Squaring circles: direct biblical contradictions

I dealt with what you said about the topic and that makes it part of the topic. Now stop running from the issue and deal with the issues I laid before you, please.

But those who wrote it weren't there and thus it is hearsay. again no evidence. When is there a lunar eclipse at 3 or 4 PM. A lunar eclipse occurs when the sun and moon are at opposition and at a node. It cannot occur when the sun is visible. For the darkening one would need a solar eclipse of which there was not one on Apr 3 33 AD and if your Christ died on that date then the scripture of his birth was wrong since Herod died several years before 1 CE. or than it is wrong that he was 33 years old when he died so which is it. Edited by AdminPD, : Off Topic

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There is no better love between 2 people than mutual respect for each other WT Young, 2002Who gave anyone the authority to call me an authority on anything. WT Young, 1969Since Evolution is only ~90% correct it should be thrown out and replaced by Creation which has even a lower % of correctness. W T Young, 2008

bluescat:1. You didn't step into this discussion until after you saw me post.2. You told me that I should offer 'evidence' outside the Bible but you did not do so yourself.3. Either you are lying or the writers of scripture are lying. Since you have no evidence that they are lying and because I have seen both the promises of God's Word fulfilled and seen the power of the Lord in many ways (with witnesses), I reject your statement that 'those who wrote it weren't there'. That statement is pure ignorance.4. 'again no evidence'. You deliberately ignored what I said. NASA gives us the date of the lunar eclipse that matches what Joel the prophet said 800 yrs prior to Christs death and two independent witnesses at different locations in the Roman Empire corroborated the dark day that occurred. According to both of them it was so dark that the stars could be seen in mid-afternoon. The darkness was of supernatural origin and not because of a solar eclipse.5. Because the Hebrew calendar demands it, the passover had to be killed on 14th of Nisan (April) and there were only two dates in the A.D. 30's that qualify: April 7, A.D. 30 and April 3, A.D. 33.Quote: " Gabriel told Daniel that after the decree to rebuild, there would be 'seven sevens' (which is 49), plus 'sixty-two sevens' (which is 434). After these 483 years, the Anointed One would be cut off. If the prophecy is true, this would be the year of the crucifixion.Remember that in ancient times, our modern calendar system was not in use. In other prophetic passages a year of 360 days is used. To convert to our modern system which uses the longer solar year, we must divide by the time it takes for Earth to orbit the Sun, which is 365.24 days. This yields 476 years on our calendar.We now have a number of years, but when do we start the countdown? Gabriel said to count 'from the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem.' When was that? The prophet Nehemiah records such a decree, and he dates it as the twentieth year of Artaxerxes. On our calendar, that date is 444 BC. Counting 476 years from 444 BC, and remembering that there is no year numbered 'zero' AD, we discover what Gabriel told Daniel: the Messiah would be cut off in 33 AD."
http://www.bethlehemstar.net/day/day.htmFor the other readers who have some honesty:http://www.bethlehemstar.net/THERE is your extrabiblical evidence.But the truth is that you aren't telling the truth. You aren't even trying to be honest about this and furthermore, you only gave opinions, not facts. You did not establish that Herod died yrs before A.D. 1.The topic is the accuracy of the Bible and here is just part of my evidence. Edited by AdminPD, : Off Topic

Alright invoke magic. A lunar eclipse cannot occur at mid afternoon.
Where other than the Bible are these collaborations?as for HerodWikipedia: As for your site Bible + Astrology. Looks like a creo site. Edited by bluescat48, : No reason given.Edited by AdminPD, : Off Topic

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There is no better love between 2 people than mutual respect for each other WT Young, 2002Who gave anyone the authority to call me an authority on anything. WT Young, 1969Since Evolution is only ~90% correct it should be thrown out and replaced by Creation which has even a lower % of correctness. W T Young, 2008

Calypsis4 and Bluesact48,Please stick to the topic of this thread and not debate about other threads.Calypsis4,Please stop bringing in issues from other threads.Thanks
AdminPD

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Usually, in a well-conducted debate, speakers are either emotionally uncommitted or can preserve sufficient detachment to maintain a coolly academic approach.-- Encylopedia Brittanica, on debate

Hi, first time poster here...Great site!I've been creeping through this forum for quite some time now, and I have to say that it's one of the most valuable and interesting resources in the creo/evo debate that I've come across. It seems to me to be well-moderated, and for the most part differing viewpoints are respected, as long as you back up your position. Keep up the good work.OT portion concluded, I see the OP'er is currently suspended, but hopefully this won't fall on deaf ears. What I suspect that he was attempting was to address those Christians who consider the bible as wholly inspired by God, even those portions clearly written by men. For example, the letters of Paul are thought to be, in many circles, written by Paul's physical hand, but they may as well have been by the hand of God, since men are fallible, and for an uninspired man to write anything connected with the bible would be absolute anathema. This would serve to render the bible suspect from many, many different angles.IMO, people often confuse Christians who believe in a literal bible with those who believe in a literal, inspired bible. Does anyone else see this, or am I barking up the wrong tree?I'm not trying to put words in his mouth, you see. But from reading through the thread it seems like he would have been better served to address this subset of fundamentalists rather than trying to lump all Christians into one pile. (If that was even his intention)Have a good one.

