what makes your religious beliefs right?

[sarmchain]

just curious to see what makes you think YOUR religious beliefes (regardless of rather your Christian , Atheist, Buddhist etc) are right?

as a atheist i think the idea of anything supernatural is illogical , for example if i push something and it moves , it moved because i was applying force to it if there is nothing applying force to it it can not move

[ComradeMan]

Yes, but why did you push it?

It's pointless arguing about what is right and wrong with religious belief, because belief itself is subjective and cannot be analysed objectively.

[mollymae]

I don't think anything makes what I believe right. I'm an athiest and I believe what I see, which is nothing. However, that doesn't make me right.

[Comrade Anarchist]

Nothing. Any belief that can not be fully tested and is incredibly unreasonable is something that can only be excepted on blind faith. Blind faith is what allows for millions of people to sacrifice parts of their life if not all to empty space men or fairies. Sacrificing ones logic, reason, and happiness for empty bullshit is upsetting and disgusting to watch.

[Hit The North]

Yes, but why did you push it?

It's pointless arguing about what is right and wrong with religious belief, because belief itself is subjective and cannot be analysed objectively.

Belief isn't subjective. People are inducted into belief by cultural institutions and it is therefore a feature of the social, not the individual. This is why there are only hundreds of religions rather than six billion. The ability to believe in something from an aesthetic or moral stand-point without recourse to scientific or rational verification, might be a feature of the individual brain, but the content of and the transmission of those beliefs derive from objective social relations and forces.

Although your point that the question of the right and wrong of religious beliefs is, in fact, pointless is sound. The question presupposes that religion is a form of knowledge, open to rational scrutiny, which it is not. Read as a form of social practice, religious discourse is not involved with issues of knowledge at all, it is involved with issues of power. In other words, it lives as ideology.

[mikelepore]

It seems that most religious people aren't too concerned about whether their reasons for believing are valid. They just say "I was raised this way", "it makes me feel good", etc. But the atheist can more easily recognize that religion is essentially a set of factual assertions: "a god exists", "a soul exists", "paradise exists", and that the reasons given by the believers are invalid when offered in support of factual assertions.

Believers can sometimes recognize this with respect to other people's religions, but not their own. Tell someone who believes in the miracles performed by Jesus the stories about the miracles performed by Krishna, and they may respond, "Oh, sheesh -- how could someone believe in supernatural tales merely because they were raised since childhood to trust the veracity of an ancient book?"

Sometimes devout Christians who read the fables of Hercules have the reaction, "Supposeldly, this man could perform superhuman deeds because, although is mother was human, his father was divine. Who in their right mind would ever believe something like that?"

How ironic.

[John_Jordan]

It seems that most religious people aren't too concerned about whether their reasons for believing are valid. They just say "I was raised this way", "it makes me feel good", etc. But the atheist can more easily recognize that religion is essentially a set of factual assertions: "a god exists", "a soul exists", "paradise exists", and that the reasons given by the believers are invalid when offered in support of factual assertions.

Believers can sometimes recognize this with respect to other people's religions, but not their own. Tell someone who believes in the miracles performed by Jesus the stories about the miracles performed by Krishna, and they may respond, "Oh, sheesh -- how could someone believe in supernatural tales merely because they were raised since childhood to trust the veracity of an ancient book?"

Sometimes devout Christians who read the fables of Hercules have the reaction, "Supposeldly, this man could perform superhuman deeds because, although is mother was human, his father was divine. Who in their right mind would ever believe something like that?"

How ironic.

And yet there are plenty of religious people who are very concerned if their religions beliefs are valid.

[Dimentio]

Nothing. Any belief that can not be fully tested and is incredibly unreasonable is something that can only be excepted on blind faith. Blind faith is what allows for millions of people to sacrifice parts of their life if not all to empty space men or fairies. Sacrificing ones logic, reason, and happiness for empty bullshit is upsetting and disgusting to watch.

Like objectivism?

[spiltteeth]

Bob, I think your confusing objective evidence and subjective states of self-verifying beliefs (when people believe in God because it just seems self-evidently true to them and is justified unless contrary evidence is presented) and the social FUNCTION of religion (which indeed mainly involves power structures of oppression)

Actually science can both falsify and verify claims of religion. When religions make claims about the natural world, they are making predictions which scientific investigation can either verify or falsify.

The views of ancient Greek and Indian religions that the sky rested on the shoulders of Atlas or the world on the back of a great turtle were easily falsified.

Or think Church’s condemnation of Galileo for his holding that the Earth moves around the sun rather than vice versa. On the basis of their misinterpretation of certain Bible passages like Ps. 93.1: “The Lord has established the world; it shall never be moved,” medieval theologians denied that the Earth moved. Scientific evidence eventually falsified this hypothesis, and the Church had to admit its mistake.

Another example is the claim of several Eastern religions like Taoism and certain forms of Hinduism that the world is divine and therefore eternal. The discovery during this century of the expansion of the universe reveals that far from being eternal, all matter and energy, even physical space and time themselves, came into existence at a point in the finite past before which nothing existed. As Stephen Hawking says , “
almost everyone now believes that the universe, and time itself, had a beginning at the big bang.”
But if the universe came into being at the Big Bang, then it is temporally finite and contingent in its existence and therefore neither eternal nor divine, as pantheistic religions had claimed.

On the other hand, science can also verify religious claims. For example, one of the principal doctrines of the Judaeo-Christian faith is that God created the universe out of nothing a finite time ago. The Bible begins with the words, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth” The Bible thus teaches that the universe had a beginning. This teaching was repudiated by both ancient Greek philosophy and modern atheism, including dialectical materialism. Then in 1929 with the discovery of the expansion of the universe, this doctrine was dramatically verified.
Physicists John Barrow and Frank Tipler, speaking of the beginning of the universe, explain,
“At this singularity, space and time came into existence; literally nothing existed before the singularity, so, if the Universe originated at such a singularity, we would truly have a creation ex nihilo (out of nothing).”

Anywo, my criteria for truth is rational consistency, which, as far as I can tell, rests only with christianity.
Plus I think things like the bigbang, or nueroscience, or the archeological evidence for Christ risen for the grave, are all good objective evidences - at least collectivley they are convincing to me.

Its the only rational belief system I've found..

I like Calvins idea that God has given us all an built-in belief of God, so that evidence is secondary.
And I should mention everyone believes things for which there is no evidence - other minds, many memories, the external world, axioms like 2+2=4 - they all just seem self-evident, like the belief of God for many.
- Check out Bertrand Russell - he was a hard core atheist who said his whole life was the search for the proof that 1+1=2, but in the end it can never be proven, there are no evidences, it is a basic belief, a self-evident belief, an axiom.

And of course the statement "only things for which there are evidence ought to be believed" itself has no evidence, so one ought, by that very principal, not believe it....

[Hit The North]

Bob, I think your confusing objective evidence and subjective states of self-verifying beliefs

No, I'm not. I don't consider self-verifying beliefs to constitute knowledge.


Actually science can both falsify and verify claims of religion. When religions make claims about the natural world, they are making predictions which scientific investigation can either verify or falsify. I wouldn't disagree that religion has sometimes made valid insights into the order of the world, but it takes scientific thinking, not religious thinking, to prove them, as you indicate.


The Bible begins with the words, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth” The Bible thus teaches that the universe had a beginning. This teaching was repudiated by both ancient Greek philosophy and modern atheism, including dialectical materialism. Then in 1929 with the discovery of the expansion of the universe, this doctrine was dramatically verified.But the principle truth-claim is not that the universe had a beginning, but that a sentient God created it. The big bang theory does not confirm this at all. In fact all credible attempts by scientists to describe or understand the Big Bang, leave God out of the equation altogether.


