Historical non biblical references about Jesus


Amym73
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1 hour ago, Amym73 said:

Ancient evidence for Jesus's life and death

I recently stumbled across this article and thought it was a good breakdown of outside proof of Jesus's life. Most may know about this but if not you may find it very interesting and exciting ! 

Thanks for posting, this is a very interesting article. And to think, some atheists claim Christ never existed. I don't see how anyone who has looked at all of the evidence (even outside of the Bible) could conclude that Jesus didn't exist. I guess most of those people haven't studied it out because they don't care about Jesus.

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11 minutes ago, Larry Cotrell said:

Thanks for posting, this is a very interesting article. And to think, some atheists claim Christ never existed. I don't see how anyone who has looked at all of the evidence (even outside of the Bible) could conclude that Jesus didn't exist. I guess most of those people haven't studied it out because they don't care about Jesus.

 Most atheists chose to believe that Jesus didn't exist then look for evidence to back it up, no matter how discredited. 

in reality, if you tried to argue that Jesus didn't exist-even in very secular divinities schools-you'd be basically ignored. The evidence (even just straight historical, non biblical) is overwhelming that He existed. 

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It's quite a silly argument, when you think about it.  Secularists don't trip all over themselves trying to prove that there was no Moses, or Mohammed, or Confucius, or Siddhartha Gautama, or Zoroaster. 

Crimony, no one even seriously doubts the existence of Paul of Tarsus.  It's only when you go back another decade in history that "scholars" all of a sudden start wondering whether we can be really sure that the hapless Yeshua ben Yosef ever actually existed.

Edited by Just_A_Guy
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3 hours ago, Larry Cotrell said:

Thanks for posting, this is a very interesting article. And to think, some atheists claim Christ never existed. I don't see how anyone who has looked at all of the evidence (even outside of the Bible) could conclude that Jesus didn't exist. I guess most of those people haven't studied it out because they don't care about Jesus.

Agree. I feel that a common  argument is that there is nothing written while he was living and while all of these accounts are written atleast 7 years past his death,  some a hundred, they all acknowledge that he was very real and I feel that cannot be ignored! I really appreciated the description of the way the early Christians worshipped together.  That was just plain interesting! Glad you enjoyed it ! 

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3 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

It's quite a silly argument, when you think about it.  Secularists don't trip all over themselves trying to prove that there was no Moses, or Mohammed, or Confucius, or Siddhartha Gautama, or Zoroaster. 

Crimony, no one even seriously doubts the existence of Paul of Tarsus.  It's only when you go back another decade in history that "scholars" all of a sudden start wondering whether we can be really sure that the hapless Yeshua ben Yosef ever actually existed.

I am not sure why people always want to pro e he wasn't real. It is just too well documented to make a good argument out of it. 

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3 hours ago, MormonGator said:

 Most atheists chose to believe that Jesus didn't exist then look for evidence to back it up, no matter how discredited. 

in reality, if you tried to argue that Jesus didn't exist-even in very secular divinities schools-you'd be basically ignored. The evidence (even just straight historical, non biblical) is overwhelming that He existed. 

True, and most scholars actually believe that the Bible is an accurate and true historical narrative of its times. So the fact people still argue about it is interesting . I feel it's really a lack of knowledge of what is out there for proof and being attached to the ideal they are right,even when the evidence says otherwise. 

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38 minutes ago, Amym73 said:

True, and most scholars actually believe that the Bible is an accurate and true historical narrative of its times. So the fact people still argue about it is interesting . I feel it's really a lack of knowledge of what is out there for proof and being attached to the ideal they are right,even when the evidence says otherwise. 

I think it is much more nuanced than this. Very few scholars, that I am aware of, believe that the book of Job is about a historical figure. Most that I am aware of believe that Job is a work of fiction. Similarly, Jonah is often consisdered less than historical. And, of course, there are always the discussions around the creation accounts and flood accounts of Genesis.

I, too, find it interesting that there are extra-biblical references to a person named Jesus in that time period, and that at least some of those references seem to validate the existence of the person we call Messiah, Savior, Redeemer. I see very little in these accounts that can possibly corroborate the miraculous resurrection, or His performance of a substitionary atonement in the Garden and on the Cross. It is interesting, but one still needs to rely on faith and testimony for the important parts of the Biblical claims.

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12 hours ago, Amym73 said:

True, and most scholars actually believe that the Bible is an accurate and true historical narrative of its times. So the fact people still argue about it is interesting . I feel it's really a lack of knowledge of what is out there for proof and being attached to the ideal they are right,even when the evidence says otherwise. 

I will go further. As far as I know, the Old Testament is by far the most complete and accurate record we have of ancient dealings. It largely lacks the lionization that characterizes so much surviving ancient writing.

Or so I've been told; I personally haven't performed extensive comparative studies of ancient historical sources in their original languages.

