Gary & Rhinestone's Thread on Burial and Resurrection of Christ

[Adrift]

I am curious how Dr. Craig is able to read the minds of Roman military commanders living twenty centuries ago to conclude that they did not see Jesus as a threat.

I imagine it's a combination of reading the Bible, knowing the scholarship on the subject, reading Christian and non-Christian sources from the era, and years of formal training on the NT including under the renown scholar Wolfhart Pannenberg in Munich. Upon what authority do you make your own proclamations about what did and did not happen. Your years bumbling around between denominations as you struggled with a strict surface reading of the bible in English? That time you paid $3.95 to become a member of Erhman's blog? It certainly wasn't a formal education where you learned to prescribe potentially hazardous placebos to the naive suffering.

Let me be brutally honest here: I don't think Jesus entered Jerusalem on one or two donkeys with crowds cheering him as the liberating King of the Jews as the Gospels claim. The Romans guarding the gates of the city would have arrested him or cut him down on the spot. I think that this is pure fantasy on the part of the Gospel authors...as are claims of (holy) ghosts impregnating virgins, water-walking, resurrections, and space levitating.

Jesus lived.
Jesus was an apocalyptic preacher and pacifist.
Some people thought he performed miracles, probably no different than the "miracles" performed by Pentecostal preacher, "Pastor Billy Bob", down on Main and Broadway.
He got on the wrong side of the Jewish authorities who asked the Romans to get rid of him.
He was crucified by the Romans during the rule of Pilate.

That's all we can really know. The rest is pure speculation and guesswork.

Or you realized how weak your argument was and ran out of steam. Either way, I take it this means you concede that this is a bad argument to support your other argument that permission would not be granted for Jesus' body.

[One Bad Pig]

If there ever was an "empty tomb" why did Christians so quickly forget its location???

They didn't. We've been over this already.

[Adrift]

Dear Readers: There is NO HARD EVIDENCE for the Empty Tomb claim. This belief is only based on assumptions and inferences. Here is William Lane Craig, the most famous of all Empty Tomb defenders today:

"An examination of both Pauline and gospel material leads to eight lines of evidence in support of the conclusion that Jesus's tomb was discovered empty: (1) Paul's testimony implies the historicity of the empty tomb, (2) the presence of the empty tomb pericope in the pre-Markan passion story supports its historicity, (3) the use of 'on the first day of the week' instead of 'on the third day' points to the primitiveness of the tradition, (4) the narrative is theologically unadorned and non-apologetic, (5) the discovery of the tomb by women is highly probable, (6) the investigation of the empty tomb by the disciples is historically probable, (7) it would have been impossible for the disciples to proclaim the resurrection in Jerusalem had the tomb not been empty, (8) the Jewish polemic presupposes the empty tomb."

Read more: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-h...#ixzz48qi7wWtG

Or your imaginary readers can refer back to post #87 where most of this was already outlined.

Assumptions, assumptions, assumptions.

This seems to be your default catchphrase when you're stumped.

It's pathetic that educated, intelligent people buy this nonsense. If there ever was an "empty tomb" why did Christians so quickly forget its location???

You're not going to like the answer, because it doesn't work in your favor. WLC points out that the fact the location was not venerated like other Jewish sages is evidence of the resurrection. No need to venerate the tomb of a man who is no longer dead.

[Bill the Cat]

Dear Readers: If the story of Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem on "Palm Sunday" is fiction as the Christians here on TW are telling us,

Moderated By: Bill the Cat

Gary, that is a blatant lie. If you are posting these falsehoods on your site like this, making it seem that ONE opinion of ONE poster is indicative of the whole of us here, you will be banned. We have been accommodating of your reposting of things you have posted/been posted to while you are here, but if you misrepresent what is being said so blatantly again, you will be banned immediately. If you post this on your blog, you will be banned.

***If you wish to take issue with this notice DO NOT do so in this thread.***
Contact the forum moderator or an administrator in Private Message or email instead. If you feel you must publicly complain or whine, please take it to the Padded Room unless told otherwise.

[Gary]

I imagine it's a combination of reading the Bible, knowing the scholarship on the subject, reading Christian and non-Christian sources from the era, and years of formal training on the NT including under the renown scholar Wolfhart Pannenberg in Munich. Upon what authority do you make your own proclamations about what did and did not happen. Your years bumbling around between denominations as you struggled with a strict surface reading of the bible in English? That time you paid $3.95 to become a member of Erhman's blog? It certainly wasn't a formal education where you learned to prescribe potentially hazardous placebos to the naive suffering.