Anywo, my criteria for truth is rational consistency, which, as far as I can tell, rests only with christianity. Well I'd suggest that is your problem, as the Bible is full of inconsistency - not least in its description of the principle character at the centre of its discourse: God itself. Besides which, even a rationally ordered and logically consistent fairy tale remains still just a fairy tale. So rational consistency is no proof of the truth of a discourse.

But thanks for this:


or the archeological evidence for Christ risen for the grave, are all good objective evidencesIt gave me the best laugh of the day. I'd love to see the hard archeological evidence that Jesus of Nazareth rose from his grave, transformed into Christ and mooched around with his former friends before migrating to Heaven. Really it shows how desperate you are to receive the benediction of scientific rationality for your Zombie beliefs.


I like Calvins idea that God has given us all an built-in belief of God, so that evidence is secondary.
I bet you do. It's one of the great intellectual dodges of the past 500 years and only supports my argument that religion is not concerned with knowledge.

The remainder of your post only proves the harmful effect of philosophy on otherwise sensible people.


And of course the statement "only things for which there are evidence ought to be believed" itself has no evidence, so one ought, by that very principal, not believe it.... I never claimed this; only that beliefs and knowledge are not the same thing and that, because they are not the same thing, they should not be treated as such.

[Lord Testicles]

What makes your religious beliefes right?

If they arn't I get triple my money back.

[spiltteeth]

No, I'm not. I don't consider self-verifying beliefs to constitute knowledge.

I wouldn't disagree that religion has sometimes made valid insights into the order of the world, but it takes scientific thinking, not religious thinking, to prove them, as you indicate.

But the principle truth-claim is not that the universe had a beginning, but that a sentient God created it. The big bang theory does not confirm this at all. In fact all credible attempts by scientists to describe or understand the Big Bang, leave God out of the equation altogether.

Well I'd suggest that is your problem, as the Bible is full of inconsistency - not least in its description of the principle character at the centre of its discourse: God itself. Besides which, even a rationally ordered and logically consistent fairy tale remains still just a fairy tale. So rational consistency is no proof of the truth of a discourse.

But thanks for this:

It gave me the best laugh of the day. I'd love to see the hard archeological evidence that Jesus of Nazareth rose from his grave, transformed into Christ and mooched around with his former friends before migrating to Heaven. Really it shows how desperate you are to receive the benediction of scientific rationality for your Zombie beliefs.

I bet you do. It's one of the great intellectual dodges of the past 500 years and only supports my argument that religion is not concerned with knowledge.

The remainder of your post only proves the harmful effect of philosophy on otherwise sensible people.

I never claimed this; only that beliefs and knowledge are not the same thing and that, because they are not the same thing, they should not be treated as such.

The hard evidence for Christ's resurrection is far more solid than most historical claims (that Nero, or Alexander the great lived, most of our knowledge of greek society etc etc)
I'd rather not really get into it but since you asked I'll just note :

Fact #1: Jesus' tomb was found empty by a group of his women followers on Sunday morning. According to Jacob Kremer, an Austrian scholar who has specialized in the study of the resurrection, "by far most scholars hold firmly to the reliability of the biblical statements about the empty tomb." According to D. H. Van Daalen, it is extremely difficult to object to the empty tomb on historical grounds; those who deny it do so on the basis of theological or philosophical assumptions.

Fact #2: On separate occasions different individuals and groups saw appearances of Jesus alive after his death. According to Gerd Ludemann, a prominent German New Testament critic, "It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus' death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ." These appearances were witnessed not only by believers, but also by unbelievers, skeptics, and even enemies.

Fact #3: The original disciples suddenly came to believe in the resurrection of Jesus despite having every predisposition to the contrary.

Nevertheless, the original disciples suddenly came to believe so strongly that God had raised Jesus from the dead that they were willing to die for the truth of that belief. Luke Johnson, a New Testament scholar at Emory University, states, "Some sort of powerful, transformative experience is required to generate the sort of movement earliest Christianity was."
N. T. Wright, an eminent British scholar, concludes, "That is why, as an historian, I cannot explain the rise of early Christianity unless Jesus rose again, leaving an empty tomb behind him."

Attempts to explain away these three great facts—like the disciples stole the body or Jesus wasn't really dead—have been universally rejected by contemporary scholarship. The simple fact is that there just is no plausible, naturalistic explanation of these facts.

Such is convincing to me personally, anyhow.

Also, science is silent on what caused the bigbang, but we can infer from the very nature of the case, this cause must be an uncaused, changeless, timeless, and immaterial being which created the universe.
It must be uncaused because we've seen that there cannot be an infinite regress of causes. It must be timeless and therefore changeless—at least without the universe—because it created time. Because it also created space, it must transcend space as well and therefore be immaterial, not physical. Moreover, I would argue, it must also be personal. For how else could a timeless cause give rise to a temporal effect like the universe?

But I'll just comment on this :


I don't consider self-verifying beliefs to constitute knowledge.

As I've said - ALL science rests on self-verifying beliefs. 2+2=4, despite the great atheist philosopher Bertrund Russell spending his entire life time trying to prove it, is a self-verifying belief. A BASIC belief.
Mr. Russell named a few - my favorite of his argument that the universe might be only 5 minutes old, with our memories intact.

Other properly basic beliefs would be the belief in the reality of the past, the existence of the external world, and the presence of other minds like your own (that people have inner lives, that they experience pain etc in a somewhat similar way as you.)

None of these beliefs can be proved. How could you prove that the world was not created five minutes ago with built-in appearances of age like food in our stomachs from the breakfasts we never really ate and memory traces in our brains of events we never really experienced? How could you prove that you are not a brain in a vat of chemicals being stimulated with electrodes by some mad scientist to believe that you are here reading this post? How could you prove that other people are not really odd creatures who exhibit all the external behavior of persons with minds, when in reality they are automatic, robot-like entities?

That doesn't mean there is no criteria for basic beliefs, they must be formed in the proper context/enviroment and other basic beliefs/data connot conflict with them.

Anyway, if you truly do not belive
self-verifying beliefs to constitute knowledge.
then you do not believe in science, or math, or the external world....and I'M irrational?!

And finally, as I put it a bit differently in the last post, your belief in only things that are NOT self-verifying would itself be a self-verifying belief - there is no evidence for it. Except that it is a self-FALSIFYING statement.

Which means it is a self-defeating statement :
if its false its false, and if its true its false (since the statement itself has no evidence and therefore according to its principal ought not be believed) therefore its false

[mikelepore]

And yet there are plenty of religious people who are very concerned if their religions beliefs are valid.

I can accept that with respect to Spinoza's God, Einstein's God, Stephen Hawking's God, the author of the order of the cosmos. But when it comes to specific elements of faith and tradition, I don't see much critical thinking.

I'm thinking of George Carlin's comedy routine about God's rules for wearing hats in houses of worship: Catholicism, men - no hats, women - hats; Judaism, men - hats, women - no hats. Those sorts of elements of specific dogma are very distant from the idea of the creator of the cosmos. The origin of the details is: story tellers simply made them up on some occasions and they stuck.

[Die Rote Fahne]

Agnostic here.

I don't believe in a god, but i don't believe that I am right. Nor do I believe I am wrong.

I don't know. We can't know. Therefore to say "God exists" or "god doesn't exist" is illogical.

[John_Jordan]

I can accept that with respect to Spinoza's God, Einstein's God, Stephen Hawking's God, the author of the order of the cosmos. But when it comes to specific elements of faith and tradition, I don't see much critical thinking.

I'm thinking of George Carlin's comedy routine about God's rules for wearing hats in houses of worship: Catholicism, men - no hats, women - hats; Judaism, men - hats, women - no hats. Those sorts of elements of specific dogma are very distant from the idea of the creator of the cosmos. The origin of the details is: story tellers simply made them up on some occasions and they stuck.

