Debating Hitchens

Greg Clarke interviews Professor John Lennox about the experience of debating the worlds leading atheists.

[@snowyalbino130]

The backlash atheists give John Lennox makes me ashamed... I'm an atheist but I really respect the guy! If atheists were as civil as Lennox is when preaching our view, they might actually make a difference... all they seem to do on youtube is attack and ridicule believers. Doesn't help :(

[@promethium-145]

Matt Nolan Mad respect for you!

[@PabluchoViision]

Without a doubt, Lennox has grace and charm by the boatload... and is not exactly an intellectual slouch. A formidable debater. His civility and likeability remind me of the old parable about the Sun and the Wind, arguing over who was more powerful...

[@jonmorr777]

When you attack or ridicule it’s a sign you know you have lost the argument!!

[@WmTyndale]

As a mathematician I greatly respect the intellect of Dr. Lennox. He truly exposes many of the Sophistries, Invalid Patterns of Inference, and Historical Absurdities of the Atheists. Dawkins is truly a feeble intellect with a lot of Ad Hominem arguments that never answer fundamental objections to his positions. The world makes a truly fundamental mistake, calling many things "Christian" without ever bothering to see if the Biblical properties of Christianity are satisfied. Many so called "Christian religions" are nothing but Crafty Counterfeits exposed by the following Scripture: (all is fair in love and war as the saying goes!) 13 For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. 14 And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. 15 Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works. 2Corinthians 11 Also Matthew 13:28 Keeping the Word of God at one's right hand will always sift out the wheat from the tares, the counterfeit from the true. Hence the violent and relentless opposition to the Word of God through the centuries. Also the Current attempt to Corrupt its semantics with new Bible translations based on corrupt gnostic "gospels" deriving from the church of Rome. WE WON'T BE FOOLED AGAIN! as the popular song screamed out!

[@AM_o2000]

As a philosopher, I don't share your admiration for Lennox. In fact, I use some of his speeches to teach people about fallacies, precisely because he offers so many of them within a short space of time.

[@WmTyndale]

@@AM_o2000 You are full of hot air. Philosophy is a failed intellectual inquiry. If you knew anything about its history you would appreciate the centuries of intellectual nothingness. In brief Aristotle was wrong about just everything and Kant sophisticated nonsense decisively refuted by Einstein (geometry is synthetic a priori according to Kant). Science and philosophy only emerged from darkness when the mathematicians got involved.i.e. Formal logic, axiomatic systems, independence proofs etc.... I really K'ant think of anything that philosophy has contributed to the human advance except confusion. U are not only Confused but Spiritually Dead. How true is the Scripture Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. 2Timothy 3:7 John Froelich Ph.D mathematics, NSF postdoc, IT consultant,...........etc.........etc...........

[@chrisclark5078]

people on all sides need to learn how to have a conversation when discussing this question without resorting to being cruel. Nothing's going to get resolved without that civility

[@geras.3813]

Does anyone have the link to the actual debate? I can't find it .-.

[@85Aheadstix]

LENNOX; atheisms worst nightmare.

[@StopMAGA]

+GamerDares wins Doesn't the fact that people actually believe in Scientology prove that man can be influenced to believe anything?

[@85Aheadstix]

Ben Theredonethat Yes but even Christians know that Scientology is a money making cult and not a credible belief system 😉

[@StopMAGA]

GamerDares wins Let me rephrase that. Doesn't the fact that people actually believe in Scientology prove that man can be influenced to believe in any belief system? If so, what makes one more credible than the other?

[@85Aheadstix]

Ben Theredonethat​ Well not everyone... i mean it's most popular with all those celebs right? It's obviously working for them... celebrity wise i mean not spiritually. And have you actually read into Scientology???? You'd think it was thought up by a 7 year old during a creative writing class. That and L. Ron hubbard was a self confessed lunatic. Yeah?

[@StopMAGA]

GamerDares wins My point is that if Scientology is believable, even though it is obviously fiction, then isn't it feasible that Christianity, Islam and Judaism are fictional, too?