Or you realized how weak your argument was and ran out of steam. Either way, I take it this means you concede that this is a bad argument to support your other argument that permission would not be granted for Jesus' body.

No, I do not concede.

Actually I left a message for Bart Ehrman on his blog today regarding this issue. I want to see what he says about this "Treason-Lite" claim.

[Raphael]

No, I do not concede.

Actually I left a message for Bart Ehrman on his blog today regarding this issue. I want to see what he says about this "Treason-Lite" claim.

Given your shockingly bad ability at basic reading comprehension, I actually don't trust you to have accurately represented Adrift's argument to Ehrman.

[Meh Gerbil]

Gary started out here with a one-on-one debate with Apologiaphoenix. When that was over, he jumped into the comment thread with both feet and hasn't looked back.

Oh drat.
Thanks for the information nonetheless.

[Adrift]

Given your shockingly bad ability at basic reading comprehension, I actually don't trust you to have accurately represented Adrift's argument to Ehrman.

http://ehrmanblog.org/did-pontius-pi...sensitivities/

Source: Gary

Good morning, Dr. Ehrman,

I read through Craig Evans article that you refer to.
https://www.hbu.edu/news-and-events/...al-p-ractices/

© Copyright Original Source

If we're going for precision here (which is important when you're relaying back someone's argument), Gary is reading into what Evans has actually said. Not as bad as I suspected he would, but he does put words in Evans' mouth. This is precisely what Evans says on the matter (as posted several times already),



Ehrman's reply,

Source: Bart

Does he tell you the date of the Digesta?

© Copyright Original Source

A bit cryptic, and I could be wrong, but I take that as implicit acknowledgment of the different types/punishments for treason, and he's essentially doubling down on the date of the Digesta as his main argument against its use (which doesn't work for reasons previously gone over).

Nice try Gary. No cigar.

[Gary]

http://ehrmanblog.org/did-pontius-pi...sensitivities/

Source: Gary

Good morning, Dr. Ehrman,

I read through Craig Evans article that you refer to.
https://www.hbu.edu/news-and-events/...al-p-ractices/

© Copyright Original Source

If we're going for precision here (which is important when you're relaying back someone's argument), Gary is reading into what Evans has actually said. Not as bad as I suspected he would, but he does put words in Evans' mouth. This is precisely what Evans says on the matter (as posted several times already),



Ehrman's reply,

Source: Bart

Does he tell you the date of the Digesta?

© Copyright Original Source

A bit cryptic, and I could be wrong, but I take that as implicit acknowledgment of the different types/punishments for treason, and he's essentially doubling down on the date of the Digesta as his main argument against its use (which doesn't work for reasons previously gone over).

Nice try Gary. No cigar.

I don't see that I put any words in Evans' mouth.

Our discussion has involved this question: For what crime was Jesus crucified? I think we both agree it was treason, however, you and Evans believe is was a less serious form of treason, and based on the comments in the Digesta, if Jesus was crucified for a lesser form of treason, it is more likely than not that his body could have been released for proper burial.

I do not contest that it is possible that Jesus' body was given a proper burial, I only question the probability. For one thing, the activities for which one could be charged for "Treason-Lite" were things like insulting the Emperor's name or standing next to a statue of the Emperor naked. Jesus claimed to be the true and proper king of the Jewish people. Caesar was the king of the Jewish people in the first century. So the question is, would a totalitarian dictatorship view someone's claim of usurping the throne of Caesar on the same level as standing naked next to his statue? Would it make a difference to a military dictatorship if the person claiming to be king had no known military force and sounded like a looney pacifist? I don't think so. I think that any challenge to the legitimacy of the dictator would be squashed like a bug on the wall, no matter how insignificant its real threat to the system it may have been.

But I can't prove that Pilate saw it that way. But neither can Adrift prove that he did not.

But my point has never been to prove that it is IMPOSSIBLE that Jesus was buried in Arimathea's tomb, only that it is improbable. And I believe that Christians' use of the stories in the Gospels to support their position on the Empty Tomb has some real issues. Let's look at Evans claim that if the Sanhedrin "initiated" a claim of treason against a Jew, the crucified body would be returned to the Sanhedrin to be buried in a "Sanhedrin tomb for criminals"; a place of dishonor.