There is critical thinking even for these things, among those whom it is important to critically think. Most of the time though, such things are continued because of tradition. And I don't think there's anything wrong with tradition per-se. Wearing hats or not isn't a big deal, and it's not a universal thing among the entirety those two religions either.

[Hit The North]

The hard evidence for Christ's resurrection is far more solid than most historical claims (that Nero, or Alexander the great lived, most of our knowledge of greek society etc etc)

This is simply not true because there is no hard evidence for resurrection. How could there be? There is no hard evidence that Jesus Christ existed at all. Because, even allowing for the fact that such a person as Jesus bar Joseph of Nazareth existed at all, his claims to be the Christ are not verifiable - unless of course you want to retreat into the realm of self-verifying beliefs (i.e. that they are true by virtue of being believed by their adherents).

What's more the "facts" you detail are open to a number of competing interpretations.


Fact #1: Jesus' tomb was found empty by a group of his women followers on Sunday morning. According to Jacob Kremer, an Austrian scholar who has specialized in the study of the resurrection, "by far most scholars hold firmly to the reliability of the biblical statements about the empty tomb." According to D. H. Van Daalen, it is extremely difficult to object to the empty tomb on historical grounds; those who deny it do so on the basis of theological or philosophical assumptions.
The grave was robbed in order to fake a resurrection for political reasons.


Fact #2: On separate occasions different individuals and groups saw appearances of Jesus alive after his death. According to Gerd Ludemann, a prominent German New Testament critic, "It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus' death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ." These appearances were witnessed not only by believers, but also by unbelievers, skeptics, and even enemies.
The appearances were faked for political reasons. Or people succumbed to the same psychological phenomenon which was repeated nearly two thousand years later when thousands of Americans spotted Elvis Presley in shopping malls, bowling alleys and Coney Island rides, in the years after his death. Btw, in your book, do the thousands of reported sightings of Elvis confirm his divinity?

But even to entertain different interpretations to these events is to do too much justice to your claim that they are "facts" as we both know that the original textual evidence was written a generation after the event and only be adherents of an already established cult.


Attempts to explain away these three great facts—like the disciples stole the body or Jesus wasn't really dead—have been universally rejected by contemporary scholarship.
This might be the case, but the scholarship takes place largely within an academic community who's adherents are, again, operating on the assumption of a hidden, holy realm and their rejection of secular interpretations are probably a defence of their own religious convictions.


The simple fact is that there just is no plausible, naturalistic explanation of these facts. If this is a fact, you must be referring to one of those self-verifying beliefs of yours. We've already encountered some preliminary and crude attempts at naturalistic explanations of these events and, crude as they might be, they are more plausible because they do not rely on an assumption of an invisible, supernatural realm. The claim that the resurrection was a political hoax at least has the virtue of being situated within the social relations of men.


Also, science is silent on what caused the bigbang, but we can infer from the very nature of the case, this cause must be an uncaused, changeless, timeless, and immaterial being which created the universe.Not at all. You want to believe this. It does not make it the only inference or even the most logical. Of course, for big bang theorists it is the bang itself which is uncaused, there is no need to posit an uncaused being which stands behind it - and certainly absolutely no reason why it would have to be sentient or moral or any of the other necessary attributes of your Christian God.

[spiltteeth]

=Bob The Builder;1689615]This is simply not true because there is no hard evidence for resurrection. How could there be? There is no hard evidence that Jesus Christ existed at all. Because, even allowing for the fact that such a person as Jesus bar Joseph of Nazareth existed at all, his claims to be the Christ are not verifiable - unless of course you want to retreat into the realm of self-verifying beliefs (i.e. that they are true by virtue of being believed by their adherents).

Actually, I state there are good reasons to believe He was resurrected, and He claimed to be God's son, which, at least if true, would indeed be a good reason to think He was the Christ.


What's more the "facts" you detail are open to a number of competing interpretations.

The grave was robbed in order to fake a resurrection for political reasons.

Well, on the sunday following the crucifixion, Jesus’ tomb was found empty by a group of his women followers
Now women back then were considered so unreliable that their testimony was not even allowed into court!
It makes no sense that they'd use women's testimony if they wanted people to believe....of course it seems a bizarre way to start a political movement anyway - fake someone's resurrection! If untrue, thats really not a way to get followers.

But even the radical fringe atheist skeptic historian Richard Carrier says, the Christians were constantly being brought into court, charges were constantly being levied at them, and if the law could have made any case, or even simple suspicion, that the Christians were the ones who stole the body, surely the accusation would have been brought by Roman authorities.


The appearances were faked for political reasons. Or people succumbed to the same psychological phenomenon which was repeated nearly two thousand years later when thousands of Americans spotted Elvis Presley in shopping malls, bowling alleys and Coney Island rides, in the years after his death. Btw, in your book, do the thousands of reported sightings of Elvis confirm his divinity?

First, Elvis never claimed divinity, second no one claims a man came up to them saying he was Elvis, they just report seeing someone who looked like him, third no one claims Elvis was raised from the dead! or that they saw him raised, fourth noone has been willing to die for this belief they did not have an empire threatening death for this belief, fifth, I know of no huge movement that has grown around Elvis's life despite an entire empire trying to squash it, sixth the sightings conflict rather than being separately confirmed, seventh, anyone could just go to Elvis's grave to prove them wrong if it was of political importance, eighth, the reports are not credible as the ones in the new testament documents are, ninth Elvis's grave has not been found empty....etc


But even to entertain different interpretations to these events is to do too much justice to your claim that they are "facts" as we both know that the original textual evidence was written a generation after the event and only be adherents of an already established cult.

Just one, of MANY, examples, all scholars are convinced that Paul is, as he says, quoting from an old tradition which he himself received after becoming a Christian. This tradition probably goes back at least to Paul’s fact-finding visit to Jerusalem around AD 36, when he spent two weeks with Cephas and James (Gal. 1.18). It thus dates to within five years after Jesus’ death. So short a time span and such personal contact make it idle to talk of legend in this case.


This might be the case, but the scholarship takes place largely within an academic community who's adherents are, again, operating on the assumption of a hidden, holy realm and their rejection of secular interpretations are probably a defence of their own religious convictions.

The list of eyewitnesses to Jesus’ resurrection appearances which is quoted by Paul in I Cor. 15. 5-7 guarantees that such appearances occurred. These included appearances to Peter (Cephas), the Twelve, the 500 brethren, and James.

The appearance traditions in the gospels provide multiple, independent attestation of these appearances. This is one of the most important marks of historicity. The appearance to Peter is independently attested by Luke, and the appearance to the Twelve by Luke and John. We also have independent witness to Galilean appearances in Mark, Matthew, and John, as well as to the women in Matthew and John.

Even Gert Lüdemann, the leading German critic of the resurrection, himself admits,
“It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus’ death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ.”


If this is a fact, you must be referring to one of those self-verifying beliefs of yours. We've already encountered some preliminary and crude attempts at naturalistic explanations of these events and, crude as they might be, they are more plausible because they do not rely on an assumption of an invisible, supernatural realm. The claim that the resurrection was a political hoax at least has the virtue of being situated within the social relations of men.

First, The hypothesis: “God raised Jesus from the dead” doesn’t in any way conflict with the accepted belief that people don’t rise naturally from the dead. The Christian accepts that belief as wholeheartedly as he accepts the hypothesis that God raised Jesus from the dead.

Actually, the evidence is so powerful that one of the world’s leading Jewish theologians, the late Pinchas Lapide, who taught at Hebrew University in Israel, declared himself convinced on the basis of the evidence that the God of Israel raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead!

