Proofs of the Bible (Long, but filled with information)
bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet
excerpt from a letter I wrote recently on Bible evidences. Replies on
the net or by email (though I can't promise I'll be prompt) are
welcome.
-Jeff
===========================================================================
You said (in not quite so many words) that I can't use the Bible to prove
the Bible. I could use that same reasoning to say don't use science to
prove science, but I'll just say this - in a trial, a man is allowed to
testify on his own behalf. Likewise, treating the Bible as we would any
other historical document, let's look at it.
It was written by 40 or so different men over a period of 1500 years on
three different continents, yet still retains an incredible unity - of
doctrine, of style, of morality, and of theme. Even if I accepted the
atheist's claim of 100-300 errors (which I do not - if you have any of
these you'd like to put forward, please do), its accuracy would still be
staggering.
Using the legal-historical method is the only way to prove the Bible's
accuracy ("beyond reasonable doubt"). One cannot use the scientific method
(repeating it in a controlled environment) to examine the Bible for the
same reason he cannot use it to prove Abraham Lincoln ever existed or other
historical events.
Comparison to other documents:
ANCIENT LITERATURE # MANUSCRIPTS PROXIMITY TO
ORIGINAL COPY
----------------------------- ---------------------- -------------
Livy's History of Rome 20 500 yrs
Caesar's Gallic Wars 10 900 yrs
Tacitus' Annals 2 800 yrs
History of Thucydides 8 1300+ yrs
History of Heroditus 1 1000 yrs
Writings of Aristotle 5 1400+ yrs
Now remember - all of these are universally regarded as accurate. Let's
compare them to the New Testament - 24,633 total MSS and 5338 complete MSS!
The second-most is Homer's Iliad, with only 643. In addition, these date
to within 40-300 years of the autograph. To reject the accuracy of these
is to reject all we know about the ancient world as historically inaccurate
as well.
Until 1947, though, we were not as fortunate with the OT. The earliest
fragments dated to about AD 850, the earliest complete copy to AD 1010.
This all changed with the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1947; these
documents dated from about 250 BC to AD 50. One who is familiar with the
deterioration of historical reliability might well expect such to be found
when compared to the 1000-year later copies, but the translations of the
Scrolls has confirmed the accuracy of the Masoretic texts.
You asserted God is inconsistent because he had an old law and a new one.
In actuality, there were three periods of time (dispensations), each with
its own law: the patriarchical dispensation (from Creation to the giving of
the law on Mt. Sinai), the Mosaic dispensation (from Mt. Sinai to the
crucifixion of Christ), and the Christian dispensation (from the cross to
the end of time). The laws of each led into the other. The Patriarchical
era led up to the selection of Abraham and his descendants to be the chosen
people of God. This came to fruition when they were given their own law,
the Law of Moses; note that the NT (in Romans) says the Gentiles had a law
under which they could obey God, but turned from it, so God left them to
their own devices. The Old Law, in turn, led up to Christ the Messiah and
the establishment of the church. Christ's death took the Old Law out of
effect, fulfilled it (Gal 3:23-25, Heb 9:15-18, 10:1-9, Col 2:14,16). The
Jews' knowledge of the morality God would have them behave in (remember -
the Gentiles' religion consisted frequently of idol worship, sexual
practices, sacrifices [sometimes human], etc., so the moral code of the NT
would be new to them), etc. helped to get the church "up and running".
For example, Acts says that elders were appointed in all the
congreagations at that time (a few years after Christ's death), yet
elsewhere in the Bible it says that elders are not to be novices
(pertaining to knowledge of the Word). A contradiction? No, the Jews were
well acquainted with what God expected of them; the Gentiles knew nothing.
The change in laws was more a doing away with the ceremonies (no need for
sacrifices when Christ's blood has been shed) of the OT and an extension of
the practices as God meant for them to be: the prohibition on divorce for
any reason other than adultery, etc.
Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
1) It claims to be - as I said, every man is allowed to testify on his own
behalf, so the Bible's claim must be counted as evidence, even if that
evidence is taken a little more lightly than some of the exterior evi-
dence. I trust we can agree that the Bible claims to be the sole rev-
elation of God to man; no Apocrypha, no additions, etc.
2) The unity of the Bible - A unity of facts, purpose, and teaching. Its
theme is that of the salvation from sin. It begins with the creation,
sin marring it, and God conceiving a great plan to redeem man from his
sins, and goes from there.
3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality - "Human books extol the virtues and
suppress the vices of their heroes. Not so with the Bible. It makes
no attempt to conceal, minimize, or apologize for the weaknesses,
mistakes, and wrongdoings of even its greatest characters. It tells of
the sins of friend and foe alike." (Jimmy Thomas - I could think of no
better way to phrase it in my own words).
5) The Brevity of the Bible - So much, virtually a history of the world, is
packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable. The
testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
Such a perfect person could never have been so perfectly created by any
man.
7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
predicted. The odds of Jesus fulfilling (whether accidentally and/or
by design) the prophecies applying to Him are beyond calculation.
8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge - One of the areas I personally
find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
was written by man. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
[force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
The Bible said the earth was round (Is 40:22, Prov 8:27, Lk
17:34-36). Not too long ago, great minds were convinced the earth was
held up by Atlas or something like him; read Job 26:7 to hear what the
Bible claimed. Moses knew about a plurality of seas, all with one
common bed (Gen 1:9-10). Solomon knew about the rain/evaporation cycle
(Eccl 1:7), as did Amos and Job (Amos 9:6; Job 36:27-28). After read-
ing Psalm 8:8, Matthew F. Henry charted the sea currents which are still
recognized today. Until recently, doctors had no idea how that blood
contained, in essence, the life of man, but the Bible did (Lev 17:11,
14). Scientists cannot distinguish between the blood of races of
people, just like God said in Acts 17:26.
9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
(I do not consider the adulterated version pushed by denominations
to be pure), it has done nothing but good. It makes those who
would obey it the model parents, friends, neighbors, and citizens, if
obeyed.
These are the main reasons. Next letter I'll examine creationism vs.
evolutionism - why if the supernaturalistic viewpoint is refused that
evolution is the only half-way logical alternative, the closed-mindedness
of those who insist upon naturalism, and the holes in the evolutionary
theory.
I accept the KJV is not definitive. I myself use the New American
Standard Version when preaching (which I have done parttime), but have to
from time to time defer to the KJV in parts where the KJV is truer to the
original and most consistent texts (ex: Mt 1:25, where "firstborn" is left
out, probably due to the fact that Catholics recopied many of the texts,
and Mt. 19:9). It takes examination of all versions. I would recommend
you read Jasper James Ray's _God Wrote Only One Bible_ for a defense of the
KJV; any efforts I make will repeat large sections of his work. I disagree
with some of his conclusions, but his data is accurate.
Loren King
My word! Look what can happen when one isn't thinking! I hope
this isn't a joke-post, or what follows will make me look pretty
gullible. Oh well, here goes ...
In article <1992Nov11....@wkuvx1.bitnet>, bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet writes:
[stuff deleted]
|> Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
|> 1) It claims to be - as I said, every man is allowed to testify on his own
|> behalf, so the Bible's claim must be counted as evidence, even if that
|> evidence is taken a little more lightly than some of the exterior evi-
|> dence. I trust we can agree that the Bible claims to be the sole rev-
|> elation of God to man; no Apocrypha, no additions, etc.
.....
|> 2) The unity of the Bible - A unity of facts, purpose, and teaching. Its
|> theme is that of the salvation from sin. It begins with the creation,
|> sin marring it, and God conceiving a great plan to redeem man from his
|> sins, and goes from there.
You'll recall a certain medieval conference which ensured this "unity"!
|> 3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
|> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
|> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
Rubbish. Read the Tao-teh Ching, the Bhagad'vita (sp?) ... and who's
standard of moral righteousness? You'll notice that one conspicuous
question that Christ failed to answer was Pilate's: "what is truth?"
|> 4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality - "Human books extol the virtues and
|> suppress the vices of their heroes. Not so with the Bible. It makes
|> no attempt to conceal, minimize, or apologize for the weaknesses,
|> mistakes, and wrongdoings of even its greatest characters. It tells of
|> the sins of friend and foe alike." (Jimmy Thomas - I could think of no
|> better way to phrase it in my own words).
RUBBISH!! Where are women in the bible? Where is their dignity and freedom?
Their interests, their intelligence? How about non-European cultures and beliefs?
Face it, the bible is a series of scripts written and extolled by M-E-N.
|> 5) The Brevity of the Bible - So much, virtually a history of the world, is
|> packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
|> important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
The history of A world, not THE world. And please spare us your cultural
arrogance as regards the importance of Jesus.
|> 6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable. The
|> testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
|> Such a perfect person could never have been so perfectly created by any
|> man.
|> 7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
|> get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
|> predicted. The odds of Jesus fulfilling (whether accidentally and/or
|> by design) the prophecies applying to Him are beyond calculation.
Well the virtue of ambiguous, translated texts is that you can read
pretty much anything into them ... just look at Hegel!
|> 8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge - One of the areas I personally
|> find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
|> workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
|> was written by man. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
|> announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
|> 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
|> heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
|> [force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
|> The Bible said the earth was round (Is 40:22, Prov 8:27, Lk
|> 17:34-36). Not too long ago, great minds were convinced the earth was
|> held up by Atlas or something like him; read Job 26:7 to hear what the
|> Bible claimed. Moses knew about a plurality of seas, all with one
|> common bed (Gen 1:9-10). Solomon knew about the rain/evaporation cycle
|> (Eccl 1:7), as did Amos and Job (Amos 9:6; Job 36:27-28). After read-
|> ing Psalm 8:8, Matthew F. Henry charted the sea currents which are still
|> recognized today. Until recently, doctors had no idea how that blood
|> contained, in essence, the life of man, but the Bible did (Lev 17:11,
|> 14). Scientists cannot distinguish between the blood of races of
|> people, just like God said in Acts 17:26.
Rubbish. see above, on ambiguity and seeing what one wants to see.
|> 9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
|> (I do not consider the adulterated version pushed by denominations
|> to be pure), it has done nothing but good.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Oh yes, the conquest and butchering of indigenous peoples around the world,
all in the name of the good book ... this is really, undeniably good. The
sexist practice of keeping women in the home is really, undeniably good.
Not.
How can you believe this rubbish? Have you been hidden away in a white, male-
dominated, Christian, hetero-sexual enclave all your life?
|> These are the main reasons. Next letter I'll examine creationism vs.
|> evolutionism
Oh good. Hey, here's a challenge: post this "examination" on talk.origins,
and see how you do (nothin like challenging real scientists on their own
turf).
(.... oh please, don't let this be a joke ...)
Loren King
MIT
Daniel S OConnell
as an intellectual exercise. . .
bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet writes:
>treating the Bible as we would any
>other historical document, let's look at it.
> Comparison to other documents:
>
>ANCIENT LITERATURE # MANUSCRIPTS PROXIMITY TO
> ORIGINAL COPY
>----------------------------- ---------------------- -------------
>Livy's History of Rome 20 500 yrs
>Caesar's Gallic Wars 10 900 yrs
>Tacitus' Annals 2 800 yrs
>History of Thucydides 8 1300+ yrs
>History of Heroditus 1 1000 yrs
>Writings of Aristotle 5 1400+ yrs
>
> Now remember - all of these are universally regarded as accurate. Let's
Note that they are all histories of politics, *NOT* religious movements;
any comptent historian knows that much of the bible's "history" is
suspect - certainly events from the hebrew testament and events from
the greek testament have not been considered "historically" accurate
for some time.
The men who wrote the bibles (unless there was a "J" and she was
female), had a specific agenda: to promulgate the revealed word
of G-d to the Hebrews of approx 2,000 years ago.
The sources you cite above had no such agenda; therefore the two
testaments are not in the same class and do not offer a useful
comparison.
> You asserted God is inconsistent because he had an old law and a new one.
...
>the end of time). The laws of each led into the other. The Patriarchical
This is opinion on which millions disagree, not scholarly research. Okay,
so much for the preliminaries, now:
> Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
>1) It claims to be - as I said, every man is allowed to testify on his own
> behalf, so the Bible's claim must be counted as evidence, even if that
> evidence is taken a little more lightly than some of the exterior evi-
> dence. I trust we can agree that the Bible claims to be the sole rev-
> elation of God to man; no Apocrypha, no additions, etc.
True, yet there are other texts which claim to be *the* revealed word
of G-d; so this isn't much.
>2) The unity of the Bible - A unity of facts, purpose, and teaching. Its
> theme is that of the salvation from sin. It begins with the creation,
> sin marring it, and God conceiving a great plan to redeem man from his
> sins, and goes from there.
It could be and has been argued there is more disunity than unity
among the texts, even about simple matters. Consider the wide
variation in the 4 gospels for example.
>3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
Wrong. Check the Qu'ran, for one.
>4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality - "Human books extol the virtues and
The testaments were written by cultists to pass on the revealed
word of G-d to a formerly obscure jewish sect. A unilateral
claim to be the sole word of G-d is hardly an advertisement
for impartiality.
>5) The Brevity of the Bible - So much, virtually a history of the world, is
> packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
> important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
And eliminates significant parts of his life. A history of the world?
No. The important bits of history for believers? Perhaps.
>6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable. The
Sez you.
> testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
And they are hardly impartial.
> Such a perfect person could never have been so perfectly created by any
> man.
Which calls into doubt the deeds he is claimed to have performed.
>7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
> get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
> predicted. The odds of Jesus fulfilling (whether accidentally and/or
> by design) the prophecies applying to Him are beyond calculation.
Note that some of these "prophecies" were written after the fact. Note
also that some prophecies tend to be self-fulfilling.
>8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge - One of the areas I personally
This is perhaps the most laughable.
> find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
> workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
> was written by man. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
> announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
> 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
> heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
> [force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
This is called looking to the text to find a way to force a theory
which the text does not appear to support.
Note that the vacuum bottle, sea currents, star charts, etc were
all known about to some degree by scholars in Roman days.
>9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
Let's see. . .More people have been killed in the name of religion
than for any other reason. The bibles and relgions have been used
to kill, rape, steal, rob, plunder, ad nauseum. I question the
word "undeniable".
> These are the main reasons. Next letter I'll examine creationism vs.
>evolutionism - why if the supernaturalistic viewpoint is refused that
Hoo boy.
Dano
Nichael Cramer
> [...] Let's
>compare them to the New Testament - 24,633 total MSS and 5338 complete MSS!
Pretty impressive. At least three major errors in only two sentences. ;)
1] The total number of *all* greek manuscripts of the NT --down to the
18th[!!] century-- is on the order of 5000[*]. Moreover this number
includes _all_ documents with any material from the NT including very small
fragments and source that are not, strictly speaking, from the NT (like
lectionaries).
2] If we restrict ourselves to the first "300 years", the total number of
manuscripts is *much* smaller. I don't have the numbers here in my office,
but I doubt that the total would reach 100. Furthermore, the vast majority
of these early "manuscripts" are little more than fragments. It is only
well into the fourth century that we get any complete NTs --and only one or
two of those.
3] At the other end of your range, it is unlikely that we have any
manuscripts from as early 40 years.
o The earliest fragment of the canonical[**] gospels that we have is a
palm-sized fragment of John (known by the name p52). A proposed dating
for this fragment places it at about 125CE (which admittedly _would_
place it at about 40 yrs from autograph) however most datings place it
at somewhat later in the 2nd century.
o Other than p52 there are probably only three other manuscripts that
have *any* claim to having been copied before or about 200 --and
certainly not much earlier-- and these, too, are fragments.
[* For more specific numbers, and break-downs according to type, etc.
please see the books on the text of the NT by either Bruce Metzger or
Kurt and Barbara Aland.]
[** Fragments exist of a non-canonical gospel --the so-called Egerton
Gospel-- which have been dated to roughly the same time as p52, and
possibly slightly earlier.]
