At Christmas and Easter every year the History Channel, PBS, and other so-called educational channels take a break from their schedule of ancient aliens, pawn stars and bridezillas to take a shot at historical Christianity. At Christmas they attack the virgin birth, the wisemen and the star. At Easter their focus shifts to the resurrection. Behind both attacks lies their absolute conviction that Jesus was a very nice man who never ever claimed that he was God. Rather, they argue that a group of men who lived 300 years after the historical Jesus decided at the Council of Nicea to elevate Jesus to God status in order to further their own political ambitions. Every year some new special loaded with experts with impressive sounding credentials is presented to debunk the biblical myths of Easter and Christmas. With great sympathy, they pity the poor deluded Christians who still are taken in by this ancient conspiracy and actually believe that the Bible is true.
The only poor deluded individuals involved in this process are the so-called experts that the channels trot out each year. They are not cutting edge scholars showing us the latest finds in ancient history and archaeology. They are second-rate hacks parroting the same old 200 year-old arguments that modern scholarship has thoroughly and completely destroyed.
In the 1850's when biblical criticism began, it was at least understandable why someone could believe that Christianity was something that developed 300 years after Jesus. At that time there was no such thing as archaeology. The earliest manuscripts of the New Testament that were available were dated to the third and fourth centuries after Christ. Evolution was becoming the paradigm for all of life, including the explanation for the development of religion. Putting these "facts" together a person living in the last half of that century might be somewhat excused for believing what the experts were saying.
However, today's unlearning channel experts do not have that excuse. We now have 150 years of archaeological evidence. Virtually every denial made by critics in the 1800's has been shown to be false. Critics claimed their was no real Jesus, no census at his birth and no Pontius Pilate. Every one of these claims along with thousands of others have been proved wrong by clear archaeological discoveries.
Critics claimed that the New Testament was written hundreds of years after the real Jesus lived. Today we have hundreds of New Testament manuscripts that predate this supposed "creation of Christianity" at the council of Nicea (AD 325). Unfortunately for the experts, these manuscripts show that the later documents remained unchanged from what the earliest Christians believed. Further, some of these manuscripts are so early that the vast majority of New Testament scholars (including many non-Christian scholars) believe that the deity of Jesus was believed by the early church right from the beginning. At the very least, there was no time for the mythological to creep in through an evolutionary process.
So why do these unlearning channels roll out these shows every Christmas and Easter? Why do they recycle the same old discredited arguments year after year? Well, honestly, what alternative do they have? If they give up on the lies, they are left with the logical conclusion that Jesus is exactly who the Bible says he is. And if he is exactly who the Bible says he is, then he is God. And if he is God, then we are obligated to bow the knee to him. That is something that they could never accept. Therefore, they go on telling the same old discredited lies because the alternative would mean that Jesus has a demand on their lives - a demand that they refuse to acknowledge.
The only poor deluded individuals involved in this process are the so-called experts that the channels trot out each year. They are not cutting edge scholars showing us the latest finds in ancient history and archaeology. They are second-rate hacks parroting the same old 200 year-old arguments that modern scholarship has thoroughly and completely destroyed.
In the 1850's when biblical criticism began, it was at least understandable why someone could believe that Christianity was something that developed 300 years after Jesus. At that time there was no such thing as archaeology. The earliest manuscripts of the New Testament that were available were dated to the third and fourth centuries after Christ. Evolution was becoming the paradigm for all of life, including the explanation for the development of religion. Putting these "facts" together a person living in the last half of that century might be somewhat excused for believing what the experts were saying.
However, today's unlearning channel experts do not have that excuse. We now have 150 years of archaeological evidence. Virtually every denial made by critics in the 1800's has been shown to be false. Critics claimed their was no real Jesus, no census at his birth and no Pontius Pilate. Every one of these claims along with thousands of others have been proved wrong by clear archaeological discoveries.
Critics claimed that the New Testament was written hundreds of years after the real Jesus lived. Today we have hundreds of New Testament manuscripts that predate this supposed "creation of Christianity" at the council of Nicea (AD 325). Unfortunately for the experts, these manuscripts show that the later documents remained unchanged from what the earliest Christians believed. Further, some of these manuscripts are so early that the vast majority of New Testament scholars (including many non-Christian scholars) believe that the deity of Jesus was believed by the early church right from the beginning. At the very least, there was no time for the mythological to creep in through an evolutionary process.
So why do these unlearning channels roll out these shows every Christmas and Easter? Why do they recycle the same old discredited arguments year after year? Well, honestly, what alternative do they have? If they give up on the lies, they are left with the logical conclusion that Jesus is exactly who the Bible says he is. And if he is exactly who the Bible says he is, then he is God. And if he is God, then we are obligated to bow the knee to him. That is something that they could never accept. Therefore, they go on telling the same old discredited lies because the alternative would mean that Jesus has a demand on their lives - a demand that they refuse to acknowledge.
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