[@anarkoFred]

@findo I was not talking about positive and negative beliefs, I was talking about deriving an "ought" from an "is". You cannot infer from a proposition "there is no gods" (is) an other proposition "we must kill believers" (ought), that's called an is-ought fallacy. It has nothing to do with positive or negative beliefs.

[@GideonMaree]

Somehow by chance, matter, space and time started to exist out of nothing in a big bang. Somehow by chance the laws of gravity and nature was seemingly fine tuned to allow the universe to expand and form and to support life and somehow by chance conditions were perfect for a molecule to somehow by chance form that contains the building blocks and code of life. Somehow by chance this molecule evolved into sentient beings and somehow by chance a being became rational, moral, conscious, and somehow this being was able to contemplate itself, the world around it and itself within the world around it and then go on to contemplate itself contemplating the world around it. And somehow by chance came across this post…. coincidence?...I think not...

[@john_ron]

No no it's all an illusion! Nothing exists bro nothing!

[@joerichmond5499]

+John Ron HAHAHA. lol. We could very well be in the Matrix too.

[@john_ron]

Joe Richmond YES! But to enter the matrix we need the red pill! And the red pill is red and and blue at the same time. So we are inside and outside the matrix at the same time. Furthermore, the matrix exists and doesn't exist and so are we. So when u look into the 136th dimension of space which is in the non existing matrix u can prove the theroy and learn rationality.

[@joerichmond5499]

+John Ron Indeed, atheism is retarded. Jesus is the truth. I think, therefor I am.

[@john_ron]

Joe Richmond yes brother! It makes feel sad atheists want to seperate themselves from God at ANY cost.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 By source texts I don't mean the originals. I mean the greek text that we have. Why that text is trustworthy is because when you back to the oldest manuscripts, you find that there are hardly any differences at all. We have a whole lot of manuscripts and the fact that they are almost exactly similar to one another means that there were no changes in message. If a text was manipulated you would see it right away because there were plenty of copies around to compare it to

[@johaneriksandberg]

Is the video broken or is it just me it won't play for?

[@ManForToday]

Epicuras once said. "If God is willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. If he is able but not willing? Then he is malevolent. If he's both able, and willing? Then where does evil come from? If he is neither able nor willing? Then why call him God." This quote kind of sums up the God you are talking about in the moral dimension. The national socialist regime was a direct consequence of Hitlers allegiance to his Christian God.

[@vaness77able]

John Lennox isn't just a brilliant man but also a really nice person, his testimony speaks more than whatever speech he could give.

[@curkas]

@sids500 "The believers in miracles accept them (rightly or wrongly) because they have evidence for them. The disbelievers in miracles deny them (rightly or wrongly) because they have a doctrine against them." G.K. Chesterton. So should we accept absolutely everything, that anyone says at face value? No, not necessarily. Refer to validation method I mentioned to another commenter: 1. Is it empirically adequate? 2. Is it logically coherent? 3. Is the experience relevant?

[@Legomyegoorj]

@MasterRobinHood Are you making a comment on the particularism that exists within many religions? (Particularism being the claim that "my religion is right and yours is wrong.")

[@willhi5]

@DerekMcCauley Maybe people don't like the fact this interview begins with the question "what do you think of hitchens as a person" and continues with a focus on analysing everything except the actual arguments of hitchens.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 Yeah and because they're only found in later versions we can keep in mind that they probably were not in the original. But none of that really changes any of the teachings anyway. It's not like some texts say "salvation by eating chicken wings" and others "salvation by faith in Christ"

[@bobbyrollar]

dude, can you give me a source for these facts please?

[@echoesintoeternity]

@AceSkepTik This is an interview, not a debate. Its not just one historian- but the vast majority of historians in all big research universities, all peer-reviewed publications point to the fact that Jesus was an actual person. He just quoted one. One can never prove historically that the miracles happened or divinity of Jesus- but its a consensus among secular scholars that Jesus was an actual person, just like evolution is agreed upon by most microbiologists today.

[@MasterRobinHood]

Quote from John Lennox:” I notice that Christianity was involved in atrocities not by obeying Christ but by disobeying him." So when God tells Israel to wipe out the Amalekites and leave no man, married woman, and child alive, that’s not considered an atrocity?

