Maybe you can enlighten us great unwashed? I really don't see the difference.

And defending the Bible with passages from the Bible STILL doesn't work -- no matter how many times you try.

you sound like you're around your 30s, single, and about to bottom out (for the x time). you try to sound intelligent and witty, but you just make yourself look confrontational and defensive. plus you take the forums pretty seriously it seems (banned daily at 8 lol). this is my 100% honest opinion.

you should show just a little bit of humility if you want to get anywhere in life and stay there.

Dude, I'm 45, married, and have two amazing children.

I've made more money in my life already than you will ever see -- and gave more than half of it away to charity.

I've read the Bible cover-to-cover at least six times -- the "popular" texts a dozen or more. I've forgotten more about Christianity than you will likely ever learn.

Care to try again, douche?

yeah, you're a stubborn mule. you win.

Truth always does.

i'm sure you were telling the truth, when you said you read the bible front to back 6 times, and and the popular texts over a dozen times.

not an ounce of lie.

Actually, that's quite a conservative estimate. I've studied Christianity very seriously for the last 20 years.

It's probably far higher than that.

elaborate on how you studied Christianity very seriously for the last 20 yrs.

What is it about "studied Christianity very seriously for the last 20 years" that you don't understand?

Would you like me to go to my bookshelf and list all the books I have read?

Would you like me to explain, in detail, why I went from a die-hard Calvinist, to Fundamentalist, to Evangelical, to Deist?

Would you like me to post the thousands of messages I posted on the CompuServe religion forum back in the early 90's?

Would you like to go **** yourself?

yeah, why dont you do all those thing. you obv got time on your hands.

this is something that's bothered me for a long time, and this thread reminds me of it. someone should do a study. i really think there's something here.



(those are supposed to be descriptions of people, if it's unclear)

Just answer yes to my last question in the post, and then we're done.

I still can't make sense of your picture.

there seems to be something thats nearly universally true about christians who frequently post on internet forums (or at least this one) that is not generally true of christians and it's not generally true of people who frequently post on internet forums.

Ah I get it now. What's your adjective?

Paul (originally Saul) is an interesting character and what can be gleaned from his merger writings and the writing of others is not much, but a general outline of this important man can be made. My assessment of Paul is that he was an obsessive personality, bordering on fanatical, as his persecution of the early adherents of Jesus clearly illustrates. It should be remembered that in this timeframe the believers in Jesus where considered, and probably considered themselves, a simple Jewish sect. The word Christian was not even in use.

Paul took his religion seriously but the persecutions he carried out against his own people set up in his very active mind an intense conflict. In my opinion, this intense conflict was made all the more stronger because of his rather obsessive personality. What he experienced on the road to Damascus was the resolution of this intense emotional conflict within his subconscious mind. This broke out as a vision or what he interpreted as a vision. It is interesting that he became blind for a period of days afterward. This is not all that uncommon for people that have an intense emotional experience or are in conflict from extreme stress, whether self-induced or from outside forces (temporary blindness is evident, for example, in shell-shock). Also, given Paul’s mindset, circumstances, and influences of being a first-century Jew, his interruption of his experience is not that surprising.

That he went on to become a successful preacher and mainly to the Gentiles is not surprising either, as the center of the Jewish splitter group of Peter and James et al, were centered in Jerusalem. It made sense that he should go eleswhere.

What has not been mentioned is that Paul does not say very much about Jesus as a person at all. He never mentions in any of his letters (some attributed to Paul were probably not written by him) oral stories or histories or parables of Jesus at all, even when to do so would help points he is attempting to make. This is a very serious incongruity that many people seem to miss or gloss over. Paul mentions the last supper and some oral wording but all his writings center on the resurrection as a theological centerpiece. But whether Paul actually thought it was a real event or more of a symbolic religious mythos is still a mystery, at least to me. Paul did preach like the resurrection was a real event when it served his purposes to do so. But his only encounter with Jesus was a self-interpreted event as a vision. This is dubious evidence at best and very suspect.

-Zeno

see you're kind of diagnosing paul's personality so that it could fit your beliefs.

Not at all. It is objective and fits with what few facts are actually known about this Man. I preach christ crucified Paul says. And see NotReady's post above that reveals something of Paul's nature, that fits quite well with my diagnosis.



A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence. -David Hume


-Zeno

You can really accuse someone else of fitting things to their beliefs without irony? Which is a more unreasonable suggestion, that Paul had fanatical and somewhat delusional tendencies, or that somone rose from the dead? Which have you met more of in your life, delusional fanatics or reanimated dead people?

By the way, Zeno mentions the absence of stories about Jesus in Paul's writing, but does not mention the most glaring omission, which is Paul's failure to mention the empty tomb. If, as NotReady suggests, Paul had plenty of time to talk things over with early Christians, not mentioning that Jesus was found to not be in his grave anymore is striking. The most likely explanation is that this story was nonexistent among early Christians.

Zeno's post is ludicrous, probably something lifted from Tillich. There was no reason for Paul to record another gospel account. There were already four, one written by his companion, Luke, as well as Acts.

Your post is even worse.


I expect another reason he didn't write a life of Christ was because he wasn't a disciple at the time. He didn't become a Christian until several years after the crucifixion. He had no personal knowledge of the detail. What would repeating that which was already recorded do?

What would be your adjective for atheists who constantly harp on the same stupidities? Most theists, including me, would hardly post at all except for that. Someone should do a study.

Well that's it guys. Looks like Jesus really was real and we were wrong all along. Let's get together next week for our conversion. Dominic, hit the lights on your way out.

Huh? My understanding is that the Pauline Epistles were written prior to either the Gospels or Acts (or at least the ones of confirmed authorship were, and certainly 1 Cor).

Resurrection doesn't have to mean an empty tomb. Obviously there's no doubt Paul believed that Jesus was raised from the dead, but that doesn't mean he believed he was raised in a physical body. Actually what you quoted is small evidence that he didn't believe that:

The lack of qualification suggests that Paul believed that the manner in which he appeared to the apostles was the same as the manner in which he appeared to Paul - i.e. as a spirit or vision. There's also 1 Cor 15:42-44 and 1 Cor 15:50, which I submit that you would have no trouble recognising as describing a spiritual resurrection if you didn't have a different agenda. None of this is conclusive evidence, but it's better than the evidence for the other side - not a single concrete mention of the empty tomb or of definitively physical appearances (of the Doubting Thomas variety). You would think these things would rate a mention in 1 Cor 15 given that the entire purpose of it is to convince those skeptical of resurrection. No?

So far as I'm aware, none of the Gospel authors were disciples. I'm a little confused because I thought you knew your apologetics but your chronology here seems completely wrong.

There were no gospel accounts written until long after Paul's letters and not until after his own death, probably in Roman. So he would have a good reason to write something down as evidence for his faith. And Paul only quotes one oral saying in any of his letters. Given this and his learning and the fact no recorded history is evident even in Paul's later years it is quite puzzling that Paul did not write more about Jesus.

Tillich who?

But also see ChrisV's post.

-Zeno

It should be noted that many gospels are extent (besides the four in the New Testament) and have claims to be from actual disciples but that is in doubt by most biblical scholars,including the four canonical gospels.

-Zeno