The Problem I have with most prosthelytize-ers

     Ok so, Its been a long while. (hey I never said I would be posting with any kind of regularity) But as with my last post, I stumbled across another vexing perplexity on, you guessed it, THE INTERNET...

    It all starts off innocent enough, me wandering through the backwaters of  CRACKED.com. When out of the blue, where there are usually 'pretty good' ads trying to sell me a t-shirt or drug paraphernalia. I saw this...

Yeah I use Google as a spellchecker. So What

     "...actually, yes..." a phrase that made this article, impossible for me to resist. Once clicked the ad took me to this article. Which starts off promising, "Is Jesus God? Did Jesus ever claim to be God? See proof from the life of Jesus Christ and why it's not blind faith to believe in him." Why it's not blind faith? Count me in SO hard.
      But then it almost immediately drops the ball;

It is impossible for us to know conclusively whether God exists and what he is like unless he takes the initiative and reveals himself.
We must scan the horizon of history to see if there is any clue to God's revelation. There is one clear clue. In an obscure village in Palestine, 2,000 years ago, a Child was born in a stable. Today the entire world is still celebrating the birth of Jesus, and for good reason.

 Whoa whoa... the ad said "Prove that he's god." and it promised logic, and intelligence. Then immediately uses the bible as the proof. Now let me be absolutely clear, I am anti-bible. NOT anti-god/jesus/religion(to cover any and all deities/prophets thereunder) No I am railing against the prosthelytizing used by this website and the author of the article. Much like my previous post (and indeed, my general style) I don't like people trying to lead others about by the nose. So please don't see what you are about to read as anti christ or anti god. Believe what you want to. That's what leads to complexity, differences, and out of complexity comes order, thus intelligence. I am nothing if not for propagation of human intelligence.

       But that leads me to my point/s about this specific article. Logical fallacy. Basically a thing that seems true so it is accepted as such. You know what? logicalfallacies.info said it best

(1) All men are mortal.
(2) Socrates is a man.
Therefore:
(3) Socrates is mortal.
It is simply not possible that both (1) and (2) are true and (3) is false, so this argument is deductively valid.
Any deductive argument that fails to meet this (very high) standard commits a logical error, and so, technically, is fallacious.

      If articles had drinking games, one for the proof jesus article could be, drink each time you spot a logical fallacy. It's not hard. Most of there argument/paragraph thingys hinge on one. Such as "We're told that." and "Few, if any, hold this position"  

Thus, to know him [jesus] was to know God. To see him was to see God. To believe in him was to believe in God. To receive him was to receive God. To hate him was to hate God. And to honor him was to honor God.

      Its debatable whether that last quote from the bible would qualify but this is my blog. So from here on, it will be considered as one. A lot of this article seems to revolve around a theory put forth by some cat named C. S. Lewis in a book he wrote 'Mere Christianity' the article quotes (presumably him) as such,

“As we face the claims of Christ, there are only four possibilities. He was either a liar, mentally ill, a legend, or the Truth.”

      For those playing the home game, you should drink. "there are only four possibilities." I could come up with more than four, and only about half of them would be the devils advocate. ("why not an alien illuminati crossover") The chief argument, they aren't open to the idea that there is no god. They take it as granted that obviously god exists, and this guy is talking about being his son, so the only thing needing to be argued is whether or not he is the guys son. Now I am not saying that there isn't a god, just pointing out that he ("heyzeus") could have been truthful and sane, and still not the son of god.

      How could J-dawg be seen as truthful if he said he was the son of god. but there wasn't a god, or there was a god but he didn't have a son? I hear you ask... It's a deep philosophical debate (ripe for another post maybe) that boils down into the "if god created us, then naturally we are all his children" principle. (but you can't really start that argument without talking about the "why would god allow hate, pain, and suffering" debacle ... and again, that's not what this post is about)

so backward to the point...

      These guys put out an AD on a popular website, while knowing they were fighting an uphill battle. So they took the underhanded route. They started misleading people. "Are there any logical, intelligent reasons to believe in jesus?" I'm sure there are. But not in the article. They require, for you to believe that they are presenting a rational intellectual argument for belief. As a prerequisite, that you also believe the bible to be true. Evidence for such can be found in there citation section.

     I am sorry but isn't that behavior what got scientologists put at the top of the ridicule pile. Endless rhetoric about who is god, how he operates, and furthermore how to get on his good side. ALL based around A STACK OF PAPERS BOUND TOGETHER. Not sane rational thought, not intense philosophical debate that arrives at the conclusion of, not even a decent argument based around history or archeology. But a collection of story's and short story's. Popularly known as The Bible.

Jesus was not a liar, or mentally disabled, or manufactured apart from historical reality. The only other alternative is that Jesus was consciously being truthful when said he was God.

(drink)

        They go on to talk about how easy it is to make claims, talking about how anyone could profess that they are the son of god. They say that you must have credentials to substantiate the claim. But when talk'n bout' our main man christ-esus (poor attempt to bring snoop d's "izzle" mechanic into religi-zzle) they make us drink again by saying

But when it comes to Jesus of Nazareth, it's not so simple. He had the credentials to back up his claim. He said, "Even though you do not believe me, believe the evidence of the miracles, that you may learn and understand that the Father is in Me, and I am in the Father.

       He had the credentials of saying "nah uh, i'm totes the son of god, cuz i so totally performed miracles and stuff so like i'm not only the son of 'm, but I AM HIM." It just undermines the whole spirit of religion/faith and even the bible itself.

to wrap it all up (for now)

        The bible is a great source to derive even greater moral lessons. But it isn't (or at the very least SHOULDN'T) suppose to be an exact iteration with which we are to live our lives. Hell, its the main reason there are churches in the first place. (pun intended) To help others understand the moral point of what the bible tells us, not the textbook definition of its words. (another topic that I am sure will be another post of mine someday "Reasons why people who think the bible condemns homosexuality as being an abomination are tragically uninformed regarding definitions of words"   ....just need to work on the title)

      I leave you with an excerpt from the email I sent them following the "questions and comments" link at the bottom of there page. (that's the link if you want to join me in commenting or questioning them.) Where I build on that "point of churches thing" by referencing the danger in letting the people and not the book talk to you.

...even after reading your "short" article, I still have no choice but to mark you guys off as just a bunch of unfortunately misguided (if not incredibly foolish and self deprecating) BLIND follower fideist jerks... no better than the poor confused middle easterners, who after being told 'that it is gods will that the infidels are to be smote' strap bombs to their chests and murder people. Only difference, the terrorists don't annoy people with huckster internet LIES.

maybe a touch dramatic. but still applicable.