Thread 18154829

How do atheists make sense of the explosive growth of Christianity without the Gospels being true?
Along with the history of Israel, which is written together with the Bible in such a way that one cannot be exempt from the other?

The mental gymnastics would have to be even more fantastical.

>>18154829 (OP)
Demonstrate that christianity' growth must mean the gospels are true; proceed

Constantine made it the state religion of Rome

>How do atheists make sense of the explosive growth of Christianity without the Gospels being true?
State backing.
>Along with the history of Israel, which is written together with the Bible in such a way that one cannot be exempt from the other?
They contradict each other.

>>18154833
You make it sound like it was enforced or something.

>>18154834
>State backing.
More like concession to the people.

>>18154832
>One day for no reason at all, Christianity took over the world.

>>18154855
I accept your concession /thread

It was over 100 years after the death of Christ when the religion took off which is comparatively slow when you place it up against islam or buddhism.

>>18154855
Christianity was successful because it's a really good meme. When you really think about it, the biggest focus of most religions is some kind of practice. On the other hand, the biggest focus of Christianity is believing that Christianity is true, and its second biggest focus is making other people believe that Christianity is true.
It's just a very minmaxxed belief system.

>>18154867
But that's an equivocation with labeling doe.

>>18154871
It answers historical and personal and philosophical matters. Can't deny creator, sin, shame, inherent dignity and values, divine even.
It convicts the heart.
No meme answers can substitute the truth.

>>18154878
I mean meme in the original sense, not like funny internet shit.

It's so ironic that /b/ and /his/ is the most reddit of all the boards on 4chan.

>>18154892
Reddit atheism is the most 4chan movement produced by reddit.

>>18154892
>having to use memes to prove your mahic man is real
Grim

>>18154898
Perpetually maintaining the underage energy is exclusively reddit though.
Has been cope.

>>18154907
>Perpetually maintaining the underage energy is exclusively reddit though.
Literally debunked by spending five minutes on this site.

>explosive growth
because one day one of the most powerful empires decided to make it the state religion followed by then the various successor states keeping that moment forward whenever they faced a lesser political entity they could easily overrun and enforce said religion, of course the moment they ran into an equal or one simply far far to large to force convert suddenly it wasn't that great at spreading

>>18154829 (OP)
There always needs to be a biggest religion and fastest growing religion by definition
Much of Biblical history is false

>>18154917
>one day
Isn't that just begging the question?
>>18154855

>>18154922
Classic fallacy of equivocation with labelling.
>>18154872

>>18154924
Nta but I can't take you seriously because you believe the Earth is 6k years old and that people a couple thousands years ago rode dinosaurs like in the Flintstones.

>>18154923
in that case its because a guy whos mother was a christian ended up winning a civil war and pretty much subtly mandated it with his successors further mandating it, of course as stated before the moment they suddenly faced a foe they couldn't bum rush suddenly christianity for some reason couldn't spread in that area

>>18154928
I don't know what I'm supposed to get from that or how much that is supposed to mean to me but isn't 6k years around the same time when the earliest writings were discovered?

>>18154937
>isn't 6k years around the same time when the earliest writings were discovered?
Ergo the planet is 6k years old and people used to ride dinosaurs like in the Flintstones!

>>18154829 (OP)
>more shitskins and chinks are being born than ever
>this means that the Bible is true!!!!

>>18154942
>Ergo the planet is 6k years
An effect which emphasises the cause, not the cause.

If you gonna ask me if I think the Earth is indeed 6k years old, I don't know the answer but that's my suspicion.

>>18154950
Lil bro... The reason why we think the oldest known text is ~6k years old is dating methods which tell us the Earth definitely isn't 6k years old......

>>18154952
Ain't that just circular?

>>18154955
How is that circular? You can't use the fact that the oldest written text is ~6k years old for the Earth being 6k years old when the dating methods that let you know the text's age say the Earth isn't 6k years old. Either the methods work and the Earth isn't 6k years old or they don't work and you can't use the age of the oldest written text as an argument for the Earth being 6k years old.
Super simple.

>>18154829 (OP)
As a person who is in that kind of balls deep: State and church control the populace using occult technique with religions, the main one being Christians.

I am a rather sought answer individual, defining myself as a NHI should tell you part of the tale.

>Muh society
Please bitch, be more obvious

Test.

Made the same thread on /pol/ and it got removed in under a minute meaning it wasn't even read. While there are tons of fedora threads up for hours.
Probably some assblasted jannie from this thread.

Following me around. The amount of seethe cannot be healthy.

>>18154829 (OP)
The proposed answer seems to be that Christianity's growth rate for the first couple centuries wasn't actually that impressive as far as cults go.
https://infidels.org/library/modern/richard-carrier-improbable-luck/#10
>Given the best estimate of the total population of the Roman Empire as 60 million, this means that even by the most favorable scholarly estimate on record, Christians comprised only 25% of the population even after nearly three centuries of evangelism. And most scholars agree the ratio was probably closer to 10%. Even so, all scholars agree a ratio higher than 25% is completely unsupportable. As Stark rightly points out—and he is a sociologist by profession—a final number like this allows us to predict the average rate of growth over the previous centuries from known historical precedents and scientific models. Stark does the math, and demonstrates that only a rate of growth of around 40% per decade fits the actual data we have as well as known precedents (it roughly matches the rate of growth of the Mormon Church, for example).

>>18154834
Except the bible is fiction
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Iep4gnmJeRE

>>18154871
Christianity is structured like a mafia style protection racket, it implies that you should join our club and pay your dues or something really bad could happen to you"

>>18155442
Again, equivocation with labelling.
Completely different circumstances.
It's about the same as "muslims also died for their beliefs" tier retarded.
The rest is just irrelevant dogshit opinion desu.
Fallacy of equivocation is about 99% of the fallacies.

Basically, people were very eager to sacrifice their life no matter the degree of persecution be it through living or death for a rumor they like which spread like wildfire.
And not the literal books of written records and letters by the people at the time explaining the events in details.
On the basis that it's supernatural, cause it's not natural.
It's not even a realistic answer, how is this anything more than personal copes?

>How do mobile phone users make sense of the explosive growth of the iPhone without the Steve's genius being true?
I guess u aer right

>>18155598
...is what I would say if I were a faggot.

>>18155615
>How do sex havers make sense of the explosive growth of the homosexuality without craving gay ass being true?

>>18155622
>How do fucking sex havers make fucking sense of the fucking explosive growth of the fucking homosexuality without fucking craving fucking gay ass being fucking true?

>>18155666
you seem rather mad and gay, Satan.