NICHAEL __
nic...@bbn.com -- Be as Passers-by. -- IC
Daniel B. Holzman
> three different continents, yet still retains an incredible unity - of
> doctrine, of style, of morality, and of theme.
Given that a council went through many books and picked and chose which ones to
put into the Canon, this is far less surprising than it seems. For that
matter, Christians are not even agreed on which books are to be included in the
Bible, and which are to be relegated to the Apocrypha.
> Now remember - all of these are universally regarded as accurate. Let's
> compare them to the New Testament - 24,633 total MSS and 5338 complete MSS!
> The second-most is Homer's Iliad, with only 643. In addition, these date
> to within 40-300 years of the autograph. To reject the accuracy of these
> is to reject all we know about the ancient world as historically inaccurate
> as well.
This establishes that what is written is indeed what the original author wrote,
but does not establish the truth of the writing.
> Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
> 1) It claims to be - as I said, every man is allowed to testify on his own
> behalf, so the Bible's claim must be counted as evidence, even if that
> evidence is taken a little more lightly than some of the exterior evi-
> dence.
Such a claim by itself is not evidence. This is why coroborating evidince is
such a sought-after thing.
> I trust we can agree that the Bible claims to be the sole rev-
> elation of God to man; no Apocrypha, no additions, etc.
Who's Bible? The Protestants', Catholics', Coptics', Gnostics', or someone
else's?
> 2) The unity of the Bible - A unity of facts, purpose, and teaching. Its
> theme is that of the salvation from sin. It begins with the creation,
> sin marring it, and God conceiving a great plan to redeem man from his
> sins, and goes from there.
That a story has a begginning, middle, and end is hardly evidence of it's
truth. Again, see above to refer to the editing process.
> 3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
Check out the Code of Hammurabbi, the Q'ran, Main Kamf, and so forth.
> 4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality - "Human books extol the virtues and
> suppress the vices of their heroes. Not so with the Bible. It makes
> no attempt to conceal, minimize, or apologize for the weaknesses,
> mistakes, and wrongdoings of even its greatest characters. It tells of
> the sins of friend and foe alike." (Jimmy Thomas - I could think of no
> better way to phrase it in my own words).
I know of several works of fiction which do the same.
> 5) The Brevity of the Bible - So much, virtually a history of the world, is
> packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
> important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
Brevity is proof? Come again?
The history of the world? Where does it discuss China? Africa? Europe?
> 6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable. The
> testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
> Such a perfect person could never have been so perfectly created by any
> man.
Quite the contrary, Jesus' existence is quite widely disputed. Further, you
assume the veracity of the statements made about him.
> 7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
> get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
> predicted. The odds of Jesus fulfilling (whether accidentally and/or
> by design) the prophecies applying to Him are beyond calculation.
Beyond calculation if he did it by design? How many prophecies did he fulfill,
and which?
> 8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge - One of the areas I personally
> find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
> workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
> was written by man. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
> announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
> 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
> heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
> [force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
The book which has the Earth orbiting the Sun?
> The Bible said the earth was round (Is 40:22, Prov 8:27, Lk
> 17:34-36). Not too long ago, great minds were convinced the earth was
> held up by Atlas or something like him; read Job 26:7 to hear what the
> Bible claimed.
Er... the word in Hebrew used to describe the world is "circle", not "sphere."
The writers of the Bible believed the Earth to be flat.
> Until recently, doctors had no idea how that blood
> contained, in essence, the life of man, but the Bible did (Lev 17:11,
> 14).
Can you expound on this one further? How does blood contain the life of man in
a way that, say, the brain doesn't?
> 9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
> (I do not consider the adulterated version pushed by denominations
> to be pure), it has done nothing but good. It makes those who
> would obey it the model parents, friends, neighbors, and citizens, if
> obeyed.
And Crusaders and Inquisitors.
Next?
--
Daniel B. Holzman | Eight Words the Witch's Rede Fufill:
HOL...@FNAL.BITNET | An It Harm None, Do What You Will
HOL...@FNALC.FNAL.GOV.INTERNET |
| All Acts of Love and Pleasure are
Love doesn't subtract, | Her Rituals
it multiplies - Heinlein |
| Speak the Word.
Disclaimer: Fermilab's far too large to have an opinion, let alone mine.
Daniel B. Holzman
atomic and subatomic structure of matter, describing a still rock as being made
of small pieces moving at dizzying speeds.
bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet
> Note: sometimes I like to deconstruct posts like the following
> as an intellectual exercise. . .
And sometimes I like to poke holes in pseudo-intellectual exercises...
> bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet writes:
>>treating the Bible as we would any
>>other historical document, let's look at it.
>> Comparison to other documents:
>>
>>ANCIENT LITERATURE # MANUSCRIPTS PROXIMITY TO
>> ORIGINAL COPY
>>----------------------------- ---------------------- -------------
>>Livy's History of Rome 20 500 yrs
>>Caesar's Gallic Wars 10 900 yrs
>>Tacitus' Annals 2 800 yrs
>>History of Thucydides 8 1300+ yrs
>>History of Heroditus 1 1000 yrs
>>Writings of Aristotle 5 1400+ yrs
>>
>> Now remember - all of these are universally regarded as accurate. Let's
> Note that they are all histories of politics, *NOT* religious movements;
My fault on this one; this was a response to "Do we have a reliable
copy of the Bible?" So, the answer to that one would have to be, yes,
we do.
> any comptent historian knows that much of the bible's "history" is
> suspect - certainly events from the hebrew testament and events from
> the greek testament have not been considered "historically" accurate
> for some time.
Please, do provide specifics and sources. We can't very well just
take your word on it.
> The men who wrote the bibles (unless there was a "J" and she was
> female), had a specific agenda: to promulgate the revealed word
> of G-d to the Hebrews of approx 2,000 years ago.
> The sources you cite above had no such agenda; therefore the two
> testaments are not in the same class and do not offer a useful
> comparison.
As I said, this is a comparison to determine whether or not they are
the same now as they were when written.
>> You asserted God is inconsistent because he had an old law and a new one.
> ...
>>the end of time). The laws of each led into the other. The Patriarchical
> This is opinion on which millions disagree, not scholarly research. Okay,
> so much for the preliminaries, now:
But on which the Bible is clear. Read the cited passages.
>> Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
>>1) It claims to be - as I said, every man is allowed to testify on his own
>> behalf, so the Bible's claim must be counted as evidence, even if that
>> evidence is taken a little more lightly than some of the exterior evi-
>> dence. I trust we can agree that the Bible claims to be the sole rev-
>> elation of God to man; no Apocrypha, no additions, etc.
> True, yet there are other texts which claim to be *the* revealed word
> of G-d; so this isn't much.
As I said, it must be taken a bit more lightly.
>>2) The unity of the Bible - A unity of facts, purpose, and teaching. Its
>> theme is that of the salvation from sin. It begins with the creation,
>> sin marring it, and God conceiving a great plan to redeem man from his
>> sins, and goes from there.
> It could be and has been argued there is more disunity than unity
> among the texts, even about simple matters. Consider the wide
> variation in the 4 gospels for example.
What wide variation? Because one mentions events the others do not?
Say I wrote a biography of someone and you wrote one on the same
person. Some events I include you might not. Does that mean that our
accounts would be disharmonious? I think not. Please provide
specifics.
>>3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
>> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
>> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
> Wrong. Check the Qu'ran, for one.
The Bible still has a higher moral code. "Turn the other cheek", "Do
unto others as you would have them do unto you", "love your enemy",
etc.
>>4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality - "Human books extol the virtues and
> The testaments were written by cultists to pass on the revealed
> word of G-d to a formerly obscure jewish sect. A unilateral
> claim to be the sole word of G-d is hardly an advertisement
> for impartiality.
I suggest you go back and read what I wrote again. If you were going
to make up a religion, would you portray the heroes as larger than
life? For example, David's affair with Bathsheba. David was a great
man, yet the Bible pulls no punches about his weaknesses. Also, take
Peter's denial of Christ and his frequently-shown weaknesses. It
impartially shows the characters in it as they were.
And the OT was not written by Christians, it existed long before
Christianity.
>>5) The Brevity of the Bible - So much, virtually a history of the world, is
>> packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
>> important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
> And eliminates significant parts of his life. A history of the world?
> No. The important bits of history for believers? Perhaps.
My point exactly. And it does span the history of the world. Do you
think any textbook of world history covers every event that ever
occurred? Of course not! Just the significant ones. And, according
to the theme of the Bible (God's plan of salvation), the important
events are covered.
>>6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable. The
> Sez you.
Sez Josephus. Sez Tacitus. Sez many Roman imperial officials. Sez
historical evidence.
>> testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
> And they are hardly impartial.
The OT speaks of it. The Jews could find no legitimate reason to
execute Him, so they had to coerce Pilate into it. These are but two
examples.
>> Such a perfect person could never have been so perfectly created by any
>> man.
> Which calls into doubt the deeds he is claimed to have performed.
No, which means that he could not have been created by a man or men.
>>7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
>> get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
>> predicted. The odds of Jesus fulfilling (whether accidentally and/or
>> by design) the prophecies applying to Him are beyond calculation.
> Note that some of these "prophecies" were written after the fact. Note
> also that some prophecies tend to be self-fulfilling.
Which prophecies? And how are they self-fulfilling?
>>8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge - One of the areas I personally
> [derogatory and unjustified comment deleted]
>> find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> was written by man. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
>> announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
>> 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
>> heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
>> [force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
> This is called looking to the text to find a way to force a theory
> which the text does not appear to support.
Perhaps, but all 5 are there. You cannot dispute this fact.
> Note that the vacuum bottle, sea currents, star charts, etc were
> all known about to some degree by scholars in Roman days.
Yes, the Galilean fishermen who followed Jesus, the tax collector
Matthew, and the others probably read the scholarly journals quite
often. Solomon and Job must have travelled through time then
travelled back.
Either that or the truth was revealed to them by God...
>>9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> Let's see. . .More people have been killed in the name of religion
> than for any other reason. The bibles and relgions have been used
> to kill, rape, steal, rob, plunder, ad nauseum. I question the
> word "undeniable".
You seem to have missed my first phrase. "When taken in its purity".
Catholicism does not take the Bible in its purity; they authorize the
pope to do what he sees best. Denominations add to and take away from
it.
If a pacifist were to kill someone to advance the cause of pacifism,
would that discredit pacifism as a whole? No, it would just mean
either the "pacifist" had no idea of what pacifism means, or that he
had lost sight of the funadamentals of pacifism.
Likewise, the Inquisition, the wars fought "in the name of God",
etc. hardly discredit the Bible. They do discredit the people who
carried them out and the religion which supported it's claims to be of
the Bible, though. The Bible condemns killing, even condemns hating.
It says to turn the other cheek. It condemns many things which have
been done "in its name". So the fault is of those who wrongfully did
these things, for they had either lost sight of the Word or never
knew exactly what it said.
>> These are the main reasons. Next letter I'll examine creationism vs.
>>evolutionism - why if the supernaturalistic viewpoint is refused that
> Hoo boy.
> Dano
Book 'em.
-Jeff
bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet
> My word! Look what can happen when one isn't thinking!
Oh, if your post was the result of you not thinking, please forgive me
for replying.
> I hope this isn't a joke-post, or what follows will make me look pretty
> gullible. Oh well, here goes ...
Gullible? No. Misinformed? yes.
> In article <1992Nov11....@wkuvx1.bitnet>, bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet writes:
> |> 2) The unity of the Bible - A unity of facts, purpose, and teaching. Its
> |> theme is that of the salvation from sin. It begins with the creation,
> |> sin marring it, and God conceiving a great plan to redeem man from his
> |> sins, and goes from there.
> You'll recall a certain medieval conference which ensured this "unity"!
And modern documentary examination bears out the canon of the Bible.
And the Apocrypha is *not* part of the Bible. And you don't dispute
the unity of theme. No conference ever has rewritten the Bible. We
*do* have a reliable copy of the Bible, as I said in the part of my
post you neither disputed nor recopied.
> |> 3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
> |> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
> |> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
> Rubbish. Read the Tao-teh Ching, the Bhagad'vita (sp?) ... and who's
> standard of moral righteousness? You'll notice that one conspicuous
> question that Christ failed to answer was Pilate's: "what is truth?"
"Turn the other cheek". "Love your enemy". "Do unto others...". I
reassert, the Bible has no match, especially among religions at its
time.
And do you think the answer would have mattered to Pilate? Seems
more like he asked that question more to convince himself Christ
couldn't be right.
> |> 4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality - "Human books extol the virtues and
> |> suppress the vices of their heroes. Not so with the Bible. It makes
> |> no attempt to conceal, minimize, or apologize for the weaknesses,
> |> mistakes, and wrongdoings of even its greatest characters. It tells of
> |> the sins of friend and foe alike." (Jimmy Thomas - I could think of no
> |> better way to phrase it in my own words).
> RUBBISH!! Where are women in the bible? Where is their dignity and freedom?
> Their interests, their intelligence?
Ever read about Deborah? Esther? Ruth and Naomi? Mary, the mother
of Jesus? Mary Magdalene? Priscilla?
The Bible sets women in subjection to men. It does not say women
are inferior to men. It also tells husbands and wives to be in
subjection to one another. It tells husbands to love their wives. I
do not apologize for the Bible in any of this.
> How about non-European cultures and beliefs?
What does this have to do with its impartiality in depicting its
characters, in showing the faults of men such as David, Demas, Peter,
etc.?
> Face it, the bible is a series of scripts written and extolled by M-E-N.
No. Prove it.
> |> 5) The Brevity of the Bible - So much, virtually a history of the world, is
> |> packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
> |> important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
> The history of A world, not THE world. And please spare us your cultural
> arrogance as regards the importance of Jesus.
Please spare me your scholar-wannabe snobbishness, then. And since
when has there been more than one earth?
> |> 6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable. The
> |> testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
> |> Such a perfect person could never have been so perfectly created by any
> |> man.
I see you do not challenge this.
> |> 7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
> |> get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
> |> predicted. The odds of Jesus fulfilling (whether accidentally and/or
> |> by design) the prophecies applying to Him are beyond calculation.
> Well the virtue of ambiguous, translated texts is that you can read
> pretty much anything into them ... just look at Hegel!
Ambiguous? He would be born in Bethlehem, to a virgin? He would die
on a cross? Don't seem ambiguous to me.
> |> 8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge - One of the areas I personally
> |> find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
> |> workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
> |> was written by man. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
> |> announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
> |> 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
> |> heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
> |> [force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
> |> The Bible said the earth was round (Is 40:22, Prov 8:27, Lk
> |> 17:34-36). Not too long ago, great minds were convinced the earth was
> |> held up by Atlas or something like him; read Job 26:7 to hear what the
> |> Bible claimed. Moses knew about a plurality of seas, all with one
> |> common bed (Gen 1:9-10). Solomon knew about the rain/evaporation cycle
> |> (Eccl 1:7), as did Amos and Job (Amos 9:6; Job 36:27-28). After read-
> |> ing Psalm 8:8, Matthew F. Henry charted the sea currents which are still
> |> recognized today. Until recently, doctors had no idea how that blood
> |> contained, in essence, the life of man, but the Bible did (Lev 17:11,
> |> 14). Scientists cannot distinguish between the blood of races of
> |> people, just like God said in Acts 17:26.
> Rubbish. see above, on ambiguity and seeing what one wants to see.
Rubbish. See above, closing one's eyes to what the Bible says.
> |> 9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
> |> (I do not consider the adulterated version pushed by denominations
> |> to be pure), it has done nothing but good.
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> Oh yes, the conquest and butchering of indigenous peoples around the world,
> all in the name of the good book ... this is really, undeniably good.
See my other response to another person for my reply to this. Note I
said "when taken in its purity".
