Jesus Had a Wife?

[BlueRidge]

The Wikipedia article I linked to doesn't say if you don't think Jesus is historical you're an idiot, in fact I didn't see any place that said that. The article I linked gives detailed information on the argument and evidence for Jesus being historical.

As a skeptic, all I conclude is that those who study the issue think Jesus is historical. I don't feel justified in judging the issue myself nor do I feel any need to. I do think it is interesting what those studying the issue have to say about it. I'm not seeing any reason to suggest that this field should be treated differently than any other scholarly field regarding its general consensus. To me, I would want to see some reasons why they would be giving out an insufficient or false answer to the question of Jesus being historical before I would be ready to dismiss their work.

New information arises and scholarly consensus does change, but that is also something for me I think requires some evidence.

[PRlady]

Oddly, this militant atheist agrees with you, because since the 19th century, unbiased scholars -- in other words, scholars who were not trying to prove this or that about Christianity, but who were really looking for the historical Jesus -- have done some rigorous work on this. I'm not willing to think that all these scholars, some of whom I've read, arrived at fallacious methods to determine what was and wasn't true.

Now the minute you get into interpretation -- e.g. what really did happen on that Sunday morning, who saw what, whether pagan or Jewish tradition was more influential in the belief in a resurrected god, not to mention the two millenia of argument about the divine/human nature of Jesus, what his legacy was supposed to be - THAT'S where to me we enter the realm of mythology. In other words, real people are arguing about real traditions and real biography and real theology, but unless you choose to believe that Jesus was something other than a human being, the rest is....a lot of trees that have been cut down. And a lot of religious wars, schisms, and other unpleasantness.

One reason I've alway been a skeptic is the logic of growing up in what is in this country a minority religion. When I asked questions about Christmas, Easter, Jesus, that other half of the bible I wasn't supposed to read, basically I got either the PC or non-PC version of...this is what they believe, but they're wrong. And since I figured out by age six that there were a lot more of them than of us, that meant there were a lot of people who were somehow misled to believe something wrong.

It's only a short step from that to taking a hard look at your own traditions and figuring out that your own people are also steeped in logical, factual and historical error.

That did not get me out of trouble when it was discovered I was sneaking into various church services on Sunday out of curiousity...and rebellion.

[Doubletoe]

According to the Gospel, Pilate offered to release either Jesus or a murderer named Barabbus (sp.?), believing the Jews would naturally choose Jesus over a murderer. However, the Jews chose Barabbus, which is why they have historically been blamed for Jesus death. Although that is kinda like blaming all of Islamic faith for 9/11.

This may have been how it happened, or it may have been that Pilate simply had Jesus put to death (his position as the Roman governor certainly did not require him to give the Jewish subjects any choice in the matter). But keep in mind that the Catholic church was based in Rome and it certainly didn't make the Romans look very good if a Roman killed their Savior. Some scholars theorize that the line about Pontius Pilate washing his hands of the deed was added into the scriptures by the early Roman Catholic Church. Also, the sect of Christianity that was spread across Europe by Emperor Constantine happened to be a very anti-Jewish sect, so it would kind of make sense that the Jews were villified here. Until that point, there was much less distinction between Christianity and Judaism.

[IceAlisa]

In the area of the headaches, my neurologist suggested B2 and magnesium over Topamax which he felt was too risky given my symptoms. He said I had to get at least 100 mg to be effective and that many OTC multivitamins had more like 10mg which just wasn't enough. What I wanted to know is if the former had actually been found to be effective in clinical studies and if they had any bad side effects, particularly at those doses, and also how much I should take. (I already knew Topamax had a lot of risks so I didn't bother to google it.) When I googled "magnesium for headaches" and "B2/riboflavin for headaches", I found many, many websites on migraines and they almost all had pages that listed effective vs. ineffective vs. "suspected of being effective but not proven effective" treatments for them and B2 and magnesium was on every list in the effective column. On top of that, I found some links to actual studies on PubMed and the abstracts also showed the magnesium and B2 had been found effective at higher doses.

OTT but my friend and colleague, a physician and a fellow migraneur, recommends magnesium (without the calcium!) supplements. Works well for me since about two weeks ago I started having my first ever ocular migraines (aura, no headache).

However, Dr. Google does not replace medical advice. Clinical experience still counts for something, otherwise we'd have computers evaluating patients. So it IS a good thing to see your doctor and to educate yourself like MacMadame did.

Alright, back to Jesus and his wife!

[AxelAnnie]

Or you choose not to claim to know either way, which seems to be the most honest response based on your statement.

Usually, though, we don't make faith claims about unicorns or life in outspace based on the provable reasoning.

