Determining a book's truth.

Also being a non-Christian, I'll leave it to others to answer (for now at least). However, having been a Christian for many years, I can correct you on one point:

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(2) The bible is an anthology of 66 books selected from the many writings mentioned above.

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For protestants, yes. However, for the majority of the world's Christians, the bible is composed of 73 books. Catholic doctrine is that the protestant doctrine is incorrect and not saving partly because the protestants removed the 7 books (and the sections of other biblical books) that originally supported the parts of Catholic doctrine that the protestants didn't like.Even outside of that, there are other changes to the canon in a few other christian denominations. Of course, your question is the same whether the "Bible" has 66 or 73+ books.Have a fun turkey day-

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-Equinox_ _ _ ___ _ _ _
You know, it's probably already answered at An Index to Creationist Claims...
(Equinox is a Naturalistic Pagan -  Naturalistic Paganism Home)

Juraikken wrote:

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the entire bible was put together so perfectly that if it didnt have ONE single book in it, it would throw off the balance.

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OK, so do you mean a Catholic Bible, a KJV Bible, an AV Bible (since that one has has come up), an Ethiopian Bible, or some other of the literally dozens of different Bibles available? And since the majority of Christians follow the 73 books of the Catholic Bible, do you think they are going to hell if you use a 66 book bible? Or vice versa?Oh,and Joman - did you see my replies to your posts?Have a fun turkey day everyone-

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-Equinox_ _ _ ___ _ _ _
You know, it's probably already answered at An Index to Creationist Claims...
(Equinox is a Naturalistic Pagan -  Naturalistic Paganism Home)

Dameeva wrote: OK, then what is the default value (that is, the conclusion you keep tentative until you’ve looked into it) for you?In other words, do you presume the book true until proven false, or presumed “of incomplete truth” until proven true? I think it is childish at best to presume a book true until proven false - that would make you a gullible fool, a slave to every idiotic piece of writing.So, then we presume any book - including the Bible - isn’t completely true until proven so, and any research into it shows that there are all kinds of errors of fact and inconsistencies in the Bible (we could go on and on here, but some are things like “when was Jericho conquered, and by whom?”, or “where, when and how did Ahaziah die?”, “how many generations between Jesus and David?”, “what exactly happened Easter morning?”, “how many chariots did King Solomon have?”, “were the Jews ever enslaved in Egypt?”, (not to mention “how old is the Earth”,)and on and on. That’s a good question. Many people seem to molly-coddle the Bible - treating it as a delicate bauble that must be guarded from the normal examination we use on all other books, as if they already knew it were packed with falsehoods and didn’t want it exposed. Many people can rationally examine all kinds of writing, and skeptically reject absurdities in more reliable publications like the tabloids, yet when faced with flying dead people, zombie armies, entire galaxies landing on earth, and talking animals, they accept it as the gospel truth without batting an eye. It boggles the mind that so many people use completely different criteria when reading the Bible so as to unfairly pamper the Bible.Do you, dameeva, apply normal, rational skepticism to the Bible just as you do to other books?Have a fun day --Equinox

OK. Have a good day-Equinox

Ps 148 wrote: That reminds of a previous discussion (here: http://EvC Forum: What is the biggest bible contradiction? -->EvC Forum: What is the biggest bible contradiction?). My post there may be useful: It’s hard to figure out where to start with all the well known errors and contradictions in the Bible. This list above is just the tip of the iceberg (another good one is “how and where did Ahaziah die?” - compare 2Kng9 with 2Cr22).In the same way you can get dozens more by simply reading Kng and Cr in parallel, and comparing the same stories that are told in each. The Bible is not like the 3rd testament (the book of Mormon) or the Qu’ran, which were both written by one person at one time. As a result they have comparatively fewer contradictions as compared to the Bible.Here's an example of that "respect" thing: Well, that makes me wonder if it's really considered the perfect word of God. If so, then 10,000 vs 10,001 would be a big problem. Of course, if one already doesn't respect it as the word of God, then 10,000 vs 20,000 doesn't matter I guess. Well, sure, but that’s hardly relevant. Just like you, I’m sure they were honest, it’s just that they were just as misinformed as you are now. It’s the same as the fact that I’m sure you’re honest in re-telling the statement that “Tyre is a good Bible prophecy”. I don’t think you knowingly lied any more than they did - you are both just repeating a story you heard because you like what the story says. Human culture works like that.Welcome to EvC, and have a fun day-EquinoxP. S. I apologize for contributing to this thread, but felt the need to since I had such a related post just a few months ago in that other thread. I’m sure you feel buried, and it’s never good to make someone feel surrounded or such. That’s especially true with something like this that can be emotional or make one feel insecure (the realization that you can’t trust what you’ve trusted, or that significant parts of your worldview could be incorrect). There’s no rush or deadline on any of this, so take your time responding.