> The
> sexist practice of keeping women in the home is really, undeniably good.
The Bible gives different roles to men and women. Not putting one
under another's feet.
> [personal attack on my character and intelligence deleted]
> |> These are the main reasons. Next letter I'll examine creationism vs.
> |> evolutionism
> Oh good. Hey, here's a challenge: post this "examination" on talk.origins,
> and see how you do (nothin like challenging real scientists on their own
> turf).
Might do that, if my server gets talk.origins.
> (.... oh please, don't let this be a joke ...)
My post wasn't. Your reply... well...
-Jeff
Daniel S OConnell
>In article <1992Nov12.0...@midway.uchicago.edu>, dsoc...@quads.uchicago.edu (Daniel S OConnell) writes:
>>>treating the Bible as we would any
>>>other historical document, let's look at it.
>> any comptent historian knows that much of the bible's "history" is
>> suspect - certainly events from the hebrew testament and events from
>> the greek testament have not been considered "historically" accurate
>> for some time.
>
>Please, do provide specifics and sources. We can't very well just
>take your word on it.
I have neither the time nor the inclination to provide
you with that education. I assure you that there are
plenty of people who will, both on this newsgroup and on
alt.atheism where some specialize in such dissection.
One example might be the story of Noah, however.
>>> You asserted God is inconsistent because he had an old law and a new one.
>> ...
>>>the end of time). The laws of each led into the other. The Patriarchical
>
>> This is opinion on which millions disagree, not scholarly research. Okay,
>> so much for the preliminaries, now:
>
>But on which the Bible is clear. Read the cited passages.
But the point was (in your words) to:
>>>treating the Bible as we would any
>>>other historical document, let's look at it.
So merely re-invoking the text alone is insufficient.
>>>2) The unity of the Bible - A unity of facts, purpose, and teaching. Its
>> It could be and has been argued there is more disunity than unity
>> among the texts, even about simple matters. Consider the wide
>> variation in the 4 gospels for example.
>
>What wide variation? Because one mentions events the others do not?
Again, there are many factual inconsistencies. In fact there
have been recent threads on this very subject. I suggest you
follow them if you want specifics.
>>>3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
>>> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
>>> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
>
>> Wrong. Check the Qu'ran, for one.
>
>The Bible still has a higher moral code. "Turn the other cheek", "Do
>unto others as you would have them do unto you", "love your enemy",
>etc.
This is a matter of opinion; nevertheless, the existence of the Qu'ran
negates your assertion that it is "virtually unique" in its moral
teachings. I think you would find it an interesting exercise to
test out your superlatives about the bible over in soc.religion.islam.
>>>4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality - "Human books extol the virtues and
>
>> The testaments were written by cultists to pass on the revealed
>> word of G-d to a formerly obscure jewish sect. A unilateral
>> claim to be the sole word of G-d is hardly an advertisement
>> for impartiality.
>
>I suggest you go back and read what I wrote again. If you were going
>to make up a religion, would you portray the heroes as larger than
>life? ...
Merely because you cannot conceive of how to write great
myths does not mean others have been similarly unable.
>>> testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
>
>> And they are hardly impartial.
>
>The OT speaks of it. The Jews could find no legitimate reason to
>execute Him, so they had to coerce Pilate into it. These are but two
>examples.
I would argue that the government which executed Jesus used
the same rationale that the government which executed Socrates
used: here is a dangerous man because he says dangerous things
(which could upset the status quo) and people are listening
to him.
His murder does not indicate "sinless perfection" on his part.
>>> Such a perfect person could never have been so perfectly created by any
>>> man.
>
>> Which calls into doubt the deeds he is claimed to have performed.
>
>No, which means that he could not have been created by a man or men.
You assert that Jesus was perfect because the bible says so, then
you claim what the bible already states: that Jesus was not created
by man.
Hint: This does not advance your theory any.
>> This is called looking to the text to find a way to force a theory
>> which the text does not appear to support.
>
>Perhaps, but all 5 are there. You cannot dispute this fact.
Of course I do not dispute the words on the page, I merely
suggest your interpretation as fanciful.
>> Note that the vacuum bottle, sea currents, star charts, etc were
>> all known about to some degree by scholars in Roman days.
>
>Yes, the Galilean fishermen who followed Jesus, the tax collector
>Matthew, and the others probably read the scholarly journals quite
>often. Solomon and Job must have travelled through time then
>travelled back.
> Either that or the truth was revealed to them by God...
Note that *they* didn't write the bibles. . .
>>>9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> Let's see. . .More people have been killed in the name of religion
>> than for any other reason. The bibles and relgions have been used
>> to kill, rape, steal, rob, plunder, ad nauseum. I question the
>> word "undeniable".
>
>You seem to have missed my first phrase. "When taken in its purity".
>Catholicism does not take the Bible in its purity; they authorize the
>pope to do what he sees best. Denominations add to and take away from
>it.
First of all, I don't necessarily subscribe to the notion advanced
above anymore after a bit more thought -- it was not a well-articulated
argument. Secondly, your phrase "taken in its purity" implies
that a subjective analysis must be made of the text.
This again becomes a matter of opinion. Also note that the word
denomination means a particular "brand" of religion, so anyone
who is a member of any church anywhere belongs to some denomination.
>the Bible, though. The Bible condemns killing, even condemns hating.
>It says to turn the other cheek. It condemns many things which have
>been done "in its name". So the fault is of those who wrongfully did
>these things, for they had either lost sight of the Word or never
>knew exactly what it said.
N.B.: The N.R.A. makes the same argument about gun control.
Dano
bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet
> bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet writes:
>> [...] Let's
>>compare them to the New Testament - 24,633 total MSS and 5338 complete MSS!
>> [...] In addition, these date to within 40-300 years of the autograph.
> Pretty impressive. At least three major errors in only two sentences. ;)
"Sez you," to quote a truly staggering Bible critic. :+)
> 1] The total number of *all* greek manuscripts of the NT --down to the
> 18th[!!] century-- is on the order of 5000[*]. Moreover this number
> includes _all_ documents with any material from the NT including very small
> fragments and source that are not, strictly speaking, from the NT (like
> lectionaries).
Can't find the original source, but here's a breakdown that's close to
that number:
NEW TESTAMENT
3145 or so handwritten copies
85 papyri, 268 unicals (written in all capitals), 2792
miniscules (all small letters)
2193 Greek MSS in which text is arranged in lectionary form
25 ostraca (Metzger, _The Text of the New Testament_, 33) - pieces
of unglazed pottery
8000 or so Latin versions
2000 or so Syriac, Coptic, Gothicm, Armenian, Georgian, Ethiopic,
Slavonic, and Arabic versions
(Greenlee, Zondervan Pictoral Encyclopedia of the Bible, V:697)
(Fee, _Biblical Criticism_, 128)
OLD TESTAMENT
Prior to 1890 - 731 Hebrew MSS published (Geisler & Nix, _From God
to Us_, 139)
1890 - Cairo Geneza documents discovered - 10,000 Biblical MSS and
fragments
1947 - Dead Sea Scrolls discovered
I believe that justifies the ~25000 total MSS claim.
Note that this does not include patristic quotes (Irenaeus,
Tertullian, etc). Sir David Dalrymple claimed to have found all but
11 verses of the NT from the 2nd and 3rd century (Geisler & Nix, 157).
> 2] If we restrict ourselves to the first "300 years", the total number of
> manuscripts is *much* smaller. I don't have the numbers here in my office,
> but I doubt that the total would reach 100. Furthermore, the vast majority
> of these early "manuscripts" are little more than fragments. It is only
> well into the fourth century that we get any complete NTs --and only one or
> two of those.
* There are two full manuscripts from the fourth century. Fragments
date back further (one bit of a papyrus codex of John 18:31-33,
37 dates to 130 AD).
* As I said in my original post, no one disputes the authenticity of
the works of, say, Thucydides - his _History of Thucydides_ is
availible to us from 8 MSS, the earliest of which dates to about
1200 years after his death. The Bible must be reviewed for its
authenticity just like any other work. If the classical scholars
can confirm the works of Thucydides, how much more reliable is
the Bible?
> 3] At the other end of your range, it is unlikely that we have any
> manuscripts from as early 40 years.
This depends on when John was written. The John Rylands fragment
(AD 125-135, mentioned above) could well have been from within ~40
years.
> o The earliest fragment of the canonical[**] gospels that we have is a
> palm-sized fragment of John (known by the name p52). A proposed dating
> for this fragment places it at about 125CE (which admittedly _would_
> place it at about 40 yrs from autograph) however most datings place it
> at somewhat later in the 2nd century.
The John Rylands fragment, commonly dated from AD 125-135.
> o Other than p52 there are probably only three other manuscripts that
> have *any* claim to having been copied before or about 200 --and
> certainly not much earlier-- and these, too, are fragments.
The Bodmer papyri, from 2nd to 4th century.
Chester Beatty Papyri - 3rd century.
Codex Sinaiticus - 4th century.
Codex Vaticanus - 4th century.
Latin Vulgate - 382-385 by Jerome from "ancient Greek manuscripts"
Once again, these plus the writings of chrurch fathers, the
fragments, etc. only serve to vindicate the Bible's accuracy.
> [* For more specific numbers, and break-downs according to type, etc.
> please see the books on the text of the NT by either Bruce Metzger or
> Kurt and Barbara Aland.]
> [** Fragments exist of a non-canonical gospel --the so-called Egerton
> Gospel-- which have been dated to roughly the same time as p52, and
> possibly slightly earlier.]
-Jeff
RBN...@rohvm1.rohmhaas.com
No two of these manuscripts are the same. Something to ponder about|
--
Siddiqui.
Nichael Cramer
|>ncr...@bbn.com (Nichael Cramer) writes:
|>> bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet writes:
|>>> [...] Let's
|>>>compare them to the New Testament - 24,633 total MSS and 5338 complete MSS!
|>>> [...] In addition, these date to within 40-300 years of the autograph.
|>> Pretty impressive. At least three major errors in only two sentences. ;)
|>"Sez you," to quote a truly staggering Bible critic. :+)
Well, "staggering" is the one accurate thing you've said so far. ;)
|>> 1] The total number of *all* greek manuscripts of the NT --down to the
|>> 18th[!!] century-- is on the order of 5000[*]. [...]
|>NEW TESTAMENT
|> [...]
|>OLD TESTAMENT
|> [...]
|>I believe that justifies the ~25000 total MSS claim.
Actually it does nothing of the sort. Since we're talking about the New
Testament, the only manuscripts of interest are those in Greek. The
Syriac, Slavonic, etc. are certainly useful to have at hand, but they don't
advance your argument in any way.
(On the other hand, your claims about the number of Homeric manuscripts
include only very ancient, Greek manuscripts. Why do you not include all
the translations in his example.)
No, the ~5000 figure is correct. And of these, only ~2% come from "the
first 300 years" of which you are so fond.
Furthermore, your listing of Old Testament accounts for >40% of your total.
Of what relevance is this? (You _do_ understand the difference between the
Old and New Testaments, don't you? ;)
|> * As I said in my original post, no one disputes the authenticity of
|> the works of, say, Thucydides - his _History of Thucydides_ is
|> availible to us from 8 MSS, the earliest of which dates to about
|> 1200 years after his death. The Bible must be reviewed for its
|> authenticity just like any other work. If the classical scholars
|> can confirm the works of Thucydides, how much more reliable is
|> the Bible?
I'll let others deal with the gaping holes in your logic, but I only wish
to make the single point that the most of the manuscripts you claim in
support of your assertion come from nearly this long after the writing of
the NT.
|> [...]
Most of the rest of what you write simple repeats in various forms what
I've already said.
I take it, then, you are acknowledging my point?
NICHAEL
nic...@bbn.com -- "...and they opened their thesaurus and offered
him gold and frankincense and myrrh..."
cj...@minster.york.ac.uk
: Comparison to other documents:
:
: ANCIENT LITERATURE # MANUSCRIPTS PROXIMITY TO
: ORIGINAL COPY
: ----------------------------- ---------------------- -------------
: Livy's History of Rome 20 500 yrs
: Caesar's Gallic Wars 10 900 yrs
: Tacitus' Annals 2 800 yrs
: History of Thucydides 8 1300+ yrs
: History of Heroditus 1 1000 yrs
: Writings of Aristotle 5 1400+ yrs
:
: Now remember - all of these are universally regarded as accurate. Let's
: compare them to the New Testament - 24,633 total MSS and 5338 complete MSS!
Where you say these documents are "accurate" you mean that what we have
is a reasonable translation of what the author originally wrote.
It would indeed be somewhat perverse to insist that the bible is not
accurate in this sense. It is indeed a very reliably transmitted
document, in comparison with other documents of comparable vintage.
However, the *truth* of what is written is another matter entirely,
and bears no particular relation to how accurately it is transmitted.
Felicitations -- Chris Ho-Stuart
Bob Sarver
/9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
/ (I do not consider the adulterated version pushed by denominations
/ to be pure), it has done nothing but good. It makes those who
/ would obey it the model parents, friends, neighbors, and citizens, if
/ obeyed.
You are a deliberate liar. More evil has been done in the name of the
bible than any other force. It has been used to justify the wholesale
extermination of villages, towns, and countries. It is used to justify
racism, slavery, and violence against people. Check out the verses
in Leviticus that proscribe death for witches & rebellious sons.
Fortunately, we live in a democracy and not a theocracy.
"Undeniable influence"? I know many who would deny it wholeheartedly.
/ These are the main reasons. Next letter I'll examine creationism vs.
/evolutionism -
I would rather you answer the holes in these arguments first. There is
no point in going on to another letter if you cannot or will not defend
what has *already* been written here.
/why if the supernaturalistic viewpoint is refused that
/evolution is the only half-way logical alternative, the closed-mindedness
/of those who insist upon naturalism, and the holes in the evolutionary
/theory.
Great. I look forward to seeing you point out the "holes" in the
evolutionary theory. In fact, why don't you start with the FAQ from
talk.origins? Go read it, and then shoot holes in all those arguments.
Post the entire thing here so that we can all see it.
Somehow I suspect, though, that you will not answer any of the questions
raised in it. The bible-believers always ignore the questions, hoping
they will go away. I also hope that you learn some chemistry, astronomy,
biology, and archaelogy before you try to point out the "holes" in
evolution. So far, your understanding of science and history has been
pretty bad.
Bob Sarver
/6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable. The
/ testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
Using the testimony of the Bible to prove the Bible is correct is nothing
but circular reasoning and will not be accepted as evidence.
The testimony of those people who were around Muhammad says that he is
the Prophet of God. Should we take their testimony, just because they
knew him?
The testimony of the followers of Charles Manson (or Jim Jones, or any other
religious leader) all say that their leader was either a god or a perfect
man. Do we believe them also, based on the "testimony of those closest to
them"?
/7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
/ get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
/ predicted. The odds of Jesus fulfilling (whether accidentally and/or
/ by design) the prophecies applying to Him are beyond calculation.
Name the prophecies. And the fulfillments.
/8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge - One of the areas I personally
/ find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
/ workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
/ was written by man.
It is inaccurate. Check the FAQ for this newsgroup. When you are through
with that, check the FAQ for talk.origins.
/ In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
/ announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
/ 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
/ heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
[force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
This is ridiculous. This verse is in no way a description of the "5
fundamental facts of science". And, these mystical "5 fundamental facts"
are clearly outdated and nonscientific (not including energy, for example).
There is more matter than the earth, and there was no time before the
creation of the sun and moon.
/ The Bible said the earth was round (Is 40:22, Prov 8:27, Lk
/ 17:34-36).
It also says it is flat: reference the verse where God will send his
angels to the "four corners of the earth". Circles and spheres don't
have corners. Only flat surfaces and 3D objects do.
