Summations Only

I submit that it is you who is missing the point. There is no deceit presented by the Gospel. Instead there are just some idiot priest/pastors who believe and convinced you that John wrote the Gospel. Those guys set you up to fail in exactly the same as do people who promote Creation Science.And even those guys probably were not being deceitful. They were just wrong. I admit that I haven't read through John with this issue in mind, but I don't see a lot of first person exposition in the text. I do see some use of what might be the royal "we" or "us" but that might well be chalked up to poetic license. So where exactly do you find a claim by the author to be John.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Right. And for the purpose of this discussion we are assuming that John did not write the Gospel.The point I'm making is that such teaching of children does not reflect deceit on the part of the author, and that's one of the issues under discussion. And if the people doing the teaching believe what they are passing on to children, there is no deceit on their part, which I think addresses the issue that you are pointing to. That's certainly hyperbole. Some are taught that and some are not. If, however, the issue here is deceit, deceit requires a mindset can only occur among those who know better and still teach or allow the teaching of wrong information. If you cannot point to someone doing that, then you are missing the point.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

What do you think of the reasoning of those citers? Because to me the passage clearly says, "We're citing John while writing about John in the third person". The author(s) cite John and even quote him, but clearly, according to verse 24, the authors (we) are not John.I understand that people make a similar argument about Moses authoring the Torah.

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Exodus 17:14 And the Lord said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua: for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven.

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Well God commanded Moses to write a book, and presumably Moses did that. But did he write the Torah which contains a description of Moses death? Maybe not.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Not correct.With respect to authors of John, there is no question of motive because there is no claim that John is the author, and in fact the text says exactly the opposite. So far nobody has even been able to cite a claim from the authors to be John authored. When John is referred to in the text, he is described in third person in exactly the same way as the other disciples. What does it mean to be "in control of the facts"? That they must not be in error? I Culpable yes. But not deceitful. John is not named as the author of the Gospel according to John and as has been pointed out the text itself says differently. A conspiracy implies deceit and there is no such thing in evidence.Controversy about the authorship of John is widely known. But we might well say the same thing about controversy about the Noahic flood. Some Christians accept that John is not the author and consider the matter of no consequence, but for others it is vital to their faith and so they reject the controversy and belief the silly arguments supporting their belief just as they insist that there was a global flood a few thousand years ago.Neither case is evidence of a conspiracy. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Your statement of non interest is inconsistent with your claims that there is a conspiracy on the part of the author or that we cannot know whether there is a conspiracy. What should I take from you being uninterested in facts that address your statement? I'm not familiar with the evidence of authorship regarding Mathew, Mark, or Luke. Luke in particular is not claimed to be an eye witness or a disciple anyway. He is essentially a well educated nobody relating what he heard and read.Regarding John, the issue of authorship is controversial, but I myself am convinced that John was not written by any of the disciples. The text implies that the author consulted writings by John.So when we say, "knowledge", what were referring to is a controversy in which many, if not most Christians believe that John wrote the Gospel according to John and in which most academics disagree. It's not "known" that John did not write the Gospel according to John. They might know because the controversy is not secret. So some know and some don't know. Anyone can find the controversy discussed all over the internet and its easy to find official church positions that include their rationale for reaching their conclusion, which is generally that John is the author. Anyone who wants to do so can reach their own conclusions. I agree that what your flat mate describes is a conspiracy. However I sincerely doubt that what she describes is a universal or even a common practice. My dad taught at a theological seminary and I never had any question regarding the sincerity of belief.Of course my experience is merely anecdotal. As is yours.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

I was referring to the girl Tangle shared a flat with. I apologize ahead of time if I missed a joke. But I've already told you that I don't subscribe to your conspiracy accusation.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

I find myself agreeing with Tangle's opinion of what you are doing here. Your personal understanding is that the Prodigal Son is a parable while the virgin birth is accurate though you admit to some doubts about the latter.So what would justify preaching similarly on the two stories? I find that admission outright bizarre. I understand how you feel the way you do about the two stories. No problem with that. Have you ever found yourself presenting or preaching on the virgin birth?

There might not be an issue for you. I'm curious about how GDR would handle the question.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

There are a lot of "educated" people who don't believe in modern psychiatry and psychology. In fact a major premise of the Church of Scientology is that the psychiatric profession is evil and that there is no such thing mental illness.Perhaps you remember Tom Cruises rants on Brook Shields for taking treatment for post partum depression?Perhaps this might help you see where other people are coming from. Nobody is going to be impressed by a lit prof's beliefs.

I don't think so. You were impressed but pretty much nobody else is. The detail you added in message 975 does not change any of that. There was absolutely nothing impressive going on.

This is probably not a good argument for you. Don't ask questions for which you cannot anticipate the answer. There are lots of buffoons who believe that mental illness is caused by demons and that find psychiatry or psychology fraudulent. Some scientists harbor superstitions. Assuming that to be so, then what are you complaining about? Now you have finally reached the point I was trying to make. If you were startled by a pretty common occurrence then perhaps that's just an indication that your experience back then was just too limited. It's certainly not any confirmation of truth.

What the heck is a respected intellectual journal, Faith? In what respected journal would a literary professor be publishing an opinion about psychology that ought to be taken seriously?Tell me why what you are citing is anything other than a lay opinion showing disdain for science

Wow, ringo. What's the lesson here?James Bond is not represented by people Golffly respected as being the literal Word of God as is the Bible.No James Bond novel "purports" to be a biography. You found 'Casino Royale' in the fiction section and never thought of it as anything other than a novel. It is essentially impossible to be betrayed. On the other hand, I have encountered children who felt betrayed upon learning that Santa Claus was not real.

You are misusing the word infer. To "infer" is to draw conclusions from the evidence. We conclude that there is likely no Bigfoot because we cannot find him despite extensive efforts. What you are insisting on is that we assume John is the author despite some evidence to the contrary and no evidence in support.Besides that, your argument regarding Bigfoot is pretty twisted and does not seem to demonstrate your point anyway. Nice sleight of hand, ringo. The issue under discussion is authorship and not 'up-to-datedness'. A person presenting a will is required to provide evidence that the will is the testament of the deceased, and that issue is closer to authorship. The presenter will of course point to the signatures of the deceased and of the witnesses. The example of wills appears to be demonstrating my point rather than your own.In situations where we care about the result, we don't simply accept the authorship of documents at face value. We only do that when we don't care about the authorship.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Right, so why would we assume that a nonexistent person wrote the document? Have you forgotten your original position and have decided just to argue a question that is not in dispute? If that was all you said/suggested, I would not have bothered. Instead you actually posted this: How do you "infer" innocence with no evidence ringo? That is as senseless as assuming guilt.The purpose of "assuming" guilt vs innocence is not that it is easier, or more likely to be correct or somehow akin to "Occam's razor". It is because we must pick some starting point for a dispute in which both sides are going to provide evidence. Namely we give one side or the other the burden of producing persuasive evidence as a starting point, and not because we assume that defendant is more likely to be innocent than guilty.If you don't know who wrote John, and the matter is important to you, the answer is not to assume John wrote it, but to seek out evidence on the matter. You don't "infer" without evidence, and you don't simply assume an answer and then quit.