To summarize the Tyre thing, let’s look at the prophecy and then what happened:The prophecy:
Nebachadnezzar will destroy the island city of Tyre (several verses make it clear the Ez knows that the city of Tyre is an island, and the mainland is just a settlement - 6, 8, etc.). That’ll include complete destruction, with the city being removed and no inhabitants left, and no one living there for ever. This destruction will be so complete that the soil or dust will be scraped off. One can see how the soil or dust line is included to emphasize that everything of the city is removed. Note also the context - Ezekiel says this in response to Tyre’s gloating over Jerusalem being sacked by Nebachadnezzar - that’s why Ezekial makes it clear that Neb will destroy Tyre soon, and by Neb.What happened next?Neb. Tried hard to take Tyre, but failed. His armies, horsemen, and such never did all the things that Ez says they will do, such as enter the streets, etc. At that point, even without going any further, it’s clear that Ez. Prophecy is just plain bunk. Then, after over 200 years, Alexander attacks Tyre. Tyre sees him coming, and most of the citizens are moved other cities. Alexander uses rocks and building materials from the mainland settlement to make his causeway, and finally conquers Tyre. Alexander is quite mad, and so he sells most of the captured into slavery - but, he does let some stay, and doesn’t kill the king, etc. Many of the evacuated citzens return immediately, and Tyre continues as a phoenician island city with many of the same inhabitants, and is a power again within a few decades. The dust or soil of Tyre is never touched. Materials from the mainland settlement were used to make the causeway, but that’s:
1. Not Tyre - the Bible is clear that Tyre is the island city.
2. Not soil or dust - it is rocks and building materials. It would be hard to make a causeway from dust or soil.
3. not scraped. You carry rocks and such, you don’t have to scrape them. Think about building something as large as the causeway - if you had to get a little material by scraping it, you’d never get done.
4. Not the whole mainland is left bare - even though the mainland isn’t Tyre, you don’t need to take all the rubble to make the causeway, which is only a few dozen feet wide, in 6’ or so deep water, and about a half mile long.We could go on, but that’s probably enough. I don’t see why literalists mention this one. It’s as clearly wrong as the legend that Darwin or Paine or Voltaire recanted - it’s just a feel good legend used to allow bible literalists to feel smug, or at least to keep them paying tithes. Well, making them vague or symbolic means you can twist them to fit a future event. That’s how astrology horoscopes work too. Do you think that astrology horoscopes accurately predict the future? If not, why not? Same for the prophecies of Nostradamus.Also, if a prophet is real, and has real knowledge of the future, then why not make a specific prophecy that will be obviously divine when it's fulfilled? Why bother with vague parlor tricks that aren't convincing if you have the real thing at your fingertips?PS 148 wrote: Well, sure, but as I said back in a previous post, their sincerity or niceness doesn’t make their statements true if they themselves are fooled. A nice or good person can be simply wrong, and nicely tell you something wrong. The most effective liar or salesman is the one who believes everything he says. That’s why groups like Amway or Tupperware try to get you to sell to your family and friends - because they trust you, and you are honest with them.Also - don't take my word or anyone else's word for anything. Check on things yourself. You cand find out if, for instance, Tyre exists today, or if it existed shortly after Alexander's conquest, etc. You may want to just start with wikipedia.Oh, and did you read my previous post, with the other biblical problems? There is no rush to respond, but I hope it wasn’t just ignored.Thanks, and have a good day-Equinox