/Not too long ago, great minds were convinced the earth was
/ held up by Atlas or something like him; read Job 26:7 to hear what the
/ Bible claimed. Moses knew about a plurality of seas, all with one
/ common bed (Gen 1:9-10). Solomon knew about the rain/evaporation cycle
/ (Eccl 1:7), as did Amos and Job (Amos 9:6; Job 36:27-28).
Everyone who lived in the ancient world knew that there was more than
one sea; Phoenician traders were well aware of that fact since they had
sailed on those seas. Caravans from the Arabian Gulf and the Red Sea
brought back stories of other bodies of water. Why is this supposed
to be something special?
The rain/evaporation cycle is well known by most children. It is
intuitively obvious how it happens, especially in times of drought. Other
ancient sources have commented on the "water which returns to the skies"..
Why do you consider this to be so spectacular?
/After read-
/ ing Psalm 8:8, Matthew F. Henry charted the sea currents which are still
/ recognized today. Until recently, doctors had no idea how that blood
/ contained, in essence, the life of man, but the Bible did (Lev 17:11,
/ 14). Scientists cannot distinguish between the blood of races of
/ people, just like God said in Acts 17:26.
I'm sorry, but under no circumstances can any of this be considered as the
bible "knowing" science. These verses do NOT support the claims you are
associating with them.
Bob Sarver
===========================================================================
/ You said (in not quite so many words) that I can't use the Bible to prove
/the Bible. I could use that same reasoning to say don't use science to
/prove science, but I'll just say this - in a trial, a man is allowed to
/testify on his own behalf.
Yes, but his own testimony is never considered conclusive unless it can
be corroborated by other witnesses or by physical evidence. Giving someone
a chance to speak is not the same thing as admitting his testimony into
evidence.
/ Comparison to other documents:
[omitted for brevity]
This is nothing more than a reprint from Josh McDowell's book Evidence
That Demands a Verdict. It is quite flawed. Check out the FAQ for a
description of the errors.
/ You asserted God is inconsistent because he had an old law and a new one.
/In actuality, there were three periods of time (dispensations), each with
/its own law: the patriarchical dispensation (from Creation to the giving of
/the law on Mt. Sinai), the Mosaic dispensation (from Mt. Sinai to the
/crucifixion of Christ), and the Christian dispensation (from the cross to
/the end of time). The laws of each led into the other.
Actually, no. The laws contradict each other. Example: ther are multiple
places in Deuteronomy where God says that he will visit the iniquities of
the sinner on his children and his children's children, even to the seventh
generation. The fathers commit the sins, and the children, grandchildren,
etc. will continue to pay the price.
Then in Ezekiel, God says "It has been said in the land of Israel, 'The
fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge.'
As I live, saith the LORD, this proverb shall no more be heard in the
mouths of the children of Israel. A man shall die for his sins, and a
son for his sins. The children shall no more die for the sins of the
fathers." Contradiction.
Bob Sarver
/ Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
/1) It claims to be -
SO WHAT? Every religious book in the world makes this claim. Are they
all the Word of God just because they claim to be? Am I Napoleon Bonaparte
just because I claim to be?
/
/2) The unity of the Bible -
Putting aside for a moment the very shaky assertion that the Bible displays
unity, consider the following:
The Constitution of the United States is a document that shows great unity.
Does that make it the Word of God, just because it shows unity? I hardly
think so.
Many documents show great unity due to the fact that a team of people with
similar interests and goals worked to keep the document unified. Other
documents show great unity due to later generations editing the document
to remove offensive or unpopular passages.
So far you haven't proven anything.
/3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
/ condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
/ righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
You are quite ignorant of other religions and beliefs. The Koran makes
even more severe demands on people. Other holy books do as well. Are
these other holy books also the Word of God?
The bible is not "unique among religious documents" because of its
condemnation of morality. Only someone with no exposure to world religions
could make such a biased and uneducated comment.
/4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality - "Human books extol the virtues and
/ suppress the vices of their heroes. Not so with the Bible. It makes
/ no attempt to conceal, minimize, or apologize for the weaknesses,
/ mistakes, and wrongdoings of even its greatest characters. It tells of
/ the sins of friend and foe alike."
Wrong. In the Old Testament, God instructs the Hebrews to take slaves
and concubines from among the conquered tribes. David and Solomon, both
accounted great (if not the greatest) kings of Israel, had concubines
to whore with. Yet other individuals in the OT, for the singular act
of fornication or adultery, were punished with death. Not to mention
the utter contradiction between a god that forbids concubines, and then
instructs the Israelites on how to take foreign women as their concubines.
/5) The Brevity of the Bible - So much, virtually a history of the world, is
/ packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
/ important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
The Bible is neither brief, nor is it a history of the world. This
assertion is ridiculous. It is a colored history of a few groups of
people, in only one part of the world, and the details are incredibly
sketchy (as well as being contradicted by archaeological findings).
And, it says absolutely NOTHING about the first 30 years of Christ's life,
except for the Nativity and the incident in the Temple when Christ was 12
years old. How do you justify your statement that it "tells the 33-year
life" of Christ?
And your belief that it tells the story of the "most important
man who ever lived" is your opinion; other people do not consider Christ to
be as important.
So far you have done an excellent job of expressing your opinions, but you
haven't offered any concrete proof that the bible is the unique, perfect
word of God. Remember the trial metaphor you were using? If this were a
trial, you would be about two steps away from the electric chair.
Steve Zobell
> You said (in not quite so many words) that I can't use the Bible to prove
>the Bible. I could use that same reasoning to say don't use science to
>prove science, but I'll just say this - in a trial, a man is allowed to
>testify on his own behalf. Likewise, treating the Bible as we would any
>other historical document, let's look at it.
>
>
>ANCIENT LITERATURE # MANUSCRIPTS PROXIMITY TO
>>>>>>> ORIGINAL COPY
>----------------------------- ---------------------- -------------
>Livy's History of Rome 20 500 yrs
>Caesar's Gallic Wars 10 900 yrs
>Tacitus' Annals 2 800 yrs
>History of Thucydides 8 1300+ yrs
>History of Heroditus 1 1000 yrs
>Writings of Aristotle 5 1400+ yrs
>
> Now remember - all of these are universally regarded as accurate. Let's
>compare them to the New Testament - 24,633 total MSS and 5338 complete MSS!
>The second-most is Homer's Iliad, with only 643. In addition, these date
>to within 40-300 years of the autograph. To reject the accuracy of these
>is to reject all we know about the ancient world as historically inaccurate
>as well.
You are trying to use the fact that there are many more copies of
Biblical manuscripts than any other ancient European manuscripts as
proof of the historical accuracy of the Bible? Could the reason for
this unspectacular occurrence have anything to do with the fact that
nearly every surviving ancient European manuscript was transcribed
while Catholic Christianity dominated Europe? And, could the fact that
nearly every scholar at that time was a Christian monk or cleric have
been a reason that so many Bible manuscripts were created while other
works were overlooked or even suppressed or destroyed? Basically, the
reason there are so many Bible manuscripts is because many people
believed in Christianity and felt Bible scholarship was more important
than any other scholarship.
OK, so many people believed in Christianity, I don't think anyone
disputes that. But taking the secondary effects of this fact and
trying to pass them off as further proof of the validity of the Bible
is a deception.
>
> Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
>1) It claims to be - as I said, every man is allowed to testify on his own
> behalf, so the Bible's claim must be counted as evidence, even if that
> evidence is taken a little more lightly than some of the exterior evi-
> dence. I trust we can agree that the Bible claims to be the sole rev-
> elation of God to man; no Apocrypha, no additions, etc.
This is not a proof and any religious work satisfies the conditions of
this proof (as well as many other works of fiction).
>2) The unity of the Bible - A unity of facts, purpose, and teaching. Its
> theme is that of the salvation from sin. It begins with the creation,
> sin marring it, and God conceiving a great plan to redeem man from his
> sins, and goes from there.
I don't consider the Bible particularly united. You will find other
religious works to be at least as united if you ever bothered to look
at any. One mighn't wonder how someone can consider a book united when
it claims to teach morality yet explicitly contains genocide, human
sacrifice, ethnic prejudice, pedocide, and many other atrocities
committed in the name of God and under direct orders from God.
>3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
You have apparently not read any non-Christian religious books. Note,
the set of rules are little different, but the standards can be at
least as high.
>4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality - "Human books extol the virtues and
> suppress the vices of their heroes. Not so with the Bible. It makes
> no attempt to conceal, minimize, or apologize for the weaknesses,
> mistakes, and wrongdoings of even its greatest characters. It tells of
> the sins of friend and foe alike." (Jimmy Thomas - I could think of no
> better way to phrase it in my own words).
Not only are you making the claim that the Bible is impartial, but the
extraordinary claim of "its unparallelled impartiality"! I've never
heard such a claim before. How about including Bible history from the
point of view of the Midianites or Cannanites or any other people who
were slaughtered in the name of God? Wouldn't this be a minimum
requirement for impartiality?
As for describing weakness in the characters, fiction would be very
dull if none of the characters had a weakness! But look at the Greek
myths, even the Gods had human failings, and the Greeks didn't shrink
from describing them. I guess this is proof that these myths are
true!
>5) The Brevity of the Bible - So much, virtually a history of the world, is
> packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
> important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
First time I've heard the bible described as brief. Also the first
time I've heard the claim that the Bible contains "virtually a history
of the world". Not only has the existence of other religions escaped
you, but apparently the existence and rich history of the rest of the
world too! Try reading something besides the Bible.
>6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable. The
> testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
> Such a perfect person could never have been so perfectly created by any
> man.
In proof #4, you tell us that the fact that the Bible describes people
with human failings is more proof of the Bible. Let me get this
straight. If a book describes characters with human failings it can be
considered proof of the authenticity of the book, and if the book
describes characters without human failings, it can be considered proof
of the authenticity of the book!
First, I don't think the Gospels describe a sinless perfect person.
Second, I disagree that a person could not make up a fantasy about a
perfect person. You underestimate the imagination of humans and
apparently haven't read much fiction (besides the Bible). I contend
that a good writer could do a much better job of creating a consistent
story of a perfect person than is available from the Gospels.
>7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
> get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
> predicted. The odds of Jesus fulfilling (whether accidentally and/or
> by design) the prophecies applying to Him are beyond calculation.
So, ALL Biblical prophecies come true? Could it be that you haven't
read all the prophecies in the Bible? I haven't examined each to see
if it came true either, but I'm not making the extraordinary claim that
they all did came true. However, I do know of some that haven't.
Jesus clearly states several times that his will return at the end of
the world and the event will be witnessed by people of his generation
who knew him and didn't yet die (see MATT 10:15, 10:23, 16:28, 24:34,
MARK 6:11, 9:1, 13:30, LUKE 9:27, 21:32). These were not parables but
clear direct statements. This was believed by members of the early
church (see ROM 13:12, PHIL 4:5, HEB 10:25, JAMES 5:8, I PETER 4:7, I
JOHN 2:18, REV 1:3). Here is a disprovable (due to the time limit)
prophecy of an unlikely event. What a chance for a prophet to shine!
Another example of a bad prophecy has been discussed in the thread
"Tyre Still Exists Today". The Bible predicts the destruction of Tyre
by Nebuchadnezzar (Ezekiel 26:7-14) and predicts the following result:
I will make you [Tyre] a bare rock, and you will become a
place to spread fishnets. You will never be rebuilt, for I
the Lord have spoken; declares the Sovereign Lord. (Ezekiel 26:14)
Nebuchadnezzar did besiege Tyre, but eventually a truce was reached and
he withdrew leaving the city intact. Later Alexander destroyed Tyre
around 323 BC. However, it was rebuilt and is even mentioned later in
the Bible (Matt 25:21, Mark 7:24, Acts 12:20). There is still a city
where the old Tyre was. One of the people out in net land (sorry, the
post has been purged but I wish I could give credit) went to
extraordinary efforts to gather the evidence that the modern Tyre is
built on top of the old Tyre. Oops, I guess the Sovereign Lord spoke
too soon.
Now, why don't you point out some Biblical prophecies that have come
true? I'm really only interested in cases where the event prophesied
is unlikely, where the event hadn't happened at the time the prophecy
was written down, and where there is real evidence (besides the Bible
itself) that the event happened. I warn you that someone tried to
present the destruction of Tyre as an example fulfilled prophecy and
investigations by others then revealed it to in fact be a counter
example.
>8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge - One of the areas I personally
> find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
> workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
> was written by man. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
> announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
> 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
> heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
> [force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
First you say that the Bible doesen't attribute the workings of nature
to colorful myths and then you use the prime example of a colorful
myth: the the creation of the universe in 6 days. Also, your mapping
of time, space, matter, force, and motion to the creation story is
quite contrived.
> The Bible said the earth was round (Is 40:22, Prov 8:27, Lk
> 17:34-36).
Is 40:22: He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth
and its people are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the
heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out like a tent to
live in.
This may describe a disk with the heavens like a tent over it. Certainly
not an accurate description of a globe in space.
Prov 8:27: I was there when he set the heavens in place and
he marked out the horizon on the face of the deep.
I see no indication of a spherical earth here.
Luke 17:34-36: I tell you, on that night two people will be in
one bed; one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be
grinding grain together; one will be taken and the other left.
??????? Sorry, wrong subject!!!
> Not too long ago, great minds were convinced the earth was
> held up by Atlas or something like him; read Job 26:7 to hear what the
> Bible claimed. Moses knew about a plurality of seas, all with one
> common bed (Gen 1:9-10). Solomon knew about the rain/evaporation cycle
> (Eccl 1:7), as did Amos and Job (Amos 9:6; Job 36:27-28).
Even stone age man could have discovered evaporation and condensation. All
that is needed is the ability to heat water. But there seems to be a
big hole in Solomon's understanding of the cycle:
Eccl 1:7: All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full.
To the place the streams come from, there they return again.
Amos appears to think God pours every shower out personally:
Amos 9:6: He who builds his lofty palace in the heavens and sets
its foundation on the earth, who calls for the waters of the sea
and pours them out over the face of the land - the Lord is his name.
Job is better at the simple realization that water evaporates and
condenses.
> After reading Psalm 8:8, Matthew F. Henry charted the sea currents
> which are still recognized today.
Psalm 8:8: the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea.
all swim the paths of the seas.
You tell us how Mr. Henry derived even one sea current out of this
verse.
Really, don't you even check your verses before you post? Were you
hoping that no one would bother to look them up? You wouldn't happen
to be blindly copying these "proofs" out of a book containing arguments
for the Bible, would you? Is the book by "Dr." Kennedy by any chance?
> Until recently, doctors had no idea how that blood
> contained, in essence, the life of man, but the Bible did (Lev 17:11,
> 14).
Lev 17:11: For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have
given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it
is the blood that makes atonement for one's life.
Lev 17:14: because the life of every creature is in its blood. That
is why I have said to the Israelites, "You must not eat the blood of
any creature, because the life of every creature is in its blood,
anyone who eats it must be cut off."
According to this, anyone who has a complete blood transfusion is dead
(or is now someone else).
> Scientists cannot distinguish between the blood of races of
> people, just like God said in Acts 17:26.
Acts 17:26: From one man he made every nation of men, that they
should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set
for them and the exact places where they should live.
If there is a verse that says everyone's blood is indistinguishable,
this ain't it!
>9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
> (I do not consider the adulterated version pushed by denominations
> to be pure), it has done nothing but good. It makes those who
> would obey it the model parents, friends, neighbors, and citizens, if
> obeyed.
Atrocities have been committed in the Bible in the name of God, and by
Bible believers in the name of God. These have included genocide,
torture, and murder. Now you say these people didn't take the Bible in
its "purity" (except, I suppose, the atrocities actually in the
Bible). They thought they did and would probably think you don't.
But the only thing this argument excels in is that it can be applied
to any religious work (substitute "The Bible" with any other religious
book). Nazis would find this statement made perfect sense if "Mein
Kampf" were substituted for "The Bible". Is it such a difficult
concept to grasp that any argument that can be validly applied to any
or all beliefs is not a useful argument?
