Does God exist?

[talalrulez]

16 hours ago, ILoveJesus said:

Fallacy: Just because some people who call themselves Christians defend ISIS' actions, doesn't mean that Christians should defend ISIS' actions.

lol i never said that christians should defend, but merely pointed out that some do defend ISIS's actions in certain fields, such as the cold-blooded murder of homosexuals. 

 

13 hours ago, Vioh said:

@talalrulez, I understand your viewpoint here, knowing that you're a religious person. But would you agree that this idea – that god tries to enforce an objective morality upon us – is based entirely on faith? I mean even if there is such a thing as an objective morality, how can you definitively prove with evidence and logical arguments that it's god who gave us these moral rules. We can't just say "objectivity requires an objectivity giver" without falling into some sort of logical fallacies such as the god-of-the-gaps or the argument from ignorance.

Yeah, you are absolutely correct, that this is entirely based on one's faith. Me, a religious person would say that objective morals arose from God, whilst atheists would either say it doesn't exist, or that some objective morals arose from evolution. ie, something which endangers one life is bad, something that saves a life is good (as my atheist friend explained it). but yeah, it all matters on what we believe in, which is why i believe that this issue of objective morals is never going to end.

[talalrulez]

wow, cant believe its actually stopped. thats surprising...

[azara]

It'll be back again.  It's just that now this topic has been beaten to death, so we'll wait for someone new to come along with a fresh topic

[talalrulez]

2 hours ago, azara said:

It'll be back again.  It's just that now this topic has been beaten to death, so we'll wait for someone new to come along with a fresh topic

LOL

[tim9800]

2 hours ago, azara said:

 

It'll be back again.  It's just that now this topic has been beaten to death, so we'll wait for someone new to come along with a fresh topic

 

Yea tbh, writing up all those syllogisms and debating stuff I didn't really have a strong viewpoint in was quite time consuming. But I feel like this debate was and definitely continues to be rewarding, and all the time I spent writing made me feel like I was doing work  Downside is, now I have to do my EE  

[talalrulez]

9 minutes ago, tim9800 said:

Yea tbh, writing up all those syllogisms and debating stuff I didn't really have a strong viewpoint in was quite time consuming. But I feel like this debate was and definitely continues to be rewarding, and all the time I spent writing made me feel like I was doing work  Downside is, now I have to do my EE  

lmao same. ive been putting off doing my EE so i can be part of this. lol, the bludge is real...

[ILoveJesus]

Hello, instead of arguing for any God I shall argue for the God of Christianity.
Here's why Christianity is probably true:

The majority of new testament critics today accept the empty tomb, and the post-mortem experiences of people literally seeing Jesus alive. These two facts are obviously best explained by a literal resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Therefore, it is highly probable that Jesus rose from the dead.

Don't believe me? Historian Gary Habermas conducted a study in which he counted the positions of all authors of relevant papers since 1975, and came to the conclusion that the majority actually accepts these as historical facts. Here's a shortvideo expanding on it a bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_r62LpPhLdQ

 

 

Edited February 2, 2017 by ILoveJesus

[Vioh]

2 hours ago, ILoveJesus said:

Hello, instead of arguing for any God I shall argue for the God of Christianity. Here's why Christianity is probably true: The majority of new testament critics today accept the empty tomb, and the post-mortem experiences of people literally seeing Jesus alive. These two facts are obviously best explained by a literal resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Therefore, it is highly probable that Jesus rose from the dead. Don't believe me? Historian Gary Habermas conducted a study in which he counted the positions of all authors of relevant papers since 1975, and came to the conclusion that the majority actually accepts these as historical facts. Here's a shortvideo expanding on it a bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_r62LpPhLdQ

