The Evidence Skeptics would like to see for the Resurrection Claim

[Gary]

Can you state their reason for doing so, other than an anti-supernatural bias?



Christ performed miracles so that the jews could see that He was who said He was, and therefore to believe His claims when He told them a new message to be believed. Like many things God does, this was supererogabutory, more than what was needed, but simple done out of the excess of the goodness of His heart. They were also done by Christ out of obedience, so that even the tiniest prophecy about Him could be fulfilled. These were considered to be signs of Christ's divinity, in turn with being kind acts.

Likewise God has compassion on those who suffer, and so again, in some cases He allows healings to occur that would not have occured on their own. However no one deserves to be healed, largely the state of the body is almost without importance to God, since its going to waste away anyway and all that really matters is the state of soul in any given moment, and at the moment of death. Those are the only two important moments in a persons life.

In some sense, being poor, sick and handicapped could be a blessing, if it left you virtues of humility and a devotion to God, whereas having been talented, healthy and rich would have been a life of debauchery. O miserable happiness, o joyful unhappiness, as one canticle writes it I remember. I'd rather die having suffered for seven years if it saved me, than life fourty years as an emperor if I became damned.



That is a good question. I could offer you some plausible reasons, but I don't have to. Not having the answer to that question is not a problem.



I tend to find the magnificat praise of God from the Virgin Mary to be the best explanation for this.

"My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has regarded the low estate of his handmaiden.
For behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed;
49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 And his mercy is on those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm,
he has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts,
52 he has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and exalted those of low degree;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent empty away.

"Can you state their reason for doing so, other than an anti-supernatural bias"

Lack of evidence.

[Leonhard]

"Can you state their reason for doing so, other than an anti-supernatural bias"

Lack of evidence.

You didn't have to wrap a quote tag around my entire post in order to answer this part.

Now, can you care to cite them [the Jesus Seminar] on this? Crossan holds a view of miracles that preclude them from ever being considered, I don't think I've ever seen him way in on the evidence regarding miracles, he simple dismisses the reality of them, and considers alternative accounts of Christ instead.

[Leonhard]

[One Bad Pig]

Historical scholars do not evaluate miracle claims, therefore, there is no such thing as a "scholar" when it comes to miracles.

If nothing else, reading historical scholars would enable you to make up more plausible sounding stories. Right now, they're painfully misinformed.

Experts in science and medicine can evaluate if prayer is an effective treatment for terminal cancer, Parkinsons, epilepsy, leprosy, amputations, and death. To date, no such nationally recognized scientific or medical group has confirmed prayer as an effective treatment for these conditions. I fully agree that these expert panels are not going to comment on whether or not ANY miracles occur as that is a theological question.

Almost no one argues for prayer as an alternative treatment for anything. As you've been told many times before, historically Christians have turned to prayer alongside consultation with physicians. It would be nice if you stopped erecting strawmen to immolate, but it seems that then you wouldn't have an argument at all.

I could also point out, a la Adrift, that expert panels do not confirm the alternative treatments you prescribe either. I anticipate your usual bluster in response which in no way deals with the charge he makes, if you respond at all.

[Gary]

Can you state their reason for doing so, other than an anti-supernatural bias?



Christ performed miracles so that the jews could see that He was who said He was, and therefore to believe His claims when He told them a new message to be believed. Like many things God does, this was supererogabutory, more than what was needed, but simple done out of the excess of the goodness of His heart. They were also done by Christ out of obedience, so that even the tiniest prophecy about Him could be fulfilled. These were considered to be signs of Christ's divinity, in turn with being kind acts.

Likewise God has compassion on those who suffer, and so again, in some cases He allows healings to occur that would not have occured on their own. However no one deserves to be healed, largely the state of the body is almost without importance to God, since its going to waste away anyway and all that really matters is the state of soul in any given moment, and at the moment of death. Those are the only two important moments in a persons life.

In some sense, being poor, sick and handicapped could be a blessing, if it left you virtues of humility and a devotion to God, whereas having been talented, healthy and rich would have been a life of debauchery. O miserable happiness, o joyful unhappiness, as one canticle writes it I remember. I'd rather die having suffered for seven years if it saved me, than life fourty years as an emperor if I became damned.