I don't think you do your beliefs any favors by presenting the
arguments you've made here. I don't know what other Christians think,
but I certainly wouldn't want you arguing for my beliefs with this type
of reasoning! I also wonder if your are deliberately deceitful or
overwhelmingly careless with your references to Bible verses.
-- Steve
Loren I. Petrich
No conference ever has rewritten the Bible.
That's because they are not supposed to. :-)
: |> 3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
: |> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
: |> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
: Rubbish. Read the Tao-teh Ching, the Bhagad'vita (sp?) ... and who's
: standard of moral righteousness? You'll notice that one conspicuous
: question that Christ failed to answer was Pilate's: "what is truth?"
>"Turn the other cheek". "Love your enemy". "Do unto others...". I
>reassert, the Bible has no match, especially among religions at its
>time.
The Tao Te Ching and the Bhagavad Gita were all written before
Jesus Christ lived. The Buddha lived before he did.
What more can be said?
> And do you think the answer would have mattered to Pilate? Seems
>more like he asked that question more to convince himself Christ
>couldn't be right.
It would be interesting to see Pontius Pilate's memoirs, if he
ever wrote any.
At least we'll see what he has to say about himself.
: RUBBISH!! Where are women in the bible? Where is their dignity and freedom?
: Their interests, their intelligence?
>Ever read about Deborah? Esther? Ruth and Naomi? Mary, the mother
>of Jesus? Mary Magdalene? Priscilla?
But how many? Any important queens, priestesses, etc.? Any
female apostles? Even our present-day society does a _lot_ better than
a lot of the Bible, and even some ancient societies, like the Minoans
and the Etruscans.
> The Bible sets women in subjection to men. It does not say women
>are inferior to men.
Women should be in an inferior position, though they are not
naturally inferior. Talk about sophistry.
It also tells husbands and wives to be in
>subjection to one another.
Mutual degradation. How thrilling.
It tells husbands to love their wives.
And masters to take care of their slaves. Sheesh.
I
>do not apologize for the Bible in any of this.
If you want to make yourself sound like someone who can defend
practically _anything_, there is no need to.
: How about non-European cultures and beliefs?
>What does this have to do with its impartiality in depicting its
>characters, in showing the faults of men such as David, Demas, Peter,
>etc.?
Its lack of such mentions proves its non-universality.
And what about the faults of Zeus, Hera, Athena, Artemis,
Apollo, Poseidon, Hermes, and so forth? Does _that_ make them real?
: |> 5) The Brevity of the Bible - So much, virtually a history of the world, is
: |> packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
: |> important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
: The history of A world, not THE world. And please spare us your cultural
: arrogance as regards the importance of Jesus.
>Please spare me your scholar-wannabe snobbishness, then. And since
>when has there been more than one earth?
The Bible ignores a Tartarus of a lot of history. What does it
say about Alexander the Great? And what about such interesting peoples
as the Minoans? You _might_ find Minoan female fashion interesting,
for starters.
: The
: sexist practice of keeping women in the home is really, undeniably good.
>The Bible gives different roles to men and women. Not putting one
>under another's feet.
The "roles" being that a woman is to be under a man's feet.
Right.
Terence T. Lung
persons. btw. does one of you not know the vi trick of-- :1,$s/^/>/ --?
This is a crude but workable way of putting carrots in front of everything.]
>
>No conference ever has rewritten the Bible.
to any such speculation of collaboration.
>: |> 3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
>: |> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
>: |> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
>
>: Rubbish.
>>"Turn the other cheek". "Love your enemy". "Do unto others...". I
>>reassert, the Bible has no match, especially among religions at its
>>time.
Yes. This is mostly rubbish too.
> The Tao Te Ching and the Bhagavad Gita were all written before
>Jesus Christ lived. The Buddha lived before he did.
>
> What more can be said?
Apollo is said to have walked as a stranger along a path with men much
like Jesus did with his apostles after his resurrection. If there are
parallels with the myths, existing legends, and miscellaneous doctrine
of the time, it is plausible to think that the authors of the texts
were consciously couching the language of the events to make them
more *familiar* to the people they were trying to speak to. i.e.
"You have heard of such a legend?...We have lived with and met with
such a person in the FLESH..." It is worth speculating that each of
the Gospel writers recorded the selected scenes that they did to suit
their specific audiences and their own personal needs. With some
sleuthing around in the NT, we find that John Mark had some serious
difficulty in his discipleship. In his alleged Gospel, we find this
reflection--there is a lot of concentration on developments of
"discipleship failure." I say "concentration" because he leaves many
of the accounts at the two-thirds point [where the apostles still didn't
have a clue] in many scenes. Matthew on the other hand usually says
at the end of each of these scenes "Then they understood." But the
author of Matthew is a different person with a different agenda.
>: RUBBISH!! Where are women in the bible? Where is their dignity and freedom?
>: Their interests, their intelligence?
As Ross Perot would say, "Let's put this into perspective."
Most of the Biblical writings are reflections only of the land
and times of Palestine and the dominant cultures in the surrounding
regions. I think women in the Bible actually receive more dignity
and freedom, RELATIVELY speaking, for the times and cultures involved.
Perhaps there is something to be said of moderating the pace of a
revolution.--slaves? the same business... there is a much more
thematical point to be made in the Bible.
Just my $0.02
Terence
Tim O'Neill
In article <1992Nov11....@wkuvx1.bitnet>, bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet writes:
> Comparison to other documents:
>
> ANCIENT LITERATURE # MANUSCRIPTS PROXIMITY TO
> ORIGINAL COPY
> ----------------------------- ---------------------- -------------
> Livy's History of Rome 20 500 yrs
> Caesar's Gallic Wars 10 900 yrs
> Tacitus' Annals 2 800 yrs
> History of Thucydides 8 1300+ yrs
> History of Heroditus 1 1000 yrs
> Writings of Aristotle 5 1400+ yrs
>
> Now remember - all of these are universally regarded as accurate. Let's
> compare them to the New Testament - 24,633 total MSS and 5338 complete MSS!
> The second-most is Homer's Iliad, with only 643. In addition, these date
> to within 40-300 years of the autograph. To reject the accuracy of these
> is to reject all we know about the ancient world as historically inaccurate
> as well.
You know, I'm really sick of this stupid argument, it'd have to be up there with
the 'Lord/Liar/Lunatic' argument on the scale of fundie sophistry. Hey Jeff, can
you think of any reason why there would be so many manuscripts of the NT?
Could it be anything to do with the fact that christianity was the dominant religion
in the Medditeranean and European worlds from the 3rd to the 19th centuries
and therefore there were an absolute shit-load of people producing, storing and
protecting MSS of this work? Could that have anything to do with the disproportionate
number of NT MSS? And could the relative scarcity of various pagan texts have
something to do with the fact that the guys who were in the business of copying
and protecting books after tha fall of the Roman Empire were christians, many
of whom openly declared that pagan works were worthless, and who were hard
pushed to preserve even their own christian books, let alone abstruse works by
Aristotle? Could that be the answer Jeff?
[The rest of Jeff's amusing arguments deleted.]
Tim O'Neill
Tasmanian Devil
Loren I. Petrich
>> bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet writes:
[How many Bible manuscripts have survived and when were they
written? -- debate omitted]
> * As I said in my original post, no one disputes the authenticity of
> the works of, say, Thucydides - his _History of Thucydides_ is
> availible to us from 8 MSS, the earliest of which dates to about
> 1200 years after his death. The Bible must be reviewed for its
> authenticity just like any other work. If the classical scholars
> can confirm the works of Thucydides, how much more reliable is
> the Bible?
And are other ancient books likewise confirmed?
Like the works of Homer and Hesiod?
I suppose it is really true that the Ruler of the Universe is
a shameless lecher with over 100 illegitimate children to his credit,
that he was raised in a cave in Crete, that he had forced his father
to vomit up all his brothers and sisters and that they all got
together to overthrow him, that his father had overthrown _his_ father
and castrated him, that he is henpecked by his wife, that he had a
daughter who just popped out of his head one day, and so forth.
Well, it has to be true since nobody would _ever_ make up such
things about _anybody_, let alone the Ruler of the Universe.
bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet
a mass answer to the responses I've gotten on my proofs of the Bible
post, hopefully tomorrow.
-Jeff
David E. Hollingsworth
more tomorrow. It appears that he is attempting to construct the
following argument:
1) The current version of the Bible is at least as temporally
close to the original as other ancient works.
2) These other works are accepted as truth.
3) It would be hypocritical to treat the Bible differently, simply
because of lack of belief in its religious implications.
This all sounds very Josh-McDowellish to me, and can be refuted in
various different manners, some of which have been addressed by those
responding to his posts. Hopefully, Jeff will not simply ignore them in
his promised post tomorrow. One facit of his argument that I do not
understand is that it seems to me to be self-undermining: one simply does
not trust ancient works to tell the truth in the absence of evidence.
I would not be at all surprised if there never actually existed a
woman in Troy named Helen over which a war was fought--a potential fact
which not only is not religious but is not remotely supernatural at all.
Moreover, even *IF* I were satisfied that this fact was true, it would not
convince me that Goddesses caused the problem, or even that an apple was
involved.
Moreover, the reason that I would hold Homer suspect is because of
the descriptions of unlikely events, so if I am to treat the Bible with
the same academic honesty, I must seriously question the validity of the
reports held within. This is not to say that the reports cannot be
validated, but that it would be dishonest not to try.
Jeff's argument thus far seems to be that you don't need to try,
because the book you have in your hands now was taken from pieces copied
at most 400 years after the original was written. He has so far not
included, if I remember correctly, quotations that would help establish
the existence of particular events, and has instead relied on nearly a
dozen rhetorical points all stemming from the ill-founded idea that the
Bible is somehow a human being, and therefore can 'testify on [its] own
behalf'.
This nonsensical notion not only is disturbing because it implies
that Jeff somehow feels that the Bible can withstand the Turing Test, but
as well that he is not satisfied with its role as an inspired work: he
wants all to deal with it as if it were literally the Living Word.
Unfortunately, this is not all. It seems as if Jeff files his
tongue before nearly every posting, as if this might somehow improve his
argument and, presumably, indicate what a 'Real Christian' would act like.
For example: (Single insets are Jeff, doubles are others.)
> > Note: sometimes I like to deconstruct posts like the following
> > as an intellectual exercise. . .
>
> And sometimes I like to poke holes in pseudo-intellectual exercises...
..
> > My word! Look what can happen when one isn't thinking!
>
> Oh, if your post was the result of you not thinking, please forgive
> me for replying.
..
> > Pretty impressive. At least three major errors in only two
> > sentences. ;)
>
> "Sez you," to quote a truly staggering Bible critic. :+)
[referring to a statement made by one of Jeff's critics]
..
> > The history of A world, not THE world. And please spare us your
> > cultural arrogance as regards the importance of Jesus.
>
> Please spare me your scholar-wannabe snobbishness, then.
..
> > (.... oh please, don't let this be a joke ...)
>
> My post wasn't. Your reply... well...
I fear decending too far into ad-hominem, so I will stop at this
point, but one surely must wonder about the amount of understanding Jeff
has of Christianity, if this is the manner in which he responds to
critics.
Hopefully, Jeff will also address Burden of Proof, as he
apparently has forgotten who is making the general assertion here:
> > any comptent historian knows that much of the bible's "history" is
> > suspect - certainly events from the hebrew testament and events from
> > the greek testament have not been considered "historically" accurate
> > for some time.
>
> Please, do provide specifics and sources. We can't very well just
> take your word on it.
Actually, it is the other way around: one MUST suspect events as
being inaccurate, if one is to be honest. While this PARTICULAR claim,
that of 'any competent historian' may well require support, the sentiment
behind it does not: the person suggesting that the Bible is historically
accurate is the one required to provide validation, and should at least
attempt to discover what possible arguments might be used against such an
assertion!
I fear that Jeff's next step will be to transform statements about
the close temporal proximity of the current versions to the originals
('reliable' in a certain sense) to statements about the truth-values of
the assertions within the Bible. ('Reliable' in another sense.) I do not
wish to call Jeff's character into question on this point, but merely
relay to him my concern of his accidental use of the nuances of the
English language, rather than rigorous argumentation.
Perhaps Jeff's post tomorrow will contain additional sources and
give information in the following manner:
The University of Blah has a full copy of the New Testament in
Greek that appears to date (based on linguistic studies) back to 303 AD.
(Encyclopedia Britannica, 1998, pg 1132)
A copy of the Torah that carbon-dates to 88 BC was discovered in
1928 by Marshal Cook when searching for frogs; it is currently being
studied by ___ ____ in Jerusalem. (A reference hopefully not by someone
that one could possibly suspect might have something to do with Mr. Cook
or Mr. ____.)
Surely, if his assertions of 20,000 pieces and 5,000 full copies
are correct, then it should be simple for him to come up with many
specific examples that can be verified by looking to secular
authentication.
--
David Hollingsworth star...@bard.mit.edu Send me NeXTMail or kill me
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Stockdale: O.K., I thought this was just an open session, this five-
minute thing, and I didn't have anything to add to his, but I will--
Gore: Well, I'll jump in if--if you don't want it.
Quayle: I thought anyone could jump in whenever they wanted to.
Moderator: O.K., whatever pleases you gentlemen is fine with me,
you're the candidates.
Quayle: But I want Admiral Stockdale's time!
John E. King
>
>Than the Qur'an? Possibly in some respects (though not in others: it
>is my firm understanding that a book which is full of atrocious crimes
>done with the approval of the supposedly just and loving deity, if not
>directly ordered by it, has an infinitely low moral code; and this is
>true of the Bible, but not of the Qur'an).
The Bible, and for that matter the BoM, deal a lot with the
history of its people of which warfare was an integral part.
The Quran does not. However, its depiction of a loving God tormenting
unbelievers for all eternity is chilling, and much more graphic
than the bible. But some of your criticism of the OT accounts
appear to show your lack of knowledge of the various covenants
the God made with the nation of Isreal.
>>If you were going
>>to make up a religion, would you portray the heroes as larger than
>>life? For example, David's affair with Bathsheba. David was a great
>>man, yet the Bible pulls no punches about his weaknesses.
>Actually, David's sending Uriah to his death was not a weakness, it
>was a crime, and the fact that David wasn't punished for it (never
>mind that his newborn son was) is just one of the scores of reasons
>for which I maintain that as a moral guide the Bible is not worth its
>weight in straw. So much about immorality being condemned, and all
>that sort of drivel.
You still didn't really address the issue raised above,e.g, no other
ancient document is so criticle of the main players. As far as David's
son, 1.) Do you think David suffered from that loss?, 2.) What do you
suppose happened to David's son after he died?
>
>>ez Josephus. Sez Tacitus. Sez many Roman imperial officials. Sez
>>historical evidence.
>Sez what? That there was someone called Yeshua who was the illegitimate
>son of a joiner called Yosef? No doubt. Both were rather common names.
>That said Yeshua was a bum, a preacher, and was ultimately crucified?
>Why not, after all? Maybe he did.
Great. At least we got you to admit he existed. Let's assume for
a minute he is not the Son of God, but just a man. At the very least
you have to admit he had a profound impact. The calanders are based
on his birth, and one third of the world claims to be one of his
followers. Can you name any other histrical figure who has had that
kind of impact. Not bad for an illegitimate bum.
Jack
Keywords:
Samuel E Wiggins
Unfortunately, there can be no adequate proofs to convince some people of
the authenticity of the Bible. The original manuscripts were written on
perishable materials, it seems. Thus we rely on copies. They all don't
necessarily agree. Some don't even stick to the original meanings and intent.
So, it's always been a struggle from the 2d century onward to know which
things written were the real truth and transmitted the "true" Christianity
of Christ.