Ps 148 wrote: The dead sea scrolls date mostly to the first century BCE and the first century CE, with some as old as the middle of the 2nd century BCE. All are 200 or more years after Alexander, who is from the 4th century BCE (that’s the 300s). Jar wrote: Daniel is probably post hoc in the sense that it was written after the events took place. That includes that copy of Daniel in the dead sea scrolls, which dates to the first century BCE or CE.Basically, modern scholars mostly support the 160 BCE date for the writing of Daniel. There are many reasons for this. One is simply the words chosen. For instance, if you found a letter in the attic that had a date on it of 1827, yet talked about “getting together to celebrate flower power and oppose the establishment and the military-industrial complex with free love, peace and Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”, you could pretty well bet that it was written after 1960. In the same way, scholars say that Daniel reads like something written around 160 BCE based on the words used. Also, there are no copies of Daniel that date to before then, and forgeries were common in the ancient world - it was a common way to get your stuff more widely read.Confirming evidence is found in the “prophecies” of Daniel. They are vague and sometimes a little off at first, then get better and better, and then are detailed and exactly correct, leading up to around 160 BC, then suddenly they become completely wrong and way off, when compared to history. I recently read “Contact” by Carl Sagan, written in the mid-80s. The stuff it talked about happening was generally correct, and got more detailed leading up to the 80’s, then suddenly become all wrong - such as talking about the soviet union existing in 1999. This is because Contact was written in the 80’s, and portrays events before and after when it was written.This is how it works. Let’s say you want to get people politically motivated behind your cause. First you write out an ancient “prophesy”, which claims to be by an ancient prophet, set in the past. Your “prophet” “predicts” things that you know already happened, making him look good. You can do better and have more detail leading up to the time you are writing, since you know more about recent history than older history. Then, write down sensational prophecies for the near future, which seem very likely since you just set up your prophet to have a bunch of good predictions. Then hide it, and conveniently “find” the “ancient” prophecy - or even better, put it somewhere where someone else will find it.
For example - say it is today. I write that I’m Abraham Lincoln having a revelation from God in 1850. I write that Lincoln foresees a great civil war, with hundreds of thousands dead on both sides of the mason-dixon line, then that I see a scientific idea that described how animals got here, and that it will cause controversy, then that I see a war in Europe, and the prohibition of alcohol in the US, then a great depression, followed by an evil german leader and another war, and the invention of the atomic bomb, then hippies and disco in the US, then describe in great detail the Monica Lewinsky incident and the war in Iraq, etc. Then I write that Lincoln sees the nation so fed up with Bush that the Republicans lose big in 2008, and are swept from office. Gay marriage and marijuana are legalized and by 2010, the Republicans are essentially non-existent, and about 80% of the US is Wiccan. Oh, and change that “prophecy” date from 1850 to 1853 - the odd number sounds more realistic. Then, I hide the “prophecy” and “discover” it in an old civil war trunk, and present it to the Democrats as a real prophecy by Lincoln. This energizes the Democratic base, allowing me to win the election in 2008. Of course, the rest doesn’t come true, but that’s not a big deal, since it did what I wanted it to do.See how these work? In all three cases, the “prophecies” are written well after the fact, and are vague at first since old history isn’t as well known as recent history. Then, the “prophecies” get very detailed, since recent history is easy to remember. Then the prophecies break down, since the writer is now really trying to predict the future, which is difficult to do. Hence, Daniel.Have a fun weekend, I’ll be out until Monday- Equinox

PS 148 wrote: I’ll leave that one to Jar, who is Christian and doesn’t see a non-literalist understanding of the Bible as a problem. You are also assuming that the Gospel of Mark is correct that Jesus actually said that. The Gospels are known to have lots of stuff that is incorrect about Jesus, so if the Gosple of Mark is wrong, that doesn’t mean Jesus didn’t exist or whatever. Fundamentalists (who are sometimes called Bibolators - those idolators who use the Bible as their idol), sometimes put belief in the Bible ahead of belief in Jesus. You may be unconsciously doing that here. There are tons of motivations to do that - in a world of people, you know how often political pressures mount one way or the other. It need not be dishonest either. Whoever wrote Daniel could well have thought he was doing the best thing possible, even that this was a real prophecy. Just as with your friends who think that Tyre is still an island, pure motives do not guarantee pure results, and vice versa.Still being here is independent of it’s source. I don’t see why it wouldn’t still be here.Rome dates to the 8th century BCE ( I didn’t know that offhand, I just looked it up - you can too), so it predates Daniel by over a half a millennium. Personal stories and such are often added by forgers to make things look more realistic. Ancient people weren’t stupid any more than we are today. I’m mostly going by the scholarly opinion, since I don’t read Hebrew myself. Again, you can weigh the arguments and check credentials as well as I can. I’ve found that those arguing that Daniel is a second century writing have solid arguments and degrees, and those arguing for a 6th century date are fundamentalists with no education trying to make a buck by convincing people to Tithe. There are exceptions of course, but that’s most common. Here is one such source, among many: from Daniel Right. BCE = Before the Common Era, CE = Common Era. The 0 year is arbitrarily set 2007 years ago, around 3 years after Jesus was born.For the other items below, just as with much of the Tyre thing, the Biblical inerrantist position most often relies on changing, denying or ignoring what the text says. This is often done by adding things to the Bible to make it say something it doesn’t say, something that fits with history or resolves the contradiction. It’s ironic that this is done mostly by people who at least claim to respect the Bible (I’m referring to those who told Ps148 about how to resolve these, not Ps148 him or herself.)Here are some examples: No. The Bible says in Ex 34:1 And then confirms this in Ex 34:28 Don’t forget that very few ancient people could read, or even had the Torah. Plus, for years these were all separate books,and only later redactors put them together. Hence, there is nothing to catch and no one to catch it, until it is in copies far and wide. Understanding the history of the Bible helps with all this. Luke and Mt mention others (such as priests) that confirm which they mean. There is no way I’ve seen that resolves this conflict, which is discussed at length here: Luke 2:2 - Errancy Wiki Again, read the texts. Mk says Peter will deny him three times before the cock crows twice, John says Peter will deny him three times before the cock crows - hence, Bibolators usually say that Peter denied him 6 times (3 before the first cock crow, 3 more before the second). I’d copy them from Biblegateway.com, but I gotta go. So the gospels are just second hand descriptions of what some humans imperfectly remembered from what the spirit revealed to them? That doesn’t sound like a process that would give a perfect or reliable account - just like your friend’s picture of the island Tyre, we know that personal recollection is unreliable. Doesn’t the spirit guide everything to make sure it is perfect, complete, and accurate? If not, then we have to use our reason to figure out what parts of the Bible to accept and which to reject, which is what many Christians, like Jar, do.Gotta scoot. Have a fun weekend, and thanks for catching up on my previous post. I’ll have to skip the Tyre response on the other thread, but I think others will have that covered before Monday anyway.EquinoxEdited by Equinox, : typo

