Testing The Christian Apologists

But he never suggests throwing God away, does he?

Actually yes he does and you even quoted an example.

quote:

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I think that every prayer which is sincerely made even to a false god, or to a very imperfectly conceived true God, is accepted by the true God and that Christ saves many who do not think they know him.

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There is no real way to differentiate between the false god or the very imperfectly conceived true God and the true God. Any god or God that humans can claim to know or can be described is a god or God created by humans.Throw them away.

You really haven't presented anything so far. I have clarified. I want to see the argument for something like the snake lying and I want to see the justification for contradicting what the Bible says. In this context, that will do. An "evidenced fact" would be a Biblical reason for contradicting the Bible.

First of all, its virtually a consensus within Christianity that the snake lied. I could care less about your claims to the contrary. If you want to indict a given apologist you will have to indict all of us (who believe that the snake lied). Quite simply, I dont have to prove anything. If you claim we all make it up, so be it. Its a majority opinion within Christianity. Drop the snake stuff already.

That is the whole point of ringo’s argument. The vast majority consensus of Christian beliefs are formed not by what’s in the bible but by what the self-serving priests have interpreted.According to the story itself, the actual script as published, your majority consensus Christian belief that the snake lied is false. This glaring disconnect between what you choose to believe and the actual book will not be swept away no matter how insistent you become. The snake stuff is not going away.

Interestingly it is the segment of Christianity that self identifies as Biblical Christians that work the hardest to deny that what is written in the Bible is actually what is written in the Bible. The whole profession of "Apologist" exists only as an attempt to explain away the errors, contradictions, fantasies, discrepancies that exist in the Bible but must be explained away to support the positions of Biblical Inerrancy and Divine authorship.

So bring us the argument that they use. Bring us the scriptures that explain the doctrine. Yes, you've made it clear that you don't care about the truth. That's exactly what I'm doing. And you haven't put up any defense. You sure do, if you want to be taken seriously here. You're reinforcing that claim by not putting up any counter-argument. An appeal to popularity is worthless. (And I'll remind you again that the appeal to popularity fails anyway: Christianity is a minority religion.) No.It's time for you to make a substantive response to it.Stop claiming matter-of-factly that the snake lied. Stop saying that it's "stupid" to claim the snake told the truth. Say something intelligent about it instead.

Sigh.All you atheists plus some of those misguided wannabe "Christians" really need to do is give just a teensy weensy bit of benefit of the doubt to two thousand years of thousands of biblical exegetes and millions of Bible-reading believers, just a teensy weensy bit of sheer logic or even . just plain humanity... to understand that your first kneejerk take on the Bible has to be wrong and those thousands of years of SERIOUS CHRISTIANS aren't that stupid and aren't liars trying to hold the masses captive. JUST A LITTLE LOGIC, JUST A LITTLE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT. Sheesh.The snake told the truth that we would know good and evil in a real way as Adam and Eve hadn't before because all they'd known is good. They knew in their heads that it was bad to eat the fruit God had forbidden but they didn't experience the evil that follows on disobedience until after they disobeyed. NOW we can see the evil consequences of our sins in all the sufferings and death that came on the human race because of their sin and all our sins on top of it.But the snake lied when he said they wouldn't die. They were immortal before and after their disobedience death entered the world. It says so in the New Testament if you wsant me to look it up:" By one man sin entered the world and by sin then death. I don't remember where it says that. Because of their sin they died though it took a thousand years in their case and less and less time to death for their descendants, and now we get maybe eight decades if we're lucky. And that isn't mentioning all the horrific diseases the human race suffers, and every other kind of death too, such as being eating by dragons among other things. Hit by a bus, thrown into the arena with the lions, drowning, guillotined, whatever.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Romans 5:12. That's Paul's opinion, not enough to overturn Genesis. Not "in the day that thou eatest thereof" as God said in Genesis 2:17.

