It isn’t a matter of whether it hurts; it’s a matter of whether it’s possible. It isn’t.
I have no interest in the OP, but this comment is interesting to me. How do you define “the earliest days”, or “the earliest Christians”?
For my part, I find no compelling evidence that the Christians that would have been alive at the time of Christ’s death would have venerated any ground at all.
OTTOMH, I think of the inner chamber of the tabernacle, Mount Zion, sites of various battles, etc and for the life of me I can’t remember any edict from the Judeo Christian God that would have any ground venerated. The temple that Solomon built was said to be holy, and at God’s direction. And…there was strict limits as to who could enter the inner chamber. (the Levitical Priests)
But I find no evidence that the earliest Church—defined as the Church in the immediate aftermath of Christ’s death----would have venerated any object, idol or piece of ground.
Fast forward 400 years or so, and we have shrines, idols, and traditions galore. But I submit that Church of the Holy Sepulchre and other items similarly venerated are just a form of idolatry. I’m hard pressed to see the earliest Church buying into any of this.
Thank goodness for your “razzing” emoticon; otherwise, the entire credibility of your argument would be destroyed. When only one side of a debate may determine what is and what is not evidence, then there isn’t a debate at all. There is a lecture.
There is indeed evidence, which I supplied. And here’s more.. You’ve begun this business again of cherry-picking what scholars you prefer, failing to mention any controversies surrounding it all, and presenting what you’ve selected as established truth. It is your failure even to acknowlege controversy that hurts your argument as much as anything. And that’s a real tragedy, because you’ve spent so much time on all this. But your time has been spent in search of evidence to support your conclusion — the very exercise which Popper labelled “pseudoscience”. There is controversy over all this. Nothing is settled, and for the sake of your intellectual integrity, you need to admit it.
The city of Jerusalem is an interesting case. For the first 150 years or so of Christianity, the entire city was reviled as the Place that had Rejected Christ. No Jews (including early Christians) were allowed within the city walls, and for part of that time, none were even allowed in the land of Judea. It would have been extremely difficult to set up any holy sites in the city during this time, and, in all liklihood, the prevailing attitude of the day would have been against it anyway.
A hijack? It seems to be nearly precisely what this thread is about.
Note the initials. 
There are no coincidences in Biblical scholarship.
“DNA tests” would seem to imply that the caskets contained some human remains. It seems a bit unlikely that these remains could have been gathering dust in some museum basement for 27 years, without anyone noticing that the skeleton labeled ‘Jesua’ had been crucified. But then, Israeli archaeologists are a legendarily obtuse lot.
Seriously, I note that the article states:
–but no matter how professional the guy was trying to be, I bet there wasn’t at least an initial ‘what the HELL?’ moment.
If Jesus is the son of God ,we can get gods dna here. That will prove it all. Case closed. I can’t wait.
Interesting post. I’ve never heard this. Are you saying that after Christ’s death all Jews in Jerusalem were essentially evacuated? Wasn’t the Epistle of Paul to the Hebrews written to the Christian congregation in Jerusalem? Didn’t the early Church elders meet in Jerursalem to resolve at least one dispute?
And shortly thereafter, we can clone God. Shake things up a bit.
This is just whining. If you have any evidence, produce it. The persuasiveness of the evidence can stand or fall on its own.
The first link you supplied contained no mention of an empty tomb at all, much less any support for a contention that it existed in a pre-Markan oral tradition.
your second link goes to a list of circular arguments and specious assertions made by made by well-known apologist, William Lane Craig. I can do a point by point rebuttal of Craig if you’d like.
Craig is not arguing from a scholarly position but an apologetic one. That is to say, he does not employ historical methodology to seek information. He starts with a conclusion and then finds any excuse to support thgat conclusion in the face of all evidence to the contrary.
There really is no “controversy” over this as far as serious historians and Bible scholars are concerned. There is the scholarship and there are apologetic efforts made against the scholarship by (generally uncredentialled) religionists who want to preserve a preconceived conclusion. I would also point out that Craig is a theologian, not a historian.
Here are a couple of rebuttals to Craig from Jeff Lowder and from historian Richard Carrier.
This is all false.
Getting back to the DNA evidence… Is there anyone alive today who claims to trace his ancestry back to Jesus’s family? Joseph, Mary, their parents, grandparents, etc? If so, and if the DNA evidence from the bodies showed that they came from the same line, wouldn’t that be pretty compelling?
