| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"words of truth" |
| Date: |
21 Nov 2005 05:40:26 AM |
| Object: |
If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
If Christ Has Not Been Raised
Mark P. Shea
"Jesus came to give us moral guidance, and to prove he meant business,
he let himself be killed and seen after death, so we would listen and
be good." Not being raised in any particular religion myself, it wasn't
until later that I discovered that this view of Jesus' death and
resurrection (which I heard from my grandmother) had more in common
with The Day the Earth Stood Still than it did with the historic faith
of Christianity. But this view of Jesus-as-Klaatu, impressing the
yokels with spiritualist stunts to wow them into listening to His
preachments, is but one of many "alternative" views of the resurrection
of Christ. In this view, it isn't particularly important whether Jesus
was raised bodily, just so long as His disciples knew He was "really
alive" - more likely as a particularly impressive ghost.
To others, it isn't important whether Jesus is alive even as a ghost so
long as He "lives in the hearts of his countrymen." This is more or
less the position of alleged "Christian theologians" like John Dominic
Crossan, who cheerfully relates this happy news in Jesus: A
Revolutionary Biography (1994):
What actually and historically happened to the body of Jesus can best
be judged from watching how later Christian accounts slowly but
steadily increased the reverential dignity of their burial accounts.
But what was there at the beginning that necessitated such an intensive
volume of apologetic insistence? If the Romans did not observe the
Deuteronomic decree, Jesus' body would have been left on the cross for
the wild beasts. And his followers, who had fled, would know that. If
the Romans did observe the decree, the soldiers would have made certain
Jesus was dead and then buried him themselves as part of their job. In
either case, his body left on the cross or in a shallow grave barely
covered with dirt and stones, the dogs were waiting. And his followers,
who had fled, would know that too. Watch, then, how the horror of that
brutal truth is sublimated through hope and imagination into its
opposite.
In other words, Jesus' corpse was dog food long ago, but since the
idiot-savant apostles were particularly adept at religious psychosis
and making lemonade out of lemons, then we can say the Resurrection is
full of "hope" in a sense intelligible only to extremely advanced
theologians like Crossan.
Then again, there are others who solve the problem of the Resurrection
by not letting Jesus die. In this view, somebody else was crucified on
Good Friday (somebody who really deserved it, like Judas Iscariot),
while Jesus went off to a well-earned pension someplace else. Depending
on which legend or Shocking Book (e.g., Holy Blood, Holy Grail by
Michael Baigent) you choose, "someplace else" could be anywhere from
Japan to France. Frequently, "Jesus didn't die" scenarios go for the
hearts-and-flowers conclusion favored by Hollywood, in which the
retired Son of Man finally gets the girl, like dark Kent in Superman II
and no longer has to pursue His unrewarding task of proclaiming
platitudes. Typically, they pack Him off to some vineyard with Mary
Magdalene, there to found a dynasty of Merovingians or something.
Instead of having Him escape crucifixion entirely, some scenarios grant
that He was crucified but insist that He only swooned (possibly with
the help of some drugged wine) and regained consciousness later. But
the central claim of all such scenarios is that Jesus didn't really die
on the Cross.
Still other theorists, often involved in the New Age movement, solve
the problem by allowing Him to be only a spirit (divine or angelic,
depending on the preference of the author) appearing as a man, a sort
of holy vision. This solves the problem of His death by making it an
illusion: a tidy disposal of a messy crucifixion that preserves the
happy ending.
Meanwhile, others have much simpler and cruder explanations: Disciples
stole the corpse, lied about it, and founded a cult for their own
selfish gain and power. Slightly kinder than this is the Hysterical
Hallucination Theory, which says the well-meaning apostles hallucinated
the Resurrection. Others say it was a later generation of Christians
who added the Resurrection to the New Testament. Originally, it was
just a collection of apostolic memoirs about the Dead Master and His
witty sayings. Many think St. Paul is behind the whole thing (see, for
instance, The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity by Hyam
Maccoby). Under the influence of pagan myth, St. Paul allegedly
transformed this ordinary Jewish rabbi into a Cosmic Christ figure. The
original apostles, according to this school, would be horrified at what
Paul did to the teaching of the gentle and witty Y'shua.