So if Pilate and the Romans had an established protocol for persons crucified for "treason-lite" worked out with the Sanhedrin by which the Sanhedrin had automatic rights to the body for burial, why did Arimathea, a secret disciple of Jesus, go to Pilate and ask for the body??? That doesn't make sense. If the Roman guards at the cross knew that the Sanhedrin had the right to take the body of Jesus to their "criminal tomb", why did Arimathea need to bother going to Pilate to ask permission? And if Evans is correct about this "Sanhedrin criminal tomb" in which the body of the victims had to decompose "in a dishonorable place" before it was finally given to the family for burial in the family plot, why on earth would the Sanhedrin allow Arimathea to place Jesus' body in his new, hand-hewn, PERSONAL, FAMILY tomb???

The story makes no sense.

Doesn't it seem more likely that the author of Mark simply invented the Arimathea tomb detail for theological purposes? As told in the Gospels, it just doesn't make sense. If Jesus' body was automatically the property of the Sanhedrin, who wanted to bury him in a place of dishonor, why in the world would they tolerate Jesus' body being placed in a place of extreme honor: the mausoleum of a rich man? And if Arimathea acted on his own, wouldn't he have put himself in danger with the Sanhedrin for defying their wish to bury Jesus in their place of dishonor? Shouldn't we read something about their outrage and complaints to Pilate about Arimathea's violation of the Roman-Jewish pact regarding the burial of persons executed for "treason-lite"?

To me the only way to get out of this dilemma is to pull a "Stein": deny the historicity of part of the story, specifically "John's" claim that Arimathea was a secret disciple and that the tomb was Arimathea's personal, family tomb. If one sticks to the entire story, without deleting the parts that are contradictory as Stein does, I think the probability of this event goes way down to "implausible".

[Adrift]

I don't see that I put any words in Evans' mouth.

Our discussion has involved this question: For what crime was Jesus crucified? I think we both agree it was treason, however, you and Evans believe is was a less serious form of treason, and based on the comments in the Digesta, if Jesus was crucified for a lesser form of treason, it is more likely than not that his body could have been released for proper burial.

I do not contest that it is possible that Jesus' body was given a proper burial, I only question the probability. For one thing, the activities for which one could be charged for "Treason-Lite" were things like insulting the Emperor's name or standing next to a statue of the Emperor naked. Jesus claimed to be the true and proper king of the Jewish people. Caesar was the king of the Jewish people in the first century. So the question is, would a totalitarian dictatorship view someone's claim of usurping the throne of Caesar on the same level as standing naked next to his statue? Would it make a difference to a military dictatorship if the person claiming to be king had no known military force and sounded like a looney pacifist? I don't think so. I think that any challenge to the legitimacy of the dictator would be squashed like a bug on the wall, no matter how insignificant its real threat to the system it may have been.

But I can't prove that Pilate saw it that way. But neither can Adrift prove that he did not.

But my point has never been to prove that it is IMPOSSIBLE that Jesus was buried in Arimathea's tomb, only that it is improbable. And I believe that Christians' use of the stories in the Gospels to support their position on the Empty Tomb has some real issues. Let's look at Evans claim that if the Sanhedrin "initiated" a claim of treason against a Jew, the crucified body would be returned to the Sanhedrin to be buried in a "Sanhedrin tomb for criminals"; a place of dishonor.

So if Pilate and the Romans had an established protocol for persons crucified for "treason-lite" worked out with the Sanhedrin by which the Sanhedrin had automatic rights to the body for burial, why did Arimathea, a secret disciple of Jesus, go to Pilate and ask for the body??? That doesn't make sense. If the Roman guards at the cross knew that the Sanhedrin had the right to take the body of Jesus to their "criminal tomb", why did Arimathea need to bother going to Pilate to ask permission? And if Evans is correct about this "Sanhedrin criminal tomb" in which the body of the victims had to decompose "in a dishonorable place" before it was finally given to the family for burial in the family plot, why on earth would the Sanhedrin allow Arimathea to place Jesus' body in his new, hand-hewn, PERSONAL, FAMILY tomb???

The story makes no sense.

Doesn't it seem more likely that the author of Mark simply invented the Arimathea tomb detail for theological purposes? As told in the Gospels, it just doesn't make sense. If Jesus' body was automatically the property of the Sanhedrin, who wanted to bury him in a place of dishonor, why in the world would they tolerate Jesus' body being placed in a place of extreme honor: the mausoleum of a rich man? And if Arimathea acted on his own, wouldn't he have put himself in danger with the Sanhedrin for defying their wish to bury Jesus in their place of dishonor. Shouldn't we read something about their outrage and complaints to Pilate about Arimathea's violation of the Roman-Jewish pact regarding the burial of persons executed for "treason-lite"?