Well, without arguing about Unicorns (and I have one in my backyard)

From Wikipedia

Depending on the religion, faith is belief in a god or gods or in the doctrines or teachings of the religion. Informal usage of faith can be quite broad, including trust or belief without proof,[1] and "faith" is often used as a substitute for "hope", "trust" or "belief". Some[who?] critics of faith have argued that faith is opposed to reason. In contrast, some[who?] advocates of faith argue that the proper domain of faith concerns questions which cannot be settled by evidence. This is exemplified by attitudes about the future, which (by definition) has not yet occurred.

But the best part is that it stopped my husband in his tracks about his belief that there is no G-d because there is not proof ...... and no proof the other way either.

[DAngel]

Because you can't prove there is no G-d anymore then you can prove there is one..... so you simply, on faith, choose to believe one or the other ;-)

Ah alright... the thing is, I don't choose my beliefs... they choose me

I'm always when someone tells me that I have to choose to believe in something... Because, well, I don't know how to do that... My beliefs are shaped from past experiences/available information. I always feel trying to "choose" my belief is like trying to fool myself and deep down inside I still know the truth. (This applies to more than just religions too... Like I really want to believe I'm a great painter, but every time I look at my painting, I know that's not true... yet )

[agalisgv]

I asked MacMadame this question before, but is wasn't answered so I'll try again. Do you believe Alexander the Great existed?

Do you believe Julius Caesar existed?

Yes or no?

[IceAlisa]

Could you please answer my question about the theories of what could explain the experiences at Jesus' "resurrection"? Much obliged, really curious.

[Japanfan]

And just to speak plainly, scholars would consider mythicists to be whackadoodles on par with fundamentalists who believe the world is only 6,000 years old. It's that fringe and that unsupported by evidence.

When you say mythicists do you mean scholars who specialize in the study of mythology? If so, is Joseph Campbell seen as a whackadoodle?

IMO religion does have a mythic dimension. Do the scholars you refer to reject that idea?

[snoopy]

This I suppose is pedantic but the wiki article says faith is the belief in god. Not a lack of belief in god. And it relies on the word hope. Faith is tied together with hope. I don't think non/theists hope there is no God. So I don't think the orientation is the same wrt belief (faith) and non/belief. I find it a critical difference and why I don't think you can justifiably invert one for the other.

But your last sentence indicates your purpose. To say non/theists have faith is just an argumentative tool toward belief. And generally non/theists know what's going on.

[allezfred]

I asked MacMadame this question before, but is wasn't answered so I'll try again. Do you believe Alexander the Great existed?

Do you believe Julius Caesar existed?

Yes or no?

Don't know about Alexander the Great, but didn't Julius Caesar write books about his campaigns?

[BlueRidge]

This I suppose is pedantic but the wiki article says faith is the belief in god. Not a lack of belief in god. And it relies on the word hope. Faith is tied together with hope. I don't think non/theists hope there is no God. So I don't think the orientation is the same wrt belief (faith) and non/belief. I find it a critical difference and why I don't think you can justifiably invert one for the other.

But your last sentence indicates your purpose. To say non/theists have faith is just an argumentative tool toward belief. And generally non/theists know what's going on.

I've always been perplexed by the casual use of the word faith regarding ultimate quesitons. It has seemed to me that faith meant much more than simply a choice of belief to religious people.

Here is one Christian's explanation of faith as a form of knowledge (albeit in a review written by an atheist):

Faith, according to Plantinga, is another basic way of forming beliefs, distinct from but not in competition with reason, perception, memory, and the others. However, it is

"a wholly different kettle of fish: according to the Christian tradition (including both Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin), faith is a special gift from God, not part of our ordinary epistemic equipment. Faith is a source of belief, a source that goes beyond the faculties included in reason. "

God endows human beings with a sensus divinitatis that ordinarily leads them to believe in him. (In atheists the sensus divinitatis is either blocked or not functioning properly.)2 In addition, God acts in the world more selectively by “enabling Christians to see the truth of the central teachings of the Gospel.”

If all this is true, then by Plantinga’s standard of reliability and proper function, faith is a kind of cause that provides a warrant for theistic belief, even though it is a gift, and not a universal human faculty.

A Philosopher Defends Religion (NY Review of Books)

Non-theists do not have faith. They do have beliefs, you can't exactly function on earth without them.

[Angelskates]

Non-theists do not have faith. They do have beliefs, you can't exactly function on earth without them.

I thought I completely agreed with you, but then I looked in the dictionary out of curiosity, and I disagree with you. Just looking a definition one, a non-theist can have faith in him/herself, can't he/she? Or their fellow human? Or science? It's an interesting word, individually (and, IMO, therefore personally) defined. I have faith in God, but also faith in myself and my fellow humans, that we are capable of feeling love and acting lovingly, and I believe I can have faith in all of these.

[gkelly]

Is there a technical sense in which the word is used in faith-based religions (although members of different sects or even of the same sect may debate exactly what it entails), and also a more general sense of the word, less strictly defined, as used in secular contexts?

