COMPETING CLAIMS REFUTE CHRISTIANITY
The problem of competing claims and competing miracles to support these claims
is an avenue that has been neglected considerably by sceptics of religion. This
is sad for it is the avenue that leads the most rapidly to the showing up of
religion as the bigoted farce it really is. Jesus himself accepted the Jewish
law that two witnesses were enough before God to establish an allegation they
make as the truth. So if people claimed a vision and there was no collusion that
was found – many people are good at disguising or hiding collusion – then two
people claiming that Jesus appeared to them and confessed that he was Satan all
the time and not the Son of God then that is the reasons to believe in Jesus
gone out the window. The point is that it is too easy to set up competing
claims.
Christians boast that the resurrection of Jesus was true for it was so unique
and believable. They boast that Satan could do any other miracle but not that one so it
showed that God approved of Jesus and his message. God did it not to fix
the mistake of letting Jesus die for that was not a mistake but to show that
Jesus was his prophet and Son. The Christians are boasting about
their great powers of perception that is what they are doing so that is why we
should find this offensive. They might attribute their perception to the
assistance of God but any other religion can say that too. God is used as an
excuse for pride and intellectual arrogance.
What is the use in the Christian boast when they cannot prove that the
beautiful Victorian medium, Florence Cook, didn’t raise the long dead Katie
King temporarily from the dead?
Jesus claimed that his resurrection was a sign that he had authority to speak
for God. After death experiences of a being of light are stronger evidences than
the evidences of the resurrection. Yet this being of light never judges.
He meets nearly everybody at the gate of a Heaven so he
contradicts Jesus who hoped that most people are destined for Hell. So the
evidences against Jesus' divine authenticity are stronger than evidences for it.
The being of light then contradicts the resurrection of Jesus. We can know
and interview the witnesses of the being of light experiences which we cannot do
with the self-proclaimed witnesses of the resurrection of Jesus.
The near death experiences make it evil to
stake so much on the apostles for it is through the apostles that we have to
learn about Jesus and his resurrection. There was not much point in a resurrection as a sign when
men had to testify to it so Jesus should have written his own testimony and got
them to testify that it was genuine and believable to them instead of letting
them interpret things for themselves. A testimony which is provided by people
we can meet and check out and suss out for ourselves is vastly superior to the
apostles. Jesus appeared after his death to give evidence and the cancellation
of that evidence by better evidence means that the appearances were illusions
or lies or from the devil.
Christians boast that sources hostile to Jesus admitted that his miracles were
real and attributed them to demons. They take it that Jesus’ miracles prove
that he had the right to demand absolute control over our bodies and minds. But
Jesus had plenty of rivals to destroy their right to assume such things. The
Christians claim that it is harder to believe that the apostles or other
disciples of Jesus stole his body or that Jesus got out of the tomb himself and
pretended he rose from the dead than to believe that he did rise. So
impossibilities are more convincing than improbabilities! It is strange that
Christians admit there is an extreme minority of people who have bizarre powers
like people who can hold light bulbs in their hand and make them light up which
ought to put them on their guard with Jesus. They say Jesus was not one of
these people but his power came from God. But Jesus could have had limited
miracle powers with which he played dead and escaped from the tomb and made his
friends hallucinate his appearances until he was well enough to meet them
personally. They cannot refute that.
There were many Messiahs who did not need the degree of dishonesty it took to
believe in Jesus to believe in them.
Hostile sources said that the false Messiah of the second century Simon Bar
Kochba, who bore the messianic title, Son of a Star, did signs and wonders (page
20, The Beast and the Little Horn) and got loads of followers through them. All
early Christian sources claimed that Simon Magus, who became a false Messiah,
had incredible miraculous powers. Simon Magus was said to be the Power of God
and was regarded as such by the Samaritans, a sect similar to the Jews, and who
was famed for his miraculous powers (Acts 8). Justin Martyr, the first nearly
competent theologian the Church had, said that Simon could do real miracles.
Simon is more convincing than Jesus because the New Testament itself says he
had strange powers. Simon was believed by the early Church to have got himself
beheaded and appeared alive three days later. He was apparently alive in 200 AD
which would mean he was then about 200 hundred years alive! No
non-Christian or non-partisan witness ever said that Jesus did miracles. A
non-partisan witness did for Simon.
