h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Apologies here, but the original question was Did Jesus rise from the dead ......

The potential for a debate around things that could have happened to explain the birth of a religion ...... instead what we have are the usual suspects bashing Christians.

I find this offensive, not because I'm a Christian but because I despise arrogance and bullying, both of which are very evident here.

So I'll leave you children to it and may you live long and prosper.

mia< I've only said that I believe in the teachings of Christ and therefore consider myself to be a Christian.>

And yet the teachings of Christ(when he isn't giving instrucitons on how to keep slaves etc) is just simple common sense that had been said before and has been said since.

YOU, if you sit down and think about tyhe world and your place in it can come up with similar conclusions. There is good stuff in the Bible about how to run wones life but what you really should be doing is thinking am I a Christian just because I think theres common sense writing in the NT?

What you should be doing if they only reason you say you are a Christian is that you think his teachings are good is analyse why they are good. Are they good because he said them or that they match what YOU yourself believe is the right way to run your life?

The bravest thing is to trust your own convictions and atnd on your own and say that your mind and views are your own and aren't the views of numerous ancient religious and politicos over the past 2,000 years.

If one crystalised the main teachings of Christ and compared them to what people believe then most people would probably have to be defined as Christians.

The problem is a Christian *really is defined* as some one who thinks the Son of the Abrahamic god got nailed to a tree, died, then rose again and went to his dad in heaven.

If you don't believe this, or have faith in this happening, then you aren't a Christian you are just a normal person(welcome to the club). Would anything in your life change if you stoped calling yourself a Christian because you really don't beleilve in any of that supernatural nonsense?

<< generally religion tells people to be nice to each other and respect each other >>

Even allowing this to be true I don't need to believe that some guy rose from the dead to come to that conclusion. The stuff that's useful and sensible is common currency. We don't need religion to justify it.

Noggin

Woodpigeon said "it sounds a little bit symbolic to me, are you saying that Christ, to you, is very much like, say Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Ghandi or Martin Luther King, in terms of what they spoke about, and in the ways they inspired people? Or is it something more than this?"

Something more? All of those people you mentioned, as well as Christ, have been very inspirational to me. How can you qualify inspiration? I don't know.

mia

Umm, if I may butt in here.....thanks awfully.

Yes, I did.

Hope that sorts things out.

Toodle-pip.

Dot Dot Dot said "The problem is a Christian *really is defined* as some one who thinks the Son of the Abrahamic god got nailed to a tree, died, then rose again and went to his dad in heaven."
"Are they good because he said them or that they match what YOU yourself believe is the right way to run your life?"
"Would anything in your life change if you stoped calling yourself a Christian because you really don't beleilve in any of that supernatural nonsense?"

I'm going to try and overlook what appear to be some very narrowminded suppositions about my personal beliefs. And I shall also overlook the very patronising tone.

For years I've been confused as to what actually defines a "true Christian". It doesn't help when people such as your fine self seem very keen to dump on what you don't understand. Is it a concept I should defend? Or should I simply stop telling people I'm a Christian?

Why do you care if I'm Christian or not? What does my personal belief have to do with you?

mia

What happened to post 45? Was it the Phantom Yikeser I've been hearing about? I can't even remember what was said.

mia

"Did Jesus rise from the dead ......

The potential for a debate around things that could have happened to explain the birth of a religion ...... instead what we have are the usual suspects bashing Christians."

I've asked, clearly and distinctly, for
1. a precise definition of "rise from the dead" and
2. the evidence to convinve a rational objective adult.

I have so far seen neither. Is this "bashing"?

I think there are rational explanations for the birth of Christianity. The resurrection is not one of them. But as I've said - if it's not real, what point Christianity?

SoRB

i wouldn't have said it was bashing more challenging the concept of rising from the dead I'm not offended yet will let you know as soon as i am

"Why do you care if I'm Christian or not? What does my personal belief have to do with you?"


Because under the umbrella of Crhistianity all mannor of groups attempt and often do influence and force laws to be passed based on their belief system, which impinge often negatively on to others who do not share the beliefs.

<>


For me, "rise from the dead" means what it says. I take it to mean what the likes of Luke, John, Paul and Peter meant when they wrote about it in the NT. They clearly had physical resurrection in mind, not metaphorical or purely spiritual resurrection.

<>

There are all sorts of "explanations" you can pull out of the air or from your imagination (eg. the "swoon theory" that Jesus didn't die, but passed out on the cross, later revived and dragged himself out of the tomb.

But in a court of law you wouldn't ask any old bod for their opinion, you'd go to witnesses who were there, and that's what we should do here. Look at what the NT writers say. Then decide whether they're lying or sincere.

