To throw the Tacitus amongst the Atheist's

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   Anicholposted 13 years ago

   Maybe the title should have been the other way round.
   
   Tacitus was a Roman historian born c.55
   
   [In 113, Tacitus was governor of Asia (which he had once called "a rich province, easy to extort"; Agricola, §6), and after his return, he published his Annals, in which he told about the reigns of Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. The famous description of Nero's persecution of the first Christians is part of this book.]
   
   Annals 15.44 is the section in the book about Nero and the christians refered to above.
   
   this is the site i got it from
   http://www.livius.org/cg-cm/christianity/tacitus.html
   
   Tacticus is also a good source if you like your Roman history
   
   Have fun!

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      Anicholposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I recomend googling Taticus as there are many sites covering him.

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      Beelzedadposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Okay, he was a historian, and since he was a historian he would have had to refer to documentation in order to write history. Where is that documentation?

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         Jeramiposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Josephus was born in 35 AD.  He was an eye witness of the things that he wrote about.
           He himself did not meet Jesus but I am pretty sure that he spoke with many that did.
         
           And you refuse to accept his writing as documentation??
         
           What would be the required before you recognize something as credible documentation???
         
           I gotta go but will ck. in later

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            Beelzedadposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Of course, that isn't documentation at all. Those are called, "testimonials"
            
             
            
            The documentation itself. Do you ever wonder why some organizations demand to see your birth certificate or drivers license, or some other form of documentation before they have anything to do with you? 

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               Jeramiposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               And my birth certificate is but a testimonial that this person saw it happen. 
               
                 What is documentation if not a testimonial... 
               same thing different name.

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                  getitriteposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                  
                  
                  But people are born everyday.  This gives weight to the veracity of a birth certificate, or testimonial of birth.  However, the son of God living on earth and performing miracles, and returning from the dead has no credibility, and requires nothing but fear to believe.  Your analogies are for those with very narrow parameters.

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            Merlin Fraserposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Jerami wrote:
            
            “Josephus was born in 35 AD.  He was an eye witness of the things that he wrote about.
              He himself did not meet Jesus but I am pretty sure that he spoke with many that did.”
            
            Hate to tell you this but In any court of law that is pure hearsay evidence and is inadmissible.
            
            Besides which if you have ten eye witnesses you will get ten different accounts and by the time you compare them against one another you will ask yourself if they were actually there at all !
            Historical records are written by all sorts of people for all sorts of reasons not all of which are fair or accurate and seldom impartial.

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            nightwork4posted 13 years agoin reply to this

            what i find strange about religion is that every prophet, every miracle, every sighting that is so-called proven happened before we had the ability to properly document it but people still concider it to be a fact. whether it be jesus walking on water or coming back from the dead, it's all the same. noah had an ark that was huge, solidly built etc., so the story goes but proof of it's exostence has never been found. we have found lots of proof of the evolution of man, the changes in our appearance, shape of our bodies but religion denies that man was once a neandrathal. if i told a christian that i actually own their house because god told me i did they would laugh at me but if i told them i was going to pay off their house for the same reason they would say " praise the lord". kind of strange how the mind accepts what we want but refuses to accept what we see as damaging to us.

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   Mark Knowlesposted 13 years ago

   No one is disputing there are later references to Christians. We know that. What does that prove exactly? You might as well add an article from Newsweek that references Christians.
   
   How desperate are you?

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      Pcunixposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      And what would it prove anyway?  There may very well have been some wandering preacher whose followers  were the base of Christianity.  So what?  That does not make it real and certainly does not negate the obvious lineage from earlier silliness.

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   Jeramiposted 13 years ago

   When a person has already make up their mind that they do not like spinache ??  There is nothing that the best Chef in the world can do with it that this person will "ADMITT" to liking.

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      Mark Knowlesposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      What has that got to do with the total lack of evidence for Jesus exactly?

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         Jeramiposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Thanks for asking.. 
            I can take your favorite food and prepare it improperly and you won't like it.
             Many people have come to their determination that there is not a creator of some kind just because this concept was presented all wrong. They become closed minded.
         
            We can look at circumstancial evidence one piece at a time and discredit every one.
            BUT...  If we examine a mountain of circumstancial evidence
         at the same time, We see the connection between them all, and only a close minded person will say  "Not possible"
         
           This is true regardless of the subject matter.

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            Mark Knowlesposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            I see. so - being absolutely certain that Jesus was the son of God and came back to life - despite absolutely no evidence at all - is being "open minded"? And anyone who does not agree is "closed minded."
            
            Interesting. But - only a complete idiot will say "definitely true."
            
            And you have absolutely no "circumstantial evidence."
            
            What you have is "hearsay".
            
            Dear me.

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               Jeramiposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               which is all that you have  hear say as to what other people say that they have figured out. And a community agrees with.
               