EDIT: I do realize that this thread is specifically about Jesus. I was responding more narrowly to the particular post quoted.

Edited by Vort
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12 hours ago, Amym73 said:

True, and most scholars actually believe that the Bible is an accurate and true historical narrative of its times. So the fact people still argue about it is interesting . I feel it's really a lack of knowledge of what is out there for proof and being attached to the ideal they are right,even when the evidence says otherwise. 

It'a a lack of knowledge but it's also like this: 

"I want to believe atheism because if I accepted Christ I'd have to admit I'm a sinner and I'm too prideful to do that." 

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57 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

What do you think is the best way to use fountain pen ink to re-fill a rollerball pen?

Assuming you mean the disposable cartridge in a rollerball pen: you'll need one of these to suck the ink out of the bottle and squirt it into the cartridge.

Now, when you're ready to talk ink, let me know. :)

Better options, IMO:

Get a re-fillable rollerball (not a rollerball that takes refills, but one that's meant to use bottled ink).  I haven't done research but have passed by information about such in the fountain pen world (there are markers and highlighters like this too).  For example:

J. Herbin Refillable Rollerball Pen

This one requires either cartridges (can be refilled with syringe, as above) or a converter which fills like the piston filler below.

Noodler's Konrad refillable rollerball pen - demonstrator

...the Noodler's is a piston filler, so you just stick the tip in a bottle of ink and pull in ink via the piston.  And you can see the ink slosh around in there - one of the joys of demonstrator pens. :)

Here's a thread talking about refilling a rollerball cartridge.  And anotherAnd a Parker one.

IMO: Just get a fountain pen instead. :)  If you change the ink (brand / color) in any of these, you'll have to clean it, just like you clean a fountain pen.  If you're using permanent ink (regardless of pen type), you'll want to clean it on occasion to keep it from clogging.

 

My question is, why?  If you're gonna use a rollerball, there are approximately 12 billion options out there, including a wide variety of ink colors and properties.  Why not just use what's out there?  (Not discouraging using bottled ink here, just really curious why you'd want to / what's lacking in pens you can buy.)
 

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1 hour ago, Carborendum said:

What do you think is the best way to use fountain pen ink to re-fill a rollerball pen?

Never found a rollerball that was quite happy with fountain pen ink, and not too many vendors have good rollerball formulations. 

Now refilling the cheap disposable fountain pens is a great way to have several inks available, though some seem to get scratchy with good inks.  Usually a little work with fine sandpaper will help there.

FWIW, my general letter writing ink lately has been Noodler's Antietam.

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27 minutes ago, zil said:

My question is, why?  If you're gonna use a rollerball, there are approximately 12 billion options out there, including a wide variety of ink colors and properties.  Why not just use what's out there?  (Not discouraging using bottled ink here, just really curious why you'd want to / what's lacking in pens you can buy.)

My wife has specific needs.  She wants a 0.5mm ball that will write in amethyst ink.  Unfortunately, the inks that are out there will only write amethyst in the 0.7mm ball.  When applied to the 0.5mm ball, it becomes more pinkish.  So, I figure I have to take the amethyst and add a drop or two of midnight blue to get the color that will appear amethyst in the 0.5mm ball.

The best I'm coming up with is using a Mont Blanc refill (amethyst) with a Pilot casing.  The Mont Blanc refills are actually quite affordable.  I can't figure out if the Mont Blanc is 0.5 or 0.7   Then if I buy a full well of ink...

BUT, if you can think of an affordable way of getting a good quality 0.5mm ball with ink that I can mix myself, that would be appreciated.

She's also particular about the comfort of her fingers.

BTW: The piston fillers would probably be ideal.  But she wants the pen itself to also be purple.

Edited by Guest
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20 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

BUT, if you can think of an affordable way of getting a good quality 0.5mm ball with ink that I can mix myself, that would be appreciated.

Best bet: http://www.gouletpens.com/rollerball-pens/c/22

Call or email them about nib sizes.  They don't seem to be listed in their tech specs, but Goulet was very helpful the times I've ordered from them. 

Also, you can try http://dromgooles.squarespace.com/  You'll have to call or email for most pricing there.  Their exclusive Noodler's Texas blend inks are interesting too.  I keep meaning to get some Pecan and Live Oak for letters.

Does anybody near you use fountain pens a lot?  The Pilot Vanishing Point seems to be a love-it-or-hate-it option for rollerball fans, but at $150, buying one just to try it out is a bit prohibitive.  Some of the cheap hooded nib fountain pens also have a feel like a very light touch rollerball.  The Hero 616 knockoffs are hit and miss, but at a buck each, you can afford to buy a handful and use the best one.  http://www.ebay.com/p/hero-616-fountain-pen-hooded-golden-black-barrel-small-vintage-m8/1669122920?iid=172293796712&ul_noapp=true,true&chn=ps&lpid=82,82

Edited by NightSG
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19 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

My wife has specific needs.  She wants a 0.5mm ball that will write in amethyst ink.  Unfortunately, the inks that are out there will only write amethyst in the 0.7mm ball.  When applied to the 0.5mm ball, it becomes more pinkish.  So, I figure I have to take the amethyst and add a drop or two of midnight blue to get the color that will appear amethyst in the 0.5mm ball.

