Strobel Under Fire - Part 2 of a Four-Part Series

Does the Bible support Lee Strobel's claims? Part 2: Are the gospels historically credible?

Some links you may find interesting:

Bible translations
http://www.BibleGateway.com

KJV Bible with Hebrew and Greek lexicons
http://www.blueletterBible.com

Early Christian Writings Website (currently not online, I spoke to Peter Kirby and hopefully he will be able to get it up and going again).
Covers the writings of Christians and other pertinent writings of primarily the first two centuries.
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com

Various articles regarding Biblical errancy at infidels.org

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/theism/Christianity/errancy.html

Encyclopedia of Biblical Errancy, a book by C. Dennis McKinsey
Much of this info can also be found at http://members.aol.com/ckbloomfld

Also, find McKinsey on youtube.
Skeptics Annotated Bible:
http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com

Gospel Fictions, a book by Randel Helms

Who Wrote the New Testament?, a book by Burton Mack

The Jesus Puzzle, a book by Earl Doherty

Anything by G.A. Wells, including The Jesus Myth, Can We Trust The New Testament, etc.

Wikipedia
Im continually surprised at how accurate this site is. Sure, theres some bias among the articles involving religion but I have been pleased with the level of detail in most of the articles.
http://www.wikipedia.org

Google
SEARCH for whatever you want to know. Bible errors contradictions Christianity formation textual criticism etc etc etc
http://www.google.com

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• truthsurge
• jesus
• bible
• christianity
• atheism
• lee
• strobel
• christ

[rianpop]

@TruthSurge The Jews were a very distinct people in the Roman Empire. highly distrusted. its a miracle Christianity survived at all. It is recorded in the Gospels that eyewitnesses to the miracles didn't even believe them but covered them up in unbelief and hatred.

[rianpop]

@TruthSurge excuse me Josephus DID mention Jesus. in not so great detail, but he wasn't a Christian, so why would he?

[TruthSurge]

@perichoresis7 "Communities protect and distribute what is important. "

If 5000 or 10000 people were miraculously fed, lots of people healed miraculously, people raised from the dead, et al, you'd have seen this spread like wildfire across the region in NO time. But there is complete silence. Not just that he lived and was a rebel. NOTHING. But beyond that, the earliest Christian authors paint a MUCH diff pic of Jesus. In fact, one who was never on earth.

[TruthSurge]

@perichoresis7 "Kings and leaders keep no records of their failings. "

But others do.  And with all the messianic pretenders Josephus mentions, not a peep about our Nazareth lad. Nothing is mentioned that we'd demand and expect to be mentioned if the gospels were true. How does ALL of the mediterranean miss an eclipse at Jesus' time of death? etc.

[TruthSurge]

@perichoresis7 That it's written in story form is not the problem. :( It fits with a fictional character/plot/setting but not really a problem. It's WHAT is being told that's the problem. (yeah, i won't say it because it'd be like a broken record... watch.... my.... ETET!!!!!!!!! hahhahah)

[perichoresis7]

@TruthSurge Kings and leaders keep no records of their failings. And I am sure quite a few "nobodies" (I say that meaning "none leader/important person"; I believe everyone is important) wrote stuff down somewhere but it was not in a community that kept rewriting it over and over again in order to spread the true story of Jesus the Christ. Communities protect and distribute what is important.

[perichoresis7]

@TruthSurge Looking forward to it. 

[TruthSurge]

@perichoresis7 "Immediately after Jesus ascended there was most likely a buzz going around about Jesus and his life/death/resurrection"

Yes, not one writing about Jesus is known in the 1st century outside the New Testament. No one wrote about darkness at his death, earthquakes at his death and resurrection, thousands of babies slaughter by Herod, tons of people fed, many raised from death, ad nauseum. Not one word was spoken about all that apparently.

[perichoresis7]

@TruthSurge It was a popular thing during this time to speak in narrative form (as we see in Jesus' use of parables), so naturally someone was eventually going to put these actual events into written, story form.

[TruthSurge]

@perichoresis7 "Suppose four people go to a Super bowl game"

I'll be addressing this in an upcoming Excavating part. You might enjoy my explanation which will be much better laid out than I want to try here.