How Can We Be So Certain that Paul , Jesus & the Gang Were Real?

[kypride]

Sadly his adversary keeps speaking me , I try not to listen but .... I become " that Christian hypocrite " occasionally .

 

That happens too, i'm afraid.

[Science Friction]

Furthermore, @ScienceFriction, how can we be sure that anything exists? We may not even be here. We could just be the story being written by a life in another universe. Maybe gravity is the invisible hand of some aliens that pushes us down when we jump. Maybe the entire world as we know it is just a drop of water on a leaf.

 

The universe is the most vast and greatest existence we have/will ever come to know. Your religion (Science) has shown that the universe is finite, and has existed for 13.8 billion years (or whatever the agreed upon number is). Knowing this, many people find it likely that there is a first mover, someone who created the universe and made conditions so that life could exist. Christianity to many people is the most plausible explanation of this deity or others (such as myself) believe it is 100% the truth. So I have decided to become a Christian, and I strive everyday to act like Christ did. Us Christians are taught to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, visit the sick, ransom the captive, and bury the dead among other righteous deeds.

 

What's your problem with Christians?

 

 

I have many friends who profess Christianity. Some I work with. Some of the best people I know.

[InItToWinIt]

I have many friends who profess Christianity. Some I work with. Some of the best people I know.

 

Then why do you constantly attack them on here?

[Aroundthehorn]

There is definitely proof (historical evidence) that Jesus was a real man, and was crucified. If you think that the Resurrection was a made-up story: there were 500 eye-witnesses, not to mention the Apostles were murdered for teaching that Jesus rose from the dead. Peter was crucified upside down, Andrew on an "x", and Bartholomew was skinned alive. If they made the whole Resurrection story up, they would not have had the courage to be crucified, and would have given up on it.

[doomer]

I never saw Abraham Lincoln, or my great-grandfather for that matter (Ebeneezer Doomer) either, but I don't question their existence.

[KYgentleman]

Science could not have created Jessica Alba, Kate Upton, or Kentucky Basketball. Our redeemer LIVES!

[hoopboy]

I don't think we can. If you have eye-witness proof from a really old relative who says they met them let me know. I honestly don't think anyone ever laid an eye on them . The historicity of the super-apostle , vexed by troubles on all sides, is less than compelling. Sure , the Pauline letters and other apostolic letters exist, but the epistles are far from genuine if you know history. As I am sure you good Christians know, the epistles originated in the midst of the bitter doctrinal battles of the the second century and this was at a time when pseudepigraphy and forged apostolic writings were used as weapons in the war of "Christianities."

 

In fact, as I hope you are aware of, pseudepigraphy is the heart of your New Testament. The Pauline corpus is no exception. In fact, it is a compendium of fraud. Scholars have attempted to chronicle the life of Paul yet Acts of the Apostles is a naive fantasy and the Pauline letters themselves provide very few clues as for time and place.

 

Paul is purported to be the first and most influential figure of the Church , a tireless founder of churches and super-evangelist. Yet, whoever wrote in the name of "Paul" combined elements from Judaism, Gnosticism, and the Mystery religions to come up with a winning formula. It makes no sense to me( I'm sure it does to you) why a pioneering apostle and devout churchman named Paul is not linked by evidence to the early Christian churches in the major cities of the Roman world.

 

I know this is not what your Sunday school teachers fed you when you were forming your religious beliefs as a child. I know all I was told was fantastic stories from the Bible that sent my little boy mind racing. I even wished I could have lived back then. I wished I could have met a man called Jesus on the road to Damascus , just as "Paul" did. How lucky I would been to have seen this Godman walk on water, turn water to wine, make the blind see, and be one of the five thousand to be fed from the seven loaves and few fish. And to have been there that morning when they rolled the stone away...WOW! But I was a little boy then. Believing what I was told, with child-like faith. Now I'm an adult....a rational thinking adult that requires more than just child-like faith acceptance of magical and supernatural phenomenon.

 

In conclusion, I think history and evidence points clearly in the direction that Christianity was NOT propagated by the bold evangelism of a handful of fearless apostles, filled with the Holy Spirit, and energized by their personal experiences of a resurrected godman. In fact, contrary to this, no evidence links Paul to the major Christian churches and ,quite frankly, the story in Acts is a pious invention. While Acts records his presence at major places like Athens and Ephesus and even small towns like Derbe and Mitylene, the epistles confirm very little of his grand tour. While I would find it intrinsically plausible that a wandering sage or Aristotlean philosopher might embark on some sort of missionary journey at that time, the Pauline journeys, marked by incongruities, contradiction, and the outright absurd are not at all compelling. I don't think they would be for you either if you didn't WANT so badly to believe, just as I did when child-like faith is all that was required.

 

 

BTW, this was post number 666 for me ! Let the jokes begin.

 

Now that you mention it, how can we be so sure that George Washington, Hitler, Sammy Davis Jr, or Walter Kronkite were real? I never saw any of em in person.

[Science Friction]

Now that you mention it, how can we be so sure that George Washington, Hitler, Sammy Davis Jr, or Walter Kronkite were real? I never saw any of em in person.

 

 

Good point. Maybe we are all just illusions and nothing is real. I think there are some REAL historical evidence on the above mentioned men, though. Paul and Jesus, however, not so much. And the Bible is definitely not a sound historical reference. Far from it, in fact.

[hoopboy]

Good point. Maybe we are all just illusions and nothing is real. I think there are some REAL historical evidence on the above mentioned men, though. Paul and Jesus, however, not so much. And the Bible is definitely not a sound historical reference. Far from it, in fact.

 

I think I saw a picture of Sammy Davis Jr. once, but you'll never convince me that George Washington, Walter Kronkite, and Hitler were real. They said they put a man on the moon a day or two ago too. I'm not buying that for one second!

[Voice of Reason]

Based on posts above, I am late to the discussions with Science Friction. My position with people like science fiction is I am not going to try and convince you of things that can't be proven to your satisfaction. I ask you to look at the Bible as purely a work of fiction. Even if it is all made up it is filled with great lessons on how to live a life to be proud of.