In the description of the video you linked, it says that it's taken from the debate between Craig and Spong, so I went ahead and looked up the original debate on youtube. But wow, that debate is almost 2 hours long, and i simply don't have time to go through it. You can find Craig's argument in the original video at 1:03:00, and Spong's reply at 1:11:08. Basically, Spong argued that Craig's scholars are not very good among the academia, and that Spong also has lots of scholars supporting him too. The ironic thing here is that John Shelby Spong is a Christian too, and a bishop no less!!! This made me realize that the debate about the resurrection of Jesus is actually more common among the Christian theologians; people don't usually see this kind of issue popping up on the debates between atheism/science and religions. In any case, if you read this comprehensive wikipedia article, it seems quite clear that there's no real consensus among the theologians about whether the resurrection of Jesus was real or was just a metaphor in the Bible. So perhaps Christians should sort this out among themselves first, before using it as an "evidence" for the existence of the christian God? Saying that "it is highly probable that Jesus rose from the dead" is premature, considering that there are many Christians who think otherwise, at least according to what it says in that wikipedia article. By the way, just for fun, here's a short video showing Christopher Hitchens "mocking" the illogicality about the resurrection interpretation (sorry for the super lame music haha): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2GM_g7VCJI

[ILoveJesus]

19 hours ago, Vioh said:

In the description of the video you linked, it says that it's taken from the debate between Craig and Spong, so I went ahead and looked up the original debate on youtube. But wow, that debate is almost 2 hours long, and i simply don't have time to go through it. You can find Craig's argument in the original video at 1:03:00, and Spong's reply at 1:11:08. Basically, Spong argued that Craig's scholars are not very good among the academia, and that Spong also has lots of scholars supporting him too.

First I want to mention that the debate isn't at all essential to my statement.
Anyways, Spong obviously just said these things without having anything to back them up. The fact that most NT scholars agree on those facts is backed up by a study that considered all the relevant scholars regardless of their beliefs. Many of them are non-Christian. It's apparent that Spong has no idea about this. He doesn't back his statement up with any sources. 

 

20 hours ago, Vioh said:

The ironic thing here is that John Shelby Spong is a Christian too, and a bishop no less!!! This made me realize that the debate about the resurrection of Jesus is actually more common among the Christian theologians; people don't usually see this kind of issue popping up on the debates between atheism/science and religions.

Lol you have no idea what you're talking about. Almost all debates on the resurrection are of course Christian vs atheist. It's just a funny coincidence that in this debate there is a non-atheist debating against the resurrection.

BTW, Many Christians wouldn't consider Spong as a Christian. He doesn't even believe that Jesus actually rose from the dead, which is pretty much the central tenet of Christianity. Also, he makes up his own beliefs. 

20 hours ago, Vioh said:

In any case, if you read this comprehensive wikipedia article, it seems quite clear that there's no real consensus among the theologians about whether the resurrection of Jesus was real or was just a metaphor in the Bible. So perhaps Christians should sort this out among themselves first, before using it as an "evidence" for the existence of the christian God? Saying that "it is highly probable that Jesus rose from the dead" is premature, considering that there are many Christians who think otherwise, at least according to what it says in that wikipedia article.

First off, I'd like to mention that wikipedia isn't the most reliable source. Anyways, I read the article and it never makes an objective statement about consensus. It just explains the three main positions on the resurrection, and has some quotes of people saying that there isn't a consensus. Once again, these people don't back it up with any study.
Also, do you seriously think that there are many Christians who think that Jesus didn't rise from the dead? Not that it would say a lot if they did believe it but come on, that's almost a contradiction. The article does not say that many Christians don't believe in the resurrection.

 

20 hours ago, Vioh said:

By the way, just for fun, here's a short video showing Christopher Hitchens "mocking" the illogicality about the resurrection interpretation (sorry for the super lame music haha): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2GM_g7VCJI

Oh, Christopher Hitchens, I see. I encourage you to watch his debate vs William Lane Craig. You'll notice how much more plausible theism is than atheism.

[azara]

On 03/02/2017 at 8:03 AM, ILoveJesus said:

Hello, instead of arguing for any God I shall argue for the God of Christianity.
Here's why Christianity is probably true:

The majority of new testament critics today accept the empty tomb, and the post-mortem experiences of people literally seeing Jesus alive. These two facts are obviously best explained by a literal resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Therefore, it is highly probable that Jesus rose from the dead.

Don't believe me? Historian Gary Habermas conducted a study in which he counted the positions of all authors of relevant papers since 1975, and came to the conclusion that the majority actually accepts these as historical facts. Here's a shortvideo expanding on it a bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_r62LpPhLdQ

The claim made in the video is that "most New Testament scholars accept the empty tomb", which is unsurprising, because I'm pretty sure scholars of the New Testament are exclusively Christian.  Of course they believe it happened!

