I just stumbled across your blog post, “If You Learn Nothing a Else About Bayes…” and I found this discussion interesting, too.

I was reading Bernard’s objection to your argument and I’d like to add a question I had.

You quoted Covington’s argument which states,
“1. There are imperfect earthly copies of heavenly things.
2. Animal sacrifices are an imperfect copy of Jesus’ sacrifice,
Therefore: Jesus’ sacrifice was a heavenly sacrifice.”

And then rephrased it as,
“P1. Hebrews 9-10 says the imperfect copies of any x are on earth and the perfect copies of x are not on earth.
P2. The sacrifice of Jesus is the perfect copy of x.
C1. Therefore, Hebrews 9-10 says the sacrifice of Jesus was not on earth.”

My question is this: Is Covington’s statement 1 equivalent to your P1?
He says that, “there are imperfect earthly copies”, and you say, “the imperfect copies of any x are on earth….” The difference between, “There exist x such that y is true,” and, “For all x, y is true,” is not an inconsequential one. If an argument is predicated on a false assumption then the entire argument is invalidated.

I’m curious about your thoughts. Thanks!

p554

‘we get a peak [sic] at this process’ surely you mean ‘peek’.

p516
1 cor 15
you don’t quote all of it (do you anywhere in the book?)
– ie the bit about ‘some still alive, others have fallen asleep’.

R Bauckham states that the implication is: go and check these witnesses out, if you like since they’re still alive still ‘alive’

Or does Paul imply that Apostleship is only for a select few…and those vouchasafe revelations are a dying breed?
(not that they witnest the resurrection on earth?)

Thanks!

In OHJ page 77, one of your sources is “did any pre-christian jews expect dying-and-rising messiah” (37). Where can I find that?

I’m having troubles replying, posting a new comment?

Anyway, Richard can you please answer this.

“JUDAS ISCARIOT

It is very unclear in the gospels just what Judas Iscariot’s betrayal consisted of, probably because there was absolutely no need for a betrayal. Jesus could have been arrested any number of times without the general populace knowing about it. It would have been simple to keep tabs on his whereabouts. The religious authorities did not need a betrayal – only the gospel writers needed a betrayal, so that a few more “prophecies” could be fulfilled. The whole episode is pure fiction – and, as might be expected, it is riddled with contradictions.

1. The prophecy

Matthew says that Judas’ payment and death were prophesied by Jeremiah, and then he quotesZechariah 11:12-13 as proof!

2. Thirty pieces of silver

According to Matthew 26:15, the chief priests “weighed out thirty pieces of silver” to give to Judas. There are two things wrong with this:

a. There were no “pieces of silver” used as currency in Jesus’ time – they had gone out of circulation about 300 years before.

b. In Jesus’ time, minted coins were used – currency was not “weighed out.”

By using phrases that made sense in Zechariah’s time but not in Jesus’ time Matthew once again gives away the fact that he creates events in his gospel to match “prophecies” he finds in the Old Testament.”

Add to that the “Mary” dilemma: there is zero evidence such a person existed. However, even if she did, the “virgin” story also falsifies the character “jesus:” either the Mary character was “inseminated” by a spirit, which cannot have genes/DNA, and would have had to produce a FEMALE child, due to the missing Y chromosome, or, if she did exist (and that is a massive stretch), she conceived in the usual way. Either way, there’s no “jesus.”

The simple fact of genetics renders the bible a collection of demonstrable fables and falsifies most of its characters.

Given the excellent science of genetics, why is there still discussion about “jesus?”