fanboys and anti-christians won't do their OWN research into evolution OR the big bang to realize the many holes in each theory. No, they eat up everything the science community says is true because they A) Don't want to be judged for their sins and wish to live a sinful life so they attack God or B) Have lived a life of ignorance as to what they think is right. It's really a sad thing too because THEY become hypocrites by forcing THEIR beliefs on Christians when they have no right too. Debate against them? Sure, but to down right attack the other side is something only a child would do when things aren't going their way.

I am not aware of Christians having beliefs "forced upon them" by scientists or anybody else other than their own priests. (Please don't even think of trying the "faith in science is the same thing as faith in god" manoeuvre. It doesn't work – something that has been demonstrated time and again in these very precincts. Please fell free to consult the archives in this regard). Despite your ramblings however it is a well-documented series of facts that the big bang, as well as the theory of evolution are well-supported scientific theories – which means being back up by empirical evidences that we can actually see, examine and explore. Wikipedia would be a good place for you to start. But where is even a single shred of the empirical evidence for this god you seem to enjoy preaching about so much? Or even that he gives a flying fuck about you (bibles and other mythical circular-reasoning methods notwithstanding).

But then perhaps you are referring to the "forcefulness" of evidence, reason and logic? If this is the case, then I'm sure you would not wish to perpetrate the same abuse as that of which you complain of by persuading me that your point of view is correct. Or is it the case that you are only prepared to play by those rules if you are allowed to win every time?

[Walter Sobchak]

True, if something "began" it must have begun "somewhere". But just exactly where, or exactly how, is not always as obvious as it might seem. There are various possibilities. Just because the most usual accounts of this particular "beginning" are more less in agreement with each other does not guarantee that these accounts are correct.

This is a logical fallacy known as argumentum ad populem; "It must be true because everybody says it is."

Is this how we do things now? You and I both know that there is more documentation of Jesus existing than not existing. The historical Jesus movement is almost three hundred years old, and people much smarter than we are have made plenty of progress in the field. Most importantly, the Jesus Seminar > us. Do I need to cite sources on a forum?

So far as I am aware, nobody, Christians least of all, assert that the biblical Jesus, historical Jesus or mythical Jesus was a superhuman.

I try to ignore you, but this is sad. Grow up. You know what I meant by the word superhuman. Don't be this way, you will find that it hurts relationships with all sorts of people.