My question to you is, why do you accept the empty tomb? What other evidence do you have?

One argument people make is that there are eyewitness accounts, set down in the Bible, that it happened.  However, I'm going to give you another eyewitness account of a Viking raid on Lindisfarne in AD 793.  This was in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, written by monks to document the year's events over the course of several hundred years:

"This year came dreadful fore-warnings over the land of
the Northumbrians, terrifying the people most woefully: these
were immense sheets of light rushing through the air, and
whirlwinds, and fiery, dragons flying across the firmament. 
These tremendous tokens were soon followed by a great famine: and
not long after, on the sixth day before the ides of January in
the same year, the harrowing inroads of heathen men made
lamentable havoc in the church of God in Holy-island, by rapine
and slaughter."

In reality, dragons were probably not involved.  

Anyhow, my point is that eyewitnesses must be backed up with other, more reliable, evidence, before their claims can even be considered viable.  Now, if we went over to Lindisfarne and discovered enormous dragon footprints on the beach, we might start taking the monks seriously.  As there are none - and there is no other evidence for Jesus' resurrection - there is little reason to credit either claim.

Setting aside the credibility issues, even if Jesus really had appeared to rise from the dead, there are plenty of more plausible explanations for why this could have been the case.  Really, the most obvious is that Jesus was not actually dead when he was taken down from the cross (he had supporters who would definitely have tried to save him), so he was cared for in the cave.  He made a couple of appearances to his closest followers, so they were suitably impressed, and lived out the rest of his life in seclusion, to avoid re-arrest by the Romans.

I'm not saying that "my version" of the events actually happened, because I have no evidence for any of these claims whatsoever.  But, my version of the story is just as good as yours: both fit the eyewitnesses' accounts.  And mine is more plausible than arguing for a resurrection!

It appears that your argument starts with the assumption Jesus rose from the dead, and then tries to fit the facts, which I don't consider very factual, around it.  There is no logical path with which you can exclude all other possibilities, and prove Jesus was definitely (or even probably) resurrected.

[talalrulez]

On 2/3/2017 at 8:03 AM, ILoveJesus said:

Hello, instead of arguing for any God I shall argue for the God of Christianity.
Here's why Christianity is probably true:

The majority of new testament critics today accept the empty tomb, and the post-mortem experiences of people literally seeing Jesus alive. These two facts are obviously best explained by a literal resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Therefore, it is highly probable that Jesus rose from the dead.

Don't believe me? Historian Gary Habermas conducted a study in which he counted the positions of all authors of relevant papers since 1975, and came to the conclusion that the majority actually accepts these as historical facts. Here's a shortvideo expanding on it a bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_r62LpPhLdQ

 

 

lol, one major problem in your claim is that no one besides new testament scholars (who i suppose are exclusively christian)  think that Jesus rose from the dead. Meanwhile, other people can put up videos claiming that their religion is real bla, bla, bla. But on your argument concerning that Christianity is the religion of "truth" i'd recommend that you go watch a person by the name of Ahmed Deedat. He's long dead, but was a respectable person among both Muslims and Christians, who had memorized the entirety of the bible and had debates with Pastors (not the many internet keyboard warriors you see on youtube these days) on the truth in Christianity. 

[aTeddy]

@ILoveJesus

It is probably insignificant to stand here and debate about the historical veracity of the resurrection story. I think if you make a claim on the grounds of "X historian agrees with me and therefore Y is true," you are making an appeal to the authority of said person - and fallaciously so.  As has been accurately presaged by previous commenters, the historical views about the Bible are extremely inconclusive. I point to obvious gaps in our knowledge - no tomb has ever been located/conclusively determined to be where Jesus Christ was entombed, there is an obvious dearth of non-biblical historical texts recording a Jesus figure, as mere examples for why I think strong doubt should be held as to the resurrection story.

In any case, it is not the burden of proof for an atheist to disprove the Biblical account, it is on the claimant - you. The broader issue with this entire argument is that Christianity is inherently unfalsifiable. There is no way that conclusively and objectively, a person is able to go about rejecting Christianity or the resurrection story, as it relies on caveats such as, "Believe or Die" and "faith is required"  to supplement a lack of objective facts. It is purposeless to even engage in objective discourse, because the material you are debating about is inherently not so. 