Are you saying you've already transferred ink from a 0.7mm refill into an empty 0.5mm refill?  Or did you get this amethyst ink elsewhere?  (Either way, it is generally true that the finer the nib, the lighter the color, because less ink is put down on paper.  So she's going to want a darker ink.)

The Montblanc Amethyst refills appear to only come in medium - that's gonna be 0.7mm or larger.  The only fines I see are Pacific Blue and Mystery Black.  Montblanc's Mystery Black is known to have some purple underneath, so this might be the thing to mix in.  But amethyst doesn't come in a bottle - closest is Lavender Purple.  If you're going to mix, stick with one brand - don't go mixing across brands until / unless you know more (some interesting chemical reactions are possible - even within the same brand).

But there's no shortage of purple inks out there, in every possible shade.  And with fountain pen inks, you can buy them in ~2mL samples, which is more than enough to determine if you like it.  (If you think you want to experiment, ask me about the ink because there are things you should know - like De Atramentis Aubergine is extremely wet and will create a wider line despite the nib size; Noodler's Bay State... inks should not be mixed with anything - unless you want the inky equivalent of Jello to result.)

That brings up paper - paper makes a huge difference.  Crappy paper (everything made in America) will literally suck liquid (aka fountain pen) ink into it and spread it out into a line much wider than the nib.  Good paper (Europe, Japan) will let the ink rest on top and dry there (a problem for many lefties).  Finding the right pen / paper / ink combo is an adventure.  So, while the bottles and mixing your own sound good, it may not do what you want, and rollerball ink may not be very mixable - dunno, depends how liquid it is.  (You may want some of these to mix and store in.)

Question: Is it rollerball, or .5mm or both that she's stuck on?  Here's a key thing people tend not to realize about pens: with a ballpoint, you put a massive amount of strain on your hand just to write with it.  Gel pens require less strain.  Rollerballs less still.  Fountain pens the least of all.  And you can easily get a fountain pen that writes a .5mm (or finer) line.  Hence my wondering which thing she's addicted to.  Because if it's comfort for her hand / fingers, a fountain pen is more likely to give it than any other pen (interestingly, I've never seen a rollerball with the kind of comfortable grip you get on many fountain pens, which seems very odd to me - maybe I haven't looked at expensive-enough ones).

[This thread has officially be hijacked.]

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@zil, @NightSG,

Here is what she wants:

  1. The pen itself (the shell) must be purple (amethyst).  It is her birthstone.  She has an affinity for it.
  2. The tip must be rollerball -- not ball point, not gel, I don't think she'd like the fountain because of leakage.   And she's not inclined to devote the time necessary to practice writing without getting it all over her fingers.
  3. The tip must be 0.5mm because she uses the Franklin Compact size planner.  With the 0.7mm, she ends up having to write broader to be able to read the writing.  Then she has to use multiple lines for the tasks on her task list.  But she has so many items on her task list that she runs out of room if she has to write two lines for each.
  4. Comfort grip.  The normally huge metal or hard plastic cases that fancier pens and most fountain pens come in are just too bulky.  The comfort grip of a Pilot G-2 seems to work fine for her.
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6 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

@zil, @NightSG,

Here is what she wants:

  1. The pen itself (the shell) must be purple (amethyst).  It is her birthstone.  She has an affinity for it.
  2. The tip must be rollerball -- not ball point, not gel, I don't think she'd like the fountain because of leakage.   And she's not inclined to devote the time necessary to practice writing without getting it all over her fingers.
  3. The tip must be 0.5mm because she uses the Franklin Compact size planner.  With the 0.7mm, she ends up having to write broader to be able to read the writing.  Then she has to use multiple lines for the tasks on her task list.  But she has so many items on her task list that she runs out of room if she has to write two lines for each.
  4. Comfort grip.  The normally huge metal or hard plastic cases that fancier pens and most fountain pens come in are just too bulky.  The comfort grip of a Pilot G-2 seems to work fine for her.

The hooded nib fountain pens let you grip a lot closer to the point without getting ink on you, and some of the 616s are impressively fine, though some are sort of random.  They're also fairly close to normal pen diameter, so no extra bulk there.  See http://www.hisnibs.com/'616'_series.htm for details, though I can't see ordering from him at $15 when they're so much cheaper on eBay...and you're already buying the cheap Chinese knockoff either way, so it's not like you're risking much.