Ps148 wrote: I’m not sure if the author means a general belief that people can be resurrected, or a belief that there will be a single time when all the dead are apocalyptically resurrected. I suspected the latter, but it’s just a minor quibble anyway. Do you otherwise agree that scholars have looked at this extensively, and that their consensus is that Daniel was NOT written when the author of Daniel claims it was? I’m not sure where this Gospel thing came from. I’m guessing it is in response the statement I made that the gospels disagree, and you are saying that this is the purpose for having four of them. The description you gave doesn’t really fit with the gospels we have. The synoptics are very similar, John is very different. Revelation was written well before the gospel canon was settled on, and your symbolism sounds pretty post- hoc (in the way Jar mentioned, not the way I mentioned).The symbolism you mentioned was invented by the early Catholic church, around the time that Irenaeus used the pagan idea of four principle directions to defend the idea of four gospels, and hence, is another example of putting in new things that aren’t in the Bible. Discussing the Gospels, their biases, their history, and the canon of four gospels is huge topic that deserves another thread. We may choose to do that sometime, but for now, we are discussing errors or discrepancies in the Bible, since you stated that there were exactly zero of them. We need to first finish discussing the ones from my earlier post (starting with this 3 or 6 cock crow twice one), then cover the others, then perhaps some more if we still need more, and only then go on to other topics like Pagan influences in the Gospel canon, or Catholic Tradition, or some such.OK, back to the cock crow thing. Now that I have a second, we can look again at what the Bible actually says.Mark 14 says: OK, that seems pretty clear - Jesus says before the cock crows twice, not before the cock crows once. In case there is any doubt, we can look at what is said to happen to fulfill the prophecy: Now, compare John, chap.s 13 &18: Jesus explicitly says that there must be three denials before the first cock crow. As before, in case there is any doubt about the prophecy, here is what John has written later to fulfill it: *Sigh* I hope it’s clear now why I say that inerrantists can only maintain their position by ignoring or changing what the Bible says. It’s not like this is the only example, we have plenty more to go through, both ones I've mentioned and more.Ps148, we discussed the 10 commandments thing - do we agree there that there is a contradiction, such that the Bible cannot be literally true?In addition to that, you have specified that you mean only the KJV. Being that other translations delete whole verses, add text, and change the meaning in places, I assume you also mean that only the KJV is inerrant, since making the KJV inerrant makes the others errant. But that’s probably a moot point, since we’ve found places in the KJV that appear to be errant - which only means that like Jar, a Christian must take the position of using reason and other information to learn God’s truths from the Bible. As before, this view, combined with a literalist approach, is saying that the holy spirit is incompetent. They don’t just “write about different aspects”, they often contradict each other. There are tons of other examples too, such as “which day did Jesus die?”, or “when was the fig tree cursed?”, or “when did Jesus clear the temple?”, or “how did Judas die?” and on and on. Remembering that these stories come to us through fallible humans allows one to maintain a good and holy view of the holy spirit, instead of blaming the holy spirit for the many problems that are unavoidable in the Bible. Maybe we should remember Mt 12:32.Well all for now. Have a fun day-EquinoxP. S. Is the tyre discussion still going? If it is, and is on another thread, then which thread is that? It seems to have been pretty well summarized as a failed prophecy, but if there is new information and it's being discussed, I don't know where that is. Thanks. Edited by Equinox, : typoEdited by Equinox, : added tyre thread request.