 

[ILoveJesus]

18 hours ago, azara said:

The claim made in the video is that "most New Testament scholars accept the empty tomb", which is unsurprising, because I'm pretty sure scholars of the New Testament are exclusively Christian.  Of course they believe it happened!

 

15 hours ago, talalrulez said:

lol, one major problem in your claim is that no one besides new testament scholars (who i suppose are exclusively christian)  think that Jesus rose from the dead.

That's a false assumption. Of course New Testament Scholars aren't exclusively Christian? Where did you get that data from? 
 

 

18 hours ago, azara said:

My question to you is, why do you accept the empty tomb? What other evidence do you have?

One argument people make is that there are eyewitness accounts, set down in the Bible, that it happened.  However, I'm going to give you another eyewitness account of a Viking raid on Lindisfarne in AD 793.  This was in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, written by monks to document the year's events over the course of several hundred years:

"This year came dreadful fore-warnings over the land of
the Northumbrians, terrifying the people most woefully: these
were immense sheets of light rushing through the air, and
whirlwinds, and fiery, dragons flying across the firmament. 
These tremendous tokens were soon followed by a great famine: and
not long after, on the sixth day before the ides of January in
the same year, the harrowing inroads of heathen men made
lamentable havoc in the church of God in Holy-island, by rapine
and slaughter."

In reality, dragons were probably not involved.  

Anyhow, my point is that eyewitnesses must be backed up with other, more reliable, evidence, before their claims can even be considered viable.  Now, if we went over to Lindisfarne and discovered enormous dragon footprints on the beach, we might start taking the monks seriously.  As there are none - and there is no other evidence for Jesus' resurrection - there is little reason to credit either claim.

Point is that most NT scholars agree that the tomb was empty and that people had appearances of Jesus after the crucifixion. And this is not the case with the dragons. I'm pretty sure about zero scholars believe that actual dragons were involved. Therefore it's a bad comparison.

And to be honest, I haven't really studied the historical evidence, so I'm just trusting expert consensus on this. 

18 hours ago, azara said:

Setting aside the credibility issues, even if Jesus really had appeared to rise from the dead, there are plenty of more plausible explanations for why this could have been the case.  Really, the most obvious is that Jesus was not actually dead when he was taken down from the cross (he had supporters who would definitely have tried to save him), so he was cared for in the cave.  He made a couple of appearances to his closest followers, so they were suitably impressed, and lived out the rest of his life in seclusion, to avoid re-arrest by the Romans.

I'm not saying that "my version" of the events actually happened, because I have no evidence for any of these claims whatsoever.  But, my version of the story is just as good as yours: both fit the eyewitnesses' accounts.  And mine is more plausible than arguing for a resurrection!

Ah, the good old swoon theory. The major problem with this theory is that the disciples came to believe that Jesus rose from the dead, which contradicts this theory. So that one's highly implausible.

Why wouldn't the most plausible explantaion for the empty tomb, the post-mortem experiences, and the disciple's belief in the resurrection be that Jesus actually rose from the dead?

[ILoveJesus]

14 hours ago, aTeddy said:

I think if you make a claim on the grounds of "X historian agrees with me and therefore Y is true," you are making an appeal to the authority of said person - and fallaciously so.  As has been accurately presaged by previous commenters, the historical views about the Bible are extremely inconclusive. 

 

Sorry but the historical views about the empty tomb, the post-mortem appearances of Jesus, and the disciples sudden belief in his resurrection are far from "extremely inconclusive". The majority of relevant New Testament scholars agree on this.

14 hours ago, aTeddy said:

I point to obvious gaps in our knowledge - no tomb has ever been located/conclusively determined to be where Jesus Christ was entombed, there is an obvious dearth of non-biblical historical texts recording a Jesus figure, as mere examples for why I think strong doubt should be held as to the resurrection story.

