Books, letters form troops, the fact that if he didn't more than likely the country im in wouldn't exist.
No theres not.
Nah people die for religious and cult leaders who performed miracles all the time. Why do you dismiss all others who have died for leaders who performed miracles? Your answer is mine. Not enough evidence.

Jesus is different than any other religious leader. No one else rose from the dead (or has even claimed to).

I dismiss all other cult leaders because they're miracles could have easily been fakes. Rising from the dead cannot be fake. And these people died defending the fact that it happened. If all Jesus had done was heal a blind person, I wouldn't put my faith in him. That can be faked. Maybe the person wasn't really blind.

Jesus was murdered. It was witnessed. It's a piece of history.

The apostles dying to defend the fact that he rose from the dead is also a piece of history. Do you think he fooled them? Do you think they were lying? You have to believe one of those two. Was his resurrection a fake? Or were the people who died just lying?

Neither did he

So you think he faked it?

This isnt true there have been a few. There was even a Jew about fifty years before Jesus who claimed the same thing and even claimed to rise from the dead in three days.

I dont have a cite if you want one ill get it tomorrow but ill have to look around.

Like above there have been people who have claimed to have come back from the dead.
I think the resurrection stuff was an add on and made up by the people who wrote some parts of the gospels (not the apostles). But even if it wasn't there was a reason they used to put bells in peoples coffins. Its was hard to tell if someone was truly dead back then so the apostles and even Jesus himsled could of been mistaken about it.

Your new here and i would go more in depth but i have had this conversation one to many times. But pretty much i would need to see something like that with my own eyes because to be honest i just dont trust the accounts of ancient or modern mans miracles.

Sad to see Christians still so misinformed about these things.

lol so wrong.

Seems like you're implying that if someone will die for a cause, it must be a fact. Is this correct? So if I link some stories of people dying, you'll tell me you believe their ideas/beliefs were factually correct?

No, I don't think he faked it. But it did make a good story that I believed for many years.

No one's gonna be put to death on a lie. Especially when they have nothing to gain from it. Well, maybe someone who was out of their mind would, but there were 10+ people who died because they saw him rise from the dead. If they were lying, they would have admitted it at some point before dying, as it would have saved their lives.

Ok, so how many people have to die for a cause for you to believe what they died for is true?

Just more than one?

What if people from two causes fight eachother, and then 2000 people from each cause dies. Are both causes true?

Here's a couple links for you, finknik...

39 people commit suicide because they believed the earth was about the be recycled, and the only hope of survival was to leave immediately

235 people die when a few priests convince them the world is about to end

The children who died most likely didn't know or believe what was going on, so we can subtract a bit from the number, but still...

There's more if you need them, just let me know!

The most correct people of all time.

The knowledge of God is limited to the knowledge of the people who lived at the time the bible was written

that's the first thing I started to think about that lead me to atheism, i wasn't really ever a true christian anyway. My dad helped a lot though, even when I was young he asked me questions like "What happens to grass when it dies, does it go to heaven? ... why do humans have the right to go to heaven but poor grass doesn't?" etc etc he's awesome I'm glad im not raised in some christian nutjob family

Sounds to me like your Dad's the nutjob. Grass? God didn't create grass with souls. Humans were the only one's that he intended to share heaven with.

Has your Dad even read the Bible? Or does he just claim to be all wise?

If your best case against Christianity is "how come grass doesn't get to go to heaven?", even the Atheists are gonna laugh at you.

I'll talk about the other stuff later. Gotta go to work.

where does grass go then, if it cant go to heaven,

grass in hell? auch poor grass

edit: not only grass btw.. its just a radical example, animals, trees etc, its all good, and i did not say thats my best case against religion, i suggest you read my entire post. Nitpicking parts of my post that is easy for you criticise but the part you cant answer you just choose to ignore, dont worry its just how christian people work

I know this is old so I'm probably adding nothing new (but I haven't read the whole thread yet so forgiveness.) But a lot wrong here...

billions don't believe he rose from the dead.

It doesn't take much to image worse pain then he supposedly endured. You're not trying very hard if you can't imagine worse. Also- as far as crucification was common, others regularly endured what he did. His pain wasn't even particularly unique.

Quite easily. A god that demands someone be tortured and killed for others to be forgiven? That's sick.

lol. So were Hercules and Zeus. They're simly a part of history.

it would be nice if new theists would do just a modicum of research before they make such ridiculous claims. I feel like there's no point debating people who come to the table with so an enormous amount of misinformation.

cite

Gabriel's Revelation
The finding has caused controversy among scholars. Israel Knohl, who is an expert in Talmudic and biblical language at Jerusalem's Hebrew University reads the inscription as a command from the angel Gabriel "to rise from the dead within three days". He takes this command to be directed at a 1st century Jewish rebel called Simon, who was killed by the Romans in 4 B.C

Come on, that's a disingenuous remark. Even in early ancient Greek society they were accepted as divine figures in religion, not real people. People wouldn't go around talking about what Zeus and Hera were fighting about (like they were celebrities or public figures) in Olympus last week that caused a huge flood when Hera bawled her eyes out and Zeus took his anger out on some poor farmers livestock by striking all his cows and horses by lightning.

yeah because that would be stupid as hell

anytime i wander into a thread that says "(for theists)" im booted out immediately and my post is deleted.

hmmmmm

Umm no... I talked about that because I only had 2 minutes to post.

Heaven and Hell are two places that were created by God for humans. Grass doesn't go anywhere after it dies. A much more legitimate question for you to ask is where animals go after they die, and tbh I cannot answer it. But does it really matter? There are things that humans can't conceive, such as where does the universe end? It's not meant to be understood by us. You just have to accept that there are things that we don't (and can't) understand.

+10000

it would also be nice if *other theists* on this board would help out with this cause as well.

yeah yeah, atheists dont do this either, blah blah, doesn't make my request any less valid.

I've read that many scholars don't believe early followers of Christianity thought that Biblical tales were literal either.

And you're also missing my point, you stating that its history has about as much validity as me stating Zeus was. Both are incredibly unlikely, both are stories told by ancient primitive man involving magic and miracles by people's who were incredible superstitious and absent a sophisticated understanding of the natural world. Its no more ridiculous to believe Zeus was real then any other god.

Also- I don't think your characterization is really all that accurate. You're suggesting that people didn't think these figures were real, yet they made temples to them, made offerings to them, etc.

By the way, if you don't like the Zeus example, feel free to replace it with any of the hundreds of other Gods that man has worshipped. My point still stands.