Ps148 wrote: OK, so now do we take each clear contradiction and say there must be some deeper meaning or symbolism? Think if I treated other texts this way. I could abolish the right to free speech, and say that the 1st amendment “must have some deeper meaning”, and so we can’t just read the words for what they say. Preposterous, you say? Yes. I agree.If the examples I’ve given are not clear contradictions, then what would qualify as a clear contradiction? Could not any contradiction simply be ignored by saying that there must be some deeper meaning? Similarly, think of applying this to the Qu’ran or some similar text from another religion. You could easily take any problem in those books (such as the line that says to fight non-Muslims), and use some similar deeper meaning argument to say that it is a good and harmless line, or even to find fulfilled prophecies in other passages. I don’t mean to make you feel bad, but it at least looks like you are playing favorites.Besides, doesn’t your “hidden meaning” explanation cause a worse problem? If the gospel is designed and given by the all perfect holy spirit, then why would a loving holy spirit make some of it’s meaning hidden from everyone, including Christians - especially if this meaning is the “good news which brings eternal life”? Doesn’t an apparently obvious problem like this make it likely that a person will fall away from Christianity, and thus be condemned to burn forever? Does that mean the Holy spirit did this intentionally to make some people fall away and be burned in Hell? Does that sound like a loving and competent Holy Spirit? Sure. That makes the inerrantist position even less rational, since it means that the Bible cannot be taken as the word of God unless you learn the original languages and then read it that way (like Muslims say about the Qu’ran). Even then, you’d be out of luck, since our original manuscripts of the Bible all differ about which words are used in the original languages. We have over 5,000 ancient manuscripts of the New Testament, and none of them agree with each other except for the tiniest fragments. Which one is right? No one knows. Um, that statement shows that you haven’t really looked into this much. Just looking at your list, the NIV has more text removed from it compared to the KJV as the entire books of 1st and 2nd peter, including some that change the meaning of the text. You know, if I considered any book the actual word of God, I’d be concerned if there were even jot or tittle changes to it - another reason why it seems that most Christians don’t seem to act as if they really believe the Bible is the word of God. Whaaaa? The “normal 66 books”? Some bibles have 66 books, others don’t. The majority of Christians the world over use Bibles that have 73 books, and other Bibles have more or less than this. It only seems “normal” to have 66 books because of who has taught you (or, more accurately, what they haven’t told you), and because of where you have grown up. It is true that most protestant bibles have 66 books, but calling that “normal” says something in itself. Please do find the actual words of Josephus (his works are online in full), because that sounds like it might be another cute Christian story. But if not, that really wouldn’t say much, since Josephus wasn’t born until 37 CE, and would be getting this story from a legend. Josephus is a good source for 1st century things, but as PaulK pointed out, but that doesn’t make the date of writing for Daniel any earlier - besides, are you saying that you know something that current scholars have missed? You’ve repeated this standard apologetic line before, and there doesn’t seem to be much to it, other glossing over the irreconcilable differences in the gospels. The writers of the 4 gospels in the Bible (as well as the writers of the other 20 or so gospels in existence) all had different biases because they were preaching different religions. The Gnostics had John’s gospel, and the Ebionite Christians had Matthew’s gospel. If you don’t know about the early Christianities, you’ll miss this information and think that the Gospels say the same thing. Of course, a pastor won’t tell you about the early Christianities, because it won’t help getting tithe’s out of you if you realize that Christianity evolved over time just as any other social institution.Mark’s gospel mainly portrays Jesus as the hidden messiah, since he wrote it early enough that no one had heard of Jesus, and he had to explain that fact.Mt wrote about a strong Jewish link (Jesus = Moses), because he’s from a group of Christians with a strong Jewish emphasis.Lk wrote to convince people that Jesus wasn’t just jewish, but for everyone, because whoevery wrote Luke was probably a Pauline Christian.John wrote to show (not just emphasize) that Jesus was divine, consistent with Gnostic Christians. Btw, it’s John, not Mark, who has Jesus washing the disciples feet. And there are exactly zero, not just “few” parables in John (despite the fact that Mark says that parables are ONLY way Jesus taught the people). Again, it don’t see any way the reconcile this statement with your idea that the Bible is inerrant and from the Holy Spirit. If it is ultimately authored by the Holy spirit, then are you saying the HS is neglectful? On the other hand, if the bible is ultimately authored by humans (and not the HS), then why insist that it’s inerrant - especially when there is such overwhelming evidence that it isn’t perfect? If it is motivated by the holy spirit, but written by humans who imperfectly got the information in there, then it is of course not inerrant.I’m sorry if this sounded harsh, it’s just that time and again I hear this “inerrant” business from people who, on further discussion, are ignorant of the most basic facts about the Bible and are mostly just repeating what they’ve been told. I understand that, that’s part of being human, especially being a young human, but it’s frustrating nonetheless.Please consider simply learning about the Bible, and not just from “Bible Study” or pastors. Those sources are terribly biased (often without their knowledge) and pretty much just teach how to selectively ignore and otherwise wring that particular church’s doctrine out of the Bible. One good place to start would be with a teaching company class that you can listen to while you drive. Here is one:The Great CoursesHave a fun day-EquinoxEdited by Equinox, : added "besides" paragraphEdited by Equinox, : -