But - look at the social relations of men : Bill craig writes :


The original disciples believed that Jesus was risen from the dead despite their having every predisposition to the contrary. Think of the situation the disciples faced after Jesus’ crucifixion:

1. Their leader was dead. And Jews had no belief in a dying, much less rising, Messiah. The Messiah was supposed to throw off Israel’s enemies (= Rome) and re-establish a Davidic reign—not suffer the ignominious death of criminal.

2. According to Jewish law, Jesus’ execution as a criminal showed him out to be a heretic, a man literally under the curse of God (Deut. 21.23). The catastrophe of the crucifixion for the disciples was not simply that their Master was gone, but that the crucifixion showed, in effect, that the Pharisees had been right all along, that for three years they had been following a heretic, a man accursed by God!

3. Jewish beliefs about the afterlife precluded anyone’s rising from the dead to glory and immortality before the general resurrection at the end of the world. All the disciples could do was to preserve their Master’s tomb as a shrine where his bones could reside until that day when all of Israel’s righteous dead would be raised by God to glory.

Despite all this, the original disciples believed in and were willing to go to their deaths for the fact of Jesus’ resurrection. Luke Johnson, a New Testament scholar from Emory University, muses, “some sort of powerful, transformative experience is required to generate the sort of movement earliest Christianity was . . . .” N. T. Wright, an eminent British scholar, concludes, “that is why, as a historian, I cannot explain the rise of early Christianity unless Jesus rose again, leaving an empty tomb behind him.”



Not at all. You want to believe this. It does not make it the only inference or even the most logical. Of course, for big bang theorists it is the bang itself which is uncaused, there is no need to posit an uncaused being which stands behind it - and certainly absolutely no reason why it would have to be sentient or moral or any of the other necessary attributes of your Christian God.

Well, upon reflection I do recall a quote from P. C. W. Davies :


'What caused the big bang?' . . . One might consider some supernatural force, some agency beyond space and time as being responsible for the big bang, or one might prefer to regard the big bang as an event without a cause. It seems to me that we don't have too much choice. Either . . . something outside of the physical world . . . or . . . an event without a cause.

The problem with saying that the Big Bang is an event without a cause is that it entails that the universe came into being uncaused out of nothing, which seems absurd.
Philosopher of science Bernulf Kanitscheider :,
"If taken seriously, the initial singularity is in head-on collision with the most successful ontological commitment that was a guiding line of research since Epicurus and Lucretius," namely, out of nothing nothing comes, which Kanitscheider calls
"a metaphysical hypothesis which has proved so fruitful in every corner of science that we are surely well-advised to try as hard as we can to eschew processes of absolute origin."
But if the universe began to exist, we are therefore driven to the second alternative: a supernatural agency beyond space and time.

I mean, logically,a pure potentiality cannot actualize itself. In the case of the universe, there was not anything physically prior to the initial singularity.
The potentiality for the existence of the universe could not therefore have lain in itself, since it did not exist prior to the singularity. On the theistic hypothesis, the potentiality of the universe's existence lay in the power of God to create it. On the atheistic hypothesis, there did not even exist the potentiality for the existence of the universe. But then it seems inconceivable that the universe should become actual if there did not exist any potentiality for its existence.

Even the great skeptic David Hume admitted that he never asserted so absurd a proposition as that something might come into existence without a cause; he only denied that one could prove the obviously true causal principle.
With regard to the universe, if originally there were absolutely nothing-no God, no space, no time-, then how could the universe possibly come to exist? The truth of the principle ex nihilo, nihil fit is obvious .

I've already stated why it would have to be sentient, I could offer other evidence that makes it likely this being would have special concern for us, but it is not included in this simple argument.
Yu say it is not the most logical? Provide the more logical explanation - whats yr argument?

[Hit The North]

Actually, I state there are good reasons to believe He was resurrected, and He claimed to be God's son, which, at least if true, would indeed be a good reason to think He was the Christ.


Ah, another self-verifying belief.



Well, on the sunday following the crucifixion, Jesus’ tomb was found empty by a group of his women followers
Now women back then were considered so unreliable that their testimony was not even allowed into court!
It makes no sense that they'd use women's testimony if they wanted people to believe....of course it seems a bizarre way to start a political movement anyway - fake someone's resurrection! If untrue, thats really not a way to get followers.

True, and according to the biblical texts, none of the disciples believed the testimony of the women. But, anyway, the point would be that the movement already existed before the death of its leader. The resurrection was the coup de grace it required to sustain itself. It had to honour the scripture.



But even the radical fringe atheist skeptic historian Richard Carrier says, the Christians were constantly being brought into court, charges were constantly being levied at them, and if the law could have made any case, or even simple suspicion, that the Christians were the ones who stole the body, surely the accusation would have been brought by Roman authorities.

But given the Roman adoption of Christianity it is sure that any suspicion that the resurrection was instead a grave robbery would have been suppressed by these later authorities.



Just one, of MANY, examples, all scholars are convinced that Paul is, as he says, quoting from an old tradition which he himself received after becoming a Christian. This tradition probably goes back at least to Paul’s fact-finding visit to Jerusalem around AD 36, when he spent two weeks with Cephas and James (Gal. 1.18). It thus dates to within five years after Jesus’ death. So short a time span and such personal contact make it idle to talk of legend in this case.

This may be the case but is no evidence against the mythical content of this tradition. There are countless examples of similar cults in the ancient world who's adherents claim all manner of magical characteristics for their 'god heads'. These managed to establish traditions and produce martyrs. Does this make their claims true?



The list of eyewitnesses to Jesus’ resurrection appearances which is quoted by Paul in I Cor. 15. 5-7 guarantees that such appearances occurred.

It guarantees nothing. No more than the list of eyewitness accounts of the after-death appearences of Elvis, notwithstanding the lesser claims to divinity. OR, more appositely, the eyewitness reports of the ghostly appearances of Saint Bernadette, or the Virgin Mary. No more than the many eyewitness accounts of witchery in 17th Century England or 21st Century Uganda.


Actually, the evidence is so powerful that one of the world’s leading Jewish theologians, the late Pinchas Lapide, who taught at Hebrew University in Israel, declared himself convinced on the basis of the evidence that the God of Israel raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead!
If the evidence was so powerful we would expect more than the odd Jewish theologian to be won to the argument. What about the countless other Jewish rabbis who remain unconvinced? What about all the Islamic scholars who deny the resurrection of Jesus and his identity as God incarnate in the flesh of man?

But all this is idle speculation and pales into insignificance when we come to address the actual purpose of the resurrection which is completely illogical. In short, God materialises in human form in order to suffer, die and be resurrected and thereby take away the sins of the world. Why? As the Lord over time and space, there would have been an easier way. Also, why then, in first century Judea?


The problem with saying that the Big Bang is an event without a cause is that it entails that the universe came into being uncaused out of nothing, which seems absurd.
It may seem absurd but there is evidence for this process in quantum physics:



According to quantum mechanics, subatomic particles like electrons, photons, and positrons come into and go out of existence randomly (but in accord with the Heisenberg uncertainty principles). As Edward Tryon reports:

... quantum electrodynamics reveals that an electron, positron, and photon occasionally emerge spontaneously in a perfect vacuum. When this happens, the three particles exist for a brief time, and then annihilate each other, leaving no trace behind. (Energy conservation is violated, but only for a particle lifetime Dt permitted by the uncertainty DtDE~h where DE is the net energy of the particles and h is Planck's constant.) The spontaneous, temporary emergence of particles from a vacuum is called a vacuum fluctuation, and is utterly commonplace in quantum field theory.[6 (http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/theodore_schick/bigbang.html#6)]
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/theodore_schick/bigbang.html


So perhaps the origin of the universe are more mysterious than your simple-minded creator myth allows for.

[Comrade Anarchist]

Like objectivism?

Actually objectivism advocates logic, reason, and one's happiness.