[@Derwydd3]

Actually I have a BA and an MA in history and most of my BA modules were about socialism and religion so I do have an understanding of what I'm talking about. Secondly I "believe" what has been confirmed historically Stalin did incorporate the church and state during the conflict with German to improve russian moral. I don't see what a quote from Lenin has to do with Stalin anyway as Stalinism was quite different from what Lenin had envisioned.

[@mellymel51029]

I LOVE JOHN LENNOX!!..One of the Best Debaters/ Christian Apologists in the Business!! XOXO

[@ManForToday]

It may be profound although I don't think it is, nevertheless, the question is: is it true or not? In all fairness, it isn't true, why does religion think it has a monopoly on hope or emotions? I resent that notion entirely. Is the world a hopeless place, is it a place of life and then death and then that's it? So what, too bad, you may not like that idea but it doesn't mean it's not true. Who says you are owed hope? And if so, how condescending of the remark to suggest religion is the only way.

[@trythinkingnow]

@gneisenau321 LOL...it was lovely legal wording agreed upon as a settlement by the attorneys. The editor violated the journal policies, Sewell claimed it made it look like he had "committed a crime" or the paper contained "serious errors" due to Elseviers policies on withdrawal. So they were made to say no "errors or technical problems found by the reviewers or editors". Self plagiarism is NOT an error or technical problem. Note they did not say the paper did not violate publishers policies.

[@niinja2]

And you didnt answer my question, how come people who say they kill in the name of their religion do so despite explicit laws made in their religion.

[@enyskept]

What's really interestingly sad is that I find that most of the believers I've come in contact with seem to not know very much about their bible...I ask them to go get their bible(if at all possible) so that I can point out certain scriptures to them; I am amazed at the shocked looks on their faces...It is as if millions of their brain cells explode simultaneously...The ones who try to rationalize the immorality of the biblical god fail so so miserably...

[@regelemihai]

Why are you assuming His self understanding wasn't divine? Just because he never said "I am God?" That's at best an argument from silence.

[@minesoriginal]

The existence of Jesus as a historical figure has been questioned by some biblical scholars; among the earliest were Constantin-François Volney and Charles François Dupuis in the 18th century and Bruno Bauer in the 19th century. Each of these proposed that the Jesus character was a fusion of earlier mythologies though Volney felt that confused memories of an obscure historical figure might have integrated into this already existing solar mythology

[@lainegordon5831]

there is a desperate need for christians to think critically, to develop reasoning and skills of logic,..the problem is that the universities,our very centers of thought and logic are filled with academics wallowing in poisonous, distorted "truth"

[@johnburke5248]

You do realize that it is because religion that we have university's and laws in place that allow you to speak freely and safely? Clearly the world view of Christians are extremely well reasoned and logical. It would be ignorant to say that they aren't just because you don't agree with them.

[@Here0s0Johnny]

i like the way lennox speaks about his adversaries, he says nothing he wouldn't say to them in person. can't say that about every adversary of the "four horsemen of the COUNTERapocalypse"...

[@whachaa]

Assertions do not need doctrines - just evidence - or to counter that, lack of evidence. If I make a (wrong) assertion to you that the grass is blue, we could go back and forth with evidence, no doctrine or dogma required. And since religions make a statement of existence, the burden of proof lies with them.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 An example: You wake up and say "what a beautiful sunrise!". Then you read in a science book that the earth actually revolves around the sun. No one would call that a contradiction, because everyone knows you don't meant "sunrise" in the literal sense. On surface level though it's a contradiction.

[@9clegalm5]

Come on people, I know this channel is called "PublicChristianity" but there is no reason to dislike this video.

[@Studentofgosset]

The interviewer misrepresented John Cleese, who sought not to ridicule Jesus, but to ridicule blind faith. That is why they derided the structure of blind faith, while only ever referencing Jesus' words from his sermon on the mount, misheard by listeners. Far too nuanced for the interviewer, perhaps.

