Validity of differing eyewitness accounts in religious texts

Going over the various points that are supposed to validate an ancient document, we come down to just two.1) Authority of the Author.
The author of the Quran is supposedly God. That would trump Moses on points such as the creation stories.More importantly we need to reliably identify the author. What is the evidence that Moses wrote the Pentateuch ?Moreover the assessment of Moses character we get from the Pentateuch must depend on whether he is assumed to be the author or not. Consider this verse, for instance: (Numbers 12:3 NASB).2) Concern with importance of "witness authority and authenticity". These would presumably include things like identifying the author and the sources used by the author. Which books of the Bible identify themselves as being written by Moses ? Which of the uses of "witness" are used to identify the author as a witness of the events ? Do all the books not written by witnesses identify their sources ?If the Pentateuch identifies neither the author nor sources we cannot say that it has any authorial authority or any concern with "witness authority" so far as it applies to the work itself. Thus, with the lack of evidence reliably identifying Moses as the author the Pentateuch clearly fails on both points and must be rejected as beign a valid eyewitness account.

It's fairly easy to track sown the post and the link is:
http://EvC Forum: Who to believe , Ham or Ross? -->EvC Forum: Who to believe , Ham or Ross?Note that the sources are "authoritative" only from a doctrinal perspective, NOT as experts on the ancient history of the Middle East.

The Quran does claim to be authored by GodThis page is an index to a translation:http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/HolKora.html And no, "we" do NOT know that the Bible was authored by God. I do know that some Christians falsely state that the Bible claims to be authored by God. But there is no statement equivalent to that found in the Quran in the Bible.

I don't think that any of the books were actually written by God. Nor do I know of any rational reason to believe that any of them really were.

The Gulag was where the Soviet authorities sent people who dared to disagree with thwm.Perhaps Faith means that people who dare to disagree with her should be sent to prison camps. If she meant that at least she would not be insulting the dissidents who were unjustly imprisoned by the Soviet regime.

Let us note that when I tried to discuss these issue in Message 31 the only point Faith chose to answer related to the Quran. The points I raised regarding the Pentateuch have yet to be addressed.

This board has a Great Debate forum that is reserved for one-on-one debates. If you are looking for a more formal discussion that might be the best way to set it up.

So lets get this straight. I point out that the Pentateuch is NOT interested in establishing that the author was a witness to the events, nor even that it was based on the direct testimony of witnesses. But somehow you think that we should assume otherwise because of the number of times the word "witness" appears in the Bible ? Well maybe someone is inventing rules, but it isn't me.As for your "internal" evidence (added an hour after Sidelined replied to the message !), lets have a look at it.Exodus 17:14 The book is not identified. There is no reason to even assume that it refers to any work that is still extant.

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80 verses in Numbers starting "The LORD spoke unto Moses;

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i.e. 80 verses that do NOT identify Moses as the author of the Pentateuch.Having exhausted the Pentateuch without finding verses which establish Moses as the author we have the rest2 chronicles 33:8 Another failure - we KNOW that the law is supposed to have been revealed to Moses, that does not mean that Moses actually wrote the books of the Pentateuch.35:6 meets the same objection.Ezra 6:18 refers to "the Book of Moses" - which only indicates that that terminology had come into use at the time of Ezra and could refer to a book ABOUT Moses. Just as the Books of Job and Jonah are ABOUT Job and Jonah.Mark 12:26 another reference to the Book of MosesLuke 16:29-31 doesn't refer to Moses writing a book either - only to the belief that Moses words were known - not how they had been transmitted.Luke 24:44 another reference to the "Law of Moses"John 1:17 another reference to the law being revealed to Moses - nothing about him writing a word of the actual books of the Pentateuch.1 Corinthians 9:9 yet another reference to the "Law of Moses"So only 1 out of 89 verses mentions Moses writing ANYTHING. And that is an identified book. So much for the claim that there were specific references in the Pentateuch to Moses as author - even if I generously granted that the unnamed work in Exodus 17:14 was in fact Exodus itself (which it almost certainly is not) you would still only have one with the others being "the Lord spoke to Moses" which by no stretch of the imagination means "Moses wrote this book".So what EVIDENCE do you have that Moses actually wrote the Pentateuch ? Are we to conclude that the most we can say is that a few short sections of the Pentateuch might (or might not) have ultimately been derived from Moses writing - and then only because the Pentateuch describes Moses as writing those particular things and nothing else ?And if Moses is not the author of the Pentateuch then any claims that it has authority derived from his supposed status as a witness are null and void.

So we have established that the Pentateuch does not identify its author or authors and does not establishe - or even claim - that it is based on the testimony of witnesses.All we have is a few - maybe only one or two - short sections that contain things that Moses was supposedly told to write down. But there is no such statement applying to the bulk of the text.Those are the facts.

If you can;t sensibly address the points that I raise then please don;t bother to reply.

The problem with Exodus is that we don't have a good date for when it was written. Exodus 13:17 and 23:31 refer to the "Land of the Philistines" which dates those verses to after the invasion of the Sea Peoples in the 12th Century BC.Another problem is the lack of dating evidence for the evnets themselves. Even if the verses mentioned above are held to be anachronistic there is no clear way to produce even a rough date from the text of Exodus. Details that might be expected - such as the names of the Pharoahs who appear in the story are missing completely. Even the name of the Pharoah's daughter who is supposed to have adopted Moses is not mentioned.And the Exodus does not easily fit into history and archaeology. While this would be surprising if the numbers usually stated were accurate this can be explained by noting that the word translated "thousands" may mean "families" or "tents" (see http://www.serendipity.li/petrie/chap14.htm ) However it must also be noted that Joshua's invasion of Canaan does not show up in archaeology either, to the point where most archaeologists have abandoned the idea.Given a document of unclear age or provenance giving descriptions of events that cannot be matched to other knowledge how can we take it as repesenting "witness testimony" when it could easily have been written centuries after the real events, if it was indeed based more than loosely on any actual events ?

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The fact that so many have testified to the authenticity of this document for 3500 years, starting with those who were THERE at the TIME, means NOTHING to you, does it?

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I do not accept your fabrications as fact. The real fact is that you have no evidence to indicate that Exodus even existed 3500 years ago, nor do you have any testimony which can be reliably identified as coming from anyone who was there at the time.Let me also add that it would not be "INTELLIGENT" to set aside the evidence in favour of unquestioningly accepting your assertions. And that is true regardless of how little evidence we have.

No, we're not even. I have presented evidence - you simply demand that I accept your unfounded opinions.

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3500 years of serious Biblical study by great men is not "my assertions."

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Since you don't HAVE "3500 years of serious Biblical study by great men" I can hardly be going against it, can I ?