[spiltteeth]

=Bob The Builder;1691145]Ah, another self-verifying belief.

How would historical facts be self-verifying?


True, and according to the biblical texts, none of the disciples believed the testimony of the women. But, anyway, the point would be that the movement already existed before the death of its leader. The resurrection was the coup de grace it required to sustain itself. It had to honour the scripture.

say they made it up, why offer woman's testimony as proof of their case? When it was virtually worthless?

Plus, following scripture? Christ's resurrection follows no previous jewish scripture at all. as I say, it contradicts jewish scripture which is why Christ and His followers were reviled by the Jewish community as blasphemers! Not a great strategy for sustaining a movement...

Plus ALL historians agree Christ appeared to the apostles (although they explain it differently - hallucinations etc) and ALL historians agree -even radical atheist ones- that the apostles REALLY believed Jesus rose from the grave.

no scholar takes the disciples' belief in the resurrection of Jesus to be a deliberate fabrication.

These are historical FACTS - you are writing historical FICTION.

Historians think they’ve hit historical pay dirt when they have two independent accounts of the same event. But in the case of the empty tomb we have no less than six, and some of these are among the earliest materials to be found in the New Testament. Thus, we have very strong historical grounds for affirming that Jesus’ tomb was already known by the disciples to be empty even before they departed Jerusalem for Galilee.

The great historian Will Durant wrote :


Despite the prejudices and theological preconceptions of the evangelists, they record many incidents that mere inventors would have concealed -- the competition of the apostles for high places in the Kingdom, their flight after Jesus' arrest, Peter's denial, the failure of Christ to work miracles in Galilee, the references of some auditors to his possible insanity, his early uncertainty as to his mission, his confessions of ignorance as to the future, his moments of bitterness, his despairing cry on the cross;

Yr idea is that a bunch of guys risked their life, bribed a bunch of guards, moved a 2 ton stone, stole the body, came up with the bizarre idea that Jesus was BODILY resurrected which was completely foreign to previous jewish thought and contradicted everything the Jews thought about what the Messiah was supposed to be DISCREDITING their story when they could have simply said Jesus visited them in spiritual form with no muss or fuss and then were tortured and killed without any of them giving the lie away.....Ok


But given the Roman adoption of Christianity it is sure that any suspicion that the resurrection was instead a grave robbery would have been suppressed by these later authorities.

Well they didn't; yrs after the Jewish community constantly leveled the accusation that Christ's followers must have stolen the body and this was recorded.
The Roman authorities kept records of the other charges against Christians, about arresting and crucifying them, feeding them to lions, and didn't suppress any of this! none about grave-robbing....


This may be the case but is no evidence against the mythical content of this tradition. There are countless examples of similar cults in the ancient world who's adherents claim all manner of magical characteristics for their 'god heads'. These managed to establish traditions and produce martyrs. Does this make their claims true?

Actually I know of NO other cults like this. For instance, in history, usually reports in the first 2 or 3 hundred yrs are pretty accurate. - Look at Augustan, the reports are pretty normal until 400 yrs pass and all sorts of mythical elements come in. Or look at Christianity - the gnostic stuff written 3oo yrs after that has Christ resurrecting and a cross coming down spouting scripture, of Christ as a baby being born and spouting scripture and talking to animals etc.

legends don't take root in a culture in a single generation, particularly when eyewitness "authorities" are available to denounce those legends;

Legends are the outgrowth of a period of oral transmission of a tradition until the original facts have been lost. As Richard Bauckham points out in his recent Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, in the case of the Gospels we shouldn't even speak of oral tradition, but rather of oral history, because the original eyewitnesses and fount of the tradition were still about to correct any departures from the tradition! But lies, such as all the cases you mention, can arise immediately, being deliberate fabrications.

The gospels and epistles are historical documents - this is a fact.

But it's not the ardor of the disciples which shows the veracity of what they believe—it is the fact that they came to believe something radically contrary to their Jewish beliefs, - along with the emptiness of Jesus' tomb and the multiplicity of his post-mortem appearances.

Plus, those martyr's died for what they THOUGHT was true. Your saying these people died and were tortured for a lie! 11 out of the 12 apostles were killed for a lie? Not one cracked and admitted the hoax?! In all of history can you point to this happening?


It guarantees nothing. No more than the list of eyewitness accounts of the after-death appearences of Elvis, notwithstanding the lesser claims to divinity. OR, more appositely, the eyewitness reports of the ghostly appearances of Saint Bernadette, or the Virgin Mary. No more than the many eyewitness accounts of witchery in 17th Century England or 21st Century Uganda.

Well, I'm not a Historian, and I haven't studied any of those cases, but according to Historians this is incorrect.

But do you disbelieve ALL history? How do you choose -personally, since you do not accept what actual historian's consensus says - what is historical fact and what is historical fiction?

Historical FACTS :
(1) Jesus' burial by Joseph of Arimathea,
(2) the discovery of Jesus' empty tomb by some of his female followers,
(3) the post-mortem appearances of Jesus to various individuals and groups,
(4) the original disciples' coming sincerely to believe that God had raised Jesus from the dead despite their strong predisposition to the contrary are historical.

as Paula Frederickson (no conservative!) says,
"The disciples' conviction that they had seen the Risen Christ . . . [is] historical bedrock, facts known past doubting"

Belief in the disciples' experiencing post-mortem appearances of Jesus is virtually universal.

The point is that your scepticism about Jesus' resurrection rests mainly, not on historical, but on philosophical considerations which fall outside the area of expertise of New Testament scholars.


If the evidence was so powerful we would expect more than the odd Jewish theologian to be won to the argument. What about the countless other Jewish rabbis who remain unconvinced? What about all the Islamic scholars who deny the resurrection of Jesus and his identity as God incarnate in the flesh of man?

I think we do have more than the odd Jewish scholar won by the argument! Christianity is the single largest movement in the history of all of humanity!

Pascal said it best :


" God has given us evidence sufficiently clear to convince those with an open heart and mind. Yet evidence sufficiently vague so as not to compel those whose hearts and minds are closed."


But all this is idle speculation and pales into insignificance when we come to address the actual purpose of the resurrection which is completely illogical. In short, God materialises in human form in order to suffer, die and be resurrected and thereby take away the sins of the world. Why? As the Lord over time and space, there would have been an easier way. Also, why then, in first century Judea?

Why? Because He loves us. I don't see the illogic, what is illogical?

Actually, 1st century Judea was the perfect time and place for this to occur, as many historians have pointed out - it was the perfect place and time to get the message of Christ to the maximal amount of people since it occurred right before the population explosion 98% of ALL humanity living AFTER Christ's life and death.


It may seem absurd but there is evidence for this process in quantum physics:



So perhaps the origin of the universe are more mysterious than your simple-minded creator myth allows for.

As yr quote shows these "virtual" particles do NOT come from nothing but from a vacuum, which is why there're sometimes called "vacuum energy"
There was NO vacuum before the bigbang.

(And of course these particles exist in time inversely proportionate to their mass - the universe is fairly massive, and 13.7 billion yrs old, not a split second old - although since there was no vacuum that is moot regardless.)

But Bob, do you sincerely think that things can pop into existence uncaused out of nothing?

Do you believe that it is really possible that, say, a raging tiger should suddenly come into existence uncaused out of nothing in your room as you read my post? How much the same would this seem to apply to the entire universe!

It seems yr resorting to plain magic!

[Hit The North]

Splitteeth,
You make some interesting points, particularly toward the end of your post. However, even if the evidence of sub-atomic particles can be dismissed as evidence for a self-causing entity, your problem of accounting for the self-creation of God remains to plague your house, as much as it does the atheist account.

