There are no documents that state that jesus did not rise from the dead.. if you claim there is a lack of evidence, how come there is no contradicting evidence against christianity??

Andrew,

Suppose I tell you I have a million dollars in my right front pocket. You might be skeptical, so I issue you a challenge. I claim that if you can't prove I don't have the money, then I must have it. Does this sound reasonable to you, that my wealth depends on your ability to disprove my poverty? I hope you can see that this is a crazy line of argument. But you're making a similar one: If there isn't proof that Jesus was resurrected, then he must have.

This is a logical fallacy called shifting the burden of proof. It's the person making whatever claim that has the burden to convince others that what he's saying is true. It's best NOT to believe in something until there is sufficient evidence to do so. The evidence for Jesus and the various miraculous claims is weak, so I'm not convince any of it is true. If you have some positive evidence, please present it. It's not my job to disprove it anymore than it's your job to prove to me that I'm not rich.

That said, there is evidence that pokes some holes in the Jesus resurrection story. First, there are four gospel accounts and they are mutually contradictory. Try to line them up and make a consistent narrative. This is a well known challenge from Dan Barker that's been in circulation for decades, but nobody has been able to do it. Maybe you can be the first.

To make matters worse, there is NO evidence of a resurrection outside of the Bible. There are no independent witnesses. The Bible accounts aren't really trustworthy as it is well known that the authors of the gospels are unknown. They are only attributed to Mark, Matthew, etc. At best, they're hearsay and repeated legends.

Adding to the difficulty is the fact that earlier mythologies in circulation in Rome before Christianity also had resurrection stories. Look up Mithra, Attis, and Persephone. The first two stories are so similar to Jesus, that it really begs the question of whether the Jesus legend wasn't just swiped from one or more of these earlier ones. So what's more likely, a copied story or a resurrection. My (real) money is on the copied legend.

Don,

how can you say there are no independant witnesses.. many historians and scholars say the gospels were eyewitness accounts.. please tell me why you think this? xx

I'm not sure which experts you're referring to. Unfortunately, there are many people who write about the Bible and promote belief in god who distort facts or outright lie to promote their agenda.

One problem is that the earliest date they can assign to Mark, the earliest gospel is 70 CE, but many Biblical scholars think it's later. Given that people lived to be in their thirties around that time and Jesus allegedly died around 30CE, it couldn't possibly be an eyewitness account. If I remember correctly, the original story of Mark ended (cleanly) before the resurrection. This is evidence that part of the story was added later.

There is some agreement that the gospels draw from an earlier source, called Q, but they don't have an original copy of it, nor do they know who wrote it. They can construct something of his political leanings from the style of the writing, but not much else.

You would think that early Christians would want to gather the facts and evidence to support their movement. Why do you suppose they couldn't do a better job? It's like some guy making the (big) claim that space aliens landed in his yard, but losing all the alien technology he gave them.

To make matters worse, early Christianity is loaded with so called "pious fraud", or stories that they invented, presumably to get more people in the door. There was so much of it, that any truthful facts are hard to discern. It's safe to say that they valued a good story over evidence.

If you'd like to read some good Bible scholarship, check out books by Bart Ehrman, Robert Price, or Gerd Ludeman. All three are serious Bible scholars who do not have an interest in you believing fairy tales.

The laws of nature contradict the claim, which means you have to demonstrate that something can defy the laws of nature and then provide evidence that something did defy the laws of nature.

Beyond Matt's point about natural events, what kind of document would you expect?

In 2,000 years' time, how many documents will there be that explicitly state that Elvis Presley did not rise from the dead? Note that Elvis existed in a far more literate time and place than the Biblical Jesus--without a continent-ruling church that has a vested interest in promoting his resurrection myth and a proven history of suppressing thoughts and documents that argue against its orthodoxy.

Andrew Quinn said, "There are no documents that state that jesus did not rise from the dead.. if you claim there is a lack of evidence, how come there is no contradicting evidence against christianity??"

Well Andy (I hope you don't mind my calling you Andy)? Andy there is no evidence that contradicts "The Three Little Pigs." Should we believe this story unless there is evidence to the contrary? There is no evidence that Jesus ever existed and the story is as illogical and fanciful as "The Three Little Pigs."

Jesus was supposed to be a boy genius, but he never wrote anything. We do have writings of people who lived at the supposed time and before the time of Jesus, but they never wrote a thing about Jesus. There are no contemporary accounts of his life or death.

