What drives people to ignore the evidence of Christ?

Well, it goes both ways.

 

Nobody 'saw' Him come back to lifeand wrote about it, but people who saw the risen Lord did.

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IF God exists, none of those things are any big deal.

 

Wrong, I said in this case.

Eyewitness testimony is often the best evidence we have. No system is perfect, probably even the DNA evidence is possible to mess up, by having the wrong person's DNA for example.

 

Here comes the circular reasoning again, by 'independent' you mean non-Christian, when in fact anyone who saw the risen Lord would become a Christian (according to atheists here anyway when asked if they would become Christian in such an event), thereby making their testimony not 'independent'. You're attempting to set up an impossible standard.

 

so you actually believe that Paul saw Jesus, decades after his resurrection?

dude, I got bridge to sell you in Brooklyn.

 

You said...

Second hand accounts are not usually admissible in court, which is what I said. The Peterson case does not challenge that assertion.

I am not challenging our legal system. I am telling you a fact that eyewitness accounts are often faulty and quite unreliable. Any responsible juror should demand more evidence than that alone. But we know people break the law. It's a common thing. Guys walking on water.... not so much. If a witness testified to such a fact few jurors would find that testimony credible.

 

Yes.

Don't need it, not much water here in NM.

 

OK, it is true hearsay is generally not accepted, but not always.

Here is a renowed legal expert, founder of the Harvard Law School, who found the Gospel accounts very convincing:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testimony_of_the_Evangelists

 

need it or not, it sounds like you'd surely buy it.

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so he was a lawyer AND an idiot.

 

I always can back up what I say. Unlike those who just have "feelings" that their "faith" must be True.

 

"Best evidence we have" =/= good evidence.

 

So? If you insist on the courtroom analogies, this guy would have been excluded from the jury pool due to his previously held biases. Obscure it's relation to the religious figures and put a similar case in front of most students of the law and I am sure the overwhelming majority would find the evidence for the factual resurrection of Christ sorely lacking. It's an extraordinary claim and you have insufficient proof in the Bible for Christ's mere existence, much less his resurrection.

 

What's your claim to this? The bright light?

 

Thank you for confirming that you have to have faith first for any of those stories to be believable.

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Can you support that "fact" with empirical evidence?

 

That book is based on the assumption that the Gospels were first hand accounts written by the Disciples themselves. To be fair, the book was written around 1850 before any major textual criticism of the Bible had begun.

 

there is no evidence that Jesus performed miracles and was resurrected.

 

Jesus said his ministers could duplicate and surpass his miracles. What church today does what he did?

 

Read the book of Acts.

I was a Pentecostal most of my life, because I believe what God could do then, He can do now. My problem with the Pentecostal/Assemblies of God churches is their doctrines that spiritual gifts are evidence of Christ. I have witnessed the praying in tongues, healing, binding demons, slain in the Spirit, all of that stuff. My conclusion is that dogma drives most of these people to do these things, which are most illusional and fabricated.

I didn't leave that church because I don't believe people today can do what Jesus said they could do in his name 2000 years ago. I'm sort of a Bapti-costal, I suppose. I still believe, but I haven't personally witnessed what I thought was genuinely the Holy Spirit working supernaturally through someone either with tongues or healing. I've seen things that had others convinced. But I've always been very skeptical, believe it or not.

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Yeah, you've said that like eighteen times now.

 

Which confirms what many think about you.
You are stuck in a mid-nineteenth century mindset.

 

i'll keep repeating it until it fully sinks in.

 

It was around this time that scholars believed that the Gospels were written in the mid to late second century, which would have made it impossible to be written by any of Jesus' disciples. Now we know better. The dates have gone back to at least within the later half of the first century.

 

There is plenty of well-researched and very thought-provoking material at these sites, if anyone is really interested in the fine details:

http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier

http://adversusapologetica.wordpress.com/

 

I'm sure you and your grossly overrepresented (compared to normal America) atheist friends here think so. Better an old truth than a new lie. Care to refute Mr. Greenleaf's argument, or can't you? You want someone newer, check out Lee Strobel, Yale Law School grad and former Chicago Tribune Legal Affairs Editor who became a Christian after studying the evidence.

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Context? He probably was speaking to the apostles who wrote the epistles.

 

thing is, Paul, there is no evidence. ergo, Strobel probably became a xian because he/she wanted to believe, or because he/she was undergoing some sort of personal crisis, or was starting to feel their mortality and was sniffing around for insurance policies. there are as many reasons for people to make the leap that faith requires as there are people making the leap. evidence is never in the picture.

 

What Church....well...the new Church of AboveAlpha!!!!

Yes....I am now putting out the Bible of Alpha that say's I was around 2000 years ago....and died and was resurrected....and all the miracles that you can read about in my Bible of Alpha that I did 2000 years ago....Bible of Alpha available online or in stores for $99 or 3 easy payments of $40.....all those miracles I can tell you my Ministers can DUPLICATE and even surpass!!!!

Yep...and you can see this happen at our Madison Square Garden Faith Concert.....Tickets available online for $100, $200 and Gold Seating...$1000.....and be amazed!!!!

AboveAlpha...p.s....Cris Angel will be the opening act.