[@bobbyrollar]

dude, it's there in Isaiah.. I don't have to account for why the church attacked people. In terms of curvature.. it's right there. I'm sorry if you want to shut your ears off to what's been written...but that's not my problem

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 Could you please give the verses that would indicate contradiction? Then I can look into it

[@SOAS007]

@vincentjdrummer "The mountains really started growing when the floodwaters were receding, so the water didn't have to be as high as the highest mountains we know now. " so the high pressure water appeared, then as the water receded ( to where) montains were suddenly appearing by unknown means .. What about all the mountains that already existed and were populated, did the water go up them. There is no evidence for any of this BTW.!

[@numben]

It is incredible that even a smart man as John Lennox, dont realise that atheism in it self can't be blamed for the evils done in history. Atheism is a not a believe, it's the rejection of a believe, and can therefore not motivate any actions by it self. Actions come from believes, not from nonbelieves. To do evil you need a positive believe, like religions are evil and needs to be destroyed. But that is an additional believe and is not inherent in the concept of atheism.

[@curkas]

@mjhallfs But more so, I'd ignore most claims and go for the core: What are the main claims and what separates them. Generally most religious claims tend to be illogical from the get go (although atheists tend to hit at the wrong point). Also, when I refer to logic, I am talking in the terms of (A=A), not, 'Susie thought it was so illogical that she would wear heels tonight'. It's ironic that Sam Harris uses philosophy to reject it...

[@Fishqueen1972]

The problem Mr. Lennox regarding Stalin is that what Stalin did had nothing to do with his atheism. There is nothing about atheism that instructs someone to kill people or be a tyrant. Hitchens has never said that there aren't evil atheists. A fundamental principal of religion is belief without evidence & appeal to authority. And also religion is divisive in and of itself. This is a logical path to a tyrannical theocracy.

[@samuellis]

@Freethinker12341 I am a Christian and I totally agree, I just didn't really understand your point but I do now... Amen =)

[@MasterRobinHood]

@gneisenau321 I just read that the Amalekites where known for their vineyards, you can't carry those around on a camel. Vineyards requires land, argriculture, water, farming. So obviously they weren't all nomads.

[@onlyonechoice]

@moonshineinsummer1 Sad? He's talking about Hitchens. What should he call it?

[@samuellis]

@Freethinker12341 I agree, so whats your point? My dad is a Christian and he is a liberal while I'm a Christian and I'm a conservative...

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 We do have tons of manuscripts. It's perfectly logical to conclude that if there's a lot of copies of the originals that are all in perfectly fine harmony with each other you can determine what the originals said. It would be historically ridiculous to use this extreme skepticism.

[@SuperMudz]

Please, be serious. Most physicists sneer at string theory, and there' like 5 different kinds of theory, why would you expect some random person to be conversant with such a field, interesting as it may be. And string theory is not atomic theory. Fundamental laws do operate on a fundamental scale, that's what makes them fundamental. That's basically self-evident.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 You have yet to show me that the texts are unreliable. Sure, you may point to a little addition here and there and different grammatical structures, but please show me the earlier writings that didn't talk about salvation through Christ and loving your enemies and such before the texts got changed, that you claimed they did without showing any evidence at all.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 Eh, I'm not sure if I get your point, but maybe I can answer. The Messiah had to be a descendant of David. Luke gives us the bloodline, and Matthew the legal (royal) line. The legal line is traced through the fathers and indicates that Jesus possesses the right to be king/Messiah, because Joseph was His legal father. Jesus' bloodline is traced through Mary, because Jesus didn't have the blood of Joseph, because of the virgin birth.

[@ManForToday]

You say atheism is a lack of morals? No atheist concedes themselves as being morally superior but we are not morally inferior. You make an okay kind of point but it's some what slanted, I mean; we share the same morality in any case, it just so happens that atheists base their knowledge on reason and not faith. Reason does not damage my morality but faith can and has damaged the morality of the religious.

[@ManForToday]

Lennox is wrong. Atheism is non-theism not a faith. 'Off' isn't a TV channel. Stalin was an atheist but it's impossible to go around killing people because they don't share the same lack of faith. What hitler did was precisely in the name of God. It's not undertaken from religion it's a direct consequence of the belief in theism. Religion has nothing to do with morals. Religion has a lot of apologising to do for most of the immorality inflicted on this earth in the last 2,000 years.

