Nature of salvation (response to comments about Hitler and his victims)

@WadCheber If you define miracles as unreasonable from the start then I guess any case for Christianity is inherently unreasonable. What I mean is, if you don't rule out that conclusion form the start, then a very good case can be made. To put it another way, if any miracle ever occurred, the resurrection is the best attested one.

@jpmc26 I agree. For example, the total picture of Jesus is quite clearly not someone who "hates gentiles". Taking one passage out of context and saying that it proves this idea is pretty bad analysis, and not the way to understand any text. (In fairness Christians are pretty found of taking passages out of context themselves.)

So if you are right about your perception of spirituality, then yes, I need more time in agnosticism.

@fredsbend Option 3) God is talking to us, but we're not paying attention because our focus is elsewhere.

@ThaddeusB It's not a chance encounter because you believe that God may have orchestrated it. I believe it occurred by chance, and then any evangelistic efforts were the sole actions of those evangelizing. It was you who suggested otherwise.

@WadCheber I've gtg soon, but before I do, I'll invite you to read some of the articles on my blog, such as: Can We Really Believe the Bible? and: How God Speaks in the Bible to Us Boneheads.

Basically, almost everything traditional Christianity has said about the Bible is wrong. As long as people are stuck in that view of the Bible, they will never be able to have anything but a rather shallow and appalling view of the Bible.

@LeeWoofenden The "Jesus Myth" morons are as bad as the "NT is literal truth" morons.

Militant atheists aren't much better than Christian fundamentalists.

The laws of physics and nature govern the physical universe, but I don't think that's all there is, and I'd suggest that artistic taste is even in a sense one of those

@fredsbend Not a miracle, just a phenomenon that's outside the laws of nature

@WadCheber Heh, doesn't sound like you're all that impartial now

@WadCheber No not semantics, a material difference. A non-natural explanation for a miracle is only "unreasonable" if you define unreasonable as such.

@WadCheber beyond all natural explanation would be more accurate

@WadCheber It comes down to how you define "reasonable/unreasonable". In common language, when someone says something is unreasonable they mean something like "incapable of being defended, beyond all explanation". In that sense, no I don't think miracles can be described as unreasonable. It only becomes unreasonable if you assume that God is impossible - leaving open the possibility leaves open the possibility of miracles.

@WadCheber Fair enough. Although, I would add that no one can be completely objective no matter what view they hold. Being in the middle somewhere doesn't make someone more objective. ... Speaking only for myself, I hold a more complex view of the NT than a pure inerrancy type view. I see reason to believe inspite (or in some cases because of) the "errors" that they contain. I can respect someone who comes to a different, reasoned conclusion.

@WadCheber Mark 16:7 gives us all the context we need to know that Mark 16:6 is saying that Jesus is alive. 7 says that Jesus is going to Galilee. It doesn't make sense to say He's going to an Earthly location and that people will see Him there when you mean "He is in heaven" or "We took him somewhere else". Additionally, I disagree with "He has been raised" being significantly different from "He is risen" in this context.

Just to be clear, Saducees=ruling class, priests, controlled by herod and the romans, not considered Jews by modern times and not considered authoritative in any way. Pharisees, the ones who made up the sanhedrin, are authoritative, are our rabbis, and had almost no power other then their rulings about Jewish law. In the romans eyes they were problematic, and the Romans did horrible things to our ancestors, which the to the revolts in 70 in which the Romans destroyed the temple,

Clearly Jesus couldn't stand the gentiles. In this discussion, the words "Sanhedrin" and Jews are thrown around rather loosely. Sadducees which were the ruling class and controlled the temple are not considered Jews in modern times and their teachings and rulings are not considered authoritative. The sanhedrin were not comprised of these "jews" but they were the priests in the temple by force (the will of rome and Herod). Jews had nothing to do with Jesus's death.

The dogs clearly here are gentiles.