What's leads you to believe what you believe?

[txag007]

[ QUOTE ]
I do see what you're saying. I'll also add that that you're doing an excellent job of wiggling away every time you're backed into a corner. You're good! And I'm sure it will take a better debater than I, to finally nail you down.

The problem is that you're having an incredibly hard time getting past your own 20/20 hindsight.

Put yourself in a time before we knew the causes of sneezing and lightning. The universe and the big bang weren't even concepts yet. So you are unable to use these to explain why God must exist. What would you do?

You would no doubt use whatever unexplained events were available (such as sneezing and lightning), as the same faulty premise for your reasoning of why God must exist.

[/ QUOTE ]
I'm not wiggling. I'm just explaining and clarifying. The more we learn about science, the more we learn about God. Science and the Bible are 100% compatible.

[David Sklansky]

"Call it what you want, but I do believe that. I believe based on the available evidence that Christianity is more likely to be true than any other religion out there. I believe those who are non-Christians have not evaluated the evidence thoroughly or objectively, not that I expect that to happen."

Are you including not just the other religions out there but also religions that don't have a name that have yet to be defined, or theories like deism and theories like no god at all? If you still think an unemotional, computer like evidence evaluater, would say that Christianity is more likely to be correct than all its alternatives, than you are indeed as stupid as thoose who would say the same thing about OJs innocence.

[txag007]

[ QUOTE ]
"Call it what you want, but I do believe that. I believe based on the available evidence that Christianity is more likely to be true than any other religion out there. I believe those who are non-Christians have not evaluated the evidence thoroughly or objectively, not that I expect that to happen."

Are you including not just the other religions out there but also religions that don't have a name that have yet to be defined, or theories like deism and theories like no god at all? If you still think an unemotional, computer like evidence evaluater, would say that Christianity is more likely to be correct than all its alternatives, than you are indeed as stupid as thoose who would say the same thing about OJs innocence.

[/ QUOTE ]
Lol! Oh the persecutions we Christians suffer!
(sw)

[David Sklansky]

But most Christians DO NOT believe that an independendent evidence evaluator would rate their specific beliefs a favorite over the rest of the field combined.

[BluffTHIS!]

David they suffer from calvinist indoctrination and its doctrine of irresistable grace. Irresistable in the sense of if you hear the gospel preached you cannot but believe it to be true and if you reject it then you are rejecting a known truth.

[txag007]

[ QUOTE ]
But most Christians DO NOT believe that an independendent evidence evaluator would rate their specific beliefs a favorite over the rest of the field combined.

[/ QUOTE ]
And you know this how?

[txag007]

What? No response?

[ QUOTE ]

1. The discovery of the empty tomb was made by women. At the time, women weren't given standing in society as legal witnesses. If the story was made up, why base it on the testimony of a woman?

[/ QUOTE ]

This isn’t evidence.

[ QUOTE ]

2. 2. The disciples hid following the arrest of Jesus for fear of being put to death. Peter even denied knowing Him three separate times. After the alleged resurrection, the disciples suddenly began to preach without fear of death. Why?

[/ QUOTE ]

That’s just the story as you have read it, a long time after the event, we would need more than Chinese whispers.

[ QUOTE ]

3. Jesus staked his entire ministry on the fact that he would rise from the dead. Why would he risk destroying the entire movement of Christianity on a false prophecy?

[/ QUOTE ]

You have mentioned this before, and it wasn’t evidence then either. I will stake my entire ministry on my resurrection right now. You will notice that as I don’t currently have a ministry, I have nothing to lose

[ QUOTE ]

4. The tombs of other religious leaders are visited and worshipped by many each year. This is true of Buddha, Confusious, Muhammad, and Joseph Smith. Why is the same not true for Jesus?

[/ QUOTE ]

I don’t know why that is, but it isn’t evidence. Why don’t they worship the tomb he allegedly rose from?

[ QUOTE ]

5. Jesus was buried in the tomb of Joseph, who Mark describes as "a prominent member of the Council". It would have been destructive for the writers to invent a man of such prominence, name him specifically, and designate the tomb site, since eyewitnesses would have easily discredited the author's fallacious claims.

[/ QUOTE ]

I can’t see how where he was or wasn’t buried affects the likely hood he was resurrected.

[ QUOTE ]

6. Jewish and Roman sources both testify to an empty tomb. Matthew 28:12 13 specifically states that the chief priests invented the story that the disciples stole the body. There would be no need for this fabrication if the tomb had not been empty. Opponents of the Resurrection must account for this. If the tomb had not been empty, the preaching of the Apostles would not have lasted one day. All the Jewish authorities needed to do to put an end to Christianity was to produce the body of Jesus.

[/ QUOTE ]

You say here that the chief priests say the disciples stole the body. Why take Matthew’s word (a follower of a convicted terrorist) over theirs?

[ QUOTE ]

7. Along with the empty tomb is the fact that the corpse of Jesus was never found. Not one historical record from the first or second century is written attacking the factuality of the empty tomb or claiming discovery of the corpse.

[/ QUOTE ]

You already said that the Chief Priests said that the disciples stole the body. Why do you discount that?

[ QUOTE ]

8. The Apostles began preaching the Resurrection in Jerusalem. This is significant since this is the very city in which Jesus was crucified. This was the most hostile city in which to preach. Furthermore, all the evidence was there for everyone to investigate. Legends take root in foreign lands or centuries after the event. Discrediting such legends is difficult since the facts are hard to verify. However, in this case the preaching occurs in the city of the event immediately after it occurred. Every possible fact could have been investigated thoroughly.

[/ QUOTE ]

Again this isn’t evidence. If you see a group today preaching cult beliefs in an even more hostile environment will you convert from Christianity to their cult on the grounds that they wouldn’t dare say anything if they were wrong? That’s just isn’t how people work.

As you can see from my answers, I haven’t proved you wrong, but that’s because there isn’t any evidence there to disprove. Religious propaganda is full of this type of ‘logic’. I was handed a leaflet in the street about the problems with evolution and it was full of ‘proofs against’ in which the logic just didn’t flow between statements.

Eg. If evolution is true then there is no God, if God doesn’t exist he couldn’t have created you. But you exist, so God must exist.

I guess it had entertainment value though.

[Lestat]

Are you saying that circumstantial evidence means NOTHING? I'm not saying you should take any one as a given, but even police detectives recognize that numerous occurances of circumstantial evidence is usually meaningful enough to pursue in an investigation and won't immediately dismiss them as you seem to be doing here.

[ QUOTE ]
As you can see from my answers, I haven’t proved you wrong, but that’s because there isn’t any evidence there to disprove.

[/ QUOTE ]

I was trying to say that here to some extent. I didn't mean to say I could dismiss it totally, but there isn't really much to dismiss...

"But MATTHEW said...."

So what?