As for the historical argument:

How would historical facts be self-verifying? I think you’re confusing historical fact of a document with the content of the message. It is clear that the documents claiming the divinity of Jesus of Nazareth are historical facts as much as the epics poems of Homer. However, this falls far short of adopting the claims of Jesus’ divinity as “historical facts”. As we know ancient documents are full of miraculous happenings. Just because Moses claims that God appeared to him in the form of a burning bush and someone later writes this down, it does not make his narrative literally true.

Plus, following scripture? Christ's resurrection follows no previous jewish scripture at all. as I say, it contradicts jewish scripture which is why Christ and His followers were reviled by the Jewish community as blasphemers! Not a great strategy for sustaining a movement... This seems a disingenuous argument on your part. You no doubt know that there was a long-standing Jewish tradition of belief in resurrection of the body after death. From the first century BC, it was the main point of contention between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and this would be the theological mileu into which Jesus was inducted and, more importantly (as we have no non-Christian evidence that he actually existed), the mileu into which the writers of the Gospels were responding to. Moreover, in 1 Corinthians 15:3-4 Paul expressly claims the resurrection as confirming scripture, and this claim is made again in Acts 2:30 when Peter sermonises during the Pentecost and claims continuity with the tradition of David. Outside of the Jewish tradition, we may also note that the Greek heroic tradition also incorporates resurrection as its myth of the hero, returning from the afterlife with magical or renewed powers. So, in fact, there are very good cultural and political reasons for the Christian insistence on the truth of Jesus’ resurrection. It’s what Jung would later come to identify as an archetype. Finally, the unorthodox interpretation of otherwise orthodox beliefs is precisely what a new cult requires in order to thrive, as any expert in cult studies will tell you.

Actually, while we’re on the subject of Corinthians, Paul reveals why modern Christians like yourself, who struggle to reconcile the miraculous with scientific rationality, need to cling, like grim death (if you’ll pardon the allusion) to the doctrine of bodily resurrection: "If Christ was not raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your trust in God is useless." It is the cornerstone belief which supports all the others.

no scholar takes the disciples' belief in the resurrection of Jesus to be a deliberate fabrication. Neither would I seriously claim that it was all a self-conscious piece of grifting on behalf of the apostles. No religious belief system can be founded on the basis of self-conscious false-hood. There are many different attempts to explain the necessary functions of religious belief from both a sociological and psychological point of view. I don’t want to deflect discussion into that large body of work, but most here will be acquainted with Karl Marx’s view on this. But it seems the difference between you and most here on RevLeft is that whilst we take religion to be symptomatic of material relations and social contradictions, you take it to be symptomatic of a universal, hidden truth. Where we see ideology, metaphor and psychodrama, you appear to see the manifest destiny of the universe.

Why? Because He loves us. I don't see the illogic, what is illogical? Let me see if I understand the scope of your narrative (forgive me if I miss the odd detail):

Around 13.7 billion years ago, God, a completely self-created and self-determining being, decides to produce a big bang out of which he creates the known universe, a massive entity, about 150 billion light years in diameter, much of it devoid of life. Then, about nine billion years later he creates the Earth, leaves it for nearly a billion more years so it can stabilise its environment and then inseminates it with microscopic life, some 3.8 billion years ago. Suddenly (in geological time), some 200,000 years ago, he creates two sentient beings and names them Adam and Eve and installs them in an Earthly paradise, giving them dominion over all living things.
These are the first beings on Earth who can have knowledge of their creator, the now revealed God. He is very proud of his creation, loves them and, unlike all other creatures who have so far existed on Earth, he bestows immortality upon them. However, as is well known, things screw up and, in defiance of the Lord God’s command that they should remain innocent, Adam and Eve eat from the tree of knowledge and lose their innocence. Angered by this, God revokes Adam and Eve’s immortality, visits the terrible agony of child birth on Eve, and casts them out of paradise into the wild world we know today.

As is clear from the Old Testament, things do not go well for Adam and Eve’s offspring as they pile sin after sin upon themselves. Irrespective of a number of calamities which God, the beneficent creator of all things, visits upon humankind, inflicting them with new, confounding language (Babel) and devastating floods, gradually scaling down their natural life-span, etc. He continues to love them. However, he reserves a special place in his affection for a particularly fractious tribe of people with whom he forges a special relationship. In fact, so allied is he with the fate of this tribe of rabble-rousers, he actively encourages them to inflict near genocidal war against neighboring tribes, who, for mysterious reasons, lack this special relationship with God the Lord of the Universe, the Light of the World, the Word, the Alpha and Omega, the loving father of all humanity, which leads them to observe different, fictitious, Gods and rituals (the epitome of living in an irrational and sinful state).

So this goes on for some time and despite the best efforts of Gods representatives on Earth, who men call prophets, sin continues to thrive and threatens to engulf humanity. Exasperated by this turn of events, God decides to incarnate into the body of a man, to go abroad amongst his chosen people (although, interestingly, we later discover that this is a ruse as the real object of instruction is not the Jews but the whole of humanity), to perform miracles and wonders, and then to subject himself to cruel torture and agonising death, so that three days later he can resurrect himself, go abroad to his apostles, before ascending to heaven. This, God has concluded in his omniscience, is the only way that humanity can be saved. He exhorts all men to believe in this and they will, as a result of this belief, enjoy eternal life. “Thank you, Lord Jesus, for defeating death!” is one of the more ludicrous priestly intonations I’ve heard at the funerals I’ve attended.

Anyway, two thousand years later, Christianity is the largest religion in the world. It has a bloody history, continues to live next to superstitious and pagan beliefs and practices in the Third World, sometimes actively encouraging them, whilst world wide it has built powerful institutions such as the Catholic Church, staffed by thousands of devout and devoted monks, priests and nuns, all of whom appear to specialise in pederasty and child abuse. In North America, the most devout ally themselves with right wing demogogy and are obsessed with the Second Coming and the end of the world (I've seen enough of the God Channel to know that. What a miserable bunch of life-haters, they are).

I’m no theologian, but it appears that your God has a pretty fucked up and useless strategy. I’d suggest he has a rethink.

[spiltteeth]

=Bob The Builder;1692615]Splitteeth,
You make some interesting points, particularly toward the end of your post. However, even if the evidence of sub-atomic particles can be dismissed as evidence for a self-causing entity, your problem of accounting for the self-creation of God remains to plague your house, as much as it does the atheist account.

Well, the argument is NOT that God is self-caused, but UNcaused.

It makes no sense to ask “What is God’s cause?” because God never began to exist.
That’s not special pleading for God because that’s what the atheists always have said about the universe, matter, and energy—the universe is eternal, uncaused, indestructible, and incorruptible.
But that has now become untenable in light of modern cosmology

As the British theologian Keith Ward writes in his book God, Chance and Necessity:
“If one asks what caused God, the answer is that nothing could bring into being a reality wholly transcendent of space-time and which is self-existent. To fail to grasp such an idea is to fail to grasp what God is.”

Even the atheist philosopher J.L. Mackie, says
“I find it hard to accept the notion of self-creation from nothing even given unrestricted chance. And how can this be given if there really is nothing?”


As for the historical argument:
I think you’re confusing historical fact of a document with the content of the message. It is clear that the documents claiming the divinity of Jesus of Nazareth are historical facts as much as the epics poems of Homer. However, this falls far short of adopting the claims of Jesus’ divinity as “historical facts”. As we know ancient documents are full of miraculous happenings. Just because Moses claims that God appeared to him in the form of a burning bush and someone later writes this down, it does not make his narrative literally true.

But I'm NOT arguing that Christ's divinity is a historical fact, simply that His actual resurrection best accounts for the historical facts.

The OT and Moses and the Iliad do NOT contain historical facts.
we’re talking about sources that are 30, 40, 60 years later. And traditions on which those are based that go back to within five or seven years after the crucifixion!