Joan of Ark allegedly came back from the dead. It is agreed that the new Joan
who came after the real one was burned at the stake for heresy and witchcraft
was an impostor. But there is no proof of this. Robert Price in his book Beyond
Born Again reminds us that the false Jewish Messiah Sabbati Zevi appeared to
his followers after his death. Some of the visions are implausible but many of
them are as good as the resurrection appearance accounts. There had to have been
people in the first century who heard what the apostles were saying about
apparitions and claimed apparitions of their own. That always happens. Indeed
the New Testament complains about false apostles. The twelve apostles bring
suspicion on themselves for they just say they had the real visions for they
were made apostles by Jesus. But no proof is given of this. Jesus could at
least have issued deeds to prove this. Their word is not good enough for why
their word and not the rivals?
St Gregory of Tours believed that the healing miracles of an ex-lunatic who
claimed that he was Christ and should be worshipped were real miracles but that
the Devil was behind them (page 41, The Pursuit of the Millennium). He died at
La Puys when he was cut to pieces by his enemies and his followers still
believed in him after that holding that he was resurrected in a spiritual way
and that he died for their salvation. Multitudes followed another Messiah
called Eudo de Stella who claimed to be Jesus Christ the Son of God. He did
miracles too. He claimed the power to control the world and he died at
Another very successful Messiah claimed to be God and had loads of followers.
It was said he commanded murders. This may have been slander. His name
was Tanchelm and there is no reason to hold that he was anything but a holy man
(page 46-50) despite the slanders. It is certain that his followers gave up
their wealth for the love of him. Yet we are commanded to believe in Christ
because his followers took him seriously and testified to him unswervingly. You
can’t be a cult figure unless you have followers like that. Having such
followers doesn't mean a thing.
Frederick II was credited with Messianic authority and if having supernatural
power to fight the Antichrist by his German following (page 113). Prophecies by
Joachim of Fiore were understood to be talking about him. And when
The Christians brag that some people saw and chatted with and touched Jesus
after his resurrection. The Jesus witnesses are largely enigmas to us for the
writings they left behind are very very short and don’t give us much insight
into what kind of people they were. Christians what about the trustworthier
people who had similar experiences with the Bigfoot most of whom were not alone
when they saw the prodigy? I say trustworthy for we can talk to them and
cross-examine them. The witnesses of the revived Jesus were never
cross-examined and took the precaution of saying nothing for forty days.
That shows that Jesus was not too bothered about accuracy and credibility.
Accuracy and credibility are
reduced as time goes on which is always an indication that something naughty
was going on. They were able to state reasons for being sure that what they saw
was not just a hoaxer dressed up. The resurrection seers gave no such assurance
in Jesus’ case. They just took it for granted that it was Jesus. The accounts
are of little value when they failed to even state that the identity of the
apparition was checked out. Even if he did rise he could not expect us to
believe that he did and there are several other ways to prove this as well.
Despite the testimonies and the calibre of the witnesses Bigfoot does not
exist. Neither does the Loch Ness Monster. There is no doubt about this. When
we reject belief in the Bigfoot and Nessie because they cannot exist we are entitled to reject the reports of the resurrection of
Jesus Christ too. In fact, the resurrection report is far worse in the
credibility stakes than these two myths.
The Bigfoot and Nessie witnesses face only ridicule and there is no doubt about
this. The apostles of Jesus allegedly had a bad time for what they said about
Jesus. But there is absolutely no evidence that they underwent any more torment
than most normal people taking up a controversial cause would. We don’t even
know if their faith was the prime reason they were martyred if they died under
tragic circumstances at all.
Christians have all the pig-headedness of old women who think nobody is good
for anything but their sons.
Sects that believe in the resurrection of Jesus but have silenced the evidence
for it but have visions and miracles are in exactly the same position as those
who posit evidence that somebody else was the Son of God and it was not Jesus
though it does not look that way if you glance at their theology. You see the
truth when you scratch the surface. For example, take Catholics who
run after visions and miracles. They will probably have never even read
the resurrection stories in the Bible or thought about them. They just
take it for granted that the resurrection really happened. The evidence
they use is an alternative. But it is not the proper evidence. It is
like Anna refusing to look at the evidence that her boyfriend is a murderer and
then having a dream in which her guardian angel tells her he is a murderer and
her believing he is a murderer because of the angel. She ignores the
proper evidence and so it is no good to her at all. Why does she even
bother then with evidence?
There was no point in Jesus rising from the dead to prove his claims if we cannot have solid and direct evidence. If in its absence, saints came along after doing miracles and having apparitions and giving predictions that seem to come true that destroys the whole point of the resurrection which was to provide unmistakeable evidence from God that Jesus was his infallible prophet for Satan or some other force can replicate all miracles but that one.