One of the obvious difficulties with all these theories is that they
don't fit together well. If later generations are to blame for
importing Resurrection myths, then earlier ones aren't. If it's all
Paul's fault, then it's not Peter's. If the Eleven are body snatchers,
then they're not well-meaning hallucinators, and vice versa. Such
theories demonstrate what C.S. Lewis once referred to as the "restless
fertility of bewilderment" so much in evidence when debunkers try to
overturn the mountain of solid evidence for the truth of the Christian
claims. This is unsurprising, since these "alternative explanations"
are all much harder to believe than the Christian explanation of the
Resurrection, which is nicely summarized by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians
15:1-14:
Now I would remind you, brethren, in what terms I preached to you the
gospel, which you received, in which you stand, by which you are saved,
if you hold it fast - unless you believed in vain.
For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received,
that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that
he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with
the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.
Then he appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most
of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he
appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one
untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the
apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the
church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace
toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of
them, though it was not I, but the grace of God, which is with me.
Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.
Now if Christ is preached as raised from the dead, how can some of you
say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no
resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised; if Christ
has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in
vain.
This, the earliest creedal summary of the Faith, gives the lie to my
first ignorant notion of the meaning and nature of the Resurrection.
For it shows clearly that the real heart and soul of the New Testament
teaching about Jesus is not that He was primarily a preacher,
wonder-worker, reformer, sage, or deliverer of profound truths and
happy thoughts, nor that the Resurrection was a special effect
performed to wow us into following good advice.
The first fact of the Christian Gospel, according to the New Testament,
is the Passion and Resurrection of Christ. Without the Resurrection,
you don't have an "original" Gospel of witty sayings, wise saws, and
modern instances. You have no Gospel whatsoever. This is why one-fourth
of each of the Gospels focuses on a 72-hour period in the life of Jesus
of Nazareth: His Passion and Resurrection. It is why the rest of the
New Testament is overwhelmingly focused on the meaning of that death
and Resurrection, not on His signs or sayings (almost none of which are
preserved outside the Gospels). It is why virtually nobody but the most
ignorant TV host these days holds the once-popular notion that the
Resurrection was tacked onto the New Testament by later generations of
Christians after the death of the apostles. The simple fact is that
trying to account for any of the New Testament without placing the
Resurrection at the absolute core of it is like saying that the real
truth of Abraham Lincoln consists of platitudes about peace and justice
and that the "Civil War" was just a myth concocted by later
hagiographers that forms no part of the original story. If the
"original Gospel" was just a collection of tales about Jesus going
around saying "Niceness is nice," the question that arises is what,
exactly, was so interesting about Him?
The only answer is found in the actual documents of the New Testament,
which began to be composed within 20 years of Jesus' death. These
already contain things like the creed previously mentioned and the
insistence that the Gospel is about nothing other than Jesus and the
Resurrection (Acts 17:18).
Very well, we can't blame "later generations" for coming up with the
Resurrection story. So, some say, let's blame Paul. The problem with
this theory is that Paul himself and witnesses who know Paul, such as
Luke, as well as witnesses uninfluenced by Paul, such as Matthew and
John, seem to be under the impression that the basic core of the story
Paul has to tell is not Paul's invention.