                  You have not come to any conclusions by yourself.
                  You choose who's sayings you want to believe.
                  It is all hearsay unless you yourself saw it.  And then when you tell it...  It also becomes hearsay to those that hear it.

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                  Mark Knowlesposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                  Really? Now be honest instead and address the point I made. Thanks.
                  Never really understood the McDonalds argument.
                  
                  10 billion agree so it must be good.

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                     aguasilverposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                     Same old same old Mark...
                     
                     I know that I have a personal relationship with Christ right now, no hearsay, first hand experience, and I would assess that any other regenerated believer also has that same relationship, and I know plenty of them, from all walks of life and in many countries.
                     
                     verses....
                     
                     Your same old same old blabber that never changes or adds anything to a debate, just attempts to pick away at people of faith.
                     
                     Any other believers out there who can give testimony to Christ being with us today?

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                        Mark Knowlesposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                        Your delusion is of no particular interest to me John - anymore than me telling you the Star Goat speaks directly into my head and tells me to argue against the evil religionists would be to you. I suspect you would dismiss it as readily as I dismiss your ridiculous claims.
                        
                        If it made you a better person, I might be impressed, but this whining about other people not wanting to listen to you and crying out for Jesus to come and smite the unbelievers is not convincing me one little bit.
                        
                        Same old same old.................. 

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                           aguasilverposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                           "this whining about other people not wanting to listen to you and crying out for Jesus to come and smite the unbelievers is not convincing me one little bit."
                           
                           Where have I done that Mark?
                           
                           Seems plenty of folk listen to me, not many answer with constructive arguments, but then why should they, the forums are for harmless fun and spleen venting!

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                              Mark Knowlesposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                              I am finding that is not possible to have a constructive argument with some one who thinks there is an invisible god telling him what to say. No matter how many times I tell you it is offensive to lie and say a god is speaking through you instead of admitting that you are the one speaking - you insist on doing so, and whining that no one will listen to you and crying out for Jesus to come and smite the unbelievers.
                              
                              
                              http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/47189?p … ost1084296
                              
                              And then lying about doing it. No morals. None.
                              
                              Going for a bike ride. Catch you later.

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                        Anicholposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                        @Aqua
                        Mat 7:6

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                           aguasilverposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                           Amen, I take note.

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            Pcunixposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            And what should we call someone who decides that the most unlikely explanation, the explanation that has absolutely NO evidence, is correct?

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               luvpassionposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               How about a theorist...

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                  Jeramiposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                  Theorist ??   Good answer!

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               Jeramiposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               Who should we elect to determine what things are the most unlikely ?   
                  The most likely answer when presented poorly may seem to be most imposible. 
               
                  It all depends upon what side of the mountain you are looking at when determining the likelyhood of seeing snow on the trees.

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   earnestshubposted 13 years ago

   Nice post Merlin. A spot of logic never hurts!

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   earnestshubposted 13 years ago

   I can tell you from personal experience that the religionist has no capacity whatsoever to see the whole picture Jeremi.
   I have been there myself.
   
   Indoctrination into a religion requires a self blinding that is impossible to penetrate until the victim is able to regain the strength to think for themselves again.
   
   Those who do believe the bible instructs us to be enslaved by some invisible entity.
   This entity has never been seen, never been heard. A whole lot like the ball-bearing bird! The story is ridiculous.
   A psychotic lunatic that has to be worshipped or it will wipe out all of mankind?
   A god who has done nothing for mankind ever, never answered a single prayer, or stopped a war, or fed the poor and starving, or helped the dying?
   As opposed to understanding that mankind suffers from a terrible affliction at this time in our developement.
   
   Firstly I believe that fact and fantasy should be seperated into what they are.
   Fact.
   There is a bible. (and many other old books)
   Fact.
   It was written by men.
   Fact.
   There is no god of the bible, or any other god for that matter.
   Fact.
   Man has a need for a god, displayed since words were written and pictures drawn and pyramids built et al.
   Fact. Those purporting knowledge of gods are doing so with a part of themselves they are almost to a man, bone ignorant of!
   
   We are capable of being destructive because we are confused totally by the flight or fight instructions coming from our still early consciousness.
   
   This should not even be in dispute in the last 45 years.
   
   A galvanic probe experiment proved the existence of this part of the brain's response mechanisms yonks ago!
   The probe behaved like a switch. Turn it on? Loving human. Turn it off? Back to being the psychopathic killer with no known cure.
   
   Not seeing our sub-conscious desires and needs clearly means we spend our time trying to use conscious thinking to sort it out and fail because we have insufficient information.
   
   The proposition that anything in the bible should be followed other than morals which we do not need to get from this source by digging through the shocking psychosis to reach a few good statements in the OT which were no more enlightened than many people of the time.
   Just like it is today in the world. The Taliban are generally uneducated except for extreme passages from the quoran, as others do with the Torah.
   We know most of the theories that are held scientifically are tenuous at best, yet many are cohesive. Not an easy clearance when you are challenged by all other branches of the sciences such as atomic medicine to prove up or shut up.
   