p2 148 wrote: You can always use the “peek” button to see what the html text was for anyone’s post if you see something you like. In this case, quote boxes are done like this, without the spaces: [ q s ] text [ / q s ] . Cute, but meaningless. You had stated that there were no contradictions. If it is the glory of God to conceal things (in the Bible or a text, which is never mentioned in that Pr 25), then how can you claim there are no contradictions? Maybe God hid a contradiction. In other words, you first state that the Bible can be examined, and now say that it can’t be, since God could hide anything. I hope you can see why such a response as “god conceals things” only makes Christianity look silly and meaningless, not to mention that you are taking lines out of context (no mention of the Bible or even the scriptures in Pr 25) - again showing that Christians don’t actually respect the Bible, but instead use it as their personal quotemine source. Moving goalposts. You stated that there were no contradictions (and that even a miscopied number would “make you think”). Now, contradictions may exist, but they don’t matter unless they are approved as being a “core fundamental” or overall “message”?
About the language - it’s starting to sound a lot like the Catholic responses I got while growing up. If any error is pointed out, simply respond by saying “it’s a divine mystery, so shut up.”. In your case, you seem to be saying that “if there is a problem, then it’s either God hiding a deeper meaning, or a word that can’t be translated.” In either case, it means the hypothesis that the Bible is true becomes and unfasifiable hypothesis, which I hope you recognize as meaning that it’s a meaningless statement, no longer useful for actually learning things, and only useful to coerce behavior. I mean that the other translations take out a word here, a sentence there, a whole verse here and there, and end up taking out more text than the combined lengths of 1 and 2 peter. For instance, if 1 & 2 peter combined have 1,300 words, then that’s the number of words taken out of the KJV to make a more modern translation. If you prefer, you could instead listen to your fellow Christians saying that instead of me.Chick.com: Attack, The
http://www.av1611.org/nkjv.html etc. I’ve asked for clarification on this several times. You started by saying that the Bible is inerrant, without error or contradiction. Then you said that the human authors wrote it after being given divine knowledge or whatever and wrote whatever they wanted. They could obviously have written whatever, and your scenario doesn’t say why you think the Bible is inerrant (in addition to being unscriptural - there is no place in the Bible that the HS is described as being a memory enhancer). Please answer simply whether or not the HS, or the human authors are ultimately the author of the Bible. I could ask the same thing about Buddha. Part of God’s plan involved Buddha - what was his plan and why? What did Buddha come to do? Did Buddha doodha it? Have you read Buddha’s writings? (we actually have writings attributed to Buddha, unlike Jesus.) So did dozens of other people claiming to be the messiah and working miracles both before and after. Why? Pythagoras was said to be able to walk not just on water, but on air. Why? What did Pythagoras teach? Maybe. Maybe they are a waste of time. Maybe they are a waste of entire lifetimes that could be spent better focusing on this world instead of on some possibly fictional afterlife. Maybe it’s better to fully frame exactly what you are trying to say, and propose a thread on it, instead of bouncing all over in topic-space. Please find some other streetcorner to preach at. I can read J3:16 as well as you, and I’ve been over the whole thing many times over the past 20 years. No problem at all! There is no contradiction there, since one is David killing Goliath, and the other is David killing another person who happened to be named Goliath as well. Or, the second Goliath was actually Goliath’s brother, and the Bible just used “Goliath” for short. Or, there is a “deeper meaning” that we have to look for. Or, God is hiding things, like it says he will in Pr. 25. Or it’s a special principle called Goliath manifestation. Hey, when the real meaning doesn’t matter, and all we worry about is pretending there is no contradiction, then anything can be dismissed as we wish - just invent new details that aren’t in the Bible, such as saying that two different people were killed, and you are all set. Your mention of Goliath reminds me of these verses:From 2 Sam 21: From 1 Cr20: Of course, that could be two brothers with matching spears - but then why the omission in each book of the other brother, if this is an inspiration from the holey spirit? As we saw, other contradictions don’t have as much wiggle room. You also didn’t address the clear contradiction about the 10 commandments in Ex 34, nor have you touched the many others I listed in more than one post. You haven’t shed light on any areas, and even your mental gymnastics aren’t as polished as some more experienced faith-peddlers I’ve seen. We could keep doing this - I’ll bring a contradiction, you’ll say it is a hidden meaning - but it looks pointless. As Jar pointed out, you have some basic learning to do. Many of your statements were like saying that the first jet was invented by Thailand, allowing Thailand to beat Grant in civil war in 1765. Do you want to learn, or not? Have your ordered that course yet? Do you intend to order it? Absolutely false - internal consistency is a necessary, but not by any means sufficient, condition for truth. This could be one part of the problem here. The Qu’ran is very consistent in it’s message, much more so than the Bible - are you saying that the Qu’ran is the truth? If so, then what about the Newest Testament, the book of Mormon? It too is very consistent, giving the same message. Is it true? Please let me know which of the two (Islam or LDS) you have converted to. You don’t need a plan, just a bookmark, to read from one cover to the other. Did you read about the different times when God had a hitman slaughter a family, or when God had the severed heads of 70 children put in baskets, or when God demanded human sacrifice, or made a pie from monkey fingers, killed innocent children simply to make a political statement, ordered genocide, failed to follow through on his word, tortured an innocent person as part of a bet, and so on? Did you read about the flying people, jumping doorknobs, talking animals, and the army of zombies? Oh, and some of that is in the Bible, some I made up. Guess which is which . . .Anyway, I really have to stop spending time on this - it seems to be annoying me, taking time, and not helping anyone. I see so many Christians appear with hardened, stubborn views like the Bible is inerrant or such, and then they say many things that show they don’t know even the most basic facts (it looks like others have already addressed the KJV printing statement). I hope you are starting to see why it looks to me like Christianity is the worst thing that has happened to learning in a long time. It seems that talking with them is as effective as talking to a doorknob. Have a good weekend, and I’ll apologize now for my harsh tone (yet another reason why I should spend time in other ways), I’ll be out until Monday.-Equinox