[@SOAS007]

@vincentjdrummer The King James Version mistranslates the Hebrew word "almah", which means "young woman" as "virgin". (The Hebrew word, "bethulah", means "virgin".) In

[@-Redemption-]

@SOAS007 No, you see all our models show that each of these forces came into being within a plank length at the very beginning of space/time and are set at the exact strengths required to form matter and a stable universe. They were not just floating around and somehow became organised, they were created and integrated with one another in an instant. - science bit. Universe : one sentence - Let there be light. creation was spoken into existence, the love just added flavour. No pixies involved.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 The scriptures were written from after Christ's resurrection to about the end of the 1st century. There's in the Bible itself references to Paul's letter being spread and read through the communities, so the scriptures were around all the time 'till the canonization. I know that the church decided what they wanted in the NT. All I'm saying is that that doesn't mean that the outcome of that canon wasn't God's Word. (I'm working on my rumba clave... independence exercises ftw ;-))

[@OleVinny]

@MomoTheBellyDancer Mutations aren't random when you want to genetically modify the cells of some vegetable right? On your second point; Yeah, but that's also a case of natural selection. I didn't say it right. I don't mean mutations being beneficial. The issue is; can that process be responsible for creatures evolving legs for example?

[@Derwydd3]

But if that individual were to become the president of the United States and then blame religion and close down churches, it could thus be surmised that that individual was not Christian in practice despite his claims. Therefore Stalin was not an atheist as a true atheist (and a militant, anti-religious atheist) should/would not incorporate religion into the state. Do you get what I mean?

[@Luxopathos]

Can you give me a citation on that?

[@regelemihai]

No, the first Gospel was written within 20 years after Jesus' death. Mark was Peter's tarslator and traveling companion. Since Peter was an eyewitness I dunno where you're getting the idea that it's a third hand account. You talk about internationally accepted standards of authenticity? By your standards what do you say about Alexander the Great? The eariest account we have of him comes 400 years after his death--not 20 or 40.

[@SOAS007]

@vincentjdrummer "In general every translation gets all the messages across though. " the reason 1 timothy is is not accepted as pauline is because of its message.!

[@MPaulHolmesMPH]

@gregrutz I don't have a religion either. I think Jesus is a real live person, and creator of our universe. He said Let there be light, and 13.7 billion years ago, it came into existence. How do you explain the start of the universe? You have faith that it was not God that did it. So, can you get more specific than that? Or is it just you know it wasn't God, but you have no idea what it was?

[@chrisclark5078]

it's kind of funny how all this guys questions were "is this new atheist movement going to make christianity look bad"?

[@OleVinny]

@GeorgeEJWaites So you are in fact saying that if you think that someone who's got the right papers is telling you the truth you, beyond any possible doubt, KNOW he's right? I want to be clear on this; I'm not at all saying that it's irrational or stupid to fill that little gap of uncertainty with faith that x will always get the same result. But I want it to be abundantly clear that you are using faith to bridge that gap, no matter how small or irrelevant it seems.

[@derangedyoshi]

@GeetarAdam I don't think he was sincerely a Catholic, no. But he does use Catholicism to justify himself in Mein Kampf and elsewhere; the belt buckles of Nazi soldiers said "God with us". And the vast majority of Nazi soldiers, who carried out Hitler's evil orders, were either Lutheran or Catholic. The point, though, is that he was very decidedly not an atheist.

[@Seracinfinity]

I agree completely with Lennox.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 Contradiction by definition is only found when you don't allow any kind of depth to language, which is the problem with pretty much every apparent contradiction. The answer to this contradiction is that Heli was the father of Mary, and in marrying Mary Joseph could be called Heli's son. You will probably see this as twisting of the language and not being willing to face the obvious truth, because I doubt this makes you change your faith

[@thegreattesm]

@steveoho No joke, right? He's not only interested in the truth but I find him fairly well spoken.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 You prove my point. So if we don't have the originals of a text we can't know anything about the original? If that's how you'd do history we'd have no knowledge of what ever happened at all! I have a theory for you: The NT letters were all copied and distributed around the christian communities. It would be impossible to change a letter, because it was already spread wide. All would know it's fake. There's a remarkable harmony between the manuscripts, which is proof they hardly changed

[@Renato404]

A challenge to all Christians: Have you proven all the other gods (of all the other religions) wrong?