Not knowing where the tomb is right now is a very bad reason to doubt the story. There are many sources, and btw it seems like you have a common misconception about what the Bible is. It's not a normal book. The New Testament (second part of the bible) is a collection of many different historical accounts from the first century. You cannot doubt the validity of these historical documents just because they were later put together in a collection and called the New Testament.
Now there are obviously good sources for this. Otherwise the majority of NT scholars wouldn't agree on those facts.

 

14 hours ago, aTeddy said:

In any case, it is not the burden of proof for an atheist to disprove the Biblical account, it is on the claimant - you. The broader issue with this entire argument is that Christianity is inherently unfalsifiable. There is no way that conclusively and objectively, a person is able to go about rejecting Christianity or the resurrection story, as it relies on caveats such as, "Believe or Die" and "faith is required"  to supplement a lack of objective facts. It is purposeless to even engage in objective discourse, because the material you are debating about is inherently not so. 

Stop making false claims about things you obviously don't understand. Christianity is based on historical events that are as falsifiable as any historical event. So if you complain that Christianity shouldn't be engaged with, then you shouldn't engage with history at all. 

These facts are as objective as they get in history.

[azara]

Quote

That's a false assumption. Of course New Testament Scholars aren't exclusively Christian? Where did you get that data from?

 No data is required, it's quite obvious.  The only people who would dedicate so much time to studying the New Testament are those who believe it's worthwhile, ie. Christians.  No other religious group would have any interest in it, it's not even like the Old Testament where the text is relevant to Judaism and to an extent Islam as well.  The NT is exclusively Christian.  Would you become a scholar of, say, the Koran? Of course not, the scholars of Islamic texts are exclusively Muslim.

Quote

And to be honest, I haven't really studied the historical evidence, so I'm just trusting expert consensus on this.

The expert consensus of only Christian scholars? 

Can you find me several examples of non-religious scholars who believe in the resurrection?

Quote

Ah, the good old swoon theory. The major problem with this theory is that the disciples came to believe that Jesus rose from the dead, which contradicts this theory. So that one's highly implausible.

Why wouldn't the most plausible explantaion for the empty tomb, the post-mortem experiences, and the disciple's belief in the resurrection be that Jesus actually rose from the dead?

I'm not saying my suggestion happened, though I will point out it's not as implausible as you think.  The population of 2000 years ago was not a medically enlightened one.  Jesus' chance of survival was obviously low, so if he had been nursed back to health, it would have seemed miraculous.  

Anyway, I don't actually believe that Jesus rose from the dead, or emerged in any sense, after his crucifixion, because there's no reason for me to believe so.  As I'm sure you're aware, the gospels were only written down almost 100 years after Jesus died.  And it took about 350 years before the "official" version was decided! That's plenty enough time to make revisions to the story - and indeed, the later gospels do make revisions:

Quote

By the middle of the 2nd century it becomes evident that a great many different and often contradictory passages of holy scripture are circulating among the various Christian churches, each claiming to offer the truth. (There is even a Gospel according to Judas Iscariot.) Which of these shall be accepted as the official canon? This becomes a subject of urgent debate among church leaders.

By the end of the century it is widely agreed that four Gospels, the Epistles of Paul and the Acts of the Apostles are authentic. But it is not until 367 that a list is circulated by Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, which finally establishes the content of the New Testament.

Read more:http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/PlainTextHistories.asp?ParagraphID=bkf#ixzz4XlEMQWSK 

Imagine telling somebody about an event which occurred in 1917.  The factual detail would be hazy, and your information would be based on hearsay.  It's like Chinese Whispers - the more you pass the message around, the less accurate it becomes.

For the early Christians to improve upon the life of their leader, it would be very easy for them to come to believe he was resurrected from the dead, before disappearing off to Heaven only a few hours later.  Someone, probably high up as it made it into a couple of gospels, could have just suggested/claimed he rose from the dead, it was dutifully copied down by a couple of the writers, and those are the ones that made it into the "final version" of the Bible in AD347.

And now, to practical issues: if Jesus had really risen from the dead, why didn't he stick around, show himself to the Romans who had doubted him, and generally made a bit more of a fanfare? It doesn't make spiritual sense that he only showed himself to a select group of people for a short amount of time, then disappeared forever.  It's convenient to the story, because there's nobody around to dispute it, and of course it wasn't recorded elsewhere, because nobody other than the disciples saw him! The explanations are very convenient to the writers of the Bible...