Of course, even if Jesus’s body were 100% proven to exist, I imagine Christians could just say, “He was risen in spirit. He walked the Earth as the son of God. His body was therefore irrelevant, and perhaps it was moved by his disciples to prevent its desecration” or something like that. I have a hard time imagining Christians saying, “oh, you’ve got DNA evidence? Well, in that case, screw the faith that my family has followed for centuries.”
Not unless you count the discredited Merovingian theory.
In answer to the OP’s question:
No, I don’t care. I might go to the movie, though.
Tris
Aren’t you the same guy who claimed that the God of the Bible does not call for death in many circumstances that seem morally trivial or silly?
In any case, James Cameron has always been an egotistical nutball, so I sort of look forward to him getting his comeuppance on something that looks, in all respects, to be pathetically silly as historical debunking goes. In fact, this will most likely hurt skepticism in general, unfortunately, and skepticism of Christian apologia specifically (and will give Christianists a heck of a lot to scream about and point to whenever needed).
I really don’t understand what you mean. He earned at least $115M from Titanic alone, and with a resume that includes Terminator I&II, Aliens and True Lies, should he decide to write/produce/direct another feature for theatre release, the studios/distributors will outbid themselves to bankruptcy for a chance to get the film. There is arguably no one more bankable in Hollywood today.
Back to the topic at hand:
I find this worrying and slightly offensive. Are you actually saying that the only reason you behave like a nice human being, is because you fear Yahveh, or try to obey his rules? That without your deity, you wouldn’t have a moral compass and that you’d start behaving more like an asshole?
I don’t know what that says about me, being religion free, or about anyone else who doesn’t believe in a vengeful god.
What do you think is holding *me * back from fornicating, despising my enemies and not turning the other cheek? Seriously, if it’s not too much of a hijack, I’d like an answer.
I’m not sure that Ted was claiming to refrain from hating his enemies, seeking revenge, or fornicating strictly on the basis of fear of a vengeful god. The impression I got was that he doesn’t currently do those things because JC said not to, and JC is God, according to Ted’s beliefs. (So maybe that falls into your category of “just obeying Yahweh’s rules”.)
But yeah, I also find it a bit strange that a devout Christian would consider it desirable, in the hypothetical case of losing the scriptural basis for traditional Christian ethical principles, to abandon the rules against, say, despising one’s enemies and not the rules against killing or stealing.
When I show up at church every Sunday (lifelong atheist, also Episcopalian choir singer, long story, never mind), what I hear is sermons about why Christian principles are good for humanity and aligned with God’s will and all. Not about “these rules are a pain in the ass, but we have to follow them as long as we can’t disprove that this radical hippie back in Roman Judaea was lying when he said he was God”.
Ah, the ad hominem begins. Allow me to refocus your attention to the discussion itself. You claimed first that there was no “good” evidence. When informed that you do not get to decide unilaterally what is good and what is bad, you changed it to “no” evidence. When more evidence was given to you, you invoked “whining”.
Squirm. Fight. Shout. Sling fists if you like. But when you’re finished with whatever you need to do, you still do not get to declare the Objective Truth about matters of controversy like this. You just don’t.
I gave you two separate studies, which you (finally) indicate don’t suit you. But not suiting you does not constitute failing as evidence. Despite what you might think, it is not the case that you sit on the Throne of Truth while we bring you our alms to examine for validity. 
I recognize that there are arguments to more than one side. You present only one side and ignore the other(s). Your arguments would carry so much more weight if you simply revealed that you are trusting certain scholars over others. (Calling one a scholar and another an apologist doesn’t help your case; rather, it only makes your prejudice more conspicuous.)
I guess the question at this point, since we’ve covered this very issue so many times, is … why? Why do you attempt to hide opposing views? I mean, other than because you find one superior to the other. Nobody cares about that, and no one even knows it’s only your opinion, because you don’t tell anybody that’s all it is. Are you afraid that other people might choose the opposing view if you reveal it?
For one that claims to follow logic to an extreme this is sad, **Diogenes ** did not hide the opposing view, anyone can still see your evidence.
Well, I did check for a rebuttal to Craig, and so far it seems to me that Craig is not telling the whole history.
I don’t think this calls for a whooosh, but I am pretty sure that the good friar was posting ironically.