It might be good to note one OT Jewish test for validity of what someone
was saying. If a statement, it matches reality; or if a prophecy, it comes to
pass. If the manuscripts don't match these, by Biblical standards, they're
not true and not of God; because, of course, God claims to be a God of truth.
So, every Scripture that we include as such should be historical and
accurate. If they are, then we can trust them and they can form the basis of
The Religion.
So, don't they match history? Many sources say, "Naah." But, is that
because all the Scriptures are inherently phony to begin with, or because
the scientist/historian wasn't there to witness the events and doesn't
understand the full breadth and meaning of what the writer intended?
A big mistake is to assume all scientists and historians know what they're
talking about. If one can't trust writings always previously thought to be
holy, how is it that modern-day "scholars" are accorded this status? Sometimes
they deduce well; other times they can be just as biased as anyone else.
Several doctors at college (non-Christian doctors of physics, philosophy,
and history) say that academia knows nothing, really. It's all just guesses,
since the only way to be 100% sure of any theory or idea is to witness it
taking place.
I'm not really proving the Bible here, I just wanted to say that
modern scholarship is not inerrant. Nor do various inventors of ideas
agree among themselves in their areas of expertise. It's merely up to
the individual to believe whatever he wants. This is laughable, and yet
sad. In our effort to find the Truth, we end up believing only what we want
to believe.
But, I guess we'll all find out in the end, when we die, what we
should have believed.
Bob Sarver
>> Now remember - all of these are universally regarded as accurate. Let's
> Note that they are all histories of politics, *NOT* religious movements;
/My fault on this one; this was a response to "Do we have a reliable
/copy of the Bible?" So, the answer to that one would have to be, yes,
/we do.
Not hardly.
Unless by "reliable", you mean that after trimming and editing the original
manuscripts, accurate copies were made of the resulting work. In that
case, then yes: it is a reliable copy of an erroneous work. All the
errors have been faithfully reproduced.
>> You asserted God is inconsistent because he had an old law and a new one.
> ...
>>the end of time). The laws of each led into the other. The Patriarchical
> This is opinion on which millions disagree, not scholarly research. Okay,
> so much for the preliminaries, now:
/But on which the Bible is clear. Read the cited passages.
The bible is not clear on any of this. And the cited passages are in
dispute; that is they contradict each other. The end result of this
contradiction and confusion is seen in the varying interpretations that
Christians come up with from the same passage. If the bible were clear,
there would be no argument or difference of interpretation.
Dividing the history of the law into Pre-Mosiac, Patriarchal, etc. is
simply a framework that you have created to help you understand and
categorize things. That is not the same as saying the bible supports
your view. Your case is far from proven.
>>2) The unity of the Bible
> It could be and has been argued there is more disunity than unity
> among the texts, even about simple matters. Consider the wide
> variation in the 4 gospels for example.
/What wide variation? Because one mentions events the others do not?
/Say I wrote a biography of someone and you wrote one on the same
/person. Some events I include you might not. Does that mean that our
/accounts would be disharmonious? I think not. Please provide
/specifics.
See the discussion on how Judas died. Then see the contradictions in
the genealogical trees (the "begats"). See how two different gospels
describe the same miracle, and present contradictory details of the
events.
>>3) The great moral teachings of the Bible - No other book has ever
>> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
>> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
> Wrong. Check the Qu'ran, for one.
/The Bible still has a higher moral code.
Sez you.
/"Turn the other cheek", "Do
/unto others as you would have them do unto you", "love your enemy",
/etc.
The Qu'ran presents the same code. Of course, never having read any other
religious book, you couldn't possibly know that, could you? Several other
religions present the same code using different words. So again I ask the
question you have not yet answered: How is your bible any better?
>>4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality -
> The testaments were written by cultists to pass on the revealed
> word of G-d to a formerly obscure jewish sect. A unilateral
> claim to be the sole word of G-d is hardly an advertisement
> for impartiality.
/I suggest you go back and read what I wrote again.
There wasn't much substance there. Do you have anything else?
By the way:
I am waiting on answers to the specific examples I presented. Do you
have any answers?
>>5) The Brevity of the Bible -
>The important bits of history for believers? Perhaps.
/My point exactly. And it does span the history of the world. Do you
/think any textbook of world history covers every event that ever
/occurred? Of course not!
Just because a book can't possibly cover every event that ever took
place does not mean it's impossible to have a general history of the world
in one book. It has been done many times before. The bible does not
even *approach* this standard of historical research and documentation.
It covers (sporadically) the events of one region, and one group of
people.
/Just the significant ones. And, according
/to the theme of the Bible (God's plan of salvation), the important
/events are covered.
So in other words, it covers all the history of the world that you and
your religion care a damn about. That isn't quite the same as your
original claim to be a history of the world. "This book covers all
the events of history that medical doctors care about" is not the same
as saying "this book is a history of the world".
And it has already been proven that the part of world history the
bible *does* cover, it covers erroneously.
>>6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable. The
> Sez you.
/Sez Josephus. Sez Tacitus. Sez many Roman imperial officials. Sez
/historical evidence.
Sorry; insufficient. There are just as many historical sources which
put his existence into doubt.
>> testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
> And they are hardly impartial.
/The OT speaks of it.
Another "impartial" source? When will you learn that quoting the bible
to prove the bible's claims is circular reasoning?
/The Jews could find no legitimate reason to
/execute Him, so they had to coerce Pilate into it. These are but two
/examples.
Examples from the bible, which we have already determined is not:
a. unbiased
b. proven to be accurate to begin with
>>8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge
In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
>> announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
>> 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
>> heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
>> [force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
> This is called looking to the text to find a way to force a theory
> which the text does not appear to support.
/Perhaps, but all 5 are there. You cannot dispute this fact.
Already disputed and proven erroneous. Care to answer the charge, or
will you continue to ignore it?
> Note that the vacuum bottle, sea currents, star charts, etc were
> all known about to some degree by scholars in Roman days.
/Yes, the Galilean fishermen who followed Jesus, the tax collector
/Matthew, and the others probably read the scholarly journals quite
/often.
Fishermen know about things such as sea currents and the motion of
stars. Educated people (the kind who could write manuscripts to begin
with) might also know about some of the science of the day.
You have also not answered all the scientific inaccuracies that appear
in the bible. What is the problem: you want to take credit for good
science, but don't want to accept the responsibility for bad science?
/ Either that or the truth was revealed to them by God...
Either that or you are delirious.
>>9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> Let's see. . .More people have been killed in the name of religion
> than for any other reason. The bibles and relgions have been used
> to kill, rape, steal, rob, plunder, ad nauseum. I question the
> word "undeniable".
/You seem to have missed my first phrase. "When taken in its purity".
/Catholicism does not take the Bible in its purity; they authorize the
/pope to do what he sees best. Denominations add to and take away from
/it.
So your interpretation is the "pure" one, and everyone else is wrong.
Tell me: when was the international conference to decide what the "pure"
version was?
Wild and Crazy Kind of Girl
In article <1992Nov11....@wkuvx1.bitnet> bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet wrtes:
(much stuff deleted)
> You said (in not quite so many words) that I can't use the Bible to prove
>the Bible. I could use that same reasoning to say don't use science to
>prove science...
We don't use science to prove science. We use an experimental method to
prove scientific theories. And at least, science admits fallibility.
> Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
>1) It claims to be -
WOW! So do the Qu'oran, the Rg Vedas, etc, etc. Big deal.
>2) The unity of the Bible -
I guess you haven't read many other religious texts. They are equally as
unified. Even Greek mythology has a similar unity.
>3) The great moral teachings of the Bible -
Once again, you cannot have read any other religious texts if you insist
on claiming the Bible is unique among religious texts in teaching morality.
And being strict, how does that make it good. It seems to me that this
would make it predjudice and vindictive.
>4) Its Unparallelled Impartiality -
Just because it gives the good and bad sides of people, doesn't mean it
has any truth value whatsoever. I know many fiction writers who present
the flaws and good attributes of their characters.
>5) The Brevity
Again, this does not make it true. Perhaps it is brief because of a lack
of correct information to put into it.
>6) The Life of Jesus - That Jesus existed is virtually indisputable.
Really? We have only the Bible to say he did, and many other religious
documents to say that even if he did, he was merely a prophet.
>7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
> get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
> predicted.
Well.. then how come Christians are often predicting a certain doomsday which
never happens. The fact is that predictions that "come true" are often vague
and subject to interpretation.
>8) The Bible's Scientific Foreknowledge - One of the areas I personally
> find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
> workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
> was written by man. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
> announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
> 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
> heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
> [force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
> The Bible said the earth was round (Is 40:22, Prov 8:27, Lk
> 17:34-36). Not too long ago, great minds were convinced the earth was
> held up by Atlas or something like him; read Job 26:7 to hear what the
> Bible claimed. Moses knew about a plurality of seas, all with one
> common bed (Gen 1:9-10). Solomon knew about the rain/evaporation cycle
> (Eccl 1:7), as did Amos and Job (Amos 9:6; Job 36:27-28). After read-
> ing Psalm 8:8, Matthew F. Henry charted the sea currents which are still
> recognized today. Until recently, doctors had no idea how that blood
> contained, in essence, the life of man, but the Bible did (Lev 17:11,
> 14). Scientists cannot distinguish between the blood of races of
> people, just like God said in Acts 17:26.
OK... so there is some scientific-type knowledge in the Bible, but the
same is true of many religious texts. Yes, they have their scientific
innacuracies, but it seems to me that the Bible does as well. So, in this
regard, the religious texts are probably all close to equal.
>9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
> (I do not consider the adulterated version pushed by denominations
> to be pure), it has done nothing but good. It makes those who
> would obey it the model parents, friends, neighbors, and citizens, if
> obeyed.
Well, I guess there must not be too many people who follow the teachings of
the real Bible then. I don't know very many model parents or friends. Most
often, I hear people use the Bible as justification to look down on someone
else. Furthermore, the Bible promotes female inferiority which is not good.
If you believe it is, we would need to have a whole other discussion.
The bottom line is this: You cannot prove that the Bible is true.
You can believe it is true, and that is fine, but your reasons will never
convince anyone else who is a non-believer to believe. Faith is not something
you can appeal to with logical argument. Also, I would reccommend that you
read some other relgious documents before you tout the authority of your own.
"For those who believe, no explanation is necessary. For those who don't
believe, no explanation is possible" - unknown author
Shari Heino
bar...@wkuvx1.bitnet
> Jeff has posted many articles on this subject, and promises to add
> more tomorrow.
"Many articles"? No, just a couple. There *have* been many
replies, though. And a Pascal project I've got due tomorrow means
it'll be delayed probably until Thursday.
> It appears that he is attempting to construct the
> following argument:
>
> 1) The current version of the Bible is at least as temporally
> close to the original as other ancient works.
> 2) These other works are accepted as truth.
> 3) It would be hypocritical to treat the Bible differently, simply
> because of lack of belief in its religious implications.
No, this hasn't been my argument at all. My arguments are:
1) The current version of the Bible is temporally closer to the
autograph as other ancient works.
2) They are regarded as accurate copies of the autograph.
3) It would be hypocritical to treat the Bible differently, simply
because it has religious implications.
4) Since we do have an accurate copy of the original, let's then put
it on trial to determine whether or not it is the Word of God.
> He has so far not
> included, if I remember correctly, quotations that would help establish
> the existence of particular events, and has instead relied on nearly a
> dozen rhetorical points all stemming from the ill-founded idea that the
> Bible is somehow a human being, and therefore can 'testify on [its] own
> behalf'.
The first step in determining whether or not it is the Word of God is
determining whether it claims to be. If it makes no claims, that fact
will reflect poorly upon whether or not it is (would any kind of God
inspire men to write it then forget to say it was from Him?). If it
claims not to be, to be merely the teachings of men and not divinely
inspired (Book of Mormon), you can forget it.
> Unfortunately, this is not all. It seems as if Jeff files his
> tongue before nearly every posting, as if this might somehow improve his
> argument and, presumably, indicate what a 'Real Christian' would act like.
<examples of my sarcasm deleted>
> I fear decending too far into ad-hominem, so I will stop at this
> point, but one surely must wonder about the amount of understanding Jeff
> has of Christianity, if this is the manner in which he responds to
> critics.
Christ called the Pharisees "hypocrites", "vipers", tombs containing
the bones of dead men. He accused them of "straining a gnat and
swallowing a camel". Don't confuse Christianity with politically
correctness.
> Hopefully, Jeff will also address Burden of Proof, as he
> apparently has forgotten who is making the general assertion here:
>> > any comptent historian knows that much of the bible's "history" is
>> > suspect - certainly events from the hebrew testament and events from
>> > the greek testament have not been considered "historically" accurate
>> > for some time.
>> Please, do provide specifics and sources. We can't very well just
>> take your word on it.
> Actually, it is the other way around: one MUST suspect events as
> being inaccurate, if one is to be honest. While this PARTICULAR claim,
> that of 'any competent historian' may well require support, the sentiment
> behind it does not: the person suggesting that the Bible is historically
> accurate is the one required to provide validation, and should at least
> attempt to discover what possible arguments might be used against such an
> assertion!
I asked for specific examples so that I might answer his charges. Him
making such a claim and not needing any proof for it to be true would
be as stupid as me saying, "Any competent historian knows the Bible to
be totally proven by archaeology" and not require proof to back it up.
Would you have me go through verse by verse through the Bible and
write a paragraph on each verse?
> Surely, if his assertions of 20,000 pieces and 5,000 full copies
> are correct, then it should be simple for him to come up with many
> specific examples that can be verified by looking to secular
> authentication.
I listed my sources for the 20,000+. Not I said *total* pieces, not
just Greek, though.
-Jeff
Paul Harvey
>No, this hasn't been my argument at all. My arguments are:
> 1) The current version of the Bible is temporally closer to the
>autograph as other ancient works.
If I'm not mistaken, the oldest written text that we have today that we
understand is the Persian Epic of Gilgamesh. The second is the Indian
Mahabharata. Third is probably the Hebrew Scriptures. All three
languages are still widely used today. I would say that all texts are in
similar shape as regards closeness to "autographia" which is actually a
bogus concept since all three began as oral traditions. As for the
Christian Greek scriptures, well, Jesus spoke in Aramaic and the
Christian scriptures were written later so we don't even have a written
version of what Jesus preached in the same language. Hardly anywhere
near the questionable concept of "autographia."
> 2) They are regarded as accurate copies of the autograph.
This doesn't make any sense for the time period. You may want to
investigate the word redaction to gain some more insite.
> 3) It would be hypocritical to treat the Bible differently, simply
>because it has religious implications.
Yes, this may be something for you to think about. By the way, all myths
have religious implications. Religion is just organized mythology.
> 4) Since we do have an accurate copy of the original, let's then put
>it on trial to determine whether or not it is the Word of God.
All myth is the "Word of God", God being a metaphor for the
transcendent.
>The first step in determining whether or not it is the Word of God is
>determining whether it claims to be.
The one who claims to be is not The One. False prophets abound and there
is a reason for that. The process of learning is not easy. Teacher says,
follow me and be free, students follow and fail. Learn from dogma, but
please do not become dogmatic.
Ivan A Derzhanski
>>
>>([...] it is my firm understanding that a book which is full of
>>atrocious crimes done with the approval of the supposedly just and
>>loving deity, if not directly ordered by it, has an infinitely low
>>moral code; and this is true of the Bible, but not of the Qur'an).
>
>The Bible, and for that matter the BoM, deal a lot with the
>history of its people of which warfare was an integral part.
>The Quran does not.
Not much, that is true. It contains more sermons and fewer narratives.
Of course, this may well be the reason for which the Qur'an leaves the
reader with a more favourable impression than the Bible.