[BlueRidge]

I thought I completely agreed with you, but then I looked in the dictionary out of curiosity, and I disagree with you. Just looking a definition one, a non-theist can have faith in him/herself, can't he/she? Or their fellow human? Or science? It's an interesting word, individually (and, IMO, therefore personally) defined. I have faith in God, but also faith in myself and my fellow humans, that we are capable of feeling love and acting lovingly, and I believe I can have faith in all of these.

Just curious and you don't need to answer if you don't wish to, but do you feel those two aspects of faith are the same?

There is obviously a non-religious use of the word faith which is commonly employed. I can't personally speak to the use of faith that Plantinga gives because I don't feel any religious faith. But it makes sense to me that in a religious context as Plantinga is saying, faith is a source of belief. Thus it is not just belief but a way of knowing.

Non-religious individuals tend to react negatively when faith is ascribed to them and I think the reason is that faith really is a religious experience. Nontheists, atheists, whatever term people prefer have a belief system but they don't come to it the same way religious people do. They do not rely on faith as a source for belief.

I hasten to add that is my take on it. I'm very interested both in others opinions on this and also to hear from our posters who have extensive academic knowledge of this.

[PRlady]

I've always been perplexed by the casual use of the word faith regarding ultimate quesitons. It has seemed to me that faith meant much more than simply a choice of belief to religious people.

Here is one Christian's explanation of faith as a form of knowledge (albeit in a review written by an atheist):



A Philosopher Defends Religion (NY Review of Books)

Non-theists do not have faith. They do have beliefs, you can't exactly function on earth without them.

Isn't that sort of a circular definition of faith? If a Christian believes that God endows him with a special sense that allows him to discern the truth of the gospels, doesn't that mean that one can't dispute that truth, since if one does, it means ipso facto that one is not endowed with that sense?

In other words, we "blocked" non-theists can't ascertain Christianity without the sense we are missing -- and that we are missing a sense is "proven" by the fact that we don't embrace Christianity. Talk about circular logic, or your assumptions proving your conclusions!

Oh boy.

[BlueRidge]

Yes its logically circular. Rather like Descartes argument that we know that God exists because he gives us clear and distinct knowlege of him and how do we know that knowledge is of God? Because it is clear and distinct...

For those who require empirical verification for knowledge claims, there would have to be some way of proving that some people have a sensus divinitatis just as science can show that we have other senses. You'll have to look to neuroscience for answers to that. There is an atheist view that humans evolved a sensus divinitatis because it aided survival but that it is a natural feeling and does not mean God actually exists.

I find it a very interesting subject.

[Angelskates]

Just curious and you don't need to answer if you don't wish to, but do you feel those two aspects of faith are the same?

Interesting question. My answer is, I think so. I have enough proof for me that God (the Christian God) exists, and I have enough proof, for me, that people are capable of feeling love and acting out of love. I know I am. I've experienced, on a regular basis, that both are true. Some people don't believe in angels, I've seen one, that's enough for me. I don't care if people think I (or someone or several someones thousands of years ago) was/am dreaming, hallucinating, making the whole thing up, *I* know what I experienced, and experience, that's enough for me. I don't think that's all there is, I am constantly asking questions - and I have an interfaith (including an atheist and non-theist) dinner in my house once a week because I'm interested in others' views, but it doesn't change my own experiences, which is how I (mostly) form both my faith and my beliefs. They do change somewhat, but the basis mostly stays the same.

[numbers123]

to me the use of the word faith = faith in the convictions that you hold are true. More in faith in yourself to believe what you believe because for you it is true.

I am never sure how to describe someone who is atheist or agnostic. Should I say your belief is to be ____ or your faith is _____. I am not poking anyone, I am not trying to assign my descriptions on you, just want to know how I should address your convictions?

[PRlady]

Yes its logically circular. Rather like Descartes argument that we know that God exists because he gives us clear and distinct knowlege of him and how do we know that knowledge is of God? Because it is clear and distinct...

For those who require empirical verification for knowledge claims, there would have to be some way of proving that some people have a sensus divinitatis just as science can show that we have other senses. You'll have to look to neuroscience for answers to that. There is an atheist view that humans evolved a sensus divinitatis because it aided survival but that it is a natural feeling and does not mean God actually exists.

I find it a very interesting subject.

So do I. I wonder what I should read about this....[usual wonky reaction]

Perhaps the sense/need for divinity was really a way of establishing human hierarchy when society settled down and started to diversify economically and then stratify. In other words, the Divine Right of Kings was a pretty early idea...and let's face it, those kings had some excellent publicists. Why is that guy king? Because the gods made him one, of course!

The various mythologies also should have served the in-group purpose, uniting a tribe against its adversaries because each tribe had its patron god(s). Unfortunately that us vs them characteristic of religion still obtains.