There is a war over words happening out there. iPhone and Android apps are being used to buttress their points of view when debating the God vs no God topic. If you believe God is all-powerful, and all-knowing, and you want to defend your claim, then there is an app for that. If you know for sure God is imaginary, then you have apps to back you up.
Well, I will note only that, if your god does exist, he doesn't think getting people to realize the fact is important enough to warrant an appearance. No, two thousand years ago, assuming that wasn't made up, doesn't count. If he's hiding, he doesn't object to people thinking he's not there.
ReplyDeleteConcerning your unbelief...there is an App for that. Why doesn't two thousand years count for an appearance of God? Several eyewitness testimonies, plus notable miracles are a couple proofs that come to my mind.
ReplyDeleteLet's just say that, if I go twenty years without addressing some particular concern, then it probably means that concern is not a high priority for me. Your deity, if he exists, has gone nearly two thousand years without addressing the issue of people believing he exists or not. It is evidently not a pressing concern for him. Clearly, he just doesn't care.
ReplyDeleteAt any rate, we don't have eyewitness testimonies, even from that time. We have the writings of anonymous authors. I don't question that the people who wrote the gospels existed, even if there is no way of knowing who they were. But it is highly unlikely that any of them were witness to the birth of Jesus.
: ) Luke may or may not be the author of the gospel called Luke. I think he is the best candidate to answer the question of authorship.
ReplyDeleteThe author of Luke states that he makes a careful investigation of the birth of Jesus. I would imagine that he interviewed relatives of Jesus, neighbors, and followers. I think it is important to think about luke's gospel in this way, because it leads one to think Luke carefully recorded facts, and evidences concerning Jesus. Another words, I don't get the impression when reading the book of Luke, that the author is titillating the reader with myths or embellished stories.
The LA Times in early 1995, reported an expert had reevaluated some papyrus fragments of the Gospel of Matthew and dated them to the 1rst century. If hard artifacts verify the dating of Matthew’s Gospel as far back as A.D. 60, these artifacts would destroy the foundation of liberal higher criticism. Since some of these same scholars argue that Mark wrote the first Gospel, this discovery would push the composition of Mark to within 20 years, at most, of the events his Gospel describes. Taken together, the synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) and Luke’s second volume, Acts, would give us a record of the events of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection indisputably written within the lifetimes of those who were eyewitnesses and who, therefore, could have disputed any untrue assertions.