>However, its depiction of a loving God tormenting
>unbelievers for all eternity is chilling,
The Qur'an doesn't place such an emphasis on Allah being a loving god,
though it does call him merciful and compassionate. But when we are
talking of the value of books as moral guides, I am more interested in
the actions of human beings portrayed as positive characters therein
than in the long-term strategy of a superhuman character (though
doubtless that is relevant as well).
>and much more graphic than the bible.
Your argument above applies here, only backwards: just as the Qur'an
doesn't tell much about the wars the Arabs led, the Gospels don't tell
much about hell, except that it is a bloody unpleasant place.
>But some of your criticism of the OT accounts
>appear to show your lack of knowledge of the various covenants
>the God made with the nation of Isreal.
That's "Israel". Which covenants do you mean? It may be that I know
about them, but don't think that they suffice to justify everything
that is going on.
>>>If you were going
>>>to make up a religion, would you portray the heroes as larger than life?
>
>>Actually, David's sending Uriah to his death was not a weakness, it
>>was a crime, and the fact that David wasn't punished for it (never
>>mind that his newborn son was)
>You still didn't really address the issue raised above,e.g, no other
>ancient document is so criticle of the main players.
If I didn't address that statement, it was because it was so obviously
false that I didn't think it deserved attention. All Sumero-Akkadian
religious epics are very critical of the main players, gods and men
alike. So is much of the Egyptian religious literature. So are many
of the Greek myths.
>As far as David's son, 1.) Do you think David suffered from that loss?,
It says he did. Yet this doesn't sound like much of an argument in
support of the death penalty for the newborn child of a murderer.
Someone had said that sons were not to be killed for their fathers' crimes.
>2.) What do you suppose happened to David's son after he died?
He underwent whatever the standard funeral procedure was at that time
and place. Oh, you didn't mean his body? The same as happens to the
flame of a candle when you blow it out.
>>That there was someone called Yeshua who was the illegitimate
>>son of a joiner called Yosef? No doubt. Both were rather common names.
>>That said Yeshua was a bum, a preacher, and was ultimately crucified?
>>Why not, after all? Maybe he did.
>
>Great. At least we got you to admit he existed.
Just don't overcredit yourselves. I admit the possibility that he
existed, because I have no reason to deny it. With so many carpenters,
so many illegitimate children, so many wandering preachers getting
themselves crucified by the Romans, and so many Yosefs and Yeshuas,
the probability of the above is certainly greater than zero.
>Let's assume for a minute he is not the Son of God, but just a man.
>At the very least you have to admit he had a profound impact.
>The calanders are based on his birth,
The Christian (and nowadays mainstream) calender is only said to be
based on his birth. The various sources suggest that said event ought
to be located somewhere in the late spring of year 4BC, I think. The
"date of his birth", which we know as Christmas and whereon the
calender is really based, is a pagan solstice holiday.
>and one third of the world claims to be one of his followers.
It might not be so, mind you, if the Crusades and the Conquista hadn't
taken place. Hmm. Does the Inquisition also count as impact of Jesus?
I'm not blaming it on him, merely wondering what "impact" really means.
>Can you name any other histrical figure who has had that kind of impact.
Yes. Gutenberg, for example. Most people deal with printed books more
often than with calenders, and I expect printing to outlive Christianity.
>Not bad for an illegitimate bum.
Well, some people are just lucky. Not many illiterate merchants have
the like of Mohammed's impact either. Not that this proves much.
--
`Haud yer wheesht! Come oot o the man an gie him peace.' (The Glasgow Gospel)
Ivan A Derzhanski (i...@cogsci.ed.ac.uk; i...@chaos.cs.brandeis.edu)
* Centre for Cognitive Science, 2 Buccleuch Place, Edinburgh EH8 9LW, UK
* Cowan House, Pollock Halls, 18 Holyrood Park Road, Edinburgh EH16 5BD, UK
Ivan A Derzhanski
>If I'm not mistaken, the oldest written text that we have today that we
>understand is the Persian Epic of Gilgamesh.
You are definitely mistaken. The several Epics of Gilgamesh are
written in either Sumerian or Akkadian. Both languages have been
as dead as Dodo for more than two thousand years.
>The second is the Indian Mahabharata. Third is probably the Hebrew
>Scriptures. All three languages are still widely used today.
Well, Hebrew had ceased being used for quite a while, and was revived
artificially. Sanskrit has never gone out of business, but its
application nowadays is rather limited. Present-day Persian (Farsi)
is quite different to Old Persian (which was very close to Sanskrit).
David Spurrett
>
> Comparison to other documents:
>
>ANCIENT LITERATURE # MANUSCRIPTS PROXIMITY TO
> ORIGINAL COPY
>----------------------------- ---------------------- -------------
>Livy's History of Rome 20 500 yrs
>Caesar's Gallic Wars 10 900 yrs
>Tacitus' Annals 2 800 yrs
>History of Thucydides 8 1300+ yrs
>History of Heroditus 1 1000 yrs
>Writings of Aristotle 5 1400+ yrs
>
Utter rubbish. Name one philosopher, historian, literary scholar or
_anyone_ who takes the texts you mention seriously who does not approach
them critically, and in the light of ongoing scholarship dedicated to
testing the credentials of the manuscripts in question.
o------------------------------------------o------------------------------o
| David Spurrett, Department of Philosophy | `I have seen the truth, and |
| University of Natal, Durban | it makes no sense.' |
| email: spur...@superbowl.und.ac.za | - OFFICIAL! |
o------------------------------------------o------------------------------o
Ivan A Derzhanski
> In our effort to find the Truth, we end up believing only what we want
>to believe.
> But, I guess we'll all find out in the end, when we die, what we
>should have believed.
I am having some trouble with the last four words here, and I daresay
they raise an interesting question about behaviour. When I have to
make a decision, I make it on the basis of my current knowledge,
beliefs, assumptions, and so on. If later it turns out that another
choice would have had more favourable consequences, I don't blame
myself for not having taken the most fortunate course. I just shrug
my shoulders and say, `Bad luck' or `Well, I couldn't have known that'.
That's how I shall react, in particular, if after my death I meet one
of the heads of the various pantheons. I won't say `It seems I should
have bought the claims of this religion'.
RBN...@rohvm1.rohmhaas.com
a historical evidence for the existence of Jesus. All Biblical scholars
(with the exception of christian apologists or polemicists) concur that
the books of Josephus were tampered by early christians. One of the early
christian historians, Origen, does not mention Jesus, but a century later
Eusebius, another christian historian, says that Josephus, a Jew, indeed
accepted Jesus as a Christ. And the copy that was produced by these christians
do show that several bracketed sentences were added to the manuscript.
Prof. S.G.F. Brandon in his book, Jesus and Zealots, like most other research-
ers simply conclude that Josephus's book as it stands today, cannot be cited
as a proof toward historical evidence of Jesus. I shall encourage interested
readers to read this book of Prof. Brandon.
--
Siddiqui.
NEIL MCKINNON
> Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
> behalf, so the Bible's claim must be counted as evidence, even if that
> evidence is taken a little more lightly than some of the exterior evi-
> dence. I trust we can agree that the Bible claims to be the sole rev-
> elation of God to man; no Apocrypha, no additions, etc.
> theme is that of the salvation from sin. It begins with the creation,
> sin marring it, and God conceiving a great plan to redeem man from his
> sins, and goes from there.
> condemned immorality so severely or demanded as high a standard of
> righteousness. It is virtually unique among religious documents.
> suppress the vices of their heroes. Not so with the Bible. It makes
> no attempt to conceal, minimize, or apologize for the weaknesses,
> mistakes, and wrongdoings of even its greatest characters. It tells of
> the sins of friend and foe alike." (Jimmy Thomas - I could think of no
> better way to phrase it in my own words).
> packed into so few pages. It tells the 33-year life of the most
> important man ever to walk the earth in four short books.
> testimony of those closest to him indicated His sinless perfection.
> man.
>7) The Fulfillment of Prophecy - Modern self-proclaimed "prophets" usually
> get about 10-20% right; the Bible's all come true in exactly the way
> by design) the prophecies applying to Him are beyond calculation.
> find fascinating. Being pre-scientific, it should attribute the
> workings of nature to colorful myths and be woefully inaccurate - if it
> was written by man. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer first
> announced the 5 fundamental facts of science; yet the Bible covered all
> 5 in the first 2 verses: "In the beginning [time - jdb] God created the
> heavens [space] and the earth [matter]. And the spirit of God moved
> [force] upon the face of the waters [motion]."
> The Bible said the earth was round (Is 40:22, Prov 8:27, Lk
> 17:34-36). Not too long ago, great minds were convinced the earth was
> held up by Atlas or something like him; read Job 26:7 to hear what the
> Bible claimed. Moses knew about a plurality of seas, all with one
> common bed (Gen 1:9-10). Solomon knew about the rain/evaporation cycle
> (Eccl 1:7), as did Amos and Job (Amos 9:6; Job 36:27-28). After read-
> ing Psalm 8:8, Matthew F. Henry charted the sea currents which are still
> recognized today. Until recently, doctors had no idea how that blood
> contained, in essence, the life of man, but the Bible did (Lev 17:11,
> 14). Scientists cannot distinguish between the blood of races of
> people, just like God said in Acts 17:26.
> (I do not consider the adulterated version pushed by denominations
> to be pure), it has done nothing but good. It makes those who
> would obey it the model parents, friends, neighbors, and citizens, if
> obeyed.
To the author of this crock. Try thinking about the title of this posting,
and then try thinking about the sort of statements 1-9 are. It might be a
worthwile exercise.
Neil.
Samuel E Wiggins
===========================================================================
/ You said (in not quite so many words) that I can't use the Bible to prove
/the Bible. I could use that same reasoning to say don't use science to
/prove science, but I'll just say this - in a trial, a man is allowed to
/testify on his own behalf.
Yes, but his own testimony is never considered conclusive unless it can
be corroborated by other witnesses or by physical evidence. Giving someone
a chance to speak is not the same thing as admitting his testimony into
evidence.
-------
But the Bible is not just one guy. It's A LOT of guys agreeing that
something did happen.
-------
/ Comparison to other documents:
[omitted for brevity]
This is nothing more than a reprint from Josh McDowell's book Evidence
That Demands a Verdict. It is quite flawed. Check out the FAQ for a
description of the errors.
-------
Never read it, so I can't comment.
-------
/ You asserted God is inconsistent because he had an old law and a new one.
/In actuality, there were three periods of time (dispensations), each with
/its own law: the patriarchical dispensation (from Creation to the giving of
/the law on Mt. Sinai), the Mosaic dispensation (from Mt. Sinai to the
/crucifixion of Christ), and the Christian dispensation (from the cross to
/the end of time). The laws of each led into the other.
Actually, no. The laws contradict each other. Example: ther are multiple
places in Deuteronomy where God says that he will visit the iniquities of
the sinner on his children and his children's children, even to the seventh
generation. The fathers commit the sins, and the children, grandchildren,
etc. will continue to pay the price.
Then in Ezekiel, God says "It has been said in the land of Israel, 'The
fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge.'
As I live, saith the LORD, this proverb shall no more be heard in the
mouths of the children of Israel. A man shall die for his sins, and a
son for his sins. The children shall no more die for the sins of the
fathers." Contradiction.
-------
Only in a simplistic, superficial way. People are always living out the
consequences of other people's actions. For example, a baby born addicted
to drugs because the mother used them while pregnant. The baby hasn't even
had time to do wrong yet.
I think God was merely correcting a MISUNDERSTANDING or MISINTERPRETATION
on the part of Israel. They thought they would be guilty of their ancestors'
sins. God was saying that, although they might have to live with the
consequences of their mistakes, in the end one is judged for his own mistakes.
BTW, you can always catch someone in the exact wording of what he
says over time and find contradictions. But, really the person can be quite
consistent as to his meaning. True understanding is derived from the
semantics, not the exact words used. "I ain't got none" does not mean
"I do have some." Language is "slippery" and does not follow logical
or mathematical precision.
Samuel E Wiggins
/ Proof for the Bible being the Word of God:
/1) It claims to be -
SO WHAT? Every religious book in the world makes this claim. Are they
all the Word of God just because they claim to be? Am I Napoleon Bonaparte
just because I claim to be?
-------
I think he meant that the Bible says that it excludes the possibility of
other religions being right; it is mutually exclusive.
No.
And, lastly, how do I know you're not Napoleon (reincarnated or
something)?
-------
/
/2) The unity of the Bible -
Putting aside for a moment the very shaky assertion that the Bible displays
unity, consider the following:
The Constitution of the United States is a document that shows great unity.
Does that make it the Word of God, just because it shows unity? I hardly
think so.
Many documents show great unity due to the fact that a team of people with
similar interests and goals worked to keep the document unified. Other
documents show great unity due to later generations editing the document
to remove offensive or unpopular passages.
So far you haven't proven anything.
-------
True. How could he convince you?
Samuel E Wiggins
/9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good - When taken in its purity
/ (I do not consider the adulterated version pushed by denominations
/ to be pure), it has done nothing but good. It makes those who
/ would obey it the model parents, friends, neighbors, and citizens, if
/ obeyed.
You are a deliberate liar. More evil has been done in the name of the
bible than any other force. It has been used to justify the wholesale
extermination of villages, towns, and countries. It is used to justify
racism, slavery, and violence against people. Check out the verses
in Leviticus that proscribe death for witches & rebellious sons.
Fortunately, we live in a democracy and not a theocracy.
"Undeniable influence"? I know many who would deny it wholeheartedly.
-------
Yeah. It has been used for evil. But, was the Bible being used correctly?
Or, was it just some guys *claiming* to be Christians using religion also
to prove the morality of their own agenda?
You say, check out the verses about witches and rebellious sons. Does
this mean you support the kind of witchcraft and rebellion the Bible
condemns? Here witchcraft meant consulting demons and stuff. And rebellion
of a son meant beating up your parents. You support these? Nope, the Bible
punishes the people who deserve it.
I know the Bible says make the best Christian example in whatever
station in life you find yourself: slave, second-class citizen, etc. Where
does it say, "Slavery, racism, and violence are good"? It doesn't. It
reports these as a matter of record.
Before I blew off the Bible completely, I would check out where
the founders of this country's government got A LOT of their laws and ideas
about people's rights.
-------
/ These are the main reasons. Next letter I'll examine creationism vs.
/evolutionism -
-------
Who wrote the preceding line? Sheesh.
-------
I would rather you answer the holes in these arguments first. There is
no point in going on to another letter if you cannot or will not defend
what has *already* been written here.
-------
Amen.
-------
/why if the supernaturalistic viewpoint is refused that
/evolution is the only half-way logical alternative, the closed-mindedness
/of those who insist upon naturalism, and the holes in the evolutionary
/theory.
Great. I look forward to seeing you point out the "holes" in the
evolutionary theory. In fact, why don't you start with the FAQ from
talk.origins? Go read it, and then shoot holes in all those arguments.
Post the entire thing here so that we can all see it.
Somehow I suspect, though, that you will not answer any of the questions
raised in it. The bible-believers always ignore the questions, hoping
they will go away. I also hope that you learn some chemistry, astronomy,
biology, and archaelogy before you try to point out the "holes" in
evolution. So far, your understanding of science and history has been
pretty bad.
-------
"The bible-believers?" "Always?"
I've been talking with some scientists and historians at school (non-
Christians). They claim true science admits it knows nothing about the
origins of the universe. Theories are not necessarily truth, only what
is believed until something better comes along. These are preached like
gospel and may be totally erroneous. Science is like a religion. You
rely on faith.
You know, there is some "scientist" or "historian" who will say
whatever you want. Just depends on what you're looking for. And, there's
always room for differences of interpretation or re-interpretation of
"facts," for the religious or non-religious side. Aside from really being
there no one knows a thing, especially "scientists."
This is coming from a "scientist."
