Have you tried reading the NT in the correct order?

[Shaker]

No, you are misunderstanding.  Alan's explanation is not plausible.

No less than all the various explanations that you and your crew seek to give.

Then Jeremy's suspicion that you don't understand the meaning of the word plausible is confirmed as correct after all.

[jeremyp]

No, you are misunderstanding.  Alan's explanation is not plausible.

No less than all the various explanations that you and your crew seek to give.

I claim that the Empty Tomb story is fiction.  How is that as implausible as a dead man coming alive?

Seriously Hope, if we need a demonstration of the dangers of religion, you and Alan are providing it right here.  Your biases are preventing you from comprehending simple obvious statements of fact.  Dead men don't come alive but people do write fiction.

[Shaker]

Dead men don't come alive but people do write fiction.

At risk of stating the obvious allow me to expand upon that:

Dead men don't come alive but people can be deliberately deceptive.

Dead men don't come alive but people can be genuinely and sincerely mistaken.

Dead men don't come alive but people can and do invent stories for propagandistic purposes.

[Andy]

And let me emphasise again, Alan's own explanation - Jesus coming back to life - is itself totally implausible.  Why do we have to provide a plausible explanation when he doesn't?

The plausible explanation we need you to give is why, if Jesus was God in human form, he couldn't have come back to life?  Simply saying that you don't believe that there is a God, or some such reason, isn't a plausible explanation.

More "if God, why not?" <face palm>

[Dicky Underpants]

...You have not answered my question. Why don't you explain the whole lot?

I did - lies, misquotes, too long between events and their telling ... all far more likely than that a guy who had been dead for 72 hours returned to life!

No, you have not. You need to come up with a plausible scenario of how it all happened. If you cannot do that, you have not provided an alternative explanation. For example, you have not explained why they would lie, how long you think it was between "events" (whatever they are), who might have misquoted whom and why. Heck, man, you don't even have the correct number of hours even roughly. Jesus was dead less than 48 hours (Friday afternoon to before first light Sunday).
[/quote]

Trying to specify a correct number of hours for the period of Jesus' death is singularly inappropriate when the whole crucifixion-to-ascension narrative is so replete with contradictions over time-periods. Luke himself seems confused over the days that Jesus spent on earth after he was 'resurrected'.
Reducing everything to the basic details of the earliest two accounts - St Paul and Mark - you haven't much to go on. St Paul (in Phillippians) simply implies that Jesus was 'taken up into God' and that afterwards some vision came to him. Mark says very little (in the shortened genuine version of his gospel) apart from the disciples being informed "He is not here, he is risen and is going before you into Galilee".
Further details, by other evangelists, I suggest owe more than a little to romantic imagination.
No doubt the disciples were inspired to believe something about Christ's presence in their lives. Belief is a great force for good or evil - there is no need for any verifiable reality behind the belief itself for people to be inspired to do extraordinary things. And sometimes one heartily wishes they were not so inspired.

[Hope]

More "if God, why not?" <face palm>

And your explanation that disproves the argument would be? 

[Nearly Sane]

More "if God, why not?" <face palm>

And your explanation that disproves the argument would be?

That's a huge amount of fail packed into a very small sentence.

(A) You have put something forward that is unfalsifaiable by any method we have, so raising the question of 'disproving' it is pointless.

(b) If God can do everything -- there is nothing God cannot do - is circular

(C) An explanation isn't something that ever disproves an argument,

(D) There isn't anything in your post that actually requires an explanation

(E) Your post isn't an argument - - see (B) also it is merely assertion, not an argument

[Hope]

No, you are misunderstanding.  Alan's explanation is not plausible.

No less than all the various explanations that you and your crew seek to give.

I claim that the Empty Tomb story is fiction.  How is that as implausible as a dead man coming alive?

... the very fact that it is merely a claim, as you say.  You have no evidence that your claim is the truth.

Seriously Hope, if we need a demonstration of the dangers of religion, you and Alan are providing it right here.  Your biases are preventing you from comprehending simple obvious statements of fact.  Dead men don't come alive but people do write fiction.

I'm afraid that your 'bias' argument is somewhat double-edged.  The famous claim that  miracles don't exist but 'spontaneous healings' do, sort of cooks that goose.

[Hope]

That's a huge amount of fail packed into a very small sentence.

(A) You have put something forward that is unfalsifaiable by any method we have, so raising the question of 'disproving' it is pointless.

(b) If God can do everything -- there is nothing God cannot do - is circular

(C) An explanation isn't something that ever disproves an argument,

(D) There isn't anything in your post that actually requires an explanation

(E) Your post isn't an argument - - see (B) also it is merely assertion, not an argument

Sadly, NS, Andy made the assertion.  He needs to provide the evidence to back it up.

[Nearly Sane]

That's a huge amount of fail packed into a very small sentence.

(A) You have put something forward that is unfalsifaiable by any method we have, so raising the question of 'disproving' it is pointless.