   Moving away from belief in hundreds of thousands of studies, and denigrating the great minds of those in medicine and sciences to hang on to a belief in an entity in an old book requires ignorance or early indoctrination.
   The thing religion does best is criminal. Indoctrination as children is a crime in my view.

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      Jeramiposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Though I disagree with your conclusion I do understand how you have arrived at it.
      
         Concerning this Higher Power neglecting the dieing??
        I think that it is a metamorphic issue. 
        Am I doing a good thing by keeping a caterpillar as a caterpillar and never allowing it the privilege of being a butterfly??
        Is that metamorphosis painful ??   
         I believe that When our body dies it is the same thing.
       
      
        Has Religion misrepresented God ?  In many instances I would think so,.  But inadvertently ..  I think that It has done more good than bad.
      
         Without religion, all believers in God would have been exterminated long ago.  And without a belief in God, there wouldn't be a concept of morals. 
      
         Religion and faith in God are two separate things but most often are married.     It is a balancing act. 
      
        Was Abraham religious?  Or Jacob ?   I don’t think so

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         earnestshubposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Jeremi on what basis do you believe that god believers would be exterminated. Much of the early extermination was by the biblical god.
         
         He only left 8 people on the planet alive at one time.
         
         The rest were mostly wiped out by religious wars weren't they?

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            Jeramiposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            The Romans were killing them for several hundred years. Until they were weeded down enough that The Roman Empire created a suitable subistute religion and then all other faiths were wiped  off the face of the earth. 
            
              No one seems to comprehend that being religious and believing in a higher power (God) aint the same thing.
            
              The religious wars such as the crucades were politicaly motivated, orchistrated by the Church, YES.
            
               Can we gather together a dozen people of any sort, for any length of time without polotics entering into the mix?
            
              Just my thoughts.

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   earnestshubposted 13 years ago

   I'm incredulous about the deaths attributed to this biblical god. You passed it like you don't believe it. Why in all hell would a god make something apparently in it's own likeness then wipe it out like a spiteful brat?
   Not very godly!

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      sandra rinckposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I did refer thou to Romans 3:7, apparently his holiness King David doth admit he lieth for God and slanderously so, so that evil doers can makeith evil so that good will come.

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         earnestshubposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         thanks Sandra. I know of 15 versions of that as with most of the contentious bits of the bible, everyone has a differing view.

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   Merlin Fraserposted 13 years ago

   Do you ever feel that you are trying to push water up hill ?
   
   No matter how thoughtful or logical your point of view may be those that have a closed mind set will merely push it to one side.
   
   I find that those who chose to believe in a God, doesn’t really matter which one, really need that belief to make their life complete.  Why is frankly beyond me because to my way of thinking it is a way of divorcing the mind away from free thought .  It is a crutch on which they rely yet they use it to beat the rest of us free thinkers with at every conceivable opportunity accusing us of having a closed mind.
   
   An accusation I find insulting since it is their mind that is closed not mine.   I value each day I learn something new, since childhood I have looked on in wonder at each stumbling step mankind has made to discover who we are and where we came from and look upon it as an never ending journey of discovery.
   
   I feel a little sad and sorry for those whose mind set is to deny every new discovery as an affront to this God of theirs whatever that discovery might be, be it plate tectonics so powerful it can move continents or the findings of Charles Darwin.
   
   As hard as they try to prove the existence of this God each step we manage to take for ourselves seems only to help prove that God was invented by man as a means of controlling the mind of the mass population.
   
   The arguments I see within this Forum where some would like to separate religion from God is a puerile argument.   They are inseparable when looked at with a logical mind, one cannot exist without the other, organised religion is a power thing always was and the creation of God or gods was the means of exercising that control.  “Do as God tells me to tell you or suffer the consequences,” has a familiar ring to it throughout history and goes on to this day.
   
   Today’s society tolerates the religious because of habit, tell the world you do good things because God speaks to you and tells you to do good things, people around you will smile and cross to the other side of the street.
   
   Kill someone because God commanded you to do so and the same people will lock you away in a rubber room with the rest of the lunatics.....
   
   I have no desire to challenge or change anyone’s beliefs, you want God to be real fine, you want to think the universe was farted out of the great white space goat... that’s fine as well.
    
   All I ask is that if you want these debates to continue in a more or less friendly way stop ducking and diving all over the place, changing Biblical facts and quotes to suit whatever point you are trying to make. It is annoying and pointless and serves no useful purpose.   
   
   PS   Just for the record I am not an Atheist, Read my Hubs, I'm a Pagan. (Which, by the way is not a religion as some idiots would like you to believe. It's a way of life).

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