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Author Topic:   The Tension of Faith
PaulK
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Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 764 of 1540 (823891)
11-18-2017 5:31 PM
Reply to: Message 763 by Percy
11-18-2017 5:20 PM


Re: The Evidence Of 1 Corinthians 15:5-8
If you have nothing worth saying, better not to say it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 763 by Percy, posted 11-18-2017 5:20 PM Percy has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 765 by Percy, posted 11-18-2017 5:37 PM PaulK has not replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 773 of 1540 (823904)
11-19-2017 4:27 AM


An Example of Good Written Evidence
In Babylon, nearly 4000 years ago a dissatisfied customer accused a merchant named Ea-Nasir of delivering sub-standard copper. We know this because we have the original complaint
This is perfectly good evidence for the existence of the copper trade, for recognising that the quality of goods was a big issue even then and for the existence of a copper trader using the name Ea-Nasir.
It cannot tell us who was in the wrong since we have only one side of the story, and no other evidence.
In short simplistic rules will not work. It is necessary to weigh written evidence carefully, to consider the ways in which it is likely to be unreliable. Thus, while the complaining customer may have exaggerated the problems in order to demand a refund, it is rather less likely that the complaint is addressed to a fictitious trader or over a delivery that never happened.

Replies to this message:
 Message 774 by Tangle, posted 11-19-2017 8:31 AM PaulK has replied
 Message 782 by ringo, posted 11-19-2017 1:20 PM PaulK has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 776 of 1540 (823911)
11-19-2017 8:53 AM
Reply to: Message 774 by Tangle
11-19-2017 8:31 AM


Re: An Example of Good Written Evidence
quote:
It's only evidence because we know that Babylon is a real place and we know the history of the area and we can carbon date the tablet and so on. We have multiple sources and levels of corroborating evidence into which this clay tablet information comfortably fits. That's all fine and dandy.
Clay isn’t exactly a good materal for carbon dating. As for the rest, if we had little information about the region the tablets value as evidence would increase. If we had contradictory evidence then it would be hurt - but you would need contradictory evidence, not simple ignorance.
quote:
Now if Ea-Nasir instead of writing about a perfectly normal event, he'd written that he routinely walks around with a personal daemon, is that evidence of daemons?
Ea-Nasir didn’t write the tablet as should be perfectly clear. However, strictly speaking it would be evidence of daemons at that time. Just not good enough evidence to be worth taking seriously.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 774 by Tangle, posted 11-19-2017 8:31 AM Tangle has not replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 783 of 1540 (823931)
11-19-2017 1:32 PM
Reply to: Message 782 by ringo
11-19-2017 1:20 PM


Re: An Example of Good Written Evidence
quote:
So, is the reference to Tubalcain in Genesis 4:22 evidence of iron-work before the Flood?
That’s a strange non-sequitur. Perhaps you can explain why you relate the two texts ?
(Of course there was no Flood, therefore the idea of iron working before it is incoherent. And because of that we can’t count anything as evidence for it)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 782 by ringo, posted 11-19-2017 1:20 PM ringo has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 784 by ringo, posted 11-19-2017 1:36 PM PaulK has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 785 of 1540 (823935)
11-19-2017 1:52 PM
Reply to: Message 784 by ringo
11-19-2017 1:36 PM


Re: An Example of Good Written Evidence
quote:
My question is why do you treat the two texts differently?
Then maybe you should have just asked that. Or better the general question of why business documents are considered more reliable than myths and legends. (Although that seems kind of obvious, doesn’t it ?)
One important point is that a business document is a primary source while a myth or even a legend is a secondary source (at best) a long way removed from whatever real events (if any) inspired it and may even be entirely fictional, at least so far as the literal content goes.
quote:
I didn't suggest that anything was evidence for the Flood.
I didn’t say that you did. I was saying that we can’t have evidence for anything before the Flood because - there being no Flood - the expression has no meaning.
Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 784 by ringo, posted 11-19-2017 1:36 PM ringo has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 786 by ringo, posted 11-19-2017 2:02 PM PaulK has not replied
 Message 787 by GDR, posted 11-19-2017 5:08 PM PaulK has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 788 of 1540 (823938)
11-19-2017 5:18 PM
Reply to: Message 787 by GDR
11-19-2017 5:08 PM


Re: An Example of Good Written Evidence
quote:
I'm not sure I agree with that. I think that we can say that Genesis is evidence of there being a flood.
That is an orthogonal to what I was saying. Since the physical evidence shows that there was no Flood anything like the Biblical story it really doesn’t matter that Genesis says that there was.
quote:
Other ancient stories such as Gilgamesh are secondary evidence.
Not secondary to Genesis by any means !
quote:
Is the evidence conclusive. Of course not but I think that it is a fair conclusion that there was a flood of some kind but not one a world wide one.
First, if there was such a flood, the story has got far enough away from it that it could only be inspiration, not the Flood. Second, while there certainly were floods I don’t think there is good reason to suppose any single flood inspired the story.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 787 by GDR, posted 11-19-2017 5:08 PM GDR has not replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 793 of 1540 (823949)
11-20-2017 7:47 AM
Reply to: Message 790 by Faith
11-19-2017 9:14 PM


Re: An Example of Good Written Evidence
quote:
The claim for Genesis as evidence isn't just that it is something that was written, but that it was inspired by God.
Even if it was inspired by God - and there’s no good evidence for that - Genesis is still a compilation of myth and legend and very poor evidence for any of the events it relates.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 790 by Faith, posted 11-19-2017 9:14 PM Faith has not replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 809 of 1540 (823969)
11-20-2017 1:21 PM
Reply to: Message 797 by Faith
11-20-2017 12:19 PM


As I stated before an intent to persuade is better evidence of bias than of truthfulness. And it is rather obvious that the author of John, for instance was out to promote the claim of Jesus’ divinity.
If the Gospel of John were an eyewitness account it would still be of questionable reliability for other reasons. It includes things John did not witness, ancient writers were often credulous - miracle stories are not that rare, and being written relatively late there is much time for confabulation - which is all but certain to occur.
However, it is likely that the Gospel was not written by an eyewitness. The author was highly literate, unlike the uneducated John. The only direct claim to an eyewitness source was very likely written by a redactor by its wording alone (we know his testimony is true) - and the redactor may not even have meant that the original author was John, and certainly could be mistaken (perhaps confusing John the Disciple with John the Elder, named by