The first manuscript of the Iliad we have was written OVER 1,000 YRS AFTER the original!

Bruce Metzger, THE world's most authority on this subject :


"The quantity of New Testament material is almost embarrassing in comparison with other works of antiquity," next to the New Testament, the greatest amount of manuscript testimony is of Homer's Iliad, which was the bible of the ancient Greeks. There are fewer than 650 Greek manuscripts of it today. Some are quite fragmentary. They come down to us from the second and third century A.D. and following. When you consider that Homer composed his epic about 800 B.C., you can see there's a very lengthy gap."

Therer's over 5,000 NT manuscripts !

Were not talking hundreds of yrs for odd mythology to come in - we're talking 5-7 yrs after the crucifixion the apostles were proclaiming the resurrection!
This simply is not enough time for myths to develop.

And also there is more evidence for Christ than there is for any other ancient religious figure - Buddhas first bio was written 700 yrs after his birth! Even Mohammed's first bio was written nearly 150yrs after his death...


This seems a disingenuous argument on your part. You no doubt know that there was a long-standing Jewish tradition of belief in resurrection of the body after death. From the first century BC, it was the main point of contention between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and this would be the theological mileu into which Jesus was inducted and, more importantly (as we have no non-Christian evidence that he actually existed), the mileu into which the writers of the Gospels were responding to. Moreover, in 1 Corinthians 15:3-4 Paul expressly claims the resurrection as confirming scripture, and this claim is made again in Acts 2:30 when Peter sermonises during the Pentecost and claims continuity with the tradition of David. Outside of the Jewish tradition, we may also note that the Greek heroic tradition also incorporates resurrection as its myth of the hero, returning from the afterlife with magical or renewed powers. So, in fact, there are very good cultural and political reasons for the Christian insistence on the truth of Jesus’ resurrection. It’s what Jung would later come to identify as an archetype. Finally, the unorthodox interpretation of otherwise orthodox beliefs is precisely what a new cult requires in order to thrive, as any expert in cult studies will tell you.

Actually, while we’re on the subject of Corinthians, Paul reveals why modern Christians like yourself, who struggle to reconcile the miraculous with scientific rationality, need to cling, like grim death (if you’ll pardon the allusion) to the doctrine of bodily resurrection: "If Christ was not raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your trust in God is useless." It is the cornerstone belief which supports all the others.

Wow. You seem to be pretty well informed.
Well, I see what yr saying, and I agree with Paul, it all rests on Christ's resurrection. And Paul is referring to the other NT gospels.

As I say - EVERY scholar agrees the apostles REALLY belived Christ was raised from then dead, Even Gert Lüdemann, the leading German critic of the resurrection, himself admits, “
It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus’ death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ.”

This is not a myth but a historical fact - Christ appeared to people after his crucifixion. (The 2 naturalistic explanation given are usually hallucinations or the Christ had an identical brother! Both have, uh, major problems...)
so perhaps the rest of this is moot...

But many of the alleged parallels to Christ's resurection are actually apotheosis stories, the divinization and assumption of the hero into heaven (Hercules, Romulus). Others are disappearance stories, asserting that the hero has vanished into a higher sphere (Apollonius of Tyana, Empedocles). Still others are seasonal symbols for the crop cycle, as the vegetation dies in the dry season and comes back to life in the rainy season (Tammuz, Osiris, Adonis).

Some are political expressions of Emperor worship (Julius Caesar, Caesar Augustus). None of these is parallel to the Jewish idea of the resurrection of the dead. David Aune, who is a specialist in comparative ancient Near Eastern literature, concludes,
"no parallel to them [resurrection traditions] is found in Graeco-Roman biography"

In fact, most scholars have come to doubt whether, properly speaking, there really were any myths of dying and rising gods at all!

In the Osiris myth, one of the best known symbolic seasonal myths, Osiris does not really come back to life but simply continues to exist in the nether realm of the departed.
T. N. D. Mettinger reports:
"From the 1930s. . . a consensus has developed to the effect that the 'dying and rising gods' died but did not return or rise to live again. . . Those who still think differently are looked upon as residual members of an almost extinct species"

The resurrection is not the transformation of the man from Nazareth into God.

As far as the Jewish background, Jews were familiar with the seasonal deities mentioned above and found them abhorrent. They would never copy them to GAIN adherents.
Given its Jewish context, if the God of Israel has raised Jesus, it would thereby vindicate his allegedly blasphemous claims by which he put himself in God’s place, which was why they were universally CONDEMNED by the Jewish population - Not a great way to win popularity...

look at the facts :
1. Their leader was dead. And Jews had no belief in a dying, much less rising, Messiah. The Messiah was supposed to throw off Israel’s enemies (= Rome) and re-establish a Davidic reign—not suffer the ignominious death of criminal.

2. According to Jewish law, Jesus’ execution as a criminal showed him out to be a heretic, a man literally under the curse of God (Deut. 21.23). The catastrophe of the crucifixion for the disciples was not simply that their Master was gone, but that the crucifixion showed, in effect, that the Pharisees had been right all along, that for three years they had been following a heretic, a man accursed by God!

3. Jewish beliefs about the afterlife precluded anyone’s rising from the dead to glory and immortality before the general resurrection at the end of the world. All the disciples could do was to preserve their Master’s tomb as a shrine where his bones could reside until that day when all of Israel’s righteous dead would be raised by God to glory.



Neither would I seriously claim that it was all a self-conscious piece of grifting on behalf of the apostles. No religious belief system can be founded on the basis of self-conscious false-hood. There are many different attempts to explain the necessary functions of religious belief from both a sociological and psychological point of view. I don’t want to deflect discussion into that large body of work, but most here will be acquainted with Karl Marx’s view on this. But it seems the difference between you and most here on RevLeft is that whilst we take religion to be symptomatic of material relations and social contradictions, you take it to be symptomatic of a universal, hidden truth. Where we see ideology, metaphor and psychodrama, you appear to see the manifest destiny of the universe.

I don't think Marx's method is useful for explaining the four facts I've laid out, although it might prove useful to explain the social consequences of this historical event, or why the movements formed as they did over the yrs.

Again, I honestly don't see how Marx can explain those 4 facts.


Let me see if I understand the scope of your narrative (forgive me if I miss the odd detail):

Around 13.7 billion years ago, God, a completely self-created and self-determining being, decides to produce a big bang out of which he creates the known universe, a massive entity, about 150 billion light years in diameter, much of it devoid of life. Then, about nine billion years later he creates the Earth, leaves it for nearly a billion more years so it can stabilise its environment and then inseminates it with microscopic life, some 3.8 billion years ago. Suddenly (in geological time), some 200,000 years ago, he creates two sentient beings and names them Adam and Eve and installs them in an Earthly paradise, giving them dominion over all living things.
These are the first beings on Earth who can have knowledge of their creator, the now revealed God. He is very proud of his creation, loves them and, unlike all other creatures who have so far existed on Earth, he bestows immortality upon them. However, as is well known, things screw up and, in defiance of the Lord God’s command that they should remain innocent, Adam and Eve eat from the tree of knowledge and lose their innocence. Angered by this, God revokes Adam and Eve’s immortality, visits the terrible agony of child birth on Eve, and casts them out of paradise into the wild world we know today.

Well, I belong to the Orthodox faith, which is awfully strict, but we have NEVER taken the OT to be factual, documents from 350 ad, way before science, has the faithful understand that to understand the OT literally is "to have ones mind in Hades"


As is clear from the Old Testament, things do not go well for Adam and Eve’s offspring as they pile sin after sin upon themselves. Irrespective of a number of calamities which God, the beneficent creator of all things, visits upon humankind, inflicting them with new, confounding language (Babel) and devastating floods, gradually scaling down their natural life-span, etc. He continues to love them. However, he reserves a special place in his affection for a particularly fractious tribe of people with whom he forges a special relationship. In fact, so allied is he with the fate of this tribe of rabble-rousers, he actively encourages them to inflict near genocidal war against neighboring tribes, who, for mysterious reasons, lack this special relationship with God the Lord of the Universe, the Light of the World, the Word, the Alpha and Omega, the loving father of all humanity, which leads them to observe different, fictitious, Gods and rituals (the epitome of living in an irrational and sinful state).