That is a good question. I could offer you some plausible reasons, but I don't have to. Not having the answer to that question is not a problem.



I tend to find the magnificat praise of God from the Virgin Mary to be the best explanation for this.

"My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has regarded the low estate of his handmaiden.
For behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed;
49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 And his mercy is on those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm,
he has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts,
52 he has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and exalted those of low degree;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent empty away.

When I responded to this post this morning, I was running out the door to my son's Little League game. That is why my response was brief.

It is certainly possible that the reason why Jesus only answers a very few of the prayer requests for healing that are offered up to him every day is because he has "good" reasons for doing so; the good ol', "Gods ways are not our ways" excuse. But I ask Christians to also entertain the possibility that the reason prayer requests for dramatic healings are rarely answered is because the "healings" that do occur shortly after prayer are a coincidence. If every time a Christian is seriously ill and prayers are made for healing, that Christian recovers, the effectiveness of prayer must be strongly considered. But if healings after prayer only occur once in a great while, Christians should see and admit that "coincidence" should be high on their list of probabilities.

[Gary]

If nothing else, reading historical scholars would enable you to make up more plausible sounding stories. Right now, they're painfully misinformed.

Almost no one argues for prayer as an alternative treatment for anything. As you've been told many times before, historically Christians have turned to prayer alongside consultation with physicians. It would be nice if you stopped erecting strawmen to immolate, but it seems that then you wouldn't have an argument at all.

I could also point out, a la Adrift, that expert panels do not confirm the alternative treatments you prescribe either. I anticipate your usual bluster in response which in no way deals with the charge he makes, if you respond at all.

If prayers for healings are only answered once someone has seen the doctor and been prescribed medical treatment, why give the honor of the cure to prayer and not to the doctor??

The problem for your side is this: Western medicine and science has never confirmed the existence of the supernatural or confirmed the veracity of one single miracle claim. Not one. You can make up all the excuses you want but your miracle claims have no more validity in the eyes of most scientists and medical researchers than a witch doctor's claims that his incantations to an idol can cure disease. Both belief systems are superstitious ignorance and must be exposed as such.

[Leonhard]

When I responded to this post this morning, I was running out the door to my son's Little League game. That is why my response was brief.

I hope you two had a good game. I'm a nitpicker with formatting.

It is certainly possible that the reason why Jesus only answers a very few of the prayer requests for healing that are offered up to him every day is because he has "good" reasons for doing so; the good ol', "Gods ways are not our ways" excuse. But I ask Christians to also entertain the possibility that the reason prayer requests for dramatic healings are rarely answered is because the "healings" that do occur shortly after prayer are a coincidence. If every time a Christian is seriously ill and prayers are made for healing, that Christian recovers, the effectiveness of prayer must be strongly considered. But if healings after prayer only occur once in a great while, Christians should see and admit that "coincidence" should be high on their list of probabilities.

I'm usually pretty dubious about miracle claims. That's the way they should be treated. The Catholic Church itself, beyond the dogmatic statements of the faith, such as Christ's resurection, binds no one to believe anything regarding any purported miracles. At times various miracle claims have been investigated because have drawn a cult following, and the phenomenon is at most deemed 'worthy of belief', meaning the Catholic Church could find no sign of fraud or natural explanation, nor find anything illicit or bad by the piety of those drawn to it. This is true even for the miracles used for the canonization of sainthood. It remains agnostic on whether they occur, and many of the Church Fathers go so far as to warn people of seeking after them, because it is easy to be decieved.

So this concern is much shared.

Its a classical pious tradition that eucharistic miracles, where the host turns bloody or even into flesh usually, or only, occurs because the priest and congregation has started to lose faith in the presence of God after consecration. In other words, if a miracle occurs its because something is wrong.

[Leonhard]

If prayers for healings are only answered once someone has seen the doctor and been prescribed medical treatment, why give the honor of the cure to prayer and not to the doctor??

I don't think this is difficult at all. First of all because we don't really understand how God interacts with the world at all, secondly because His acting is timeless. Everything that happens, happens according to a plan that takes all of eternity in account. So there is not a single thing unfolding that isn't part of God's plan, set up in infinite provision. If anything happens to you, good or bad, its within God's permissive will, and He allows all of it to befall someone for that persons ultimate good.