(b) If God can do everything -- there is nothing God cannot do - is circular

(C) An explanation isn't something that ever disproves an argument,

(D) There isn't anything in your post that actually requires an explanation

(E) Your post isn't an argument - - see (B) also it is merely assertion, not an argument

Sadly, NS, Andy made the assertion.  He needs to provide the evidence to back it up.

That's a non sequitur both to your post and mine.

[Andy]

That's a huge amount of fail packed into a very small sentence.

(A) You have put something forward that is unfalsifaiable by any method we have, so raising the question of 'disproving' it is pointless.

(b) If God can do everything -- there is nothing God cannot do - is circular

(C) An explanation isn't something that ever disproves an argument,

(D) There isn't anything in your post that actually requires an explanation

(E) Your post isn't an argument - - see (B) also it is merely assertion, not an argument

Sadly, NS, Andy made the assertion.  He needs to provide the evidence to back it up.

What's the assertion I've supposed to have made?

[Andy]

More "if God, why not?" <face palm>

And your explanation that disproves the argument would be?

Oh I see now, the point went sailing over your head.

[Shaker]

More "if God, why not?" <face palm>

And your explanation that disproves the argument would be?

That's a huge amount of fail packed into a very small sentence.

(A) You have put something forward that is unfalsifaiable by any method we have, so raising the question of 'disproving' it is pointless.

(b) If God can do everything -- there is nothing God cannot do - is circular

(C) An explanation isn't something that ever disproves an argument,

(D) There isn't anything in your post that actually requires an explanation

(E) Your post isn't an argument - - see (B) also it is merely assertion, not an argument

That's a huge amount of excellence packed into a few sentences 

[jjohnjil]

...You have not answered my question. Why don't you explain the whole lot?

I did - lies, misquotes, too long between events and their telling ... all far more likely than that a guy who had been dead for 72 hours returned to life!

No, you have not. You need to come up with a plausible scenario of how it all happened. If you cannot do that, you have not provided an alternative explanation. For example, you have not explained why they would lie, how long you think it was between "events" (whatever they are), who might have misquoted whom and why. Heck, man, you don't even have the correct number of hours even roughly. Jesus was dead less than 48 hours (Friday afternoon to before first light Sunday).
[/quote]

Alan

I do not have to come up with a plausible scenario for something that there is not a shred of evidence that it ever took place!

As for why they would lie ... you should get out more, people lie all the time, there is even a career in it, called politics!  If there is an agenda to follow, lies will follow as night follows day, Alan, I thought anyone over the age of ten would know that!

You argue about silly little details like how long he was supposed to have been dead for before coming alive again - I don't care if it was 48 hours or 48 years, even with all today's expertise, anything over about 25 minutes would mean he had snuffed it for good!  And you quibble about it being 48 and not 72 hours! 

You're unbelievable!

[Hope]

I do not have to come up with a plausible scenario for something that there is not a shred of evidence that it ever took place!

Sorry to disappoint you jj but, as has been pointed out on numerous occasions, there is a considerable body of documentation providing evidence for the events having taken place.  You may choose to dismiss this, but to say that 'there is not a shred of evidence' is a lie. 

As for why they would lie ... you should get out more, people lie all the time, there is even a career in it, called politics!  If there is an agenda to follow, lies will follow as night follows day, Alan, I thought anyone over the age of ten would know that!

And what would the agenda have been?

... even with all today's expertise, anything over about 25 minutes would mean he had snuffed it for good!  And you quibble about it being 48 and not 72 hours! 

... and you manage to dismiss medically acknowledged events in this sweeping misgeneralisation.  If anyone has an agenda that will lead people to lie, it is people like you.

You're unbelievable!

Thakfully, you and your ilk aren't.  Such nay-saying has been going on for some 2000 years, so your's is no better than any of the other unsuccessful attemptees.

[Hope]

Oh I see now, the point went sailing over your head.

No, it didn't sail over my head, Andy.  It has been made so often over the centuries that, if anything, it rolled under my feet.

[Andy]

Oh I see now, the point went sailing over your head.

No, it didn't sail over my head, Andy.  It has been made so often over the centuries that, if anything, it rolled under my feet.

So what was it then? Also still waiting to hear what assertion I've made...

[jeremyp]

I claim that the Empty Tomb story is fiction.  How is that as implausible as a dead man coming alive?

... the very fact that it is merely a claim

The idea that Jesus came alive again is merely a claim.  My claim is more plausible than your claim.

I'm afraid that your 'bias' argument is somewhat double-edged.  The famous claim that  miracles don't exist but 'spontaneous healings' do, sort of cooks that goose.

I don't claim that spontaneous healing does occur.  That's your unsupported claim.

[Gordon]

...as has been pointed out on numerous occasions, there is a considerable body of documentation providing evidence for the events having taken place.  You may choose to dismiss this, but to say that 'there is not a shred of evidence' is a lie.