Ps 148 wrote: I think you are making a pretty strong case against inerrancy. You’ve said that translation itself can change the meaning of the text, that some parts (parts that other writers considered so important that they quoted them) have been left out or are missing, that meaning is hidden, etc. All that seems to be quite consistent in that it sounds like you are saying that the Bible cannot be relied on. Regardless of whether that specific verse is a contradiction or not, I have to ask - how do you know that the Hebrew says/means/implies that? Very often I see all kinds of “explanations” of contradictions that are blamed on translation by saying that the Hebrew word or whatever means something else, in a way that resolves the contradiction. These are very often just Christian apologetic fabrications that are false, since they know they can say the Hebrew says whatever and most listeners won’t know any better. One common example is the “virgin” mistranslation in Isaiah. Christians will say that the Hebrew word means “virgin”, when in fact it doesn’t. If you got that information from a pastor, priest, apologetics site, or faith-healer, I’d take it with a pretty big grain of salt - and that goes for other contradictions that are defended by saying that the original language says something else. A direct question deserves a straight answer. I don’t know, but I’ll guess in your 30’s at most, with no degree in Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek, nor any degree (from an accredited University) in the Bible. Not only is that in direct contradiction to our result in the cock crow discussion, it also (and more importantly) shows the mindset - that the goal is the explain away any contradiction at all costs. Instead, maybe a better approach would be to drop the faith based clinging to the presupposition that the Bible can’t have any contradictions, and instead work to find the truth? Isn’t that control? In other words, you are saying that the holey spirit is ultimately responsible for anything wrong, since you suppose it corrected if they went off - such as if they misquoted, or omitted something, got a fact wrong, or such? Please be clear on this - does the holey spirit make sure their product is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Thanks. I’ll answer this only because it is a question in a response to my post. I think the Bible can be stretched a number of different ways (hence the “screaming” meaning). As a result, it has proven very useful in extracting money, time, and commitment from people over the years. The ultimate hope for believers, and what is in it for them, is therefore irrelevant - they are simply being stolen blind. Right. If you learn about the Historical Jesus work (here is a great introduction - The Great Courses), you’ll agree that the coming Kingdom was Jesus’ main concern. It’s not emphasized much in many churches because it isn’t as useful in resource extraction. If that’s true, then I’m amazed that you would say that there are no contradictions, and even more amazed that you’d say a numerical contradiction would “make you think”. It takes mental gymnastics topping those of Nixon to resolve the contradictions between those accounts. So your answer to this clear contradiction is the same answer you gave before, that “it must not be a contradiction because it would have been corrected by now”? That’s not an answer - we know that very, very few people in the ancient world could read, and those that had the power didn’t want to show everyone an error. Why would it have been caught, and more importantly, why do you disagree with modern scholar’s who reject the idea that a single person (Moses or not) wrote the Pentateuch? More importantly, it shows an ignorance to how texts like the Bible are constructed over time - it’s not like someone sat down and wrote it out all at once, or that parts aren’t changed continually over time. So a religion is right if it is old and popular? Then many religions beat Jesus - Hinduism is centuries, probably millennia older than Christianity, and is growing faster as well. Islam and Mormonism both claim the Jewish root (hence age), and are both growing faster than Traditional Christianity. In fact, your Jesus - Kingdom approach has also fallen through the cracks - it was more a focus 1900 years ago than it is now. As IA pointed out, they are both much more consistent than the Bible, and they use the same methods to pretend to have the same message going back to Genesis as you are using. With all that, there is no basis to say that the God of any of them is more shifty than the God you are proposing. Cool, a double success! You got the quotebox right, and did pretty good on the above, with the following minor corrections:
2. here is the account from 3 Kg 10: Looks to me, for a number of reasons, that they were mostly if not all kids. If you still think there weren’t kids in there, then we can continue discussing it. In addition to killing the kids and putting their heads in the baskets, God clearly had planned this - it’s not just some Ahab idea. Read 2Kg 10:30 if you aren’t sure - 5 - there are really too many to count because God very often orded the killing of children. But in particular, there are several cases where God does the killing himself, apparently not wanting to bother with a middleman. In Exodue God kills thousands of children simply to make himself look powerful, and in the flood god kills millions of children. Your mouse example is both heartless as well as being illogical - mice aren’t people - you can raise people to act differently than their parents.
6 How is there any difference between those? Even if there was, yes, children have been ordered to be killed, as we saw, and God himself even did the killing sometimes. I don’t understand how any one with any morality or integrity can continue to molly-coddle this heinous stuff. Here is Num 31: Now, they apparently weren’t “inspired” to write out all the details, but think how this would have went. Perhaps like this: Praise the lord! The Bible is good, pure and holey!Back to the numbers -
7 - read that exodus verse again - God says he will write them, but then has moses write them. Plus all the failed prophecies, and plenty of other cases.
9 - Elijah, Jesus (see Acts 1:9), perhaps Enoch - it doesn’t say how they got him up there. Plus, don’t forget that to the ancient Jews, Heaven in the divine sense and Heaven as in the place above the sky were literally the same place. The flat surface of the earth was under the bowl shaped firmament of the sky. Thus, you can play word games and pick which meaning you’d prefer to fit our modern knowledge of the way the world really is.11. Don’t forget the talking snake in Gn. There is nothing in Gn to suggest that this is the devil - that’s a later application of the story.
12. Yep, plus Mt 28.Speaking of Mt, there are plenty of references to Hell that go beyond just a trash dump. You’ll see the same thing in Mt 25, and we can get into more if you’d like.Have a fun day- EquinoxEdited by Equinox, : typo

