Quote:
No, I act like the selection process was so the Bible had the optimum compatibility with itself. It doesn't work to have the Gospel of Thomas in there with Jesus turning his friends into frogs or whatever, or putting in the Gospel of Peter and having Herod kill Christ. The apocryphal texts are of the same authorship as any of the other books (meaning, they weren't written by the people whose perspective they take, but rather much later), but they are EXTREMELY incompatible with the others, so they got scrapped.
1. You claim the canonical gospels could not have been written by the people they are attributed to. That is a faulty assumption on your part, and a claim which I would like to see you support.
2. It is still my claim that the canonical books are distinct from the non-canonical ones based on the support that the early church did have for their authorship.
Quote:
If one reads the gospels and notices that Matthew and Luke reverse where Christ was born and where he moved to
Oh, really? Funny how I've been studying those texts for years and completely overlooked such a detail. Perhaps I better do a bit of checking on that:
St. Luke wrote:
And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David (2:4).
St. Matthew wrote:
Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king (2:1).
Funny, it looks to me that they both claim he was born in Bethlehem.
Quote:
However, the apologists "know" that the Bible is true, and thus scenarios are concocted to "make the puzzle fit". That explanation assumes that, for no discernible reason, the canonical books were made as a group, like John/Mark/Matthew/Luke all sat around a table and split up their facts so they all interwove and interlocked.
I never made that claim at all. I claimed that they were different accounts by different men in different times, and for that reason contain different details. But at least in the case you cited - Jesus' last words - I feel I was adequately able to demonstrate that their accounts, while different, were not contradictory.
Quote:
or that John says Jesus was crucified the day before passover while Mark says it was the day after
Really? Funny how I missed that too. You say Mark claims he was crucified AFTER Passover? Can you cite me a resource for that?
Oh, and incidentally, you might want to take into account that, according to ancient Hebrew reckoning, the Passover starts in the evening and continues all day through the next day.
Catholic Encyclopedia wrote:
The use of the word Parasceve in the Gospels raises the question concerning the actual day of Our Lord's crucifixion. All the Evangelists state that Jesus died on the day of the Parasceve (Matthew 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:14, 31), and there can be no doubt from Luke, xxiii, 54-56 and John, xix, 31, that this was Friday. But on what day of the month of Nisan did that particular Friday fall? St. John distinctly points to Nisan 14, while the Synoptists, by implying that the Last Supper was the Paschal meal, convey the impresion that Jesus was crucified on Nisan 15. But this is hardly reconcilable with the following facts: when Judas left the table, the disciples imagined he was going to buy the things which were needed for the feast (John 13:29)–a purchase which was impossible if the feast had begun; after the Supper, Our Lord and his disciples left the city, as also did the men detailed to arrrest Him–this, on Nisan 15, would have been contrary to Ex., xii, 22; the next morning the Jews had not yet eaten the Passover; moreover, during that day the Council convened; Simon was apparently coming from work (Luke 23:26); Jesus and the two robbers were executed and were taken down from the crosses; Joseph of Arimathea bought fine linen (Mark 15:46), and Nicodemus brought "a mixture of myrrh and aloes about an hundred pound weight" (John 19:39) for the burial; lastly the women prepared spices for the embalming of the Saviour's body (Luke 23:55)–all things which would have been a desecration on Nisan 15. Most commentators, whether they think the Last Supper to have been the Paschal meal or an anticipation thereof, hold that Christ, as St. John states, was crucified on the Parasceve of the Pasch, Friday, Nisan 14.
Bauer, Walter, Gingrich, F. Wilbur, and Danker, Frederick W., A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press) 1979. wrote:
paraskeuhv, h`", hJ (trag., Hdt.+; inscr., pap., LXX, Ep. Arist., Philo, Joseph.) lit. preparation (Polyaenus 7, 21, 6 tou` deivpnou; 7, 27, 3 polevmou), in our lit. only of a definite day, as the day of preparation for a festival; acc. to Jewish usage (Jos., Ant. 16, 163; Synes., Ep. 4 p. 161d) it was Friday, on which day everything had to be prepared for the Sabbath, when no work was permitted Mt 27:62 (CCTorrey, ZAW 65, ’53, 242=JBL 50, ’31, 234 n. 3, ‘sunset’. Against Torrey, SZeitlin, JBL 51, ’32, 263-71); Mk 15:42; J 19:31. hJmevra paraskeuh`" Lk 23:54 (v.l. hJm. prosabbavtou, cf. Mk 15:42). paraskeuh; tw`n jIoudaivwn J 19:42. paraskeuh; tou` pavsca day of preparation for the Passover (or Friday of Passover Week) vs. 14. For the Christians as well paraskeuhv served to designate the sixth day of the week (ESchürer, ZNW 6, ’05, 10; 11f) Friday MPol 7:1, and so in Mod. Gk. For Christians it is a fast day, as the day of Jesus’ death D 8:1.—M-M. B. 1008.
(Sorry about the odd characters here. It was cut/pasted from Bauer's lexicon, which far from being an "apologetic" work, is strictly a lexicon, and is considered an authoritative resource by both liberal and conservative scholars alike). The gist of my quoting it is that, apparently, the term "Preparation Day" became widely accepted as the name for Friday in ancient Judea. That being the case, it is highly probable that John is using the term to mean "Friday of the Passover" rather than "Day of Preparation for Passover."
Quote:
But it CAN'T and that's the problem. There is zero none nada historical evidence of a Jesus Christ, for one thing. None. Any and all evidence of Christ's existence comes from Christian writers, there aren't any secular non-Christian historians who have written about a man named Christ. And before you start, Josephus/Tacitus/Pliny/et al are disqualified due to the blatant inauthenticity of the supposed "writings".
You obviously have done no reading on this subject. No serious scholar would ever make the kind of claim you have just made. At the very least, if you wish us to take such claims seriously, cite some scholarship.
Besides, weren't these men writing for Roman authorities, and not for Christians? And is there any distinct evidence of this "tampering/fabricating" that you hint at?
Quote:
And then you get actual heads of the Church who say the Old Testament isn't literal. Well of course not, our society has evolved beyond a time where we can consider it literal. But what in the BOOK says it wasn't literal? What in the book makes you think we should take Adam and Eve symbolically? Or Sodom and Gomorrah? Where in the Bible itself does it suggest that Noah's Ark (including that he lived to 950!!) shouldn't be taken literally?
Point conceded. There is no evidence within these accounts to suggest we shouldn't take them literally.
HH, I'm getting the distinct impression that you really don't care what we have to say. You've already made up your mind on this topic, and even when I present a reasonable answer to your question, you persist in rejecting it (and that, based on your own form of illogical circular reasoning - you're already presuming that anything we say is wrong, for no other reason than that we believe it). In fact, you seem to take exception to the fact that I offer any answer at all. That pretty much makes posting on this thread pointless. Therefore, I will suggest that, if you wish to continue this conversation, then it might be best if you focus your attention on presenting a specific text or texts that we can examine, rather than persist in posing arguments based on vague generalizations.