Trump and racism

[carpedm9587]

So are you saying that there is not adequate evidence to substantiate that Trump is a racist?

No - I believe there is more than adequate evidence to support this claim.

And isn't that same as saying that he's not a racist? Occam's Razor and all that...

See the previous answer...

[carpedm9587]

The works of Josephus document the goings on in Jerusalem in reasonable detail, especially in the 66-73AD war. From his descriptions of the various factions and their actions it is obvious that the vast majority of Jerusalemites weren't Christians. He discusses dozens of different factions and their activities and there are only 2 mentions of Christians in the entire works. Jesus gets a mention as (one of many) self-proclaimed prophets, and James the brother of Jesus gets a mention when he gets executed by the governor. It's about 2-5 sentences (some are believed to be later insertions by Christian copyists) in works that are hundreds of pages long on the subject. If the majority of Jerusalem (or even a large minority) had become Christians it would get orders of magnitude more coverage in the course of the books.

I am far separated from modern historical investigation. I guess I need to get caught up.

[Mountain Man]

Given the vast majority of people in Jerusalem at the time were not convinced the resurrection happened, it is amusing that people in the present day are supposed to believe it based on much more tenuous 2nd-hand evidence (Gospel writings written long after, not by eyewitnesses) than the people at the time had (who could actually go talk to as many 'eyewitnesses' as they wanted). I guess the Jerusalemites were just too rigorous in their skepticism and excessive demands for evidence! Whereas we should obviously be much more credulous and gullible about believing the teachings of a cult than the people of the time were, it's only reasonable!

And you wonder why we laugh at you whenever you claim to be an expert on Christian history.

There were a substantial number of people who did believe, and the Christian movement gained such momentum and was having such a significant influence on the population that Jewish leaders, and later Rome itself, attempted to forcefully stamp out Christianity without success.

As for the gospels, Matthew and John were written by the hands of eyewitnesses, Mark is known to have been a traveling companion and interpreter for Peter and so recorded Peter's firsthand testimony, and Luke has been praised as a first-rate historian who carefully researched his account and recorded the direct testimony of eyewitnesses. With the possible exception of John, the gospels were written prior to the destruction of the Jewish temple in 70AD, but they existed from the beginning as oral tradition (and possibly as preliminary writings) with the earliest version of the Resurrection account recorded in 1 Corinthians 15 being traced back to within months of the Resurrection itself.

To claim that the evidence available to the people at the time was weak and that nobody believed it is hilariously ignorant.

[Mountain Man]

No - I believe there is more than adequate evidence to support this claim.

I don't suppose you realize what a ball of contradictions you are.

[One Bad Pig]

Because that is pretty much the universal position of the right. It doesn't really matter what evidence is presented, it is simply discounted as "not evidence." For the right, Trump is the quintessential Teflon politician - nothing sticks. We have a huge body of evidence that Trump is enriching himself by virtue of his office, that Trump has racist inclinations, that he is dishonest and defends it as "OK," and that he has significant personality flaws - but it is all waved away because the right likes his policies.

The message is clear: I"m exaggerating like all get out, and if you disbelieve, I'll exaggerate even more!

Fixed that for you. I'm waving away your weak sauce because it is weak sauce, not because I'm happy with Trump's shenanigans. I wish he'd mostly shut up and quit self-inflicting wounds. He is most certainly not okay - but the alternative is worse. You'd have to dig deep to find a president who actually embodied conservative Christian values; we live with "deeply flawed" because better is unobtanium.

[Starlight]

I am far separated from modern historical investigation. I guess I need to get caught up.

Josephus' works are hardly new. But as a first century Jew who wrote multiple works about the politics and religion of first century Judea and particularly his personal involvement therein, we get a pretty clear picture of the shape of things from his writings.

From my own readings of his writings and other ancient sources I would feel reasonably safe at ball-parking the amount of Christians in Jerusalem in the mid-1st century at around 1% of Jerusalem's population with a margin of error of an order of magnitude either way (i.e. 0.1% to 10% of total population).

I am not familiar with any scholarly estimates on the subject...

...however googling it as I write this, the best online source appears to be How many Jews became Christians in the first century? which seems to be a paper from a researcher at a Catholic university and it cites and discusses various scholarly estimates and concludes:

Throughout the first century the total number of Jews in the Christian movement probably never exceeded 1 000

Given mid-century Jerusalem had a population of around 600k, that would put the Christians at 0.1-0.2% of total population, around the lowest end of my own estimates (and his carefully considered estimate should probably be considered a lot more reliable than my own ballpark figures).

In any case, the proportion of Jews in Jerusalem that the first generation of Christians managed to convince with their testimonies about resurrection appearances appears to be very small, to the point of being almost zero. Given the above numbers we are probably reasonable in taking Paul's reference in 1 Cor of the resurrected Jesus being seen by 500 people as providing us with the number of people in the entire Christian population of Jerusalem at that time. If the Christian population subsequently grew to <1000 people in Jerusalem by mid-century, that implies that first generation of 500 'eyewitnesses' to the resurrection were on average able to convince between zero and one fellow citizen each of their testimony (assuming they made any such claims, because we only have it second-hand from Paul that they did). So on the whole they don't seem to have been hugely believed.

And you wonder why we laugh at you whenever you claim to be an expert on Christian history.

When you write tripe like the rest of your post, I don't wonder, I just laugh at your ignorance.

[carpedm9587]

I don't suppose you realize what a ball of contradictions you are.

Sure I do.