You can point it out all you like - but you are wrong.

You don't have 'evidence' in any meaningful sense of the term: what you do have are some ancient anecdotes involving fantastical and impossible claims that are indistinguishable from fiction, where the details of who/when/where these were written down are imprecise, and where the authors are likely to have biased and/or gullible.

Anecdotes about prophecies, miracles and the actions of gods may well have had currency in the middle-eastern culture of antiquity - but today, 2,000 odd years later, these anecdotes are exposed as being the curious legacy of more superstitious times and shouldn't be taken seriously.   

[Leonard James]

...as has been pointed out on numerous occasions, there is a considerable body of documentation providing evidence for the events having taken place.  You may choose to dismiss this, but to say that 'there is not a shred of evidence' is a lie.

You can point it out all you like - but you are wrong.

You don't have 'evidence' in any meaningful sense of the term: what you do have are some ancient anecdotes involving fantastical and impossible claims that are indistinguishable from fiction, where the details of who/when/where these were written down are imprecise, and where the authors are likely to have biased and/or gullible.

Anecdotes about prophecies, miracles and the actions of gods may well have had currency in the middle-eastern culture of antiquity - but today, 2,000 odd years later, these anecdotes are exposed as being the curious legacy of more superstitious times and shouldn't be taken seriously.

Quite! But the carrot and stick can overcome the ability to reason in the more credulous individuals.

[Nearly Sane]

...as has been pointed out on numerous occasions, there is a considerable body of documentation providing evidence for the events having taken place.  You may choose to dismiss this, but to say that 'there is not a shred of evidence' is a lie.

You can point it out all you like - but you are wrong.

You don't have 'evidence' in any meaningful sense of the term: what you do have are some ancient anecdotes involving fantastical and impossible claims that are indistinguishable from fiction, where the details of who/when/where these were written down are imprecise, and where the authors are likely to have biased and/or gullible.

Anecdotes about prophecies, miracles and the actions of gods may well have had currency in the middle-eastern culture of antiquity - but today, 2,000 odd years later, these anecdotes are exposed as being the curious legacy of more superstitious times and shouldn't be taken seriously.

  And, of course, as pointed out many many times, evidence in the historical methodology is naturalistic, therefore even claiming this to be evidence, is incorrect.

[Hope]

You can point it out all you like - but you are wrong.

You don't have 'evidence' in any meaningful sense of the term: what you do have are some ancient anecdotes involving fantastical and impossible claims that are indistinguishable from fiction, where the details of who/when/where these were written down are imprecise, and where the authors are likely to have biased and/or gullible.

Anecdotes about prophecies, miracles and the actions of gods may well have had currency in the middle-eastern culture of antiquity - but today, 2,000 odd years later, these anecdotes are exposed as being the curious legacy of more superstitious times and shouldn't be taken seriously.

  And, of course, as pointed out many many times, evidence in the historical methodology is naturalistic, therefore even claiming this to be evidence, is incorrect.

Of course the two of you are going to disagree because your pre-existing ideas don't permit you to allow the consideration that naturalistic evidence isn't the sole form of evidence in this aspect of life.

I'm not sure how many times we've done this debate over the last 6 months, let alone the life of this forum. It is partly why I have often stated that we are actually talking about live from two radically different perspectives neither of which are compatible in terms of debate.

[floo]

Dead men don't come alive but people do write fiction.

At risk of stating the obvious allow me to expand upon that:

Dead men don't come alive but people can be deliberately deceptive.

Dead men don't come alive but people can be genuinely and sincerely mistaken.

Dead men don't come alive but people can and do invent stories for propagandistic purposes.

Agreed. When something isn't credible like resurrection from the dead, then it didn't happen!

[Nearly Sane]

We may have done the debate many times but you are still failing to grasp the point. History is methodologically naturalistic, you are being asked for a method that covers the supernatural. You have been asked for it many many many times. You have not provided it, therefore your talk of evidence is spurious.

[Gordon]

And, of course, as pointed out many many times, evidence in the historical methodology is naturalistic, therefore even claiming this to be evidence, is incorrect.

Yep - this has indeed been pointed out regularly, but tends to be ignored.

This thread, more than others recently, seems to have highlighted just how detached from reality theism is. We hear Christians tell of the so-called 'Trinity', but I'd say that a more blindingly obvious 'Trinity' is the mix of fallacies that are regularly trotted out - my top three candidates for this Trinity would be;

1. Incredulity, where some here seem to be almost overwhelmed by incredulity to the point of being pathologically gullible.

2. Ignorance, such as the science deniers.

3. Tradition/Authority (in various permutations), such as those who regard the Bible as inerrant or who regard religious traditions, holy books and the rituals of religious observance as being sufficient confirmation the truth of religious claims.

Mind you, there are probably a few more fallacies jockeying for position, such as the relativist (its true for me) and survivor fallacies.