oh man. This is hilariously true. I'm so using that line IRL

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“Been living here in galus for a life too long" - Matisyahu

audrasun,






Sooo... now we have 2 people who do not believe in the son of god debating his existance LOL



PS
As far as I'm know, the person now known as "Jesus the Nazarene" has already been proven to exist as per ancient Roman, Israeli and Arab documentation. I'm sure a religous scholar would be better equipped for this since I have long forgotten the evidence but it convinced me at the time.

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"When I'm in command, every mission is a suicide mission!" -Capt. Zapp Branigan
The United Church of the Latter Day Tangential Tarts

usually are, fairly easily.

I doubt his existence because there is no solid, irreproachable evidence that an actual person named Jesus lived.

Catz

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Job 13:5 (New International Version)
If only you would be altogether silent! For you, that would be wisdom.

I'll go you one better: I'm an agnostic, but I'm arguing over in Religion that the theory of evolution does not contradict the existence of God, and that God has to be bigger than many religious fundamentalists portray him/her/it as.

Of course, I'm agnostic largely because I find God unprovable either way, and I'm turned off by the tiny little boxes most religions try to cram God into.

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Man up.

Thats for sure! Look how many people there are that believe everything Bush tells them.










LOL.. yeah, its like hearding cats.

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"When I'm in command, every mission is a suicide mission!" -Capt. Zapp Branigan
The United Church of the Latter Day Tangential Tarts

You have any more details about this? I'm curious

I've always questioned Rome's motives behind all this... like blaming the execution on the jews, shifting responsibilty from the roman governor in charge of Israel. A superpower killing the son of god is never good publicity.

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"When I'm in command, every mission is a suicide mission!" -Capt. Zapp Branigan
The United Church of the Latter Day Tangential Tarts

Didn't Flavius Josephus specifically mention a Jesus of Nazareth in his "Jewish Wars"?

Also, I'm an atheist.

it existed in 33 AD.

Spork: Flavius Josephus is almost certainly an interpolation by the Roman Catholic Church. Josephus was a practicing Jew who would have been guilty of blasphemy had he made the statements about Jesus called the Christ that he allegedly made. Josephus remained Jewish until he died and never converted to Christianity. Ergo, it's extremely illogical that he made these comments. Further, even conservative Christian scholars have brough at least half of what Josephus wrote into doubt. Thus, since half has been discredited even by conservatives, it's likely that the entire account was falsified by a scribe in the early church. Bear in mind, Josephus's histories were preserved by the Catholic church and no place else. So, we'll never know.

There are only a few references to Jesus, called the Christ, from that era.

Josephus: (discussed above)

Tacitus: wrote the following:

Still doesn't prove the actual existence of a man called Jesus. Christ, in aramaic, meant only LORD, it wasn't a surname. And, this is a reference to the followers of a particular mystery religion, but it doesn't prove the existence of an actual Jesus. It proves only that there was a religion who followed a person named Christus...

Issues with this source:
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/tacitus.html

Far from definitive, suffice it to say.

a bit more on this topic, for those who might be interested...

http://www.infidels.org/library/mode...er/hojfaq.html

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Job 13:5 (New International Version)
If only you would be altogether silent! For you, that would be wisdom.

Josephus has probably been tampered with, but I think most scholars agree that the mentioning of a Jesus (son of god or son of carpenter) was not added by later Christians. The embellishments ("He is Christ") are certainly added, but the mentioning of a Jesus probably not.

(Besides it would have had to have been tampered with before 324AD, for Eusebius quoted the entire relevant passage of Josephus then in its 'current' form)

I pretty much agree with this
This also states it pretty nicely.

This is much more of a technical matter than anything else, Christians will not forsake their faith even if somehow it would be conclusively proven that Jesus was all just one big pratical joke. And even atheists/agnostics would gain little, for it probably wouldn't convince them any more or any less on the plausibility of God.

Josephus was most likely tampered with during the era of Eusebius. There may well have been a mention of a Jesus who was crucified (it was a common enough name in those days), but some scribe who will forever be unknown made the account more "interesting."

Catz

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Job 13:5 (New International Version)
If only you would be altogether silent! For you, that would be wisdom.