[@Derwydd3]

... You don't seem to understand what I'm trying to explain. Let me do so in a far more simplistic fashion. If an individual claimed to be a devout Christian, told his friends he was a devout Christian and even described himself in his biography as being a devout Christian you could assume he is a Christian.

[@moyga]

Jesus told his followers that they had to hate their families before they could truly be his disciples. Textbook cult behavior. He also told his follows that the ONLY way to God was through him and that the alternative to believing what he told them to was eternal suffering. He also told them that faith is a virtue, that is believing something is true without or irrespective of evidence. All of which are highly disagreeable in my opinion.

[@Roper122]

P.S... rather than watch this.. why not actually go and watch him debate Dawkins?? See for yourself how Lennox is shown up.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 That's more like natural selection. Resistant bacteria will reproduce and the others will die, therefore you're left with only resistant bacteria. But I'm don't strictly want to say there can't be beneficial natural mutation. I just think it's silly to claim that mutation can make species develop into another type of species. It's one thing to point out that bacteria can adapt themselves to viruses and things like that than to claim that the same process will make a fish grow legs.

[@SOAS007]

@vincentjdrummer Galations Chap 1 has many contridictions. but 1:17 Neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before me; but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto Damascus. acts 9:26 And when Saul was come to Jerusalem, he assayed to join himself to the disciples: but they were all afraid of him, and believed not that he was a disciple. the next line mentions Barnabus, who had a gospel in the bible for hundreds of years!

[@lessevdoolbretsim]

The only "solution" Christopher ever talked about was for individuals to get rid of religious superstition and free their minds. I don't know of any Atheists who are for knocking down great religious monuments and historical architecture.

[@packe777]

@SOAS007 There are no religious authorities that people should worship or bow to. Only Jesus Christ is an authority, not secular organized religions like churches. DNA code mystery is not only a job for biologist, i would say programmers, mathematicians and logicians in the first place. We only know that INTELLIGENCE can produce code, and not by alternate - mechanisms of random chance and necessity. Btw, do you know that Michael Ruse agrees that Darwinism is a secular religion for atheists?

[@sids500]

Atheism is not resposible for any wars. Ideologies are. Atheism is merely a lack of theism. It is not an ideology, it's a lack of a certain ideology, namely theism. How many more times do atheists have to explain this? It's really very simple! Religious people have no argument against the accusations that many many wars are started by religion. None are started by atheism. Atheists have started wars, but in the name of other ideologies! Remove religion, remove many wars, simple.

[@Fishqueen1972]

@MPaulHolmes You seem to point out how horrible it is for millions of people to be killed. But as a Christian, I presume, you think that all non-Christians are going to be tortured for an eternity. Certainly it is horrible to kill millions of people and it is horrible to be murder victim, but why isn't even more horrible and unjust for ANYONE to be tortured for an eternity. I just don't get the logic of the Christian. Evil applies in this case, but not in that case.??? Strange.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 First of all, that's simply not true. There was the catholic (general) church with orthodox teaching. Then there came groups and people who started to twist the truth. Therefore the church had to reinforce their beliefs and to make clear what the original apostolic teaching was they collected all inspired scripture and made the canon. The only agenda in that action was to uphold Truth and glorify God in the midst of perversion. God used that means (forming of canon) to uphold Truth

[@RandomVortex]

If that is the best the Christians can do in reply to some screamingly obvious contradictions with regard to their faith and faiths in general then they pretty much reinforce non belief. On the point of the historical account of Jesus does this"history" include(for example)the resurrection?(if so where?)and if not why not? I did not notice any difficult questions being posed by the interviewer. Lennox is totally unconvincing.