"I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received" -
or, more prosaically, "I'm handing on to you the Tradition I was
taught." Taught by whom? In Paul's case, taught by the apostles
(Galatians 1:18-21) and by the normal primitive catechesis given in
places like the Church at Antioch where Paul lived for many years
before he started any mission at all (Acts 13). Paul says this sort of
thing repeatedly and seems to take for granted not only that what he
has to say about Jesus is common knowledge to all Christians (not just
the ones he's converted) but that none of the other apostles bopping
around the Mediterranean - and none of the churches they founded -
are going to have any quarrel with him when he says that Christ is
risen. If Paul alone had come up with this myth about the Risen Christ
while the rest of the apostles were just wandering hither and thither,
sharing Anecdotes about Their Friend the Martyred Nazarene, you might
think somebody would have noticed.
In short, if faith in the Resurrection is as old as Paul, it is as old
as the apostles themselves. He preaches it for the same reason they do:
He really believes he saw the Risen Christ, just as they say they saw
the Risen Christ.
Ah, yes. They say. But why should we believe them? What if the Eleven
were just body snatchers, stealing the corpse of Christ in order to
portray themselves as the martyr's best buddies and found a cult with
Jesus as putative head but themselves as the adored big cheeses?
The difficulties with this are numerous. First of all, they don't act
like any cult leaders we know. The records they leave behind do not
describe fearless, shiny, happy, faith-filled dynamos of apostolic
courage, theological acumen, and intellectual agility. They show us a
group of men whose chagrined honesty compelled them to carefully
incorporate into the public record the fact that they were snobbish,
spiteful, cowardly, factional nitwits who were slow on the uptake,
ambitious, blind, selfish, and, when the supreme test came, quite
willing to bolt and run in the hour of their Master's terrible trial.
Compare this with the adoring exhalations of the North Korean press on
the Manifold Virtues of The Fearless Leaders, or the flawless
perfection of Stalin according to the Stalinist press of the 1930s, or
the Nazi hagiography of Hitler. The apostles make sure that their
public preaching and the public record include a faithful recitation of
their many, many sins. Moreover, they continue to preach the
Resurrection for decades, despite separation, persecution, poverty,
threats, torture, and martyrdom (except for John, who had the pleasure
of watching his brother James executed for his testimony). In short,
they speak and act like honest men, not like men out to make a buck or
acquire power.
Indeed, so honest are they that they even make Jesus look rather
ungodlike at first blush. Jesus is recorded displaying weakness,
showing fear, confessing ignorance, and asking questions. He is
described as unable to do certain things. The disciples' official
record has Him saying things that sound dangerously like denials of
deity, such as "Why do you call me good? There is none good but God
alone" (Mark 10:18) or "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"
(Matthew 27:46). Yet we are to believe that cunning liars who carefully
doctored history to make Jesus appear to be the Risen Lord also managed
not to notice such unsettling details in their account?
No. What comes across with terrific force in the New Testament is that
the testimony has been given by people who tell the truth, even about
awkward facts not instantly advantageous to their claims. They come
across as people who genuinely believe Christ risen, not as people who
lie about a body that they know perfectly well was stolen or eaten by
dogs. For the rest of their lives (right through to their torture and
execution), the apostles behaved like men utterly convinced that they
had met the Risen Christ. Indeed, so convinced are they that they
include numerous details that, frankly, no liar would ever make up. So,
for instance, no first-century Jewish liars would call as their first
witness Mary Magdalene. For the Magdalene was prima facie incredible to
a first-century Jewish audience on two counts: First, she was a woman;
second, she was a woman out of whom seven demons were supposed to have
been driven - a rather shady psychological profile (Mark 16:9). The
Gospels read like accounts by honest people who are stuck with the
facts - including the fact that one of the first witnesses of the
Resurrection was a woman of uncertain reputation.
