New blog

By Weekend Fisher -
A new blog may be of interest to some in the on-line Christian community:

Heart, Mind, Soul, and Strength is a blog which I'll be writing, covering topics ranging from apologetics to Zen. Most of the content will be outside of the normal editorial content of this blog, hence the new blog. Drop by and give it a read. The site is still under construction; links to my favorite sites around the blogosphere will be coming shortly.

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Ignatius' Reliance on Paul's Letter to the Ephesians And More

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In an earlier post , I responded to the arguments of an online skeptic -- Quixie -- that 1 Clement showed awareness of none of Paul’s letters. He has since conceded that his analysis was greatly flawed and that the author of 1 Clement at least knew 1 Corinthians. Indeed, his “analysis” of 1 Clement can be fairly described as a massive failure of analysis because he simply ignored several of 1 Clement’s chapters. Nevertheless, Quixie appears to still claim that Ignatius lacked any knowledge of Paul’s letters except possibly a few allusions to the “opening” of 1 Corinthians. As an initial matter, Quixie does not explain why Ignatius’ awareness of at least part of one of Paul’s letters is insufficient to sink the “Dutch Radical” ideas with which he is enamored. If Ignatius is clearly dependent on the “opening” of 1 Corinthians -- whether by allusion or quotation -- does that not mean that Paul is a historical figure and at least one or more of his letters took a prominent place in...
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The Banana: Proof of Atheism!

By J. P Holding -
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I'm kind of busy this week, so I asked our recurring fundy atheist punching bag, I. M. Skeptical, to write me a post about the best argument for atheism he could come up with. Here's what he gave me. ** There was once a slimy, snotty Christian apologist who made the argument that the banana is an “atheist’s worst nightmare” because it has so many great design features. I used to love that argument when I was a stupid, blind fundy, and now as an intellectually fulfilled atheist I think it is really stupid ! In fact, I want to argue now that if anything, the banana proves that God does not exist, or that if he does, he is evil, malevolent, and really snotty! Here’s why: The banana has a slippery peel which can be thrown on the ground, causing innocent people to slip and fall. The banana has been used for endless, cruel practical jokes (especially on me, and I have the bruises on my butt to prove it!) and this would only be a feature designed by a m...
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The early Christians Did not believe in adoptionism

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Pixie said: "The early Christians believed Jesus was adopted as God's son, not born that way (though Paul believed that happened at the resurrection). His childhood was relatively normal, born to two Jewish parents, the oldest of four brothers and some sisters too." [1] There is no historical basis for that belief.There is no document that says  this.  Adiptionism arises in the second century there is no recognized bastion of that view in the first century. [2] The only basis anyone has is gained by interpreting passages in Mark and written by Paul to seem to take an adoptionist view. [3] Of course they have to ignore the testimony of the church in all it's many facets. It is not hard to imagine that before the creeds and the controversies that shaped Trinitarian doctrine the average Christian probably did understand something like an adotionist view. That does not mean that the Gospel of Mark  or Paul taught this view. There is no passage in Mar...
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Why Christian Theism Is Almost Certainly True: A Reply to Cale Nearing

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Resurrection harmony

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The purpose of this argument is merely to establish that the events described in the four canonical Gospel resurrection accounts can be construed as a coherent event. Atheists are always harping on the many differences in the accounts. They seem to feel that these amount to insurmountable contradictions, marking a totally contradictory story. But I will argue that we can pull together the events described in all four Gospels to create a unified harmony which shows that there was a single coherent event taking place.This may not mean that call differences vanish away, but most of them can be explained by the process of eye witness testimony and story telling based upon the accounts of eye witnesses. There may be a couple of loose ends, but I will argue that these are not important when one considers the over all agreement and ensuing harmony, (for harmony table click here) * my model: (1) women go to tomb find stone moved, immediately  they suspect the Romans or Sa...
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How Many Children in Bethlehem Did Herod Kill?

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On the Prior Probability of the Resurrection

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Did Mark Invent the Empty Tomb?

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Jesus in the Talmud part 1

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  As with many pieces on my sight it's written to be more like debate briefs than an essay. But don't let that get in the way,  It's a series of quotations with explains about why I'm using them. Jews self censored the Talmud to remove mentions of Jesus, thus modern Jews deny that it is talking about him, while ancient rabbis used examples supposedly speaking of him for centuries. But what cannot be denied is that the Talmud gives evidence of Christians believing in Jesus as a flesh and blood rabbi from the late first century, which contradicts the Jesus myth theory. There is a history of the Talmud The Babylonian Talmud translated by MICHAEL L. RODKINSON Book 10 (Vols. I and II) [1918] The History of the Talmud from Vol I chapter II Thus the study of the Talmud flourished after the destruction of the Temple, although beset with great difficulties and desperate struggles. All his days, R. Johanan b. Zakkai was obliged to dispute with Sadducee and Bathu...
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The Bogus Gandhi Quote

By J. P Holding -
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I first made this post in 2012, and since then I've made a sort of mini-career out of tracking down bogus quotes like this one (including a video version below). It's a sort of fun microcosm of the way information is mishandled in the Information Age. ** I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ. – Mahatma Gandhi A Christian can probably expect to get this quote thrown at them at least once in their lifetime, and waved in their face many more. I had it put to me recently, but my experience with this sort of thing immediately led me to wonder -- is it real? The evidence at this point seems to be no. The first signal of a problem was that anywhere I found it, no source was given. That's often a sign that something is being passed around uncritically. Whether online sources or books, no one seemed to have a source for this quote. A second warning was that the quote has been given more than one context. As ...
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