By God's help and guidance in the name of His son Jesus Christ i will seek to refute the lies of a user called Nous against Christian faith, on Religion&Spirituality yahoo answers, by the truth and historical proof:
Nous: Why such a silly post when they have the education and intellect to know the truth and live in reality and it is you that make the outrageously silly claims?!
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https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20170302184032AAJr3Wx So people have to believe people on word when they say they are educated and know the truth and live in reality? Or do they judge them by their behavior first? There were loads of educated, but mentally deranged people excelling in some areas, but deficient in most others. Does obsessively posting the same copy-pasted rants against "Bad Chrsitians", as Nous does it, confirm mental problems? The doctors say his behavior shows: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/obsessive-compulsive-disorder-ocd/index.shtml
And yet these same people pretending to be educated, refuse to accept Christian teachings and historical and practically good proof of them. Nous:The first person to produce a single tiny little piece of verifiable evidence for any god will become world famous and mega rich! Fulfilled prophecies. Answered prayers in Christian believers. Note that belief in God is not science, therefore it is based on faith, not verifiable repeated scientific evidence. Here Nous makes a wrong approach to Christian faith, trying to fit into the limited understanding of human science. If somebody claims that science is not limited, let them raise dead people to life. If not able, it proves it is limited. http://www.reasons.org/articles/articles/fulfilled-prophecy-evidence-for-the-reliability-of-the-bible Nous:Academia states that in the absence of any sort of evidence of the existence of something it must be deemed not to exist until verifiable evidence is found - thus god is held not to exist pending some sort of verifiable evidence. Where it is recorded? What is this Academia? That's a claim without evidence, ironically. So if Nous cannot show evidence of having love to people, it means he has no love to people and thus completely egoistical and narcissistic? That's what his pretend hearsay method "Academia states" leads to. Nous:The bible is what is called "Faction” A fictional story set in a factual time and place. Thus the time, place and real historical characters are all correct but the fictional characters and stories are not! Before calling something a fiction it must be proved first. You don't arrive to conclusions before you prove it, which shows he is trying to pass his belief "Bible is fictional" as fact, and only then tries to fit arguments he can dig into this belief to pretend it is really so. This is a fallacy. Circular reasoning (Latin: circulus in probando, "circle in proving";[1] also known as circular logic) is a logical fallacy in which the reasoner begins with what they are trying to end with.
Or jumping to conclusions without first proving it:
https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFallacies/114/Jumping-to-Conclusions Nous:There is not one single mention of Jesus in the entire Roman record - that is right - not one! At the same time as he was supposed to have been around there were a number of Jews claiming to be the messiah - all of whom are well recorded! This is an outright lie, since historians Tacitus and Josephus Flavius do mention Jesus Christ, when writing around end of first century-beginning of second century AD. Tacitus says that Nero was persecuting Christians during his reign (60s AD) who came from Christus condemned to extreme penalty by Pilate. Also the stoic writer Mara bar Serapion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacitus_on_Christ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_Jesus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mara_bar_Serapion_on_Jesus Also possibly Suetonius does mention Jesus, as well as the roman governor Pliny the younger who mentions him and does not deny his existence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suetonius_on_Christians http://faculty.georgetown.edu/jod/texts/pliny.html Even anti-Christian writers, like Celsus, did not deny Jesus' existence:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_True_Word Nous:There is not a single contemporary record from any source and even the bible mentions of him like all other references were not written until many years after his supposed death! Another lie. The New Testament Bible is contemporary record of Jesus Christ from His disciples. Second, most information from ancient times was recorded much later. For instance should we discard Tacitus' information on 1st century emperors if he was writing "many years" later in early 2nd century? Historians do not. Nous:He was supposed to have been a huge problem to the Romans and produced wonderful miracles but still not one contemporary record? And what is the source of this claim "huge problem to the Romans"? Making up nonsense arguments, since the New Testament Bible Gospels are the contemporary records and does not present Jesus as "huge problem to Romans", except maybe to Pontius Pilate at a time. Nous:Even the bible mentions of him like all other references were not written until many years after his supposed death! Nous is making up a fictional condition of "many years" to try to diminish the validity of the Bible references to Christ,
though by this approach we would have to discard most ancient history.