So we can always thank God. Read Job to see how that works out. "The Lord gave, the Lord took, the Lord's name be praised"

If someone is cured by a doctor, we should thank the doctor, because he was a proximate cause of what happened. He took part in that good work. But the only way the doctor could have done that, is by having all the gifts and ability God bestowed on him, and living in a world with such possibilities, and a situation, that God has provided, and sustains, and allowed, and is ultimately the cause of, so there's no reason not to thank God.

I think the only thing we can't thank God for is our own sin and evil.

The problem for your side is this: Western medicine and science has never confirmed the existence of the supernatural or confirmed the veracity of one single miracle claim. Not one.

There's quite a few miraculous healings that are well documented. Basically people with terminal inoperable cancer, going to a place like Lourdes, bathing in the blessed waters, and then finding that they've been completely healed with not a trace of the cancer left, nor any remission, without any subsequent cancer treatment. There's not really any dispute about the existence of medical cases like these, but natural scientist will just look at this, conclude that they have no clue what happened and simple mark it down as 'spontanious remission'. I'm not sure what else they're supposed to do, as their studies are limited to the behaviour of natural systems. At most they can conclude that something beyond the ordinary happened here.

[Gary]

I don't think this is difficult at all. First of all because we don't really understand how God interacts with the world at all, secondly because His acting is timeless. Everything that happens, happens according to a plan that takes all of eternity in account. So there is not a single thing unfolding that isn't part of God's plan, set up in infinite provision. If anything happens to you, good or bad, its within God's permissive will, and He allows all of it to befall someone for that persons ultimate good.

So we can always thank God. Read Job to see how that works out. "The Lord gave, the Lord took, the Lord's name be praised"

If someone is cured by a doctor, we should thank the doctor, because he was a proximate cause of what happened. He took part in that good work. But the only way the doctor could have done that, is by having all the gifts and ability God bestowed on him, and living in a world with such possibilities, and a situation, that God has provided, and sustains, and allowed, and is ultimately the cause of, so there's no reason not to thank God.

I think the only thing we can't thank God for is our own sin and evil.



There's quite a few miraculous healings that are well documented. Basically people with terminal inoperable cancer, going to a place like Lourdes, bathing in the blessed waters, and then finding that they've been completely healed with not a trace of the cancer left, nor any remission, without any subsequent cancer treatment. There's not really any dispute about the existence of medical cases like these, but natural scientist will just look at this, conclude that they have no clue what happened and simple mark it down as 'spontanious remission'. I'm not sure what else they're supposed to do, as their studies are limited to the behaviour of natural systems. At most they can conclude that something beyond the ordinary happened here.

As I said, medicine and science have never confirmed the existence of the supernatural or confirmed the veracity of one single miracle claim. That isn't to say that Christians don't have any good cases for miracle claims. I have seen many cases that certainly sound miraculous, but I haven't seen one for which a natural explanation is impossible. Therefore until the reality of the supernatural is proven, I choose to ignore it's possible existence.

I admit that I and other skeptics come to miracle claims with the bias that their existence is highly improbable and not worth our consideration due to the fact that western medicine and science have never confirmed the existence of supernatural beings and powers. I believe Christians come to miracle claims with the bias that supernatural powers definitely do exist, specifically, God (Yahweh/Jesus/the Trinitarian God) exists, and therefore the probability of an all-knowing, all-powerful God performing miracles is very high.

But when Christians are asked to provide proof for a miracle-producing Yahweh/Jesus, they point to past miracles in the Bible including the Resurrection and current miracles. But this is Begging the Question. I don't think that Christians can prove the existence of a miracle-producing God without assuming the reality of current miracles; miracles for which modern medicine and science find no convincing evidence to declare their existence as fact.

Isn't that a pretty tenuous foundation for your belief system?

Would it be better to simply state that your Faith's supernatural claims must be believed by faith, not evidence?

[37818]

Scientific studies on prayer and healing have been done. The following link is one report: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2802370/


A Christian perspective:
http://www.equip.org/article/the-pro...ayer-research/

[One Bad Pig]

If prayers for healings are only answered once someone has seen the doctor and been prescribed medical treatment, why give the honor of the cure to prayer and not to the doctor??