To me the only way to get out of this dilemma is to pull a "Stein": deny the historicity of part of the story, specifically "John's" claim that Arimathea was a secret disciple and that the tomb was Arimathea's personal, family tomb. If one sticks to the entire story, without deleting the parts that are contradictory as Stein does, I think the probability of this event goes way down to "implausible".

Just gonna point out a few things to anyone who's still interested. Gary has a huge problem with exaggeration, putting words into people's mouths, moving goalposts, straw-manning and out and out lying. So, for example, anyone with eyes can see in post #373 the difference between what Gary says Evans says, and what Evans literally says. I guess he thinks he's being clever by coming up with phrases like "treason-lite", and then pretending as though the only things suitable for that sort of crime are the more ridiculous offences he noted from my citation from Welch in post #328. No one's buying that of course. A number of scholars I've cited, including Welch, agree that Jesus was charged with some lower version of maiestas, this is not an invention of Evans'.

Why did someone have to specifically ask permission for the body? Because that's what the law demands, "At present, the bodies of those who have been punished are only buried when this has been requested and permission granted; and sometimes it is not permitted, especially where persons have been convicted of high treason.".

Gary, again, out of either terrible reading comprehension, or dishonesty (I'm leaning towards dishonesty) invents a number of things not actually said by Evans. Gary says, "Let's look at Evans claim that if the Sanhedrin 'initiated' a claim of treason against a Jew..." That's far more specific wording than Evans actually uses. Evans simply says "If condemned by the Jewish council...". In the article being cited, Evans never lays the charge of treason on the Sanhedrin/Jewish Council. Even if treason is the charge the Jewish council is ultimately condemning with, the devil is in the details, and Evans is careful with the language he's using.

And you find this throughout Gary's little shpiel,
"So if Pilate and the Romans had an established protocol for persons crucified for 'treason-lite' worked out with the Sanhedrin by which the Sanhedrin had automatic rights to the body for burial..."
That's not at all what Evans says. Evans says, "" and "According to law and custom when the Jewish council (or Sanhedrin) condemned someone to death, by whatever means, it fell to the council to have that person buried.". No where does Evans say that this was the rule only for those accused of treason, nor does Evans ever imply that this was some sort of automatic process. Evans only offers that the Sanhedrin were in the business of making these sorts of arrangements, which, naturally, would include asking permission as Jesus' case demonstrates, and as Ulpian points out that the law demands. These two points of reference, the Gospels and the Digesta, are in perfect harmony.

As for the description of dishonorable burial in 1st century Israel, it included only two things, lack of burial in a family tomb, and the lack of public mourning. As Professor of Religion Byron R. McCane points out,

Source: The Historical Jesus: Jesus' mission, death, and Resurrection edited by Craig A. Evans, "Where No One Had Yet Been Laid" The shame of Jesus' burial by Byron R. McCane

m. Sanh. 6:6 says that criminals condemned by a Jewish court were not interred "in the burial place of their fathers," but in a separate places kept by the court specifically for that purpose. Rites of mourning were not observed for these criminals, either. Family members were supposed to keep their grieving to themselves:

The kinsmen came and greeted the judges and the witnesses as if to say, "We have nothing against you in our hearts, for you have judged the judgement of truth." And they used not to make open lamentation, but they went mourning, for mourning has its place in the heart (m. Sanh. 6:6).

Talmudic texts likewise argue that mourning should not be observed for those condemned by a Jewish court (Sem. 2.6). Even though these sources do not always spell out in full the exact details of dishonorable burial, certain elements do recur, and enough for us to reach at least one conclusion. From the Hebrew Bible through the rabbinic literature, dishonorable Jewish burial meant two things: burial away from the family tomb, and burial without rites of mourning.

© Copyright Original Source

McCane, who believes that the Gospels do embellish the event, notes that, "In keeping with Jewish custom, Joseph of Arimathea buries the body at sunset, probably in a tomb reserved for criminals. What has been shown for Mark holds true for the other canonical burial narratives as well. The story is steadily improved upon, but the two defining marks of shame continue and persist: no family tomb, and no mourning."

