Story of Jesus Christ was 'fabricated to pacify the poor', claims Biblical scholar Joseph Atwill

[squeezewax]

"Religion ends where philosophy begins, just as alchemy ends where chemistry begins, and astrology ends where astronomy begins."

"It takes ordinary moral people, and orders them to do disgusting, wicked, unforgivable things. There is no expiation for the generations of misery and suffering religion has inflicted in this way, and continues to inflict. And I still haven't heard enough apology for it."

"Mother Teresa was a fanatic, a fundamentalist, and a fraud. She was not a friend of the poor - as she claimed to be - she was a friend of poverty. Preached it as a gift from god, something to be welcomed along with other kinds of suffering - wasn't interested in alleviating it."

"People are frightened of death, and the central lie of all religion is that there's a cure for this, and that an exception can be made in your own case. Well, I'm sorry, but I think it's the height of immorality to lie to people like that. That's why religion survives."

"It is a horrible idea that there is somebody who owns us, who makes us, who supervises us, who knows our thoughts, who can create us sick, then order us on pain of eternal torture to be well again. To demand this, to wish this to be true, is to wish to live as an abject slave."

"I refuse to be told what to think or how, let alone what to say or write by anybody. But most certainly not by people who claim the authority of fabricated works of primeval myth and fiction, and who want me to believe these are divine. That I won't have."

"Violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism and tribalism and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free enquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children: organized religion ought to have a great deal on its conscience."

"In some ways I feel sorry for the racists and religious fanatics because they so much miss the point of being human. But I harden my heart and decide to hate them all the more because of the misery they inflict, and because of the contemptible excuses they advance for doing so."

"Perhaps the clearest empirical proof for the non-existence of God, is that he appears to have given up on the battle against stupidity."

[Q]"You seem to be angry with religion, angry with god. Am I wrong in my perception?" "Well, not with god, obviously. That would be absurd."

"Putting the word 'faith' in front of something is no excuse for barbarism and cruelty and ignorance and stupidity."

"We keep being told, 'respect faith'. Well, I actually don't, because I don't think that lying to children is a respectable occupation."

"If religious instruction were not allowed until the child had attained the age of reason, we would be living in a quite different world."

All quotes from Christopher Hitchens.

 

[squeezewax]

"A virgin can conceive, a dead body can walk again, leprosy can be cured... Nonsense! It's not moral to lie to children. It's not moral to lie to ignorant, uneducated people, and tell them that if they would only believe nonsense, they can be 'saved'. It's immoral."

"Religion now comes to us in this smiley-faced, ingratiating way because it's had to give so much ground, and because we know so much more. But you've no right to forget the way it behaved when it was strong, and when it really did believe that it had God on its side."

"But you say not only that there is a god, but you know what he wants. Well, I know you can't know that. It's not a matter of how clever you are - you can't know it. But why do you claim to? Because you think it might give you the right to tell me what to do. Well, fuck that."

 

[lfd0311]

So no actual historians and no original documents.

... wow.....

 

[lfd0311]

Bruh, it’s in the book. If they support sexual molestation due to what their religious text said then it’s their religions fault, that’s just a fact.

Bro, this is just awful, dreadful line of reasoning. And it's flimsy at best.

 

[lfd0311]

That isn't the same as the other thing you said. Are you intentionally putting up an ink cloud here? What I see is multiple preemptive attacks on credibility, and I put no stock in them.

Let's ignore all that and examine your claim.

Your claim is as follows:

"It is a well documented fact that Pontius Pilate's diary containing his writings about his time in Judah and his interactions with the man who came to be know as Jesus survived more or less in it's original form into the Early Middle Ages when it was taken by monks to a monastery where the current canonical story of Jesus was created, and the actual history of the real man and Pontius Pilate destroyed."


You have a burden of proof to provide evidence for your claim. Please provide evidence.