<>

So the NT writers were bare-faced liars then? Fair enough if that's what you think. And I agree with your comment that if it's not real, what's the point of Christianity?

Don't you think it's a little unfair to suggest that all Christians belong to these groups you mention, 2legs? I assure you that my own personal beliefs would not impinge negatively on you. And I am not so insecure that I require everyone, or even anyone, to share my beliefs.

Though I would guess that you share at least one of my beliefs, which is that church and state should be separate.

And apologies to Dot Dot Dot if I came across super defensive earlier. I think it was the feeling I got that you think there is something wrong or abnormal about being a Christian that got my back up. I'm over it now.



mia

<>

Of course, you may conclude that they were sincere but mistaken. However, I find it difficult to see how you could be mistaken about someone rising from the dead and demonstrating that they were the risen son of God over a forty day period.

Of the three options (they were correct, they were lying or they were mistaken) the idea that they made a mistake is the least likely. Unless you point-blank refuse out of hand to entertain the possibility that they could have been telling the truth.

"Of the three options (they were correct, they were lying or they were mistaken) the idea that they made a mistake is the least likely."

I disagree.

If you're using the word "likely" in the way most objective adults would, the actual least likely explanation is that they were correct.

Do you agree?

SoRB

Mia kulpa

Apology accepted. I was simply saying you don't need call yourself a Christian to follow the common sense stuff in the Bible.

You do have to call yourself a Christian if you believe Jesus rose from the dead...that's the crux of the faith.

mia kulpa

Because I care that people are living thier lives based around fairy stories rather than by a rational view of life and its problems.



Number 1: see answer above. Number 2: Christianity affects me as I have mentioned above and while Christians have a voice in what I do via laws etc I have to assume (rightly or wrongly) that your beliefs are affecting the way I live (via the heads of the church etc).

You may well not go to church or voice your personal opinions of what we should all be doing based on the teachings of a 2000year old guy. I do not know. I have to assume you do.

If it is a truly 'personal' belief about whose beliefs you follow and you keep it in your home then great!

It would be even greater if you realised lots of people have these 'beliefs' but they do not connect them with a prophet but with common sense.

And I am not being patronising at all just seeing you from the outside and not a faith driven person.

<>

This of course takes for granted that the NT writers were present, and therefore that there was some event to be present at. In fact, of all the NT writers, only St John has ever been suggested as a possible, but by no means certain, eye witness, and the most important NT writer, St Paul, never even pretended to have been an eye witness.

How many people do you know personally to have risen from the dead?

How many people do you know personally who have been mistaken about events that happened before their time?

Which is the most likely, in your experience?

David Hume, the Scottish philosopher, is excellent on this subject.

Noggin

"How many people do you know personally who have been mistaken about events that happened before their time?"

How many people do you know personally who have been mistaken about events that happened before their EYES? Ever seen Derren Brown? Uri Geller? David Blaine?

"Because under the umbrella of Crhistianity all mannor of groups attempt and often do influence and force laws to be passed based on their belief system, which impinge often negatively on to others who do not share the beliefs."

But there's nothing unique or unusual about Christian groups in this context. All kinds of groups lobby for laws based on their world view and force them on others. That's politics.

Equality and anti-discrimination legislation forces everyone - under threat of prosecution - to treat everyone equally in terms of employment opportunities and the provision of goods and services. So if I were a racist, sexist, homophobic businessman, it would be illegal for me to act on my beliefs in terms of whom I employed and whom I did business with. Now I think this legislation is entirely right - but make no mistake about it, even its strongest supporters must concede that it forces a liberal agenda on the illiberal on pain of prosecution.

In a liberal democracy, everyone is entitled to their views and to put forward arguments in support of their position and to try to gain support. Religious groups often do this, and regularly phrase their arguments in secular terms to try to appeal for broader support. They're playing the game according to the rules.

If others don't agree, they have every right to argue back and put the counter-arguments. That's what liberal democratic politics *is*.

But they don't have the right to shout them down and try to silence religious groups and try to exclude them from the political process. And there's a worrying new trend of secular illiberalism that goes beyond wanting to counter 'morally conservative' arguments in the public sphere to wanting to silence those voices entirely. Strange times when secular liberals oppose free speech because they don't agree with what's said.....

Your post reminds me of an article I read recently in the Grauniad Otto -

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lawrence/Story/0,,208395,0.html

"And the final answer, frankly, is the vigorous use of state power to coerce and repress. It may be my Presbyterian background, but I firmly believe that repression can be a great, civilising instrument for good. Stamp hard on certain 'natural' beliefs for long enough and you can almost kill them off."

In this case he was talking about racism, but it's not a huge leap to extend that to religion and then any other area the state chooses to focus upon.