For example, we have the very words written by Julius Caesar himself who lived 100 years before the alleged Jesus. We also have hundreds of letters written to Caesar and from Caesar. Cicero wrote to and about Caesar. We have other artifacts that confirm Caesar existed. There are statues, paintings and coins depicting the likeness of Caesar. We know what Caesar looked like and we have a complete history of Julius Caesar's life. Plutarch of Chaeronea a Greek historian, biographer and priest of Delphi described in detail the life and assassination of Julius Caesar. The most famous biographer of Caesar was Tranquillus Suetonius, who wrote Lives of the Twelve Caesars.

We do not have one thing that authenticates the Gospels. Hundreds of Gospels existed before canonizing the holy books. There were hundreds of Jesus stories that existed in the 5th century. A Council of men decided what books were holy and what books would be burned. There exist no contemporary record of Jesus; no evidence of a City called Nazareth in the 1st century, and originally there was no belief in a human Jesus. The Gospels contradict each other; and there is plenty of evidence that the Jesus myth was copied from existing earlier myths.

There exists no documents from the ancient world by witnesses or followers stating that Jesus had risen from the dead. There are no references to a historical Jesus by any known contemporary historian. No literate person in that time period, which Jesus supposedly lived in, mentioned him in any known writing. All of the documents about the alleged Jesus came well after his supposed death. The Gospels are writings from unknown authors, and the names assigned them are just titles. They could not serve as historical evidence for a historical Jesus, because they are hearsay accounts. They were not written in Jesus' lifetime.

The "evidence" given by Christians is not reliable evidence for a historical Jesus or of any event. Their story is unsupported by evidence, Many Biblical Scholars know this and do not claim it is historical evidence. They instead claim that what's important is the story. A story that is a lie can't be very important.

There is not one shred of physical evidence that supports the historical Jesus. There are no artifacts, self-written manuscripts or the writings of Jesus' contemporaries. The claims about Jesus come from writings of unknown people long after the events. There are no contemporary Roman records of Pontius Pilate executing Jesus. Fiona said, "Don, how can you say there are no independant witnesses.. many historians and scholars say the gospels were eyewitness accounts.. please tell me why you think this? Xx"

Scholars and historians dismiss the Gospels as hearsay because they are not eyewitness accounts. They were written long after the events. They do not provide proof or evidence. The evidence proves that there were no contemporary writings about the life of Jesus, and that there was never a city or town of Nazareth. It didn't exist.

Titus said, "Beyond Matt's point about natural events, what kind of document would you expect?"

At the time of Jesus, there were many writers who were recording the events of the time. We have extensive volumes that could fill a library.

Philo the historian lived during the time of Jesus in Jerusalem. Philo was there when Christ made his triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Philo was living in Jerusalem when Jesus was crucified. Philo was there when the earthquake, supernatural darkness, and resurrection of the dead took place. Philo was there when Christ himself rose from the dead and, in the presence of many witnesses, ascended into heaven. Philo the famous historian never wrote one word about any of this, and neither did any other historian.

A well-founded historical account is cited with sources that trace to the subject themselves. There are no writings of eyewitnesses and there are no artifact citations to documents, which give personal or eyewitness accounts, and no writings of a Jesus.

The Jesus story is almost identical to other earlier myths about savior gods. The Jesus myth was not original.

No one knows who wrote the four canonical Gospels of the Bible. They did not exist during the time Jesus supposed lifetime. The unknown authors do not claim to have ever known the earthly Jesus. And none of the original gospel manuscripts exist; we only have copies of copies. Other gospels existed at the time the four gospels were chose, but they were destroyed or lost.

Scholars know from critical textural research that there simply occurs no evidence that the gospel authors could have served as the apostles described in the Gospel stories. The stories were created and attributed to the authors Mark, Luke, Matthew and John (only titles the authors are unknown as most bibles inform) in order to unify the Roman Empire under one state religion. This new religion was a synchronization of ancient myths and religions that existed long before Christianity. The Gospels are written almost virtually in the third person. Eyewitnesses write first person accounts not third person stories. Some of these stories supposedly come from Jesus when he was alone. They knew what Jesus said or thought when he was alone. This is clearly fiction and a technique fictional writers use.

It's not lost on me what you are stating about the Roman's official religion Christianity. Add to that the fact that the Church fathers were admitted liars.

I'm sure people can be convinced to believe almost anything right now. I think they are much better at deceiving people today, and it will only get worse. There are no watchdogs. I'm sure people fall for lies constantly, and far more than one. I'm sure that most of what people believe to be the truth is a lie. Most people are no more skeptical of the official story today than they were then.