Of course, some will retort that this proves too much: We would not
normally bother with the testimony of a psychotic (i.e., "demoniac"),
so why bother with Mary's? Because Mary is among the first, not the
last, witnesses. The records point to hundreds of witnesses - most
still alive at the time 1 Corinthians was written - and give an
account of the Resurrection that is, in the main, coherent. An
appearance to the women, to the Twelve at various times in and around
Jerusalem, and to various others in Galilee, followed by an appearance
to Paul some years later (not counting various vision phenomena that
are of a different order). Nitpickers are fond of talking about the
discrepancies among the Gospel accounts (books written decades apart
for different audiences and for differing theological purposes). But
what really stands out is how similar the tale is in all of them. If
the minor discrepancies that distinguish them really mean they are
false, then we must also conclude that JFK was never assassinated since
witnesses have as many discrepancies in their testimony.
Indeed, it's often the details that are so persuasive. Thus, another
fact nobody would ever make up is the burial place of Christ: the tomb
of Joseph of Arimathea, a member of the Sanhedrin. It's exactly the
sort of detail that gives the Gospels the ring of truth. If you're
making the story up, you put the body in the tomb of some devoted
disciple, not in the final resting place of a member of the ruling body
that is most bitterly opposed to your message.
The mention of the tomb leads some people to another favorite theory:
namely, that the disciples went to the wrong tomb and leapt to the
conclusion that Christ was risen. One can only wonder what such
theorists think people are made of. For the apostles to conclude that
Jesus was the risen and glorious Lord of all on the basis of such a
blunder would have required preternatural stupidity not only on their
part but on the part of the Jerusalem authorities. Even if all the
early Church was too obtuse to find its way back to the final resting
place of the Man who was the focus of their devotion, surely somebody
in the Jerusalem elite who opposed the growing sect of Nazarenes could
have said, "Uh, guys? Here's the corpse. You were looking in the wrong
place. Next time ask for directions." Joseph of Arimathea might have
been of some help here. So might the women, who saw where He was laid.
And such a theory becomes doubly silly when the early Church's
fascination with relics and tombs is factored in. Early liturgies
tended to be held at gravesites, yet there is no cult that develops
around the most important grave of all. Why, it's as if the tomb had
been empty or something.
Which takes us, in our taxonomy of Resurrection alternatives, to the
various escape-from-death/swoon theories: the notion that Jesus somehow
avoided death, either by skipping town and leaving a stooge to take the
fall for Him or by enduring crucifixion and then escaping the tomb.
It's hard to say which version of this theory is more preposterous. If
there's a fact of history that's not disputed even by hard-core atheist
historians, it is the fact of His death. If we know nothing else about
Him, we know that He died by crucifixion outside the walls of Jerusalem
circa 30 A.D.
And yet some insist that He didn't. Like a sort of first-century Elvis,
He went into sudden and mysterious retirement, in sharp contradiction
to everything He had ever said or done, and founded a dynasty or
studied philosophy or something in some far-off land. What is the
evidence for this? Well, there is none really, just hints, supposings,
surmises, and what-ifs. It's rather like the thinking behind Chariots
of the Gods. It's a case of a theory in search of evidence, not of
evidence giving rise to a theory. Meanwhile, the people who were there
give testimony, not that Jesus left town right after the Last Supper (a
supper at which He specifically prophesied His Passion with a strange
accuracy that would reduce Peter to tears when it all happened), but
that He went to betrayal, trial, and crucifixion. And again, why would
lying cult founders make up the story of that prophecy and its very
embarrassing fulfillment? Indeed, eyewitnesses like John saw Jesus at
both His trial and crucifixion. So there aren't many ways for Jesus to
have skipped town and left somebody else holding the bag.
Ah! But John only thought he saw Jesus die. Really, the Nazarene
received a drugged wine, passed out, and awoke in a freezing-cold tomb
on a chilly morning in April. The perfect setting for a dramatic
recovery from scourging, crucifixion, massive blood loss, shock, and a
spear wound to the heart, as nine out of ten doctors agree. He then
stumbled out (after somehow freeing Himself from the bandages sealed to
His torn flesh) and, shoving the zillion-ton stone that sealed the tomb
out of the way, limped up to the disciples on His bloody feet, showed
them His hands (complete with permanently immovable thumbs due to
irreparable nerve damage), and gasped out a greeting between the stabs
of agonizing pain from the spear wound. Most people, faced with such a
ghastly spectacle, would dial 911. The disciples, naturally, greeted
Him as the glorious Conqueror of Death and Lord of the Universe and
founded a religion instead.