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19 minutes ago, NightSG said:

The hooded nib fountain pens let you grip a lot closer to the point without getting ink on you, and some of the 616s are impressively fine, though some are sort of random.  They're also fairly close to normal pen diameter, so no extra bulk there.  See http://www.hisnibs.com/'616'_series.htm for details, though I can't see ordering from him at $15 when they're so much cheaper on eBay...and you're already buying the cheap Chinese knockoff either way, so it's not like you're risking much.

That answers the "ink all over" criterion.  What about the bleeding?  One advantage of the rollerball is that you can hold it on one spot with much less bleeding into the paper than a fountain pen, no?

EDIT: I checked the link.  They only come in three colors -- none are purple.

Thanks anyway.

Edited by Guest
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14 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

That answers the "ink all over" criterion.  What about the bleeding?  One advantage of the rollerball is that you can hold it on one spot with much less bleeding into the paper than a fountain pen, no?

EDIT: I checked the link.  They only come in three colors -- none are purple.

The burgundy varies from plain red to a garnet color, but again, it's luck of the draw.  Maybe http://www.ebay.com/itm/Clearing-Out-Hero-359-Fountain-Pen-Red-Fine-Nib-With-Extra-Fine-Nib-Two-Nibs-/331226132392  I can't find the purple one available at the moment, but maybe email the seller and see if they've got a few they haven't listed yet.

The boxed one seems to have the EF nib hooded, while the blister packed version is a straight up Lamy Safari knockoff with two unhooded nibs, so you'd want to clarify that and make sure you're getting a hooded EF if you decide to order one.

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29 minutes ago, NightSG said:

The burgundy varies from plain red to a garnet color, but again, it's luck of the draw.  Maybe http://www.ebay.com/itm/Clearing-Out-Hero-359-Fountain-Pen-Red-Fine-Nib-With-Extra-Fine-Nib-Two-Nibs-/331226132392  I can't find the purple one available at the moment, but maybe email the seller and see if they've got a few they haven't listed yet.

The boxed one seems to have the EF nib hooded, while the blister packed version is a straight up Lamy Safari knockoff with two unhooded nibs, so you'd want to clarify that and make sure you're getting a hooded EF if you decide to order one.

Why is it when i do a search for hooded nibs that I get 90% unhooded nibs called "hooded nib" pens?

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1 hour ago, Carborendum said:

leakage

Mythville, dude.

1 hour ago, Carborendum said:

And she's not inclined to devote the time necessary to practice writing without getting it all over her fingers.

Unless she's left-handed and a side-writer, the only time she's getting ink on her fingers is when she decides to have ink-ventures.  And unless you're going to spend the rest of your life refilling her 0.5mm rollerball cartridges with [some other ink], she's gonna have an ink-cident eventually - when refilling.

#4 - you would wait to ask this question until I'd thrown all the G-2s in the trash.  G-2s, BTW, are not rollerballs, they're gel pens.

So, we're looking at the following operation:

  • Buy a purple G2 (or 12, they break)
  • Buy an Extra Fine (05) G2 (or 12, the refill will wear out eventually)
  • Figure out how to empty the 05 G2 of it's undesirable ink
  • Figure out how to get the purple G2 ink into the 05 cartridge
    • Or, buy a Montblanc Amethyst rollerball, and figure out how to get its ink into the G2 05 cartridge and see if that works (rollerball ink is thinner - more liquid - than gel ink, and may gush right out of that cartridge (you may want to get an Ultra Fine G2 to test)).
  • Figure out how much that blob of gunk at the top of the ink matters, and if so, how to replace it

NOTE: There are a billion different pens with the same sort of grip as G2s.  You might have more luck looking at a different brand:

And the list goes on and on.  Looks like Pilot and some unheard-of brands are the only ones advertising liquid ink.

NOTE 2: It's possible the reason she likes this grip is because she's only ever tried other grips in equally small diameters, and a larger, hourglass grip, even though it's hard plastic, would be more comfortable.  On the other hand, it sounds like she's trying to stuff it into a pre-manufactured space and those tend to barely be large enough for a #2 pencil.

I'm beginning to feel compelled to go to the store to buy a crappy pen and put De Atramentis Aubergine in it to see what happens.... <sigh>

1 hour ago, Carborendum said:

That answers the "ink all over" criterion.  What about the bleeding?  One advantage of the rollerball is that you can hold it on one spot with much less bleeding into the paper than a fountain pen, no?

I have in my back pocket, the only rollerball worth using (uni-ball deluxe). I'm typing one-handed as the tip of the black one is held to paper.  And the paper was perfectly happy to suck ink right out of it.  (Just not as quickly as it will from a fountain pen.)  Frankly, except ballpoints and gel pens, where you have to force the ink out of the pen, I don't know of any pen that wouldn't do this.

Edited by zil
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