Again, the OT are mythical documents. But I stand behind much of it. The genocide for instance - if the town over to me had people like those described in the Bible torturing, murdering, and raping their own children - then yea, hand me a gun...
But ALL morality comes from God anyway, which the atheist can't account for anyway.


So this goes on for some time and despite the best efforts of Gods representatives on Earth, who men call prophets, sin continues to thrive and threatens to engulf humanity. Exasperated by this turn of events, God decides to incarnate into the body of a man, to go abroad amongst his chosen people (although, interestingly, we later discover that this is a ruse as the real object of instruction is not the Jews but the whole of humanity), to perform miracles and wonders, and then to subject himself to cruel torture and agonising death, so that three days later he can resurrect himself, go abroad to his apostles, before ascending to heaven. This, God has concluded in his omniscience, is the only way that humanity can be saved. He exhorts all men to believe in this and they will, as a result of this belief, enjoy eternal life. “Thank you, Lord Jesus, for defeating death!” is one of the more ludicrous priestly intonations I’ve heard at the funerals I’ve attended.

I think your arguing theology, this isn't how MY theology, of the Orthodox church sees it, for example.


Anyway, two thousand years later, Christianity is the largest religion in the world. It has a bloody history, continues to live next to superstitious and pagan beliefs and practices in the Third World, sometimes actively encouraging them, whilst world wide it has built powerful institutions such as the Catholic Church, staffed by thousands of devout and devoted monks, priests and nuns, all of whom appear to specialise in pederasty and child abuse. In North America, the most devout ally themselves with right wing demogogy and are obsessed with the Second Coming and the end of the world (I've seen enough of the God Channel to know that. What a miserable bunch of life-haters, they are).

Yea, I agree alot of them ARE life-haters. It seems to me the WORST of Christianity gets on TV (Fox, Pat Robinson etc)
But, really, this just proves how cracked and crooked is humanity.


I’m no theologian, but it appears that your God has a pretty fucked up and useless strategy. I’d suggest he has a rethink.

I'm not too familiar with western Christianity, but I have found the Orthodox explanation elegant, logical, beautiful, and loving.

And in fact, I've studied Athesit, Buddhist, and Muslim claims, and none is coherent or logically consistent, they ALL contain logical falsifiers etc ONlY Christianity has a logically consistent worldview.

[SouthernBelle82]

I know for me I don't think my religious beliefs are "right" but they're "right for me." What is right for me may not be for someone else. God blessed us all with freewill and an independent mind to make up our own decisions. He has always sent messengers to us and it's up to us on who we want to believe whether it's Jesus or Mohammad or someone who isn't here yet. I think God always has a way of reaching us. We know what "clicks" for our individual selves. I think that's what it's all about and why there are so many different paths.

[¿Que?]

I know for me I don't think my religious beliefs are "right" but they're "right for me." What is right for me may not be for someone else. God blessed us all with freewill and an independent mind to make up our own decisions. He has always sent messengers to us and it's up to us on who we want to believe whether it's Jesus or Mohammad or someone who isn't here yet. I think God always has a way of reaching us. We know what "clicks" for our individual selves. I think that's what it's all about and why there are so many different paths.
Or no supernatural person at all.
Nice voice. use my nice voice.
Why is it that religious people often say this. This is not the first time I've heard something like this. Has it ever occurred to you that some of us are perfectly happy not believing in any supernatural idol. Remember that study that said atheists are the least trusted minority group. No offense (as I am using my nice voice) but you sound a little bit bigoted when you propose that "there are so many different paths" but that all those paths imply belief in some supernatural absurdity. I suggest the next time you want to make a statement like this, you add the category "or none at all".

And I noticed you put in your profile, Marxist-Leninist. Doesn't religion go against the basic materialist foundations of Marxism-Leninism?

[SouthernBelle82]

Or no supernatural person at all.
Nice voice. use my nice voice.
Why is it that religious people often say this. This is not the first time I've heard something like this. Has it ever occurred to you that some of us are perfectly happy not believing in any supernatural idol. Remember that study that said atheists are the least trusted minority group. No offense (as I am using my nice voice) but you sound a little bit bigoted when you propose that "there are so many different paths" but that all those paths imply belief in some supernatural absurdity. I suggest the next time you want to make a statement like this, you add the category "or none at all".

And I noticed you put in your profile, Marxist-Leninist. Doesn't religion go against the basic materialist foundations of Marxism-Leninism?

Uhm maybe you should read what I said again. And yes pretty much all spiritual paths believe in some sort of Deity or more then one since this is a religious thread and the topic is about which religion is right etc. I don't give two fucks if you're an atheist or not that's not what the thread is about. It's not my life. As I said my beliefs are mine. I don't care if they aren't yours. That's your life and if you read what I said (want to borrow my glasses?) that I believe we all were blessed with freewill and an independent mind. And for you to say I'm being a bigot you clearly do not know me at all so fuck you. Oh and as far as Marxist-Leninism that's called politics. My religious beliefs are my private beliefs for my life. You can fuck it for all I give a damn.

[¿Que?]

OK. Well I was trying to use my nice voice. I didn't want this discussion to degenerate into a mud slinging competition (and so soon). But I should have known better when I used the word bigoted. For the record, I did not say you were bigoted, just that the post made you sound bigoted. I admit, it was a little inflammatory to even say that, so my apologies.

[SouthernBelle82]

OK. Well I was trying to use my nice voice. I didn't want this discussion to degenerate into a mud slinging competition (and so soon). But I should have known better when I used the word bigoted. For the record, I did not say you were bigoted, just that the post made you sound bigoted. I admit, it was a little inflammatory to even say that, so my apologies.

And yes it did. You should have said something else for sure. You don't know me and I don't recall having many discussions with you here on RevLeft. If you did you wouldn't say such nonsense. And as I said this thread was about religion and not atheists and the person asked about various religious beliefs. But to end my post I do accept your apology so thank you and I look forward to other discussions with you and we can get to know each other more. Oh and for the record I'm a gnostic Christian so I view things differently than other mainstream religions with things.

[tradeunionsupporter]

Don't know

[Tread Softly]

Agnostic here.

I don't believe in a god, but i don't believe that I am right. Nor do I believe I am wrong.

I don't know. We can't know. Therefore to say "God exists" or "god doesn't exist" is illogical.

Believers say "God exists". This is illogical as we can't know.

Atheists are not saying "god doesn't exist", atheists are saying "We have no belief in god". This is logical, as we can't know.

It's a subtle but important difference that shows your position as incorrect. To reiterate, one is a position of belief, the other is a position of non-belief.

[spiltteeth]

Believers say "God exists". This is illogical as we can't know.

Atheists are not saying "god doesn't exist", atheists are saying "We have no belief in god". This is logical, as we can't know.

It's a subtle but important difference that shows your position as incorrect. To reiterate, one is a position of belief, the other is a position of non-belief.

If a theist experiences what he or she interprets as God, they can claim knowledge of God.
Or a theist can claim there are good reasons for thinking God exists.

An atheist makes a knowledge claim - that God does not exist.
In other words, an atheist affirms the non-existence f God.

I mean, by yr definition even babies would be atheists ! They have no belief in God...

I think yr talking about being agnostic.

[Tread Softly]

Atheism is certainly a complex thing to define. It would involve conscious choice though in my opinion.