We know that such things happened and such people existed, but there is still
(and always will be) much debate about the specifics of these people or events.
That is because we are dependent on eyewitness testimony.
>Think about it, and you'll see it's not logic or experiments, but written and
>oral testimony.
Sure, testimony can give you vague generalizations of the truth. But it can also
be wildly misleading.
>Another reason the statement above belies ignorance is that when you have
>mutliple eye witnesses the question is NOT the reality of the event, but only
>the details.
Which is exactly what we are discussing here: the details of Jesus' life and
his personality.
>IOW, we know the auto accident happened. And if FOUR people saw
>it, and reported it, we would accept it as a certainty.
>
>Right?
Right. But we might never get a very accurate account of exactly *what*
happened.
>So then, what about the details? Well, they might differ, they might not. But
>if four out of four all agree on the major details--e.g., the light was red,
>the blue car was speeding, the white car was making a left turn--then, once
>again, you have a virtual CERTAINTY.
Or they might not agree on such details. One might say that the light was red
and the blue car was speeding, the other might not have noticed the color of
the light and said that the white car was speeding. Then you have nothing
approaching certainty.
>That's life. So you don't really depend more on logic and experiments in this
>realm. In most things, you depend on testimony, too.
Only when you have to. And when that testimony does not seem to be
overwhelmingly
reliable, you simply admit that you can't know the truth (I know that you have
a hard time with this, Jim).
>Now, are you willing to go through the standard testimonial tests as applied
>to ancient documents?
Depends on what these tests entail.
_____________________________________________________________
| Russell Stewart |
| http://www.rt66.com/diamond/ |
|_____________________________________________________________|
| Albuquerque, New Mexico | diamond@rt66.com |
|_____________________________|_______________________________|
2 + 2 = 5, for very large values of 2.