Is there anyone here who is good with Symbolic Logic? Here's a challenge..

[antigone382]

5. It assumes that because the gospels attribute to Jesus claims of divinity...

He is either a liar (and therefore a bad man) or he is telling the truth (and therefore God).

I've seen other fallacious logical exercises that have the same dichotomy, with the added option that Jesus was crazy. They then prove that because Jesus did or said this or that (again, according to the Gospels) he could not be crazy or a liar. So therefore he's God.

What's missing is honest admission that the earliest Gospel in the Bible was written somewhere around 35 years after Jesus is thought to have died, and that each of the gospels was written with its own political and religious agenda, and its own intended audience. While the gospels converge on several points (particularly Matthew, Mark, and Luke, which seem to have been written in succession), there are also several points at which their timelines and theological points conflict. There is no way to verify that any particular statement attributed to Jesus was actually said by him. Therefore a supposed assertion by Jesus that he is God does not necessarily stand or fall based on the other statements and actions of Jesus as described in the gospels.

This doesn't even get into the fallacious reasoning that a person who is dishonest or delusional in some aspects of his or her life must not have great integrity or wisdom in other aspects.