Uh, no I don't have to explain anything to you, Sawlty. You and I have been down this road before on multiple subjects. It isn't my fawlt you aren't anywhere near as informed or intelligent as you think you are. It's not my fawlt that simple reading comprehension escapes your grasp. This game, as always, will feature me proving myself exactly right, you crying, flinging poo and then disapearing like you were never here to begin with. I'm not interested in playing your game, especially when what I just said escapes you, even after I've explained it about 9 times in this thread.

 

[Fawlty]

Uh, no I don't have to explain anything to you, Sawlty. You and I have been down this road before on multiple subjects. It isn't my fawlt you aren't anywhere near as informed or intelligent as you think you are. It's not my fawlt that simple reading comprehension escapes your grasp. This game, as always, will feature me proving myself exactly right, you crying, flinging poo and then disapearing like you were never here to begin with. I'm not interested in playing your game, especially when what I just said escapes you, even after I've explained it about 9 times in this thread.

Your claim is as follows:

"It is a well documented fact that Pontius Pilate's diary containing his writings about his time in Judah and his interactions with the man who came to be know as Jesus survived more or less in it's original form into the Early Middle Ages when it was taken by monks to a monastery where the current canonical story of Jesus was created, and the actual history of the real man and Pontius Pilate destroyed."


You have a burden of proof to provide evidence for your claim. Please provide evidence.

 

[lfd0311]

Your claim is as follows:

"It is a well documented fact that Pontius Pilate's diary containing his writings about his time in Judah and his interactions with the man who came to be know as Jesus survived more or less in it's original form into the Early Middle Ages when it was taken by monks to a monastery where the current canonical story of Jesus was created, and the actual history of the real man and Pontius Pilate destroyed."


You have a burden of proof to provide evidence for your claim. Please provide evidence.

Uh, no I don't have to explain anything to you, Sawlty. You and I have been down this road before on multiple subjects. It isn't my fawlt you aren't anywhere near as informed or intelligent as you think you are. It's not my fawlt that simple reading comprehension escapes your grasp. This game, as always, will feature me proving myself exactly right, you crying, flinging poo and then disapearing like you were never here to begin with. I'm not interested in playing your game, especially when what I just said escapes you, even after I've explained it about 9 times in this thread.

 

[Fawlty]

Uh, no I don't have to explain anything to you, Sawlty. You and I have been down this road before on multiple subjects. It isn't my fawlt you aren't anywhere near as informed or intelligent as you think you are. It's not my fawlt that simple reading comprehension escapes your grasp. This game, as always, will feature me proving myself exactly right, you crying, flinging poo and then disapearing like you were never here to begin with. I'm not interested in playing your game, especially when what I just said escapes you, even after I've explained it about 9 times in this thread.

I admire your confidence.

Now please provide evidence for your claim.

 

[lfd0311]

I admire your confidence.

Now please provide evidence for your claim.

I don't admire your arrogance.

1.) Learn to read, so you can understand what I said.

2.) Do yourself a favor and re-evaluate your "No bible scholars that I know of" claim, combine it with #1, then actually look into the secular history of Christianity. Then get back to me.

 

[dontsnitch]

I don't admire your arrogance.

1.) Learn to read, so you can understand what I said.

2.) Do yourself a favor and re-evaluate your "No bible scholars that I know of" claim, combine it with #1, then actually look into the secular history of Christianity. Then get back to me.

I kinda lost track of the arguments, is this still about Jesus existing?

 

[lfd0311]

I kinda lost track of the arguments, is this still about Jesus existing?

You've got to ask Fawlty

 

[Fawlty]

I don't admire your arrogance.

1.) Learn to read, so you can understand what I said.

2.) Do yourself a favor and re-evaluate your "No bible scholars that I know of" claim, combine it with #1, then actually look into the secular history of Christianity. Then get back to me.

We're examining your claim. This is your claim:

"It is a well documented fact that Pontius Pilate's diary containing his writings about his time in Judah and his interactions with the man who came to be know as Jesus survived more or less in it's original form into the Early Middle Ages when it was taken by monks to a monastery where the current canonical story of Jesus was created, and the actual history of the real man and Pontius Pilate destroyed."