"Okay, fine," the diehard skeptic says, "Jesus died. And the disciples
didn't steal the body and lie about it. They just hallucinated.
Together. All 500 of them. For 40 days. No, really . . . "
Even if we put aside that troublesome matter of the empty tomb (with
empty grave clothes in it), there's still a problem concerning the
nature of hallucinations. Mass hallucination is extremely rare. So
rare, in fact, that it's usually only invoked to explain away things
like, oh, the Resurrection. The rest of the time, when 500 people say
they saw somebody and spoke with him, we believe them, particularly
when they have nothing to gain by saying it - when they are routinely
put to death for saying it.
And we have other problems to deal with if we want to entertain the
Mass Hallucination Theory. First and foremost is the curious fact that
hallucinations like this are supposed to be the fruition of intense
wish-fulfillment fantasies. The witnesses supposedly wanted Jesus to be
alive so bad that they freaked out and thought they saw Him. On at
least three occasions, however, His disciples failed to recognize Him
when they did meet Him. We are told they were so desperate to see Him
that they might have tricked themselves into believing they had seen
Him, but they walked for half a day with Him and did not notice.
Strange. More to the point, what hallucination can be touched and eats
fish?
Which leaves us pretty much with the Jesus-was-a-divine-illusion school
of Gnostic or New Age thinking. But if the Risen Christ was really a
purely spiritual illusion sent by the divine to teach us higher truths
about the unimportance of the body and the need to transcend our
humanity, what could be more certain to obscure this lesson than a body
that Thomas could touch, a body that breathes the air and eats fish?
The apostles, at any rate, don't seem to have picked up on these higher
truths at all. They teach instead that the Risen Christ is raised
bodily and is not only fully God but fully human, albeit glorified.
A resurrected body. Glorified. Fully God and fully man. When the
alternatives have all spent themselves in fruitless clamor for our
attention, it's the old Christian story that still persuades. It's the
story of the Conqueror of Death who has Himself borne the sting of
death and raised our dead human nature out of the grave so that we,
too, may be resurrected. You can read all about it - without crackpot
alternative explanations - in the New Testament. A most convincing
book, especially when so many skeptics drive you to murmur, "Almost
thou persuadest me to be a Christian!"
The Resurrection is the factual cornerstone of Christian faith. Without
it, you do not get a Gospel purified of superstition. You get a litter
of low-rent "real" conclusions to the story of Christ that are vastly
harder to buy than the Christian explanation. At the end of the day,
the fact remains that "if Christ has not been raised, then our
preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain" and "we are of all men
most to be pitied" (1 Corinthians 15:14,19). But that never seemed to
worry Paul, for "in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the
first fruits of those who have fallen asleep" (1 Corinthians 15:20).
Mark Shea is the author of By What Authority: An Evangelical Discovers
Catholic Tradition (Our Sunday Visitor, 1996) and Making Sense Out of
Scripture: Reading the Bible as the First Christians Did (Basilica
Press, 2001).
http://www.catholicculture.org/docs/doc_view.cfm?recnum=5070
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| User: "Yournameheres personal Cthulhu" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
21 Nov 2005 10:03:42 AM |
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"words of truth" <wordsoftruth@hoshmail.com> suddenly spluttered:
If Christ Has Not Been Raised
Arguimentum ad
http://www.coc.cc.ca.us/departments/art/images/dogChasingTail.Dsc00037.jpg
------------------------------------------------
Conflict over the exact will/purpose/nature of God cannot ever be
resolved, since there are no facts to go on.