Anyhow, I'm not obligated to go through all the possible explanations.  I've mostly just given you my own personal viewpoint here, that over the course of several hundred years the story was revised to inaccuracy for spiritual reasons.  Until you can provide me with more evidence than "the Bible says so" (and "Christian scholars agree with the Bible"), I can't entertain the prospect of a resurrection.

Edited February 4, 2017 by azara
became too smart for my own good and messed up the quoting

[aTeddy]

4 hours ago, ILoveJesus said:

Sorry but the historical views about the empty tomb, the post-mortem appearances of Jesus, and the disciples sudden belief in his resurrection are far from "extremely inconclusive". The majority of relevant New Testament scholars agree on this.

That's just it, the limit of your historical inquiry is New Testament scholars. That's like saying all Quran scholars agree on the facts about Islam, therefore its claims are correct. You ignored the wider point, that you can't just simply state that "X historians believe in this, therefore 100% correct." Historians and scientists alike have had consensus about supposed facts which have been proven palpably untrue later. E.g Geocentric theory. It's an appeal to authority and a textbook fallacy. You don't have even have a wide historical consensus, because the only document which records these supposed facts is an Iron Age book that claims it's truth is undeniable and you are given the caveat of believe it or die.

4 hours ago, ILoveJesus said:

Not knowing where the tomb is right now is a very bad reason to doubt the story. There are many sources, and btw it seems like you have a common misconception about what the Bible is. It's not a normal book. The New Testament (second part of the bible) is a collection of many different historical accounts from the first century. You cannot doubt the validity of these historical documents just because they were later put together in a collection and called the New Testament.
Now there are obviously good sources for this. Otherwise the majority of NT scholars wouldn't agree on those facts.

What an unsubstantiated assertion. Why exactly is it a bad reason? It draws all sorts of questions about the veracity of a Jesus character even having existed at all, because the cornerstone of his recorded history is a supposed resurrection after being crucified - a claim which is drawn into doubt in the obvious absence of a tomb for such an instrumental figure. Any historical document is open for criticism. For example, Nazi Germany made supposed "historical documents" about its government and the Holocaust which were inconsistent with a host of other documents. This was obviously propaganda and considered to be so. If you call it a historically accurate document, I think that's a lopsided characterisation of an unscientific, inconsistent book, chock full of religious propaganda.

4 hours ago, ILoveJesus said:

 

Stop making false claims about things you obviously don't understand. Christianity is based on historical events that are as falsifiable as any historical event. So if you complain that Christianity shouldn't be engaged with, then you shouldn't engage with history at all. 

These facts are as objective as they get in history.

As I have elucidated to you on numerous seperate occasions, belief in Christianity lacks falsifiability. Here's a quote from a post that I've made before and should go someway to explaining it.

The concept of a theory, at least in a scientific sense, are the best explanations that we have, based on observations of the natural world.
I firmly reject the concept that the Christian conceptualisation of a "God" qualifies as theory. A good theory should have clearly defined and testable concepts and accurately predict phenomena in line with future empirical research. The Bible, God and the Christian religion do not meet these criteria. First, it is an unfalsifiable concept, it does not employ concepts that can be tested, and as you say, it relies on belief without evidence. If you believe me to be wrong, show me a way to empirically prove that your premises are correct. Even if it was a falsifiable concept, it certainly does not ipso facto become true in the absence of contradictory evidence. For example, if I claimed that there is a miniature-sized tin can orbiting the Earth right now, and this theory had not been falsified, it would not be considered to be true.

The ability to engage with Christianity as history is so hampered by it being a religion which employs faith as a necessity. You can select as much "proof" as you want, and atheists can respond with counter-proof, it's just useless, because belief in the religion is inherently a personal choice affected by emotion and faith, rather than pure reason. Not to say pure reason is great, I'm just saying you can't treat a religion in those terms.

 

[fromsomewhere2k17]

Now I may not be able to make you all believe in God if you don't want to, it is entirely upto you, but as a muslim, I personally believe that everyone of us should step back a bit and evaluate critically what exactly we are believing and why. I urge everyone to see this video about Science, Qur'an & the Bible. Even though it is primarily a debate between a muslim & a christian scholar, I think it is very much relevant to those who say God doesn't exist. I linked this specific video because atheists reject God on the basis of the incompatibility between science and religion. 

