AWAKE! NO. 5 2016 - Did Jesus Really Exist?

by ttdtt 31 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  slimboyfat

  Their heart is not in it any more and it shows.

  You'd think, among the thousands of people at headquarters, they'd manage to muster up a few individuals who care enough about religious and biblical issues to produce something worth publishing on the topic. Apparently not.

  They're much more interested in producing policy books and articles on shunning, avoiding education, remaining loyal, branch facilities, feats of translation, how you can send them money in a dozen different ways. They just don't give a damn about Jeusus and whether he exists or ever existed.
• 

  ttdtt

  How many COs talked about "worldly churches" serving up fast food spirituality.

  This isnt even that - its the "free sample" from the chinese stand at the Mall Food Court.
• 

  bohm

  I have always been amazed at how the WT will quote Einstein in support of their positions whenever possible but ignore most of what he believed:

  
• 

  bohm

  SBF:

  Isn't it customary, when asking a question like this, to first explain why the question arises in the first place? There is no sense, anywhere in this magazine, as to who has been asking this question in the first place, who supports the idea, how it originated, or the arguments involved.

  I think this is a very precise observation.. I think this is the general tactic for the WT, they never try to frame the argument (context, history, who believes it, why, etc.) but just introduce it like "Some people say/believe.." (always "some") and then pile on their counter arguments without explaining the other position in details. I think the best example is "evolution" and "the theory of evolution" which I think the WTBs in 100 years has still not defined even once.
• 

  cyberjesus

  Well documented?.... how? Where? When? In the watchtower literature?
• 

  Saename

  cyberjesus - Well documented?.... how? Where? When? In the watchtower literature?

  I'm assuming you're speaking to me. I don't think I'm going to debate with a Jesus mythicist, so I'll put it in a brief, blatant, and clear way.

  There is an overwhelming consensus amongst scholars who agree that Jesus did exist. We have two references to him in Josephus' work and one reference to him in Tacitus' work. One author knew Jesus' brother, James, and Jesus' disciple, Peter, and was an eyewitness to both of those persons. This is more than for any other Jewish Messianic claimant of the first century. So.. er.. yes, it is well-documented. You don't have to agree. But as Bart Ehrman, one of the leading scholars on the New Testament studies who specializes in textual criticism, put it, "I'm sorry. I respect your disbelief, but if you want to go where the evidence goes... I think that atheists have done themselves a disservice by jumping on the bandwagon of mythicism because, frankly, it makes you look foolish to the outside world. If that's what you're gonna believe, you just look foolish. You are much better off going with historical evidence and arguing historically rather than coming up with a theory that Jesus didn't exist."
• 

  Crazyguy

  Tacitis only refers to Christ never mentions the name Jesus. Josephus mention two guys named Jesus , one is a guy on the wall calling down bad things on the people of Jerusalem and then he writes that he was killed by a rock. The other mentioning of a Jesus most experts agree this texts was a forgery.
• 

  bohm

  CG: The other mentioning of a Jesus most experts agree this texts was a forgery.

  What is the source for this? from Wikipedia:

  The general scholarly view is that while the Testimonium Flavianum is most likely not authentic in its entirety, it is broadly agreed upon that it originally consisted of an authentic nucleus, which was then subject to Christian expansion/alteration

  There is IMO a lot of questionable assumptions floating around in the atheistic community on Jesus mythicism.
  
  
  
• 

  OneGenTwoGroups

  JW publication writers are torn between having evidence settle a matter vs. having the GB vote on it on Wednesday morning.

  What's a cult member to do?
• 

  John_Mann

  I think the most important argument to Jesus is the fact that Jews never said he never existed. Jesus was a threat to Jewish religion and they would use the never existed argument.