Robert said
I don’t think he will be around much longer 

You would think.

Helen Young said
He did the same thing to me as a newbie. 

What exactly?

Judith said
Will say a little prayer…

Say a prayer for his soul, that’s what’s important and that is what he is lacking; not for his blood clot in his leg, that’s just his mortal body.

LenaFerrari said
I wonder why would God make us live, instead of leading us straight into what is the afterlife. And my conclusion is that it has to have a purpose,   

That’s a common question in religion and usually people like Bart come with bad answers, like God is evil, to take away the faith of the people. Not only that there is a purpose, it seems that our earthly life has a very important role in the play in the after-life, we, as humans, might change things in the other world. We might become angels to take part of a celestial conflict. Who knows.

By the way, it’s ready. ** you do not have permission to see this link ** from yours truly. You’re welcome.

Robert said
No, Bart never says anything like that. 

Yes, he does. Whenever he speaks about his atheism and the reasons why. He invoks the suffering argument. Which isn’t a real argument and has nothing to do with bible studies, scholarship, academia anything scientific. However, it is a very strong instrument of proselyting.

Helen Young said 
“There are no real Christians for Bart. Maybe a few boomers with degraded intellectual capabilities.”
…
You called my ideas and myself a “boomer with degraded intellectual capabilities.” 

I have never called you specifically anything. I was speaking in a general way. I have no idea what’s your age and your IQ. And yes, that is correct, I estimate the overwhelming majority of Bart’s followers to be older people, from a Protestant background, many atheists, many Jews, many not-smart liberals. A vast majority of them do not have a real education and never read a Bible commentary… not even the Bible itself. Besides Bart’s first book, the Jesus misquote, and a couple of scientific articles, Bart has no real value to the scientific and non-scientific world. What he does is not scientific, it’s religious. 

Tjalling said
Dansanta, I should probably have taken more time to seriously engage with what you believe and the arguments you make in your posts. I haven’t. I tend to ignore them, but what I do read shocks me.
You clearly see yourself as a Christian defending Christianity. So I would like to put one saying of Jesus next to the way you speak to and about other people:

“By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
— John 13:35

I am asking only this: when people read the way you speak here, is this what they are able to recognize?
  

1. First of all, I’m not sure what the heck are you talking about “what I believe”; I’m fairly convinced that I haven’t expressed too many, if at all, of my real opinions and my real beliefs. In fact, I never even disclosed my religion. I could be an orthodox Jew for all that matters. You probably misinterpreted and misunderstood many of my things that you happen to read. Same like the others.

2. Second, what I put here, many times, are facts and sometimes lesser facts, like estimations. Facts are not quite debatable. For example, correcting an uneducated forum user that the Bible is not at all jewish but it’s hebrew and has nothing to do with the jewish people besides the fact that they were using it a millennium after the hebrews wrote it, that is fact. That is not my opinion. That is reality. I guess reality can be shocking, racist, antisemitic or evil etc for some folks that still want to live in a rainbow dream. 

3. Thanks for the unrequested dedication of John 13:35; to be frank, I didn’t got to John yet in my Biblical studies; I only did Mark and Matthew. I’m not quite sure what you are trying to hint here… are you trying to make a call to Christian morality? Despite, very probably, yourself are not a Christian? How convenient. My dear friend, not everybody here is a disciple of Christ; not all of us here are fam. Atheists, communists, jews, subverters, satanists – I’m pretty sure these are not the people that Jesus spoke to fraternize with. You’re probably confusing me with one of those low IQ Protestant boomers that say “love is love” and then tolerate, embrace and welcome degeneracy. Why I do not make peace with evil; I try to uproot it. The best I can is to expose it, as I don’t have power. As I said, I didn’t studied John, however, with the miracle of AI, we can find the following:

John 8:44-47

⁴⁴ You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies. ⁴⁵ But, because I tell the truth, you do not believe me. ⁴⁶ Which of you convicts me of sin? If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me? ⁴⁷ He who is of God hears the words of God; the reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God.”

Now at what point would this apply… to you?

Helen Young said
Instead of being about her and the subject she wanted to talk about, it’s turned into this.

Oh, well, they did so with my thread on Jesus non-jewishness, too. It’s a coin flip: very low IQ or intentional thread derailing. Call it. 

Helen Young said
Are you implying that Lena’s father is the devil, or just asking her nicely???

No, I was not talking to Lena, I was replying to someone else.

Helen Young said
You are full of digs and accusations. Of it seems like all the forum members.  

Now, I’m not accusing anyone in particular except Bart Ehrman, however, it seems that many of you auto-assume that I’m speaking about you. It’s like I’m running my mouth and you’re feeling guilty. This speaks words.

Robert said
Bart does not believe in God, how could he believe that God is evil or that he takes away the faith of the people?  

This is actually good, you discovered the fallacy of the atheists that say they don’t believe in God because God is evil. 

However, Bart is much smarter than this to fall for it; but he uses this as an instrument of advancing his propaganda of atheism. It is a very powerful instrument because it’s based on appealing to emotion and I surprised Bart giving graphic examples in this manner. It’s actually a common one; Sam Harris employs it as well. It’s part of “militant atheism”. The trick is to present the little black baby starving to death or a case of a recent horrific murder, like the one where a mom killed her own children, after torturing them, and ask the question, where was God then? Surely a good loving God would’ve prevented it, right? And gullible masses are touched in their hearts (not in their minds, their heads is empty anyways) and start having doubts and become atheist. 

Stephen said
They don’t really think through what it means to not believe in God. 

Neither do you; weren’t you running your foul mouth of those “evil” Christians that hate the trans people? 

Very probably you are an Atheist because “Christians are evil”, which is, basically, the same pseudo-argument with “God is evil”. Many such cases. Usually lost, but maybe not really, I mean, you’re here obsessing over Christ, aren’t you?

On topic, for Lena and others: I have written an excellent article on the historical Jesus. It’s called ** you do not have permission to see this link **, on my blog, Against Heresies 5. However, it turned out to be extremely lengthy. In order to put it to good use, simply search (ctrl+f) the word “resurrection”. It should lead you to the sub-chapter 9. Resurrection; after-life; Heaven and it can be read as a single unit. It describes what Jesus said about Heaven. Reading time is about 10–12 minutes so it should be accessible enough. If you want to read more, read the last chapter, Ending Remarks, that shows the skeleton of the article. I try to do my best, in service for you.