Who is Jesus Christ and Who is Irrational? (Mike Adams)

A sixty-seven year old proud atheist friend of mine recently interjected the sweeping statement “all religion is irrational” into one of our conversations. I replied, not with a direct rebuttal but, instead, with the unexpected question, “who is Jesus Christ?” He replied, “I don’t know.” If I were to ask some of you why I pulled that question out of left field you might also reply with a bewildered “I don’t know.” So keep reading. Please.

If you have never really pondered the question “who is Jesus Christ?” then you simply cannot consider yourself to be a committed intellectual – at least not yet. Let me say that in a different way: if you have never given serious thought to the true identity of the most important individual ever to walk the face of the earth then you are either a) suffering from severe intellectual hernia, or b) possessed of an intellect impaired by a fear of knowing the true answer to the question.

Let me begin by defending the assertion that Jesus Christ was the most important individual ever to walk the face of the earth. 1) We divide time using the date of Jesus’ birth. 2) More books have been written about Jesus than anyone else in recorded history. Case closed. Now we can move on to the issue of fear and intellectual curiosity.

The options we are given for understanding the identity of Jesus are so limited that no one who is truly intelligent can be behaving rationally if he just avoids the question altogether. Take, for example, my friend who has lived 2/3 of a century on this planet without so much as attempting to work through the options. I don’t want you to be one of those irrational people so let’s get to work.

When addressing the question of Jesus’ identity, there are only four available options. Anyone who has ever read C.S. Lewis or Josh McDowell knows that Jesus was either: 1) A legend, 2) a lunatic, 3) a liar, or 4) the Lord.

The idea that Jesus was merely a legend, as opposed to someone who actually lived, is simply not an option we can take seriously (at least not for long). Independent historical accounts, by that I mean accounts written by non-Christians, are enough to put this option to rest. Jesus is cited by 42 sources within 150 years of his life, and nine of those sources are non-Christian. By contrast, the Roman Emperor Tiberius is only mentioned by 10 sources. If you believe Tiberius existed, how can you not believe in a man who is cited by four times as many people and has had an immeasurably greater impact on history? You can believe that if you wish. But then you risk forfeiting any claim to be considered rational.

Nor is it rational to consider Jesus to have been a lunatic. Perhaps you could maintain that belief if you’ve never read the Bible. But how can a person claim to be educated if he’s never read the Bible?

World Magazine editor Marvin Olasky once entertained the notion that Jesus was a mere lunatic. But, then, in the early 1970s, as an atheist and a communist graduate student, he examined the words of Jesus for the first time. He was traveling to Russia on a ship and wanted to brush up on his Russian. But all he had with him to read (that just happened to be written in Russian) was a copy of the New Testament. And so he read. And he was transformed.

Marvin recognized immediately that the words of Jesus represent a profound level of moral understanding that rises above anything else that has ever been written. Read for yourself the words of Jesus. Then read the words of Charles Manson. Try to convince me that they are one in the same – merely two lunatics who mistakenly thought they were the Messiah. You have a right to that opinion. But you don’t have a right to be considered rational if you cannot detect a glaring difference between the teachings of Christ and Manson.

So, now only two options remain. And this is where the real trouble begins. If we call Jesus a liar (who falsely claimed to be God) then we cannot also call him a great moral teacher. One cannot be both. But many look at the final option of calling him Lord and panic. To go there means to accept belief in the supernatural. And surely that couldn’t be rational. Or could it?

Science has taught us a lot since the Bible was written. For one thing, we know that the universe had a beginning. It is expanding, it is finite, and it was not always here. Put simply, Carl Sagan was wrong. In fact, he was dead wrong. The cosmos is not all that is or was or that ever will be. It had a beginning. It is irrational to dismiss the obvious implications of this: that the universe was caused by a supernatural force existing outside of space and time.

People have to let go of the idea that the natural world is all there is because that is not where the science leads us. It instead leads us away from the philosophical commitment to only considering naturalistic explanations for the things we observe in the physical universe. This also leads us to one very important question: if a supernatural force was great enough to create the universe could the force or being not also reenter creation? And another related question: is the force or being responsible for creating life not also able to conquer death?