They aren't. Next?

The problem for your side is this: Western medicine and science has never confirmed the existence of the supernatural or confirmed the veracity of one single miracle claim. Not one. You can make up all the excuses you want but your miracle claims have no more validity in the eyes of most scientists and medical researchers than a witch doctor's claims that his incantations to an idol can cure disease. Both belief systems are superstitious ignorance and must be exposed as such.

This is false. Many doctors have confirmed miraculous healings. Miracles are often ruled out due to a priori philosophical beliefs - to the point where misdiagnosis by several doctors will be posited in order to avoid giving credence to a miracle.

And as expected, you ignored the reference your own hypocrisy.

[Gary]

They aren't. Next?

This is false. Many doctors have confirmed miraculous healings. Miracles are often ruled out due to a priori philosophical beliefs - to the point where misdiagnosis by several doctors will be posited in order to avoid giving credence to a miracle.

And as expected, you ignored the reference your own hypocrisy.

I said, "western medicine and science", I didn't say the opinion of a few Pentecostal doctors.

Yes. "Western medicine and science is involved in a huge conspiracy to deny the reality of miracles because they hate religion."

Typical right-wing fundy paranoia.

Dear Readers: How often does it turn out that the conspiracy theorists are right? Answer: rarely ever. Trust western medicine and science. Abandon ancient superstitions.

[One Bad Pig]

I said, "western medicine and science", I didn't say the opinion of a few Pentecostal doctors.

Your reading comprehension is not so good. Where did Mr. Keener identify any of them as Pentecostal?

Yes. "Western medicine and science is involved in a huge conspiracy to deny the reality of miracles because they hate religion."

Typical right-wing fundy paranoia.

Typical straw man you've constructed, you mean.

Dear Readers: How often does it turn out that the conspiracy theorists are right? Answer: rarely ever. Trust western medicine and science. Abandon ancient superstitions.

Dear readers: Who is referencing conspiracy theorists?

And your continued avoidance of Adrift's accusations of hypocrisy is noted. Good luck if you think this is going to go away without you addressing it at some point.

[Gary]

Your reading comprehension is not so good. Where did Mr. Keener identify any of them as Pentecostal?

Typical straw man you've constructed, you mean.

Dear readers: Who is referencing conspiracy theorists?

And your continued avoidance of Adrift's accusations of hypocrisy is noted. Good luck if you think this is going to go away without you addressing it at some point.

Seriously, folks. If Jesus really loved the entire world he would have done everything possible to make sure that every human being on the planet knows that he is alive and well and that he is the all-mighty Ruler of the Universe. He would clearly tell each one of us, in person, that he loves us but we must believe in him as our Lord to avoid eternal punishment.

But he didn't do that, did he? He came to earth in secret; preached his life and death message in riddles; never performed indisputable miracles in front of notable skeptics such as a king, governor, or high priest; and then allegedly performed the greatest miracle in history---a resurrection---but only appeared afterwards to his followers in secret locations and to one bipolar rabbi on a dark, desert highway.

Wake up, folks. This is a tall tale from the ancient Middle East. Educated people should not believe this story and definitely should not base their entire lives upon it.

[37818]

Seriously, folks. If Jesus really loved the entire world he would have done everything possible to make sure that every human being on the planet knows that he is alive and well and that he is the all-mighty Ruler of the Universe. He would clearly tell each one of us, in person, that he loves us but we must believe in him as our Lord to avoid eternal punishment.

But he didn't do that, did he? He came to earth in secret; preached his life and death message in riddles; never performed indisputable miracles in front of notable skeptics such as a king, governor, or high priest; and then allegedly performed the greatest miracle in history---a resurrection---but only appeared afterwards to his followers in secret locations and to one bipolar rabbi on a dark, desert highway.

Wake up, folks. This is a tall tale from the ancient Middle East. Educated people should not believe this story and definitely should not base their entire lives upon it.

Well it was argued that if someone did come back from the dead - those who do not believe the holy scriptures still would not be persuaded (Luke 16:31). Jesus argued that is why some Jews of His day did not believe His words (John 5:46). Jesus even made the claim those who are of truth would hear/accept what He said (John 18:37).