Here's the actual historical method:
Historians write today about history from many many many years later. Should we start yelling to history teachers about lack of contemporary records? I doubt it. While the New Testament Bible was recorded in first century in a couple of decades, while initially spreading by preaching, as apostle Paul whose letters are considered to be the earliest, says he was preaching the Gospel (good news) of Jesus Christ. Obviously the Bible shows the apostles and their disciples were first preaching orally after Jesus' ascension and then recorded later. "For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of no effect." https://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?qs_version=NKJV&quicksearch=Gospel&begin=53&end=53 Nous:Pilate is recorded in the Roman record as a somewhat lack luster man but no mention of a Jesus, a trial or crucifixion that would surely have been used to make him look brighter! Another lie. As i already showed that Tacitus did write about Pilate and Jesus as "Christus", the founder of the Christian name. "Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judæa, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacitus_on_Christ#The_passage_and_its_context Nous:At best he was an amalgam of those others but almost certainly never existed! We already proved by history that Nous did lie multiple times about Jesus' lack of existence. Who are these "those others" he is speaking of? Here again he passes his belief in "Jesus as amalgam of those others" as fact, without any proof. Nous:Not one word of it is contemporary with the period and was not written until several hundred years after the period the story is set in!! How did the apostles write their books more than a hundred years after they would have been dead? According to historical research, the apostles and their disciples wrote their books in first century: http://www.bethinking.org/bible/the-dating-of-the-new-testament
http://earlychristianwritings.com/ So without any proof Nous passes a lie (again without proof), people supposedly have to believe him on his word, without proof. Nous:Christianity is an invention of the Italians and that is why it came from the Holy ROMAN Catholic church! Another case of passing personal beliefs as fact without evidence or proof. Dismissed as a lie. Nous:Please realize that those claims for the Old historians are worthless since they were not even born until long after everyone in the stories would have been so long dead! Josephus AD 37 – AD 100 Since Jesus was crucified and raised from the dead around 29-30 AD, it is only after 7 years that Josephus was born. Obviously his apostles were living on for decades after this able to spread the information about Jesus Christ whom they saw and after they died, through their own disciples, For ex: apostle John even told to die at the end of 1st century in late 90s AD in Ephesus by Christian historians. For instance i was born almost 70 years after bolshevik revolution, and slightly more than 60 years after Lenin's death and yet i had read loads of evidence of this happening, since it was recorded and passed on by many many people. Obviously during Josephus' life he, who lived in Israel, unlike me living far away from place of bolshevik revolution, more easily than me could have heard about Jesus Christ and His followers, just as possibly meeting them, since he mentions them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_Jesus#The_three_passages Tacitus AD 56 – AD 120 The same with Tacitus, he was born during Nero's reign and he did record him persecuting Christians, since Christian writers like Clement of Rome (end of 1st century) later attributed the deaths of apostles Peter and Paul in Rome during this period, which he could easily hear of from witnesses, or even seeing it himself as child. Being a senator i'm sure he had access to official information about this event and spread of Christian faith from Judea. For somebody who would claim that he only relates hearsay from Christians, they should prove it first; otherwise it is their personal belief only. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacitus_on_Christ Suetonius - 69 – 130 AD Pliny the Younger, 61 AD – 112 AD As known by history Suetonius as equestrian and Pliny as roman governor had more access to official information, just as interrogating and torturing and executing Christian believers, who then had little worth in lying to death. Justin Martyr (Saint Justin) AD103–165 AD Now why did not this user mention earlier extra-Biblical writers? Either he has not studied Christian history more in depth, or dishonestly covered it up. Like Clement of Rome at the end of first century ~35-101 AD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Clement_I https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Epistle_of_Clement or Ignatius of Antioch ~35-107 AD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignatius_of_Antioch https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Author:Ignatius_of_Antioch or Polycarp of Smyrna? ~69-156 AD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polycarp https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Polycarp%27s_letter_to_the_Philippians Or Papias of Hierapolis? ~70-163 AD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papias_of_Hierapolis The same with many other Christian writers who lived between first and second century and had more information. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:2nd-century_Christian_saints https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Fathers Lucian - AD 120 -180 AD but he was hostile to Christianity and openly mocked it. How about Mara bar Serapion's letter dated by most scholars to first century? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mara_bar_Serapion_on_Jesus Pamphilius AD 240-309 AD Eusebius AD 263 – 339 AD Photius AD 877 – 886 AD How about even more ancient Christian writers which Nous skips? http://www.ccel.org/fathers.html https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Category:Ancient_Christian_works Thallus - But there are no actual record of him except a fragment of writing which mentions the sack of Troy [109 BC] Showing that he was clearly not alive in biblical times. Again false. There are more fragments of Thallus, like the one quoted by christian writer Julius Africanus of 2nd-3rd century. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thallus_(historian)#The_fragments_of_Thallus "On the whole world there pressed a fearful darkness, and the rocks were rent by an earthquake, and many places in Judea and other districts were thrown down. Thallos calls this darkness an eclipse of the sun in the third book of histories, without reason it seems to me." (Africanus, in Syncellus) Nous:Some even try to use Seneca. 4 BCE – 65 CE but as a Stoic Philosopher he opposed religion yet made not a single mention of a Jesus or Christianity! Even funnier is trying to claim Celsus AD ? – 177 AD Who said that Jesus was a Jew whose mother was a poor Jewish girl whose husband, who was a carpenter, drove her away because of her adultery with a Roman soldier named Panthera. She gave birth to an illegitimate child named Jesus. In Egypt, Jesus became learned in sorcery and upon his return presented himself as a god. The point of appealing to Celsus' testimony is that he even if living at the end of 2nd century and being against Christian faith, quoting his sources from Jews, he still could not deny Jesus' existence; he also acknowledged that Jesus Christ did miracles. Unlike Nous living in 21st century, Celsus living in 2nd century did not deny that Jesus existed, even if hating Christian faith. Nous:An ancient set of lead tablets found in Jordan in 2008 showing the earliest portrait of Jesus Christ have proved to be 2,000 years old and say that Jesus and the disciples tried to recreate a religion from the time of King David! Lord Jesus Christ also recalled the law and prophets, which He came not to destroy, but fulfill. But by this latest quote Nous has discredit most of the claims he put before, since first he was claiming that there's not one contemporary mention of Jesus Christ and yet in the last sentence he mentions one. What even to speak of heretic (gnostic) sects from 2nd-3rd centuries which did mention Jesus Christ and some of his disciples in their writings, like so-called Gospel of Thomas. http://earlychristianwritings.com/ CONCLUSION: Nous was proven to be a dishonest liar, passing his unproven opinions as facts and trying to add a poorly researched view on Christian history as if that disproves Jesus' existence, when a more attentive and honest study of history shows the opposite that there are contemporary sources mentioning Jesus' this being New Testament Bible, which shows that the good news about Jesus Christ's resurrection were first preached orally then recorded by apostles and their disciples. There are also Jewish and Roman historians writing at the end of first century and early second century which do mention Jesus. There are also much more Christian writers since late 1st century, than he showed, all mentioning Jesus Christ.