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From: bch@unc.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: A burden both ways
Message-ID: <5352@unc.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 10-Jun-83 13:24:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: unc.5352
Posted: Fri Jun 10 13:24:52 1983
Date-Received: Sat, 11-Jun-83 12:24:17 EDT
References: qubix.310
Lines: 38

Despite Larry Bickford's extensive apologetic, I am left with the following:

(1) The only descriptions of the Crucifixion and Resurrection are in the
    New Testament.

(2) None of these descriptions are actually first hand.  All are heresay
    and, as such, are inadmissable by legal standards.

(3) The New Testament is not an unbiased account of historical events, but
    is a set of documents selected specifically to promote a specific
    set of beliefs.  Much of it was written decades after the events it
    purports to describe -- not only heresay, but *reconstructed* heresay.

(4) There are no other parallel historical documents describing the set
    of events the New Testament purports to describe.  While this may be
    understandable, this does not alter the fact that they still don't
    exist.

(5) The use of evidence of the same "quality" as that which describes
    other unprovable historical events does not prove the Resurrection --
    it only affords the Resurrection the same degree of unprovability
    as the other events.

In other words I find the fact of the Resurrection to be unsubstantiated.

------

So What!  I sincerely hope that the structure of Christianity will not crumble
on the basis of whether or not the Resurrection took place.   The body of
thought, ethic, morality etc. that has come to compose the best of Christian
thought will last whether or not a few events took place or not.  The
teachings that we have exist whether they were taught by Jesus in Galilee
or by some writer centuries later.  Their validity and importance stand
apart from their roots.  I have no problem believing what I believe on the
basis of faith alone, and no fear of saying that my beliefs are on the
basis of faith and not provable.  Do you?

			Byron