But mostly about my marriage

[carpedm9587]

Fixed that for you. I'm waving away your weak sauce because it is weak sauce, not because I'm happy with Trump's shenanigans. I wish he'd mostly shut up and quit self-inflicting wounds. He is most certainly not okay - but the alternative is worse. You'd have to dig deep to find a president who actually embodied conservative Christian values; we live with "deeply flawed" because better is unobtanium.

I've always thought the "IFTFY" thing was a little adolescent. Putting up a "quote" that is actually doctored is a bit dishonest, IMO. So for those reading, that last line was not actually what I said.

As for the alternative, I believe Republicans made that decision when they chose Trump out of the Republican primary line-up, so claiming he was "better than the alternative" is more than a little disingenuous. The evangelical right lined up behind Trump long before he confronted Clinton.

[Tassman]

You mean there is secret footage of the resurrection that Jesus won't release?

Indeed! The computer-generated imagery of the day was surprisingly good, it almost looks real

[Tassman]

Fixed that for you. I'm waving away your weak sauce because it is weak sauce, not because I'm happy with Trump's shenanigans. I wish he'd mostly shut up and quit self-inflicting wounds. He is most certainly not okay - but the alternative is worse. You'd have to dig deep to find a president who actually embodied conservative Christian values; we live with "deeply flawed" because better is unobtanium.

[Terraceth]

As for the alternative, I believe Republicans made that decision when they chose Trump out of the Republican primary line-up, so claiming he was "better than the alternative" is more than a little disingenuous. The evangelical right lined up behind Trump long before he confronted Clinton.

Actually, Ted Cruz was the favored choice among white evangelicals. It wasn't until after Trump won the primary that they "lined up behind" him.

[Starlight]

the best online source appears to be How many Jews became Christians in the first century? which seems to be a paper from a researcher at a Catholic university and it cites and discusses various scholarly estimates and concludes:

Now featuring new and improved actual working link to that paper for bonus accessibility value.

(Also I see the estimations he cites on the total population of Jerusalem are an order of magnitude lower that what I'd seen elsewhere, putting his estimated percentage of Jerusalemites who were Christians pretty close to the 1% that was my own approximate estimate.)

[carpedm9587]

Actually, Ted Cruz was the favored choice among white evangelicals. It wasn't until after Trump won the primary that they "lined up behind" him.

Your article makes Cruz favored by a 3% margin, Terra, and the article is dated a month before Cruz drops out. Indeed, given the margin between Cruz and Trump, it could be argued that the 38% support that went to Trump was enough to give him the edge over Cruz.

[Terraceth]

Your article makes Cruz favored by a 3% margin, Terra, and the article is dated a month before Cruz drops out. Indeed, given the margin between Cruz and Trump, it could be argued that the 38% support that went to Trump was enough to give him the edge over Cruz.

I'm not sure why it being dated a month before Cruz drops out matters. At any rate, as noted, the margin was the much larger 16% among the regular churchgoing white evangelicals which are more the group in question. So again, this claim that Trump was the choice of the evangelicals doesn't add up.

Are you sure the "nonsense" you refer to isn't your own post? As noted, Trump was not the one chosen by evangelicals; had it been up to the evangelical vote, Ted Cruz would have been the candidate. As for the claim they chose Trump over the rest of the candidates because of this pandering... well, as noted, the underlying assumption is false, but even if it were true, the claim still seems wrong. As far as I can remember, Trump barely even mentioned "LGBT rights" (certainly less so than Ted Cruz) and while he was opposed to abortion, I don't recall him being any stronger on that issue than the other candidates.

[Mountain Man]

Josephus' works are hardly new. But as a first century Jew who wrote multiple works about the politics and religion of first century Judea and particularly his personal involvement therein, we get a pretty clear picture of the shape of things from his writings.

From my own readings of his writings and other ancient sources I would feel reasonably safe at ball-parking the amount of Christians in Jerusalem in the mid-1st century at around 1% of Jerusalem's population with a margin of error of an order of magnitude either way (i.e. 0.1% to 10% of total population).

I am not familiar with any scholarly estimates on the subject...

...however googling it as I write this, the best online source appears to be How many Jews became Christians in the first century? which seems to be a paper from a researcher at a Catholic university and it cites and discusses various scholarly estimates and concludes:

Throughout the first century the total number of Jews in the Christian movement probably never exceeded 1 000

Given mid-century Jerusalem had a population of around 600k, that would put the Christians at 0.1-0.2% of total population, around the lowest end of my own estimates (and his carefully considered estimate should probably be considered a lot more reliable than my own ballpark figures).

In any case, the proportion of Jews in Jerusalem that the first generation of Christians managed to convince with their testimonies about resurrection appearances appears to be very small, to the point of being almost zero. Given the above numbers we are probably reasonable in taking Paul's reference in 1 Cor of the resurrected Jesus being seen by 500 people as providing us with the number of people in the entire Christian population of Jerusalem at that time. If the Christian population subsequently grew to <1000 people in Jerusalem by mid-century, that implies that first generation of 500 'eyewitnesses' to the resurrection were on average able to convince between zero and one fellow citizen each of their testimony (assuming they made any such claims, because we only have it second-hand from Paul that they did). So on the whole they don't seem to have been hugely believed.


When you write tripe like the rest of your post, I don't wonder, I just laugh at your ignorance.

And yet Christianity thrived and grew and spread to become a dominant world religion within a relatively short period of time, and this despite intense political and religious persecution. Not bad for a religion that "nobody" believed.

And I'm not sure where you're getting your numbers because Acts 4 records that following Peter's testimony, there were 5000 Christian men in addition to women and children, so that figure can conservatively be doubled, and there's no reason to think that the spread of Christianity suddenly stopped after that.