Jesus and His Miracles

[beso]

When did Jesus start doing miracles?

Was it only in the last part of His life when people started following Him?

Was it something he could do from the manger or did he have to develop the skill?

Or did he just do them all the time and have to learn to control it? Like did Mary give him fish for lunch and sometimes the moment He picked it up it was alive again? (Could be quite inconvenient.)

[naomi24]

There are tales emanating from ancient texts that tell of the infant Jesus informing his mother from the cradle that he was the son of God (I thought having hobnobbed with an angel she already knew that - but there you are), and as a child, among other things, bringing clay models of birds to life. Judas Iscariot is also purported to have been a playmate of Jesus. It would appear that Jesus wasn't all sweetness and light though, but was in fact a bit of brat because when another boy ran into him and knocked him over, Jesus struck him dead! How's that for Christian forgiveness? ;o)

[sandyRoe]

The first recorded miracle was at the wedding feast at Cana. There water was changed into wine.

[chakka35]

Why do you assume that he performed miracles? Where is the evidence?

[jno]

the evidence is in the Bible. You may choose to disbelieve it if you wish, as any jury may reject evidence they hear; but it's evidence all the same.

[chakka35]

jno, what is in the Bible is not evidence; it is narrative. A jury hears two sorts of evidence: physical evidence (fingerprints, DNA, gunshot residue, etc) and personal testimony (the accounts of ear- and eye-witnesses). The Bible contains neither.

[jno]

thank you for your assumptions and abuse, wyzard. Nonetheless, second-hand testimony may be presented to a court; it's up to the judge and jury what they make of it.

[Andyvon]

Jesus wasn't a Christian at all Naomi. He was a Jew.

Christianity didn't exist at the time. It only developed in the decades following Christ's death and the Christianity we know today was cemented in 325AD.

[naomi24]

Andy, you've misunderstood my post completely, but perhaps it's my fault for being deliberately flippant at the end there. I am very much aware that Jesus was a Jew and of the history of Christianity.

[beso]

When passing judgment on evidence one usually looks for independent corroboration to determine which accounts are true.

Fact is there is no independent contemporary corroboration of the Biblical accounts. Indeed the Biblical account is not even self consistent. Although one would have expected the grandest feature of His life was the ability to perform miracles only one of the Canonical texts mentions them.

Despite the remarkable claims as to His abilities, not one single other written word outside the Bible has ever come to light that suggests Jesus even existed. How such a remarkable man would go unnoticed to the wider world suggests he didn't exist.

Given that the miraculous events described are clearly fictional I see no reason not to assume that everything about Jesus is a work of fiction. Clearly the story was constructed with the express purpose of "fulfilling" the Old Testament prophecies.

It written at a time with a convenient historical setting that ensured nobody alive could have been an eye witness to the purported events.

[jake-the-peg]

Well remember that the bible is not a single book but a compedium.

the synoptic Gospells of Mathew, Mark and Luke can be compared for consistancy and as you say have some interesting deviations.

There is the near contemporary Jewish Historian Josephus although some of what he is supposed to have written is clearly a very crude later forgerie and the remainder is not very illuminating - but enough to make me believe that Jesus did at least exist.

Thing is we see enough supposed accounts of various miracles - from miraculous statues to raisings from the dead that are not associated with Jesus or even with Christianity.

There's nothing special about the claims for Jesus's miracles

I guess people believe the miracles that support their own religious narrative and reject those that don't.

They are in effect a measure of the faith that followers have in their religious leaders nothing more.

[Davethedog]

Jno - "second-hand testimony may be presented to a court"? Can I seriously ask when? I always understood that this would be heresay and would be inadmissable.

[naomi24]

I'm with Jake here. I don't think for a moment that Jesus was who he was purported to have been - either by the Christians or the Muslims - but I think he existed.

[naomi24]

ps. I don't think there is any doubt whatsoever that the 'evidence' would be deemed inadmissible in any court of law in this country.

[chakka35]

Sorry to be a bore, jno, but ...what second-hand testimony? What first-hand testimony is quoted by whom?