ignore- double postEdited by Equinox, : d p

Historically, much of the concept of Hell goes back to the Zoroastrians (before 700 BCE), who had a Hell based on what you did (works). The Jews were strongly influenced by this during the Babylonian captivity (around 600 BCE)- that’s why the Old testament has no concept of Hell prior to the bablyonian capitivity. Even afterwards, Hell was controversial, so it was largely left out.The ideas of Zoroastrianism continued to strongly influence the middle eastern region. In Jesus’s time (30 BCE) , the belief in hell was popular and widespread. Hence, it is plausible that it was included on Jesus lips when the 4 canonical gospels of Mk, Mt, Lk, and Jn were written between around 70 and 95 CE. Note that Jesus’ sayings about Hell show that he saw Hell as punishment for what you DO (works). This is especially evident in Mt 25.Paul changed this into a similar view of Hell (that it was eternal torment), except it could be avoided only by BEING CHRISTIAN, and it didn’t matter what you did, or how good you were. This is so clear in the Pauline letters that it is the doctrine of all major Christian denominations today, even Catholics, who stress the importance of good works in addition to being Christian.Yes, Jesus does appear to have referred to the trash dump to illustrate Hell, but I think he does so referring to a literal place of eternal torment - not just being burned up and destroyed. You can see that in these passages:
Mk 9:43: If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out.
Mt 25:46
Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."
Jude1:7:
Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire.Rev 20:10, 14
And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever. .
The lake of fire is the second death. If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.(There are plenty more if anyone cares . .)This is why nearly all major Christian denominations explicitly state that Hell is eternal torment. The only exceptions are the Episcopals and the Jehovah’s witnesses, who together make up less than one half of one percent of all Christians.Of course, anyone can take any text and pretend it means anything they want. You can do this with the Bible too, especially since the different books describe different religions, and you can pick and choose to get passage that are closer to fitting your point. However, it still takes a lot of mental gymnastics to get a non-eternal hell out of the Bible..
It’s possible that the actual historical Jesus didn’t believe in an eternal hell, but we’d be just guessing. If we go by what we have, it appears to me that Jesus did believe in an eternal, actual, physical Hell (not just a metaphor for a trash dump), and that his later followers made it clear that Christians went to Heaven, and non-Christians when to Hell - regardless of how good a person you were.

Ps 148, you’ve posted a variety of the LLL strawman argument, and wisely included another option, since the original three are too myopic. However, what about another possibility - that Jesus was an honest Jewish preacher who preached about the coming end of the world and the coming of God’s Kingdom, as many others like him were doing at the time, and his later followers changed his message into an effective and fertile religion, which was later co-opted by the Romans as an even more effective government tool?