Paul Harvey
wig...@hurricane.cs.odu.edu (Samuel E Wiggins) writes:
>says over time and find contradictions. But, really the person can be quite
>consistent as to his meaning. True understanding is derived from the
>semantics, not the exact words used. "I ain't got none" does not mean
>"I do have some." Language is "slippery" and does not follow logical
>or mathematical precision.
This is an important concept to remember, particularly if one seeks to
avoid dogmaticism. *ALL* language, written and oral, is "slippery". And
the transcendent is transcendent of *ALL*, which certainly includes
language.
DXB...@psuvm.psu.edu
wig...@hurricane.cs.odu.edu (Samuel E Wiggins) says:
> Actually, no. The laws contradict each other. Example: ther are multiple
> places in Deuteronomy where God says that he will visit the iniquities of
> the sinner on his children and his children's children, even to the seventh
> generation. The fathers commit the sins, and the children, grandchildren,
> etc. will continue to pay the price.
>"I do have some." Language is "slippery" and does not follow logical
>or mathematical precision.
So in other words, no matter how blatently obvious and direct the meaning
of something in the Bible, you can never be sure you really understand it.
The only logical conclusion is that the Christian God _wants_ some of us
to be confused and misinterpret his work (otherwise he would have chosen
a perfect medium of communication). Maybe he doesn't take himself
seriously? Who knows, maybe he's laughing himself to death at how
confused the Christians are...haha..they'll NEVER figure out the real
meaning!! Idiots! :-)
DXB...@psuvm.psu.edu
wig...@hurricane.cs.odu.edu (Samuel E Wiggins) says:
> Yeah. It has been used for evil. But, was the Bible being used
>correctly?
>Or, was it just some guys *claiming* to be Christians using religion also
>to prove the morality of their own agenda?
Implicitly you admit that your religion can be used by anyone to prove
the morality of their own agenda. That's a disadvantage, I would say.
> You say, check out the verses about witches and rebellious sons. Does
>this mean you support the kind of witchcraft and rebellion the Bible
>condemns? Here witchcraft meant consulting demons and stuff. And rebellion
Of course I support it. I believe in freedom of religion, no matter how
stupid or ignorant it may appear to me.
> I know the Bible says make the best Christian example in whatever
>station in life you find yourself: slave, second-class citizen, etc. Where
>does it say, "Slavery, racism, and violence are good"? It doesn't. It
>reports these as a matter of record.
The Bible has a LOT to say about what is good/bad. By not condemning
slavery it supports it (especially "slaves, submit to your master...")
>is believed until something better comes along. These are preached like
>gospel and may be totally erroneous. Science is like a religion. You
>rely on faith.
Just because someone claims to be a scientist doesn't make them one.
You haven't been talking to True Scientists. :-)
Loren I. Petrich
> You say, check out the verses about witches and rebellious sons. Does
>this mean you support the kind of witchcraft and rebellion the Bible
>condemns? Here witchcraft meant consulting demons and stuff.
Does the Bible explicitly define "witchcraft" as consulting
supposedly evil spirits? Does putting a hex on someone not count as
"witchcraft"?
And why is the death penalty (the Biblical punishment)
supposed to be appropriate?
And rebellion
>of a son meant beating up your parents.
Does the Bible explicityly state that _that_ is what counts as
rebellion? Is simple disobedience not rebellion?
You support these? Nope, the Bible
>punishes the people who deserve it.
If one talks about doing nasty things, I'd be surprised if the
Bible _didn't_ include a line or two, provided it is not done to any
of the numerous enemies described inside.
> I know the Bible says make the best Christian example in whatever
>station in life you find yourself: slave, second-class citizen, etc. Where
>does it say, "Slavery, racism, and violence are good"? It doesn't. It
>reports these as a matter of record.
But if it is this super-moral book, it ought to have had
_something_ in criticism of such things. But it does not, and it
sometimes has just the opposite. How are wars of conquest found by the
Israelites regarded? As a noble cause. The enslaving of captives in
wartime is nowhere criticized, either.
> Before I blew off the Bible completely, I would check out where
>the founders of this country's government got A LOT of their laws and ideas
>about people's rights.
The Bible NOWHERE has any concept of legal rights. Certainly
nothing of the sort to be found in the Bill of Rights. That's right.
Absolutely nothing. It does not mention anything close to
representative democracy. There are not even any councils of
aristocrats in it. There is more support for democracy in Greek,
Roman, and Germanic tradition than there is in the Bible.
Forbidding murder and theft?
Yawn.
What legislator would _not_ forbid destructive (or seemingly
destructive) behavior?
> "The bible-believers?" "Always?"
> I've been talking with some scientists and historians at school (non-
>Christians). They claim true science admits it knows nothing about the
>origins of the universe.
To paraphrase our Vice-President, that is ill-rel-e-vant. The
Big Bang is a _very_ far-off event, and if some outside entity is
responsible for it, it wouldn't be some old man with a big white beard
sitting on a throne somewhere in the sky. Personally, I think that
this claiming the Big Bang as vindication is rather extreme grasping
at straws.
Gerry Palo
Have you never rejected good advice that seemed unsound
at the time and later kicked yourself, after it was too
late to do anything about it, for not having seen the
truth of it? I suggest that whether you regret it
will depend on the seriousness of the consequences of
having been wrong. Just hold on to the hope that
you will get another chance (but it is easier if you
can get it right the first time).
Gerry Palo (73237...@compuserve.com)
Gerry Palo
Josephus's comments are still widely quoted by many fundamentalists,
but I think it is conceded by even many evangelical scholars that
the Josephus passage was doctored to make him look like a Christian.
It is one of those unfortunate things that hang on long after scholar-
ship has put them to rest. Josephus's remarks don't prove anything
even if they were authentic, and now they prove an unnecessary emba-
rassment for people who quote the doctored text. Josephus does
provide one of the few external references to Jesus, however.
Am I correct to assume that Prof. Brandon does not refute that
reference?
I find your comment about Origen interesting. His work was
suppressed, and most of it was destroyed. As I recall it
was supposed to have gnostic tendencies, but his name never
became completely anathema. The gnostics acknowledged Christ
as a cosmic divine being but did not believe that he actually
incarnated in Jesus of Nazareth and die on the cross. I gather
that some aspects of Origen's teaching were accepted as not being
entirely within that "heresy". We always have to be skeptical
of works we know only from their detractors -- e.g. manicheans,
Cathars, Templars, etc.
Can you provide more details about Origen?
Gerry Palo (73237...@compuserve.com)
James Meritt
} This is nothing more than a reprint from Josh McDowell's book Evidence
} That Demands a Verdict. It is quite flawed. Check out the FAQ for a
} description of the errors.
}-------
}Never read it, so I can't comment.
}-------
I have. Much of the original post was almost verbatum from it. Hence, the tangable
evidence does not correlate to your claim. Do you use this tactic often?
Ivan A Derzhanski
<In article <11...@scott.ed.ac.uk> i...@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Ivan A Derzhanski) writes:
<>In article <WIGGINS.92...@hurricane.cs.odu.edu> wig...@hurricane.cs.odu.edu (Samuel E Wiggins) writes:
<>> But, I guess we'll all find out in the end, when we die, what we
<>>should have believed.
<>
<>make a decision, I make it on the basis of my current knowledge,
<>beliefs, assumptions, and so on. If later it turns out that another
<>choice would have had more favourable consequences, I don't blame
<>myself for not having taken the most fortunate course. I just shrug
<>my shoulders and say, `Bad luck' or `Well, I couldn't have known that'.
<
<at the time and later kicked yourself, after it was too
<late to do anything about it, for not having seen the
<truth of it?
Not that I can remember. On some occasions I may have regretted the
fact that the advice seemed unsound, but I have never blamed/kicked
myself for having rejected it for that reason. Far from that, I would
credit myself for having acted in a consistent manner, even if the
consequences turned out to be undesirable.
<I suggest that whether you regret it will depend on the seriousness
<of the consequences of having been wrong.
No. It will depend on how unsound the advice seemed.
Bob Sarver
[re: the bible saying that the bible is inspired]
Yes, but his own testimony is never considered conclusive unless it can
be corroborated by other witnesses or by physical evidence. Giving someone
a chance to speak is not the same thing as admitting his testimony into
evidence.
-------
/(wiggins)
/But the Bible is not just one guy. It's A LOT of guys agreeing that
/something did happen.
Three observations:
1. The author of this claim is treating the bible as a single unit; he
speaks of it testifying to its divine authorship. If he wants to do it
this way, that is fine. It is his job to deal with the problems spawned
by that approach. His complaint was that the bible was not given a
chance to speak on its own behalf. If that testimony comes from many
sources instead of just one, the givers of said testimony cannot contradict
each other either.
Imagine a court situation where four people are suspected of murder. If
they give consistent testimony that squares with the physical facts as well
as with each other's words, then their testimony is accepted into evidence.
If their testimony does not square with the physical evidence, or if they
contradict each other, it doesn't matter how many people actually give
testimony--the testimony of ALL of them is suspect.
2. No, the bible is not many different people agreeing that something
happened.
It is many different people saying that many different things happened.
Unless Moses can vouch for Paul, or unless Jeremiah can vouch for Peter,
(impossible due to the fact that they are not contemporaries), then this
objection has no value.
You can only testify to events that you personally have experienced, not to
someone else's personal experience.
3. This doesn't address the subject of tampering of the texts.
[re: divine laws contradicting each other]
/ Only in a simplistic, superficial way. People are always living out the
/consequences of other people's actions. For example, a baby born addicted
/to drugs because the mother used them while pregnant.
That is different. What the text says is, "I am the LORD thy GOD. I (not
cause and effect, but *I*) will visit the iniquities the sinner even to the
tenth generation". The fact that it is God speaking in the active voice
here, plus the fact that a specific timespan is put on the punishment
(the tenth generation, not the ninth or the eleventh) clearly indicates
a deity *actively* involved in punishment, and not merely a allegory to
life's retribution for errors in judgement.
/ BTW, you can always catch someone in the exact wording of what he
/says over time and find contradictions. But, really the person can be quite
/consistent as to his meaning. True understanding is derived from the
/semantics, not the exact words used. "I ain't got none" does not mean
/"I do have some." Language is "slippery" and does not follow logical
/or mathematical precision.
We are not discussing semantic gymnastics here. We are discussing blatant
contradictions.
Bob Sarver
[re: the bible being true because it says it is]
/(wiggins)
/ I think he meant that the Bible says that it excludes the possibility of
/other religions being right; it is mutually exclusive.
Yes, it is. But all you have done is re-stated the claim; you have not
provided support for the claim. Clarifying the claim is not the same
as providing evidence for it.
/(wiggins)
/ And, lastly, how do I know you're not Napoleon (reincarnated or
/something)?
Because I haven't claimed to be? And even if I did make that claim, are you
supposed to believe me soley *because* I make that claim?
-------
/
/2) The unity of the Bible -
/ Putting aside for a moment the very shaky assertion that the Bible displays
/ unity, consider the following:
/ The Constitution of the United States is a document that shows great unity.
/ Does that make it the Word of God, just because it shows unity? I hardly
/ think so.
/ Many documents show great unity due to the fact that a team of people with
/ similar interests and goals worked to keep the document unified. Other
/ documents show great unity due to later generations editing the document
/ to remove offensive or unpopular passages.
/ So far you haven't proven anything.
-------
/(wiggins)
/True. How could he convince you?
1. By providing unedited copies of the original manuscripts
2. By successfully explaining any contradictions in those manuscripts,
contradictions of a textual, historical, archaeological, or scientific
nature
That'll do for starters.
Bob Sarver
re: [ /9) The Bible's Undeniable Influence for Good]
//(me)
// "Undeniable influence"? I know many who would deny it wholeheartedly.
/(wiggins)
/ Yeah. It has been used for evil. But, was the Bible being used correctly?
/Or, was it just some guys *claiming* to be Christians using religion also
/to prove the morality of their own agenda?
Well, that's the problem. One man's "incorrect application of the bible"
is another man's "doing the will of God". I am sure that the people who,
even today, are trying to kill homosexuals, burn library books, and the
like are utterly convinced they are doing the will of God.
You seem to believe that true belief will prevent these abuses. You are
wrong. True (but misled) believers have been perpetrating all sorts of
crimes over the years. A fully convinced zealot is much more dangerous than
a shyster merely trying to hide behind the veneer of religion.
/(wiggins)
/ You say, check out the verses about witches and rebellious sons. Does
/this mean you support the kind of witchcraft and rebellion the Bible
/condemns? Here witchcraft meant consulting demons and stuff.
If that's what they wanted to do, why shouldn't they be permitted to do
it? And why should the penalty be death? And why should the penalties
be selectively applied (some killed for these actions, others not)?
Also:
Why is it an abomination to wear a piece of clothing with two fabrics in
it?
/(wiggins)
/And rebellion of a son meant beating up your parents.
No, it didn't. It meant deliberate disobedience or disrespect.
/(wiggins)
/You support these? Nope, the Bible punishes the people who deserve it.
Oh, really? The Bible punishes only the people who deserve it?
Like the children who died in the Flood?
Like the firstborn of Egypt who died without ever knowing why?
Like the Amorites, Hittites, and Canaanites? The bible says that
God destroyed them for what their ancestors did. Besides the fact that
this contradicts your earlier point about people not being punished for
sins of their forefathers, it also brings up another point: if God can
discriminate between good and evil people, why did the good die along with
the evil?
Unless it is your argument that
*every* Amorite was evil, and
*every* Hittite was evil, and
*every* firstborn male child in Egypt, was evil, and
*every* person not in Noah's ark was evil
then the only conclusion is that God punished the good along with the evil.
(wiggins)
/ I know the Bible says make the best Christian example in whatever
/station in life you find yourself: slave, second-class citizen, etc. Where
/does it say, "Slavery, racism, and violence are good"? It doesn't.
You are wrong. The OT records instructions from God on how to acquire and
treat slaves.
If God is telling you that it's okay to acquire slaves, and further instructs
you on how to treat them, that is equivalent to saying that God approves
of slavery. Unless you want to make the argument that God routinely
instructs people in the proper ways to commit sin.
Ditto for violence. God instructed it, outlined the breadth and type
of it, and selected the targets. Ergo, God approves of it.
(wiggins)
/ Before I blew off the Bible completely, I would check out where
/the founders of this country's government got A LOT of their laws and ideas
/about people's rights.
John Locke and the Enlightenment. So what?
-------
William H. Jefferys
> In our effort to find the Truth, we end up believing only what we want
>to believe.
> But, I guess we'll all find out in the end, when we die, what we
>should have believed.
In making this argument, friend Wiggins falls into the classical
Fallacy of Argument Ad Consequentum. This is "an attempt to prove
or disprove a reasoned argument by reference to the consequences
which flow from its acceptance or rejection." [David Hackett
Fisher, _Historians' Fallacies_, p. 300.]
Logical fallacies are just that; they do not do anything to shore
up a faulty argument, and they deserve to be rejected by any
thinking people to whom they are directed.
Bill
Lotus
>Gerry Palo (73237...@compuserve.com)
My question is, how could I discern what good advice and bad advice is? Heck,
if some fundamentalist comes up with a happy face and tries to tell em the Good News, I am prone to think the advice is bad advice. And what if I read the New
Testament, for example, and think the advice means something different than
other people think? Am I to be blamed for my low IQ?
________________________________________________________________________________
Lotus Lives!!! mci4...@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu
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________________________________________________________________________________
Bob Sarver
} This is nothing more than a reprint from Josh McDowell's book Evidence
} That Demands a Verdict. It is quite flawed. Check out the FAQ for a
} description of the errors.
}-------
}Never read it, so I can't comment.
}-------
/(m)
/I have. Much of the original post was almost verbatum from it. Hence, the
/tangable evidence does not correlate to your claim. Do you use this tactic
/often?
To whom is this question directed? I am not standing behind McDowell's
book, his claims, or the claims of the original poster who decided to
quote from McDowell's book.
James Meritt
The original poster, with his plagerized new revelations.