But that's not true! I have never listened to any apologist who simply tries to explain away the Bible. And I have listened to several. So in other words, the Bible *can* be contradicted or corrected based on an evidenced fact. Say what? So let me get this straight. An apologist can't explain what the Bible means yet some yahoo who writes a book claiming Jesus is a myth can? Not on my watch. Divine authorship is a belief. Nobody can really disprove that nor can we prove it. Let the jury note that we are beginning to frame up two motives at play here in this case.
1) The motive to prove that the Bible is true and that its authority and authorship originated from a Divine Source.
2) The motive to expose the Bible as simply an anthology of anthologies and a book of myths written by humans with ulterior motives rather than as sincere effort to explain God as they understood Him.Let's examine this issue in more depth.
First, let's clarify the definitions rather than simply listen to jar.
[url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Apologist]
Apologists were never defined as Christians attempting to defend Christianity from other Christians. I suppose we can lump jar and the Anglicans in with skeptics who arose during the Age of Reason, however. In my mind, it is they who are attempting to redefine Christianity based on logic, reason, and reality rather than simply the scriptures.
So let's examine the evidence.
I will note: The Apostle Paul was one of the earliest people who was called an apologist. Critics argue that his writings themselves were attempts to redefine and change the religion of Judaism.
But were they? Anyone can quote the Bible as written and attempt to define it. jar will argue, as will ringo, that they are simply letting the text speak for itself. And yet it is they who have defined the meaning of the text as the idea that God lied and the snake told the truth. You wont find that in the text if you examine the entire book. I was taught the basic idea that God was the Father of Jesus Christ. Thus, ignoring the human attempts at defining who God was, I started with the much later New Testament when I formed my own ideas about who God was, is, and always will be. I can see jars point about many ideas of God being expressed within the Bible, and I won't argue against that. I don't believe that the Bible is inerrant in a word for word context, and I will admit that many Pastors and teachers simply use the text with which to build sermons. Granted some sermons sound inspiring, and it is easy to accept them without much thought. Here in EvC Class, however, I am being asked to think! So on we go.Having somewhat loosely defined the word "apologist" as specifically Christian apologist, lets examine some of the modern ones that I have researched. Because I dont see them attempting to define Christianity any more than I have seen jar attempt to define it here at EvC.
1) Dr.Frank Turek
2) Josh McDowell
3) Sean McDowell
4) Hugh Ross
5) Dr.John LennoxNow I will be honest. As I compiled these websites, I did note several things that challenge what I have just said.

Modern Christian Apologists do attempt to explain Christianity to Christians.

The latter two, Hugh Ross and Dr.John Lennox, even attempt to defend Biblical Creationism.

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Thus I can see some of jars accusation against this modern profession of apologetics.

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Thus we continue...

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Chance as a real force is a myth. It has no basis in reality and no place in scientific inquiry. For science and philosophy to continue to advance in knowledge, chance must be demythologized once and for all. ~RC Sproul
"A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." ~Mark Twain "
~"We, humans, are engaged in an ongoing war of ideologies. I see it in this microcosm of EvC Forum just as I see it in the governments and attitudes of people throughout the world. Take your pick: Oppression or Seduction .
"~Thugpreacha

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You can "get answers" by watching the ducks. That doesn't mean the answers are coming from them.~Ringo

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As the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, so the denial of God is the height of foolishness.
? R.C. Sproul, Essential Truths of the Christian Faith

Paul has the same authority as Moses had. Nothing he says can "overturn" anything in the OT, so we know he is explaining it. And that was known anyway by all believers before Paul, they all knew death had entered by sin.They DID die "in the day" they ate of it, death began to work in them when they lost communication with God which was the first death, and all diseases and sufferings after that are death too, the process of death that began with the sin: "The wages of sin is death."

That's also what I was taught. What is it that you are trying to teach,ringo?Don't give me this fluff about the book says what the book says. That statement itself would get challenged in any Bible class.

Or he was wrong. Chapter and verse? Clearly not - unless you corrupt the word "day" like you corrupt the word "die".

I'm trying to teach you not to swallow everything you were taught without thinking about it. So CHALLENGE it. Give us something substantive instead of just parroting.

We do not need to know motive Phat, we can actually read what is written. Trying to guess at motives is just another Carny Hide the Pea misdirection Shell Game.Stop with the silly justifications Phat. Apologists exist solely to twist what is written to fit what they market; to create not just God in their image but a Bible in their image.Edited by jar, : fix long silliness