Ah C.S. Lewis or Mr. Dreary and Absurd. The Va. Tech game was on the radio so I tuned in to C2A after the show started and thought Steve had been bumped to another time slot or off the station altogether. These Screwtape Letters are simply absurd as is any belief in beings such as demons or Satan or angels. This is what is wrong with claiming Christianity isn’t a religion but a relationship. There’s a lot more involved than just believing in one invisible supernatural being, one problem is that it isn’t just one being but three beings two of which talk to each other but are supposedly the same being. There’s a medical term for that and another for believing it. Fundamentalist Christians simply cannot understand that the Christian God, the Bible God has too much unbelievable baggage that goes along with believing in it. One must also surrender their brain to a belief in beings such as Screwtape and Wormwood and their counterparts, angels and seraphs and whatever. This is why it’s disingenuous to promote pseudo-science like Intelligent Design magic and creation “science” as alternatives to naturalistic science that produces real results. Where’s the Intelligent Design in demons may I ask and how does ID magic explain their existence? Do you people even realize all the nonsense your cult leaders have brainwashed you into believing? Do you understand why atheism is so popular these days?
Your affectionate uncle, Screwtape.

All this coming from one of the few "smart people" on the planet that actually believes that Jesus never existed! The consensus among serious historians (religious or not) is ironclad as is the mountain of evidence that exists. Does Boris believe that Plato existed? How about Cesar Augustus? What about Socrates? Has Boris ever questioned the voracity of the Galic Wars or Homer's Iliad? OF COURSE NOT! But why??? SIMPLE: those issues have nothing to do with the fact that Boris needs to reject the divine like other so-called intelligent men, many of whom are scientists, because the thought of God is just too much to bear. WHY? That implies an overarching TRUTH that they may need to be concerned with, and since their "deeds are dark" and they don't want to hear that, they simply choose to rebel, regardless of the facts that "are plain to them". In the end, BORIS the AWESOME and VERY INTELLIGENT AGNOSTIC is the fool. How sad.

Ironclad? Mountain of evidence? You must be kidding. What serious secular historian has any evidence that Jesus Christ ever existed? Contrary to Steve’s false claim no serious historian will touch the stories in the Bible simply because none of them can be substantiated historically. I know because I have a history degree. And what is the best evidence Christian apologists throw out for the existence of their dying and resurrecting god man? Obvious forgeries in the works of Josephus we all know were put there by church propagandist and liar Eusebius. Even if these were not forged passages they’re from about 60 years after the supposed crucifixion of Jesus Christ. And this is the best evidence Christians have from outside the Bible for their Jesus. After that they must resort to forgeries in the works of second century historians Pliny, Tacitus and Suetonious. Narratives that contain dialog with people speaking in complete sentences are not historical narratives they are fictive. There are no exceptions to this rule. The gospels are fiction from start to finish. Neither Jesus Christ, Paul or any of the disciples actually existed. If they did we wouldn’t have the desperate claim that historians agree on something. We would have the actual demonstrations and facts that these historians base their claims on. We don’t, we never have and we never will.

Socrates was an invention of Plato. Homer's Iliad is obviously fiction. I find it amusing that a fool like Steve Noble, who knows absolutely nothing about his holy book, who wrote it, when they wrote it, where they wrote it, why they wrote it or even what it really says in its original languages calling someone else a fool. You believe in magic and magical beings Steve. Look in the mirror if you want to see a fool buddy. That vacant stare you see is a dead giveaway.

The only historians that could tell us about Jesus Christ were the historians that lived and recorded events during the time when Jesus supposedly lived. Like Philo for example, who lived in an around Jerusalem during the first half of the first century. Philo wrote extensively about first century Palestine and we have much of his work. Needless to say Philo never mentioned such a person as Jesus Christ, his disciples or the movement supposedly spawned from his ministry. Neither do any other of about forty Jewish and Roman historians who lived during that period that we have accounts from. Christian apologists have to resort to reports about the activities of Christians from second century historians like Pliny, Tacitus and Suetonius the earliest being from 112 CE. This is almost a century after the supposed time of Jesus and none of them mention Jesus Christ by name anyway. This is the reason no secular historians write about a historical Jesus. Historians need evidence to write about history. Stories involving angels, demons, Satan and miracles and containing dialog are not historical narratives. They are fiction. Every student of literature and history knows this.

Boris,

The percentage of historians today who accept that Jesus was a historical person is almost 100 percent.

Can you even name ANY who do not? Can you name two or three credentialed historians who teach at the university level who claim Jesus never existed?

The only Roman historians who lived in the first century who wrote existing works about the history of the first century are only four in number.

Tacitus, Suetonius, Plutarch and Josephus.

All lived in the first century. All wrote about Jesus except for Plutarch.

Plutarch wrote only about Roman and Greek statesmen.

There were other writers during this time who mentioned Jesus who are NOT historians such as Pliny. Then there are other writers who were contemporaries of Jesus who don't mention him, but they wrote no history. Period. In fact there are only those four who wrote Roman or Jewish history who have works surviving today.

Philo did NOT write extensively about first century Palestine. He lived in Alexandria. He wrote mainly allegorical commentaries on the books of Moses and some letters.

Jay Rogers,
Your appeal to the authority of historians is a logical fallacy and demonstrates the weakness of your case. The percentage of honest historians who accept the gospels as historical narratives is zero. Historical narratives do not contain word for word dialogs and monologues with people speaking in complete sentences. No one speaks that way in real life and narratives such as these are always fictive. Plus historical narratives don’t contain tales of the supernatural starring such beings as angels, demons and Satan all of whom also have speaking roles in these narratives as well. Produce a historical narrative that is written in the style of the gospels, Acts or Revelation.
I cannot accept the claim that Tacitus, Suetonius and Josephus all wrote about Jesus. First of all any historian writing decades or centuries after the events could only write of those things which he had heard others say. In other words, he would be writing hearsay, secondhand accounts of what Christ's followers said about him. Certainly, this cannot be considered as reliable information. Second, the writings of these historians weren’t in some kind of library. They were in the possession of the Church, who studied them and made copies of them by hand. The Church had the opportunity, the means, and the motive to forge historical documents. The entries in the works of Josephus known as the ‘golden paragraphs’ are widely accepted to be forgeries done by church propagandist and admitted liar Eusebius. Even if these accounts are the words of these historians Josephus wrote in 90 CE and Tacitus and Suetonius in 112 CE. This is 60 and 82 years after the supposed ministry of Christ and his crucifixion. Neither Tacitus nor Suetonius mentioned Jesus of Nazareth or the name Jesus at all but only the existence of Christians. All the non-existent resurrecting god-men had many followers. Having followers certainly doesn’t mean Adonis, Dionysus, Attis, Demeter, Horus or any other gods actually existed. Using the testimonies of these historians as proof of Jesus’ existence only proves just how weak the case for a historical Jesus really is.

There were a lot more than four Roman historians who wrote about the first century. Thallus, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Cremutius Cordus, Livy, Appian, all unmentioned by you because you never heard of them, or more likely conveniently forgotten because none of them mentioned Jesus Christ. Authors Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy compiled a list of over forty Roman and Jewish historians all of whom wrote BEFORE Tacitus, Suetonius and Josephus and contemporary with the time the gospels are set in. Needless to say not one of these historians wrote a word about Jesus Christ.

If you think history professors are teaching about a historical Jesus think again. What material would a history teacher use to teach about the life of Jesus? The Bible? A book that says the earth is flat and never moves and had vegetation on it BEFORE the sun and moon even existed? Dream on. I’m quite sure you haven’t the foggiest notion what history even is let alone how it is taught at the university level.