[Gary]

Just gonna point out a few things to anyone who's still interested. Gary has a huge problem with exaggeration, putting words into people's mouths, moving goalposts, straw-manning and out and out lying. So, for example, anyone with eyes can see in post #373 the difference between what Gary says Evans says, and what Evans literally says. I guess he thinks he's being clever by coming up with phrases like "treason-lite", and then pretending as though the only things suitable for that sort of crime are the more ridiculous offences he noted from my citation from Welch in post #328. No one's buying that of course. A number of scholars I've cited, including Welch, agree that Jesus was charged with some lower version of maiestas, this is not an invention of Evans'.

Why did someone have to specifically ask permission for the body? Because that's what the law demands, "At present, the bodies of those who have been punished are only buried when this has been requested and permission granted; and sometimes it is not permitted, especially where persons have been convicted of high treason.".

Gary, again, out of either terrible reading comprehension, or dishonesty (I'm leaning towards dishonesty) invents a number of things not actually said by Evans. Gary says, "Let's look at Evans claim that if the Sanhedrin 'initiated' a claim of treason against a Jew..." That's far more specific wording than Evans actually uses. Evans simply says "If condemned by the Jewish council...". In the article being cited, Evans never lays the charge of treason on the Sanhedrin/Jewish Council. Even if treason is the charge the Jewish council is ultimately condemning with, the devil is in the details, and Evans is careful with the language he's using.

And you find this throughout Gary's little shpiel,
"So if Pilate and the Romans had an established protocol for persons crucified for 'treason-lite' worked out with the Sanhedrin by which the Sanhedrin had automatic rights to the body for burial..."
That's not at all what Evans says. Evans says, "" and "According to law and custom when the Jewish council (or Sanhedrin) condemned someone to death, by whatever means, it fell to the council to have that person buried.". No where does Evans say that this was the rule only for those accused of treason, nor does Evans ever imply that this was some sort of automatic process. Evans only offers that the Sanhedrin were in the business of making these sorts of arrangements, which, naturally, would include asking permission as Jesus' case demonstrates, and as Ulpian points out that the law demands. These two points of reference, the Gospels and the Digesta, are in perfect harmony.

As for the description of dishonorable burial in 1st century Israel, it included only two things, lack of burial in a family tomb, and the lack of public mourning. As Professor of Religion Byron R. McCane points out,

Source: The Historical Jesus: Jesus' mission, death, and Resurrection edited by Craig A. Evans, "Where No One Had Yet Been Laid" The shame of Jesus' burial by Byron R. McCane

m. Sanh. 6:6 says that criminals condemned by a Jewish court were not interred "in the burial place of their fathers," but in a separate places kept by the court specifically for that purpose. Rites of mourning were not observed for these criminals, either. Family members were supposed to keep their grieving to themselves:

The kinsmen came and greeted the judges and the witnesses as if to say, "We have nothing against you in our hearts, for you have judged the judgement of truth." And they used not to make open lamentation, but they went mourning, for mourning has its place in the heart (m. Sanh. 6:6).

Talmudic texts likewise argue that mourning should not be observed for those condemned by a Jewish court (Sem. 2.6). Even though these sources do not always spell out in full the exact details of dishonorable burial, certain elements do recur, and enough for us to reach at least one conclusion. From the Hebrew Bible through the rabbinic literature, dishonorable Jewish burial meant two things: burial away from the family tomb, and burial without rites of mourning.

© Copyright Original Source

McCane, who believes that the Gospels do embellish the event, notes that, "In keeping with Jewish custom, Joseph of Arimathea buries the body at sunset, probably in a tomb reserved for criminals. What has been shown for Mark holds true for the other canonical burial narratives as well. The story is steadily improved upon, but the two defining marks of shame continue and persist: no family tomb, and no mourning."

Your comments do not address why the Sanhedrin would allow Arimathea to bury Jesus in Arimathea's personal, family tomb and not in the Sanhedrin's dishonorable criminal tomb.

"The story is steadily improved upon, but the two defining marks of shame continue and persist: no family tomb, and no mourning."

Exactly. That is what I have been saying all along. The original story was embellished over time; even Christian scholars agree with this claim; and therefore, if we know that the Gospels contain embellishments, we have no way of knowing for certain if "Mark's" original story of an Empty Tomb is not ITSELF an embellishment to the original Jesus Story.

[psstein]

Your comments do not address why the Sanhedrin would allow Arimathea to bury Jesus in Arimathea's personal, family tomb and not in the Sanhedrin's dishonorable criminal tomb.

"The story is steadily improved upon, but the two defining marks of shame continue and persist: no family tomb, and no mourning."

Exactly. That is what I have been saying all along. The original story was embellished over time; even Christian scholars agree with this claim; and therefore, if we know that the Gospels contain embellishments, we have no way of knowing for certain if "Mark's" original story of an Empty Tomb is not ITSELF an embellishment to the original Jesus Story.