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"My own suspicion is that the Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose. J.B.S Haldane 1892-1964

Hey Apo. Welcome. I'm not disagreeing with you as that sounds more than likely. I just wondered what exactly you meant by "a literal, inspired bible"? Does it still treat the bible as a factual record of reality? Or more metaphorical? I guess I am abit confused by the use of "literal" in that context.But it is quite possible I am just being a bit thick here.

Thanks for the reply, Straggler.Let me see if I can explain this in a less-than-incoherent way. The church my family currently attends (much to my own chagrin) is quite fundamental in doctrine, as far as the commonly held definition of "fundamental" goes. I've come to understand that when the topic of bible authorship comes up in worship, the words "divinely inspired" are bandied about as the basis for claims of infallibility of this ancient collection of texts. Frequently, God seems to be portrayed as some sort of puppet master behind the various authors of portions of the bible.As I see it, there a couple of rules:1. If the bible says a book was written by X, it was written by X. (no surprise here)2. Since they believe the stories were divinely inspired, God was in effect speaking through this author, making the bible the literal Word Of GodWhat this means is that any questions regarding authenticity, or whether the bible is really God's word, are moot. The bible, regardless of who is said to have authored various parts of it, should really just be attributed to God, and God alone. Because of this, nothing can really ever be questioned, unless you want to question whether God is imperfect which, believe me, you don't want to do in these circles.So you look at these inconsistencies and discrepancies brought up by those such as blzebub, and all you can really say is "There are no contradictions, inconsistencies or discrepancies. There can't be. This is God we're talking about. He's the perfect author." Everything in the bible happened as written, and if a couple verses are off by a couple of shekels, it is what it is. It is never attributed to a mistake by a various author, because it's as if those authors have no creative license, no ability to make a mistake. God was speaking through them, so there can be nothing but perfection. What we see as imperfect is due to our own confusion.This is what I assume blzebub would like to have conveyed: that to these fundamentalists, a mistake means a LOT more when the front cover reads, "Bible, by God", than if you assume (like most Christians, probably) the bible was written by fallible men in homage to that God. Thus, alleged mistakes or contradictions are HUGE, if they are able to be proven. Therein lies the rub, no? Oh, it's treated as factual all right. As factual as the nose on your face.Let me know if I've been unclear. ;-)Have a good one.Edited by Apothecus, : Various stuff, additions, deletions

But that just can't be right...For example, lets take the claim from Genesis that the Earth was made before the Sun.Either that's not literally the Word of God or God's Word does actually contain errors.

Hi Apothecus,My understanding of the concept of 'inspired' in this context is not that God was acting as a puppet master by guiding the hand of the writer. My understanding is that it was God that inspired these people to write much in the same way that say MLK still inspires people to strive for racial equality.As you say, if it was God's work then the author would be of no significance, but prophets were very important people in ancient Israel, even the king wouldn't normally act without seeking their guidance, so I doubt if they were just puppets.Having said that, every single Old Testament book is anonymous, so we don't know exactly who wrote any of them.Finally, if God did write the Bible then it puts into question God's omniscience as the Book is rife with errors.

Agreed. Nevertheless, it's what I deal with every Sunday morning. We're also talking about YECs here, which I am steadfastly not. i.e. 24-48 literal hours' separation between creation events presents no problem. Exactly, brother.Have a good one.

Sounds like you need a new church... What are you?I fit into the Theistic Evolutionist category.

No that was very clear as to where you are coming from. But (and again I freely admit it may well be me that is at fault here) I still don't get the difference in belief between:"Christians who believe in a literal bible"And"those who believe in a literal, inspired bible"What am I missing here?

Indeed. I fully agree with your understanding, Brian. However, I think some fundamentalist groups take it a step further. See here.

quote:

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Though they were inspired, the authors of the sacred books also brought some human elements into them. The already-cited Complete Orthodox Encyclopedia reads: "as far as the human nature is not perfect, certain imperfections might occur in the sacred books due to the participation of the free human activity in the writing thereof. Therefore the divine inspiration of the Scriptures does not by any means come into a contradiction with genuine human thoughts and senses, inaccuracies and discrepancies, which may be found in them. The works of the holy writers are perfect to the extent that is needed for the divine purpose. Where imperfect human comprehension was sufficient for the salvation of mankind, there God permitted imperfections to appear."

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So to me it seems that if you want to have your cake both ways, you can, if you choose to assign a different value to "divinely inspired" than the next feller. You can admit that contradictions, mistakes, inconsistencies, etc. happen in the bible whilst still maintaining divine perfection. God "permits imperfections to appear." However, that's a far cry from the non-fundamentalist assertion that an ancient text can be authored by fallible men. To some, the bible is infallible, inerrant, and unquestionably the word of God, no matter to whom a book may be attributed. Agreed.Have a good one.

In more ways than one, CS. Sigh. What we do for family...FYI, I'm trying to find my niche. Outwardly, I'd describe myself as a TE like you. Inwardly...well, let's just say some days I tend to lean toward the agnostic area of the spectrum. To some, there can be only one true religion, and if that's the case, what of the rest of humanity? I've been raised in science and as such, I look for evidence where I can get it (pertaining to origins, etc.) I know in the end it all falls back to "faith", which is I guess where I struggle. I need a revelation, I guess... ;-)But that's neither here nor there concerning this thread, so we'll leave it at that.Have a good one.