D Silverman FLAHN, SMLAHN
AA #2208
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| User: "Goodness Godless" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
21 Nov 2005 05:00:20 PM |
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"words of truth" <wordsoftruth@hoshmail.com> wrote in message
news:1132551626.670952.52450@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
If Christ Has Not Been Raised
Mark P. Shea
<snip>
As is pointed out now:
"Mohamad may have been a Child Raping War Load, but unlike Jebus, at least
he actually existed"
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| User: "George" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
21 Nov 2005 06:44:12 AM |
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"words of truth" <wordsoftruth@hoshmail.com> wrote in message
news:1132551626.670952.52450@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
If Christ Has Not Been Raised
Ever hear of decay? It is a common occurrence with dead things.
George
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| User: "Daniel Bernard" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
21 Nov 2005 10:27:56 AM |
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On Mon, 21 Nov 2005 06:44:12 GMT, "George"
<george@wtfiswrongwithyou.com> wrote:
"words of truth" <wordsoftruth@hoshmail.com> wrote in message
news:1132551626.670952.52450@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
If Christ Has Not Been Raised
Ever hear of decay? It is a common occurrence with dead things.
Is that what happened to the original giorgio? Did he decay after he
died of cancer or did the rot set in while he was still hooked up to
his iron lung?
--
amicalement,
Daniel
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| User: "J Forbes" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
21 Nov 2005 06:11:44 AM |
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--snip crossposting--
words of truth wrote:
If Christ Has Not Been Raised
read "Another Roadside Attraction:
Jim
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| User: "duke" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
24 Nov 2005 10:46:58 PM |
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On 20 Nov 2005 21:40:26 -0800, "words of truth" <wordsoftruth@hoshmail.com>
wrote:
If Christ Has Not Been Raised
He WAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
duke
*****
"The Mass is the most perfect form of Prayer."
Pope Paul VI
*****
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| User: "Joseph Hertzlinger" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
23 Nov 2005 05:59:48 AM |
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On 20 Nov 2005 21:40:26 -0800, words of truth
<wordsoftruth@hoshmail.com> wrote:
And yet some insist that He didn't. Like a sort of first-century
Elvis, He went into sudden and mysterious retirement, in sharp
contradiction to everything He had ever said or done, and founded a
dynasty or studied philosophy or something in some far-off land.
Elvis is, of course, the best-authenticated case of resurrection in
history.
Elvis is also halachically Jewish, has been recognized as King
by all the nations, and has been predicted by the prophet Isaiah:
"Let your soul delight itself in fatness." --- Isaiah 55:2
--
http://hertzlinger.blogspot.com
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| User: "dsxfsdfsdd" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
25 Nov 2005 03:52:43 PM |
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The worms had a feast...same as what's gonna happen to you,
formaldehyde-boy.
Every worm that filled his belly on JC's carcass went straight to heaven.
And so it is written.
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| User: "Uncle Vic" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
21 Nov 2005 07:37:43 PM |
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on 20 Nov 2005 in alt.atheism, dear sweet words of truth
(wordsoftruth@hoshmail.com) made the light shine upon us with this:
How difficult do you think it could have been to hide the body of a
mythical character?
--
Uncle Vic
aa#2011
Supervisor, EAC Department of little adhesive-backed "L" shaped
chrome-plastic doo-dads to add feet to Jesus fish department
----
"The world is only 5-6 thousand years old does not mean the planet
earth is only 5-6 thousand years old. There have been many worlds
created and destroyed on this planet. The creation of the planet is
described in Genesis 1. The creation of the world is described in
Genesis 2. Two different kind of creations." --Eric Brze
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| User: "Richard Smol" |
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| Title: Re: If Christ Has Not Been Raised, What Happened To His Body? |
21 Nov 2005 10:35:48 AM |
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words of truth wrote:
If Christ Has Not Been Raised
Before you try to tackle these kinds of questions, you should first
affirm the guy even existed in the first place.
RS
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