I could pick out some character who I said lived
thousands of years ago and get somebody to fake a comeback from the dead so
that that person gets the credit for it and his power is demonstrated. It would
be easier creating a false Messiah or incarnate God that way than to get
anybody to pose as a sinless person for a few years who
dies tragically and then rises from the dead. The potential for claims that
match and outdo Jesus’ is enough to prove that Jesus was not God or the Saviour
and that the apostles were impostors for making pretensions to inspiration from
God that they never had.
The Book of Mormon claims that the Bible has been altered. It does not
confess that if that is really true then the Bible cannot
really be used as evidence for the resurrection of Jesus. The Book of
Mormon proclaims Jesus the Son of God and to have been resurrected. The
Book reaffirms Jesus after destroying the backing for the claims that he gave.
When the evidence is quashed like that it might as well proclaim somebody else
to be Son of God and risen from the dead.
This happening is just as serious as evidence presenting somebody other than Jesus Christ as the Son of God and the Messiah. When
What if the Book of Mormon said that Jesus never died on the cross but only seemed to and revived in the tomb? There was nothing stopping it from doing that. It destroyed the evidence for Jesus' resurrection and so it was free.
Mormons will respond that the Book of Mormon does back up
the Bible and shows us where the Bible is right. But this brings us back to
what we learned about Jesus doing a big sign and leaving no evidence for it but
saints doing miracles later to provide evidence. It doesn’t work for we need the
Bible to be true and to be able to hold its own against scepticism. The evidence
that Jesus gave two thousand years ago was intended to be easily understood and
interpreted because anything that is hard to interpret is not worth doing and
will only lead to schisms and dissent and confusion. You would have to do an
awful lot of research and refuting before you would have the right to believe
in the resurrection of Jesus according to the terms he has established. No
reasonable God would ask that of you meaning that no reasonable God would have
inspired the apostles to make the claims they made for Jesus so we can question
their claims as much as we wish without any qualms of conscience.
Miracles can only come from a conniving and evil source. Extreme Satanism
taught that you had to be as depraved as could be to work miracles by black
magic so miracles are defending that view. Better to assume that all miracles
are hoaxes than to end up bolstering up that belief. Better no belief in
miracles at all as losing one human life over them.
Both Old and New Testaments have God teaching that two witnesses are necessary
for establishing any claim. Jesus himself supported it. Also Jesus
was supposed to have made Moses and Elijah appear with him on the mount of
Transfiguration. The doctrine that at least two witnesses are enough is a
doctrine that was supposedly verified when Jesus said that the word of Peter and James and
John was enough
entitlement to believe that he had achieved this miracle. The two
witnesses was was supposedly verified when the testimony of
a few women were considered enough to get the apostles to believe that Jesus
rose from the dead. That means that you could take any pseudo-Messiah at all
and he will always have some followers that will swear to his divine authority
and authenticity and as long as you can get two testimonies that is enough to
believe in that Messiah.
Evangelical Christianity ignores miracles except the biblical ones. It just
simply assumes that the Catholic miracles are not from God or are hoaxes. That
is simply just choosing to believe in some miracles which is a totally
underhand approach for people who claim that miracles are evidence from heaven
about where the true gospel is. When such a huge body of Christians whose zeal
far surpasses that of the Catholics it is a warning that human nature intends
to lie about miracles so we are entitled to be sceptical no matter how devout
and holy the witnesses seem to be.
Religion is a load of old cobbles for there is no reason why we should favour
one system of belief over another. Every time religion gives you reasons to
believe all it is doing is manipulating you. Jesus was destroyed by the
claims of rival Messiahs.
Until we do the impossible task of refuting all rival claims which nobody can do
we cannot say we should believe in the miracle powers of Jesus Christ. If
you say that a statue is bleeding miraculously, the burden of proof is on you to
prove it. You have to refute every expert in the world who says it is
impossible on scientific or rational or philosophical or ethical or religious
grounds. When it is right to give you a lot of trouble if you slander, it
is right to do that too.
THE PURSUIT OF THE MILLENNIUM, Norman Cohn, Paladin, Herts, 1978
THE WORD OF THE LORD, The Church of Christ with the Elijah Message,
Independence, Missouri
THE BEASTS AND THE LITTLE HORN, Rev George S Hitchcock DD, Catholic Truth
Society, London, 1911