Note: If you start to watch this video, please try to watch it till the end, it may be long but it's worth it. No offense intended to anyone.

.

[azara]

Would you mind giving a summary of what's in the video? As you noted, it's almost four and a half hours long, so honestly I'm probably not going to watch all of it unless I know what's in the middle

(or if you know of a shorter video that has similar discussion, I'd happily watch that)

In the meantime, here's a question for everybody, religious or not: what are your thoughts on Richard Dawkins? Personally my feelings are mixed - I agree with his viewpoint (mostly), he has brilliant rhetoric and presentation, but I'm not sure his belligerence helps win over those on the fence.  I'm interested to know what you guys think!

[talalrulez]

lmao @ILoveJesus when you tell us to watch something, i most certainly do, yet it seems you have not even bothered to acknowledge that i asked you to do anything at all as it seems by complete ignorance of what i asked. If u don't wanna look at other people's opinions, why bother be part of this?

Anyway, there is many things one can say regarding the NT. Firstly, considering it's creation over a century after Jesus died is a big boo-boo. Secondly, have you heard of Theseus's ship. It is, i find, a perfect representation of the bible. You see, as the years went by, The ship kept on having its parts replaced, what with the rotting of timber and all that, and soon, people were wondering whether it could still be called Theseus's ship. This is a problem that i find with Christianity as a whole. Can it still be called Christianity. I am Muslim so i do believe in Jesus, and many of the other things you believe in as well, but there are stark differences. Never mind Christian, Judaic and Islamic belief systems, there are huge differences in between seperate divisions of Christianity. for example, i (completely assuming of course) that you are either Catholic or Protestant, since those are the 2 largest sects, yet other sects, such as Church of Latter Day Saints, etc, don't believe in the trinity. Yet they are considered Christians. Yet i've seen many ignorant people turn down Mormons and the like saying that they aren't Christians, when in reality, i believe these Mormons and other sects know much more about the bible than either Catholics or Protestants. They base this argument on something to do with Paul being not really 100% the best guy to take the bible from. TBH, i honestly can't remember, but i vaguely remember it as something to with Paul. 

lol to @azara i haven't watched that specific video, but Ahmed Deedat (Zakir Naik's teacher) made a lecture solely containing the believed miracles, etc of the Quran. I actually find the video quite nice, its an hour and a half long, a LOT less shorter than the debate, but still if you have time , perhaps during the weekends, perhaps you guys could watch the video. I've provided the link down below. lol @fromsomewhere2017 nice to see another zakir/deedat fan in here. 

lol, concerning the swooning thing, @aTeddy there is actually a simple answer to why Jesus escaped which is also present in the bible. Again, it has something to with him not dying. Ahmed Deedat was a biblical scholar as well as a Muslim scholar, and i remember there being 2 lectures which he conducted in Australia, which are solely to do with 1. "Jesus in Islam" and 2. "Easter - a Muslim viewpoint (this is the one in which he talks about Jesus not dying even according to the bible). I've provided the link down below. btw. the second video starts at 19:42 so, for those interested in either topics, i bid you adie. (lmao sorry for all the deedat) 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSnNOyxHqa4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eDN8cJs41I

 

Edited February 6, 2017 by talalrulez

[ILoveJesus]

And still it stands that the majority of New Testament scholars agree that the tomb in which Jesus was buried was found empty on the Sunday after his crucifixion, and that people had appearances of Jesus alive after his crucifixion. These two are still best explained by an actual resurrection of Jesus.
The only two objections so far are: Of course New Testament scholars will agree because they're all Christian, and the swoon theory, as a means to explain the underlying historical events.
The first objection isn't even true. I wonder if anyone could back it up? There are many atheist/agnostic NT Testament scholars that agree on those facts, but they just try to offer very implausible explanations for them.
And the swoon theory (that Jesus survived the crucifixion) is highly implausible because it doesn't explain the fact that Jesus' disciples came to believe that Jesus rose from the dead (they would have noticed his physical weakness from the crucifixion).