I thought I'd addressed this issue 5 times this thread alone...

[psstein]

I imagine it's a combination of reading the Bible, knowing the scholarship on the subject, reading Christian and non-Christian sources from the era, and years of formal training on the NT including under the renown scholar Wolfhart Pannenberg in Munich. Upon what authority do you make your own proclamations about what did and did not happen. Your years bumbling around between denominations as you struggled with a strict surface reading of the bible in English? That time you paid $3.95 to become a member of Erhman's blog? It certainly wasn't a formal education where you learned to prescribe potentially hazardous placebos to the naive suffering.

Despite my disagreements with Craig (i.e. I'm not an evangelical and don't agree with him on some ancillary issues), Craig is qualified in this area. His PhD dissertation, The Historical Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, is actually very interesting and (fairly) well-written. It has some errors in Aramaic, but the case he makes is still pretty good. I was actually very impressed with Craig's treatment of the 1 Cor. 15 passage.

If you can't read the Greek text, you shouldn't commentate on it. I don't think Gary actually gets this.

[Adrift]

Your comments do not address why the Sanhedrin would allow Arimathea to bury Jesus in Arimathea's personal, family tomb and not in the Sanhedrin's dishonorable criminal tomb.

They weren't intended to address why the Sanhedrin would allow Joseph of Arimathea to bury Jesus in his personal tomb, they were intended to show that the only things required for dishonorable burial was no family tomb, and no public mourning, which clearly refutes your argument that burying Jesus in Joseph's tomb would somehow make the burial honorable. Was that not clear enough?

Having established that Jesus was dishonorably buried, even if in Joseph's tomb, do you know of any manuscript evidence that specifically forbade dishonorable burial in a member of the Sanhedrin's tomb? We do have manuscript evidence that there existed criminal tombs for the crucified that were prepared by the Sanhedrin, but even in that document we see nothing about the special case of burial in a personal tomb of the Jewish Council, only that it could not be in the executed's family tomb (at least not until the flesh had decayed away).

"The story is steadily improved upon, but the two defining marks of shame continue and persist: no family tomb, and no mourning."

Exactly. That is what I have been saying all along. The original story was embellished over time; even Christian scholars agree with this claim; and therefore, if we know that the Gospels contain embellishments, we have no way of knowing for certain if "Mark's" original story of an Empty Tomb is not ITSELF an embellishment to the original Jesus Story.

How do you know that McCane is a Christian? I don't recall claiming that he was, and I don't know that he is. At any rate, why should it be surprising that scholars, Christian ones at that, acknowledge certain embellishments in the gospel record (and to be clear, the issues that McCane thinks are likely embellishments is the newness of the tomb, and the heavy use of spices to perfume the body)? I doubt that any of the scholars I've cited are Biblical literalists or even inerrantists. Yet, the majority of scholars, even critical scholars, accept the empty tomb tradition. The historical evidence supports it.

If your whole issue all along has been against some rigid fundamentalist literalism that you've grown up with (which appears to be the case), then you've been wasting a lot of your own time. You're fighting a straw man.

Gary, none of your gotchas have worked. All of your arguments have failed. That's expected since you jumped onto a forum with your arms swinging thinking you knew what you were doing. You didn't, and it's been obvious to everyone here from day one. You're completely out of your depth. Completely. Take my advice. Swallow your pride, reassess your position, actually read academic scholarship on the subject (maybe think of dropping the pseudo-medicine nonsense), and when you've taken a few years to do these things, if you still think you have anything to hash out, come on back. Who knows, maybe after all that study you will find the evidence overwhelmingly compelling and make Jesus Lord. Stranger things have happened.

[Gary]

I thought I'd addressed this issue 5 times this thread alone...

I know your position Stein. I am not addressing you in this comment. I am addressing Adrift, Bill the Cat, and all the other TW Christians who do NOT believe that the Gospels contain embellishments (fiction) as you do; Christians who believe that every statement of fact in the Gospels is indeed fact, including the Virgin Birth, feeding five thousand people with five loaves of bread and two fishes, turning water into wine, walking on water, the Ascension, the Triumphal Entry on Palm Sunday, burial in Arimathea's family tomb, and of course, the literal bodily resurrection. I am asking these Christians to explain why the Sanhedrin would allow Arimathea to bury a man whom they wanted to dishonor, as Adrift's scholars state, in a very honorable tomb.