You say that it is a "well documented fact" that Pilate:

1. Kept a diary
and
2. Described his interactions with Jesus

You claim that the diary:

1. Survived into the early Middle Ages
and
2. Was taken to a monastery

You claim that in this monastery:

1. The current canonical story of Jesus was created
and
2. The actual history of Pilate was destroyed



Those are six claims that you assert are well-documented facts. Please provide the documentation or sources that speak to this. Particularly, the initial claims about it being a well-documented fact that Pilate had a diary that described his interactions with Jesus.

 

[Darkballs]

... wow.....

Mate, I asked for an example of one historian documenting jesus's life "within decades of his death." The only thing you can come up with are his apostles. Do I need to walk you through how that comes up short?

 

[lfd0311]

We're examining your claim. This is your claim:

"It is a well documented fact that Pontius Pilate's diary containing his writings about his time in Judah and his interactions with the man who came to be know as Jesus survived more or less in it's original form into the Early Middle Ages when it was taken by monks to a monastery where the current canonical story of Jesus was created, and the actual history of the real man and Pontius Pilate destroyed."

You say that it is a "well documented fact" that Pilate:

1. Kept a diary
and
2. Described his interactions with Jesus

You claim that the diary:

1. Survived into the early Middle Ages
and
2. Was taken to a monastery

You claim that in this monastery:

1. The current canonical story of Jesus was created
and
2. The actual history of Pilate was destroyed



Those are six claims that you assert are well-documented facts. Please provide the documentation or sources that speak to this. Particularly, the initial claims about it being a well-documented fact that Pilate had a diary that described his interactions with Jesus.

I did. You seem to believe that not only are you an expert on the bible, but you're also an expert on literally everyone in the world in the field of Biblical Scholarship, not to mention archeological study in the area. Given your own obvious self assumed credentials in this matter, it should be easy for you to both tell me what I'm talking about, and explain my position for me. I wait in great anticipation.

 

[lfd0311]

Mate, I asked for an example of one historian documenting jesus's life "within decades of his death." The only thing you can come up with are his apostles. Do I need to walk you through how that comes up short?

Mate..... You once again can't read, and have somehow foisted your own lack of ability and education onto me. That is a massively reoccuring theme in this thread. Go back and read what the f**k I wrote. Jesus.

 

[Darkballs]

Mate..... You once again can't read, and have somehow foisted your own lack of ability and education onto me. That is a massively reoccuring theme in this thread. Go back and read what the f**k I wrote. Jesus.

For examples of historians documenting the life of Christ within decades of his death you listed:

1) The "historians" whose writings (of which we have no originals) that would makes up the new testament.

2) The oral tradition of the apostles

3) The diary of Pilate, which only records a name.

Why whenever poor posters fall short, do they just stamp their feet an insist we don't get it? None of the examples you give satisfy the claim.

 

[Quequeg]

For examples of historians documenting the life of Christ within decades of his death you listed:

1) The "historians" whose writings (of which we have no originals) that would makes up the new testament.

2) The oral tradition of the apostles

3) The diary of Pilate, which only records a name.

Why whenever poor posters fall short, do they just stamp their feet an insist we don't get it? None of the examples you give satisfy the claim.

A key to being truly stupid is never ever admitting to being wrong, no matter how obvious it is.

 

[lfd0311]

For examples of historians documenting the life of Christ within decades of his death you listed:

1) The "historians" whose writings (of which we have no originals) that would makes up the new testament.

2) The oral tradition of the apostles

3) The diary of Pilate, which only records a name.

Why whenever poor posters fall short, do they just stamp their feet an insist we don't get it? None of the examples you give satisfy the claim.

Read.... slooweerrr...

 

[Soul Rebel 2]

Bro, this is just awful, dreadful line of reasoning. And it's flimsy at best.

How is it an awful line of reasoning? The book that they consider to be the divine, infallible word of the universes creator supports banging underage women. It’s not exactly a stretch to see how this influences their attitudes towards the subject.

 

[Darkballs]

Read.... slooweerrr...

You know other people can read your posts right? You've got about half a dozen of us mocking you for your examples of "historians." Are we all just reading your one paragraph too fast?