Arguably, the resurrection is a pretty small accomplishment in comparison with the creation of the universe. But that doesn’t mean it happened. The evidence must be judged on its own merits. I recommend that serious intellectuals start here.

Of course, you could just keep avoiding the question while judging others to be irrational. But there’s no avoiding the plank in your own eye.

You are now entering the conspiracy theory zone. You would need a preponderance of the evidence to show malice or deception was intended by those who handled the eyewitness testimony. The same eyewitnesses who died for such testimony.

Not just a few mind you died for their testimony. You would have to provide evidence the deception was so convincing people died believing it to be so. That is a tall order given the documented size of the crowds who witnessed miracles and the results after.

Your Sanhedrin example is refuted by evidence Joseph and Nicodemus had inside testimony of what that body discussed. As well as Saul before his conversion.

Except the Sanhedrin testimony is not linked with Joseph (not the father of Jesus surely, he is never mentioned again after Jesus’ youth) Nicodemus, nor Saul. There is no testimony that they were part of the Sanhedrin.

Seems you are making things up now.

The putative deaths of people who did not write MMLJ has no bearing on the accuracy or credibility of MMLJ.

Again, MMLJ do not appear to be written by contemporary persons. Luke and Matthew cribbed from either Mark or Q and in pretending to be contemporary documents they would be forgeries. If they had access to eyewitness testimony, they would still be hearsay, but perhaps admitted under ancient documents, but the evidence would be refuted by the presence of error in the documents.

So if I testify that during the presidency of Barack Obama, during his second term, that you performed horrific acts of pederasty, then the fact that I asserted these acts took place during BO’s presidency makes the testimony valid....

Or does it?

Of course it doesn’t. The fact that events are asserted to have taken place during a particular time is irrelevant, when you consider that descriptions of stars, and the moon is not just not accurate, but not even possible.

Then throw in the various miracles. They are easy to accomplish so long as the principals are long dead. Prophecy is easy, so long as the events predicted are in the past.

It looks to be a scam to me. That others fell for it has no meaning. People fall for scams every day.

I guess you [dm] don’t keep up with the latest developments then regarding the shroud and the face cloth [veil of veronica?] b/c the History channel had a very good [even by their stds] documentary on the carbon-dating and authenticity of both.

Worth a review - came out around Easter 2013.

Shroud of Turin
http://www.history.com/news/shroud-of-turin-not-a-medieval-forgery-according-to-new-book

You claim Luke deposed witnesses. I see no evidence of that. I see credulous stories, not attached to any witness. When you claim Luke deposed witnesses, you are making it up.

Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things accomplished among us, 2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, 3 it seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, to write it out for you in consecutive order, most excellent Theophilus; 4 so that you may know the exact truth about the things you have been taught.

So Carbon 14 dating is foolproof? You think it is fake because of a patch detected by microscope but not the human eye? Has the science you have so much faith in come up with how the shroud or the veil were created or ‘faked’ with such unique attributes? Please don’t respond your answers are pure dribble.

If nothing else the posts on this thread prove you to be an advocate par none for devil’s advocates. Your employer must be so happy to have you - sarc.

Carbon 14 tests are merely valid, not fool proof, nor can it convince fools.

Of course since the patches were not installed with microscopes, a pretense to detect patches with microscopes is fluff.

Since the first information we have on the shroud asserts that the person who created it confessed, I figure we have pretty good information on when and how it was created.

Figuring out what really happened in the trial of Jesus is enormously difficult. Two surviving non-Christian accounts, one by Roman historian and another by a Jewish historian, confirm that Pilate ordered the execution of Jesus—but beyond that, offer few details. Writing in the late first-century, Tacitus offered this comment:

Christus [Jesus], from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilate, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, and the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular.

The Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus, writing in the 80s or early 90s C.E., indicated that both Jewish leaders and the Roman prefect played roles in the crucifixion of Jesus:
About the same time there lived Jesus, a wise man for he was a performer of marvelous feats and a teacher of such men who received the truth with pleasure. He attracted many Jews and many Greeks. He was called the Christ. Pilate sentenced him to die on the cross, having been urged to do so by the noblest of our citizens; but those who loved him at the first did not give up their affection for him. And the tribe of the Christians, who are named after him, have not disappeared to this day.

Joseph of Arimathea:

Mark 15:43-47

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

43 Joseph of Arimathea came, a prominent member of the Council, who himself was waiting for the kingdom of God; and he gathered up courage and went in before Pilate, and asked for the body of Jesus.

Nicodemus:

John 3

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

3 Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews;

Saul of Tarsus student of Gamaliel:

Acts 22

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

22 “Brethren and fathers, hear my defense which I now offer to you.”

2 And when they heard that he was addressing them in the Hebrew dialect, they became even more quiet; and he *said,

3 “I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city, educated under Gamaliel, strictly according to the law of our fathers, being zealous for God just as you all are today. 4 I persecuted this Way to the death, binding and putting both men and women into prisons, 5 as also the high priest and all the Council of the elders can testify. From them I also received letters to the brethren, and started off for Damascus in order to bring even those who were there to Jerusalem as prisoners to be punished.

No sir, I am not making this up.

Where is the evidence of Luke and Matthew “cribbing” from either Mark or “Q”? That may be nice revisionist history.

Using your same standards for evidence no one today could prove the founding fathers penned the Declaration of Independence. We have the document with signatures but those men have since passed.

See, we have the documented D of I, with signatures, and contemporary copies. That is evidence.

We don’t have that with MMLJ. Thus we can accept D of I but not accept MMLJ

No quotes regarding the people you provided mention the Sanhedrin, do they?

Q as a source is an old idea. I would think that anyone studying the bible in the last 50 years would be familiar with it.

Closest I got was report of survey investigation.

I was an infantry officer back then, and most of our expertise was focused on fire support planning and land navigation. I did work as Bn Signal and Bn Intelligence officer, and there I added terrain profiling to our routine skill set, to assess where to put the radios, where to point their antennas, and what were the essential elements of enemy information. (when they occupied their forward artillery positions and attack positions).

Dy you mean MSU as in Michigan State University? They had an early contract to teach counter subversion to the Army.

“The CIA connection even at this early date(1957) is implied with a report submitted by the South Vietnam CIA Station Chief to the U.S.Ambassador SVN wherein he complains of communications difficulties reported by the Police Division MSU. By 1960 the efforts of MSU were deemed woefully lacking, due in large part to the inadequacy of the communications it provided, and the methods used to train personnel. In respect to the later, it was complained by SVN President Diem, “they were being armed with pistols & trained like State Hiway Patrolman”. In all fairness, President Diem until 1960 had insisted that defence planning be directed towards countering a communist invasion from the north rather than internal security. With this mind set he wanted these militia units to be included as a branch of the Army of South Vietnam[ARVN].

In 1960, the U.S. Operations Mission replaced the MSU Advisory effort with the Office of Public Safety[OPS], also called the Public Safety Division. Recognizing the primary reason for the failure of MSU, the OPS opened an internal department called the Telecommunications Directorate. Noting too the previous troubles encountered when assigning technical task to bureaucrats, the U.S. Agency for International Development hired experienced civilian engineers for the job. These engineers had a clear mandate, to develop and install, equipment and systems, specifically intended to link the smallest of villages and hamlets with every level of
authority all the way up to the highest in Saigon. They needed simple and reliable communications. “

William Ramsey was a well known liberal minister and skeptic. He spent several years in the Middle East retracing Luke's travels. He investigated Luke and Acts thoroughly, and came away convinced the Evangelist was accurate down to the smallest detail.

I spent the first 3.5 years going through the Bible with my mentor verse by verse. I came away thoroughly convinced of the veracity of the Word. Can I explain everything it contains? No, but I look at the preponderance of evidence, and I came away 100% convinced it is true.

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