[@trythinkingnow]

@gneisenau321 Apparently 'brutally' means something different to you, but no matter. The Sewell incident (a favorite of creationists, find another) only proves you are wrong. The paper passed peer review and approval. Then they found Sewell violated the Originality and Plagiarism guidelines of Elsevier’s and the editor pulled it. Sewell copied verbatim from his earlier publications. 20 to 25% was taken from American Spectator article “Evolution’s Thermodynamic Failure” without citation.

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 You asked for what obvious prophecies there were fulfilled, so I gave some. You know, sometimes it can make a point clear, to look at the opposite of that point. If Jesus said to everyone "it's gonna take a very long time for Me to return, so don't expect me anytime soon!" then there wouldn't have been any urgency in living the good life, in spreading the gospel, etc. You know how people are. Nobody would expect Christ. Now everyone does, no matter when they live. Which is the goal

[@derangedyoshi]

@adriankal To paraphrase Hitchens, that which can be asserted without evidence can be rejected without evidence. There is no evidence for god's existence and I find it an illogical and indeed harmful concept. From a strictly logical perspective, I don't believe that god doesn't exist, merely that his existence is so unlikely as to be worth no consideration. When I say "opposing religion" I mean opposing stuff like religiously inspired homophobia, arguing for the separation of church and state &c

[@Yabadabadoo71]

I'm a Christian and agree, except on Christ not being God. He called himself "I am" which is God's name. He is not the Father, neither is he the Holy Spirit, but all three are God. Its futile to attempt to understand the Trinity actually. Its one of the many things I'll ask God to explain later.

[@dragaoastro69]

@theGroveMan Whit all do respect my friend, Gilgamesh is not mentioned in secular sources like tacitus or some jewish writtings hes he? And its also mind blowing to me how the bible is not accepted as a historical source just because it is a religious book by some atheist when all classic historians do. As a christian, am i to ignore a historic source just because she might be considered atheist or a pagan? Thats not how history is made! The illiad by the way is incredible important to know

[@OleVinny]

@GeorgeEJWaites What is there to address? I agree completely. The quote shows that the natural man (the unbeliever) thinks the things of God are foolish, so he must think it's logical to reject God. If the things of God are foolishness to the natural man, but at the same time logical for him, then he wouldn't think it was foolish in the first place. So to spin that around you can say it's logical for the fallen man to follow the things not of God, in other words... deny God.

[@MasterRobinHood]

@gneisenau321 I agree, i used a secular source, since you said ANY historical source. But if what you really mean to say was scriptural, you should state that. Any book that refers to a talking snake shouldn't be historical either.

[@echoesintoeternity]

@smaakjeks I have to check your sources when i have the time. AnywayComparing Caesar to Christ when looking for historical documentation is a bit lopsided.Caesar was born into and came to dominate the most powerful culture in the West, and was probably taught to read and write in a culture that had things like libraries. Jesus Christ was a Galilean peasant carpenter, or an Essene or something. Anyway, comparing a peasant to a de facto Emperor when looking for historical records is misleading. .

[@CraigMetalHead]

@Brazillianviking He was loving his neighbour, its the people outside of his neighbourhood that he didnt like. He enjoyed the company of white catholic people, everyone else... meh, not so much. In that respect, its very easy to see how he could have rationalised "love thy neighbour" into conforming with his ideals.

[@GiantSandles]

@MPaulHolmes Except that our society has police forces and courts to stop people from getting away with it (for the most part, anyway). And that wouldn't lead you directly to do anything, especially not to stoning an adulteress or murdering an apostate. Guess what DOES lead you directly to doing such things?

[@Cinnabun]

I don't get any moral code from god or anything, I don't need a bible or a tablet to tell me what's right or what's wrong I have natural understanding of right or wrong I have an understanding of logical thinking. you believe a man was 500-600 years old when he built an ark put every animal over 1 billion of them on a boat and lived through a flood, don't tell me that was metaphorical it was intended as fact not metaphorical.

[@derangedyoshi]

The Stalin argument makes my blood boil. It is so horrendously flawed, and seeing religious people's smugness when saying "ah, but one of you was Stalin" is just woeful. What's worse is when they substitute Hitler for Stalin, not being aware of his Catholicism. People need to realise that atheism IS NOT a religion, but the lack of one. The sole tenet of atheism is a lack of belief in God.

[@regelemihai]

Again, your inability to accept the Gospels as evidence is YOUR problem alone. It's by no means a general standard. If all you can say to the contrary is that it's only mentioned in the Gospels then I suggest you come up with a better objection.

[@derangedyoshi]

@glennjridge *Dawkins It is logical to assume that there is no life after death - we have no evidence of an immortal soul and no evidence of anyone living after death. Our knowledge of biology and neurology would suggest that when we die and our brains shut down, that's it. To suggest otherwise is illogical and requires faith. What's more, atheists are not required to believe this, an atheist can believe in Valhalla if they want. It just so happens that most atheists are more logical than that.

[@echoesintoeternity]

@smaakjeks: There is plenty of reasonable evidence to believe that he did exist. For instance we have one author Paul who knows Jesus' relatives and knew his disciples. Paul makes statements about Jesus as off the cuff comments. And thats very important to historians. In other words a historian wants to find disinterested comments, where he says for example James, brother of the lord.. This is just one example... but its very important for historians.

[@MasterRobinHood]

@gneisenau321 So if you've someone convinced yourself that 100 % of the Amalekite men, women and children were evil ( to which you can't come up with a modern day example of any tribe, city or nation that is) then what about the nations Israel wiped out? They weren't all nomads as you said. So for the remaining nations, Israel WAS taking their land.

[@findo]

@mountainmanbear What about them? Who are these historians who deny the existence of Jesus? I've come across about three who are actually professional historians. They are the YEC-ers of history in terms of the standing amonst their peers that the Jesus-Myth theory has.

[@adriankal]

@kemalcs And add to that that catholic church claims that they took bible (or set of unrelated writings) in first centuries AD and removed 2 or 3 books out of it and several parables leaving only those that make sense. They would do it again today if they could (adding some new stuff probably) but unfortunately they did a mistake putting translated bible under every roof. They do changes in translations today and bible in Polish is pretty different than in English LOL!

[@philosophyman76]

Your kidding right. First of all the actual authrs of the bible are not known by anyone. Secondly whoever did write the bible was not a contemporary of jesus. They all lived after him. Thirdly the translation and copying of the bible by scribes over time great changed and edited all of the stories of the bible. Fourth the stories of the bible all contradict themselves. All the stories of jesus are different. This is your historical proof? Give me one other historical book of jesus pls?

[@moyga]

Jesus also cursed a fig tree to death in a fit of rage because it bore no fruit. He also told his disciples to take away his mother when she started telling people she was worried he had gone crazy and told them that his mother meant nothing to him and that he didn't care about her now that he had a following. Jesus wasn't that great, most if not all of his moral philosophies were espoused far more sophisiticatedly by other people such as Aristotle long before he was even born.

[@mrw21]

Stacking up the bodies and picking the smaller pile doesn't settle the debate. All that matters is if it's true. I would be interested to hear the "overwhelming" historical evidence that corroborates Jesus' existence ... Zero contemporary mentions of Jesus is not a great start.

[@OleVinny]

There were people around Jesus who didn't need faith to believe in His miracles and what He said. I am personally convicted to trust these people and the messages I believe God gave me through them. I just want everyone to consider the possibility that this message is for everyone and God wants you to seek after Him. There is a time for discussing every little issue, but for now I think it's distracting. I'm don't want to come across as trying to defend God. If He wants to He'll convince you

[@OleVinny]

@SOAS007 There's people out there who debunk every single apparent contradiction. I won't get into that. If you reject the NT, because it is religious writing containing supernatural claims than you should be aware that you're rejecting it because of your assumptions about reality, not because you want to treat it fairly as historical writings. Which they are. There's no benefit in writing what they wrote if it wasn't true, so I don't buy into that

[@chris241289]

Ok. I admit I am not a good person. I have said this before. But the fact that I am a bad person does not mean I am wrong about the Trinity. The fact that you are not willing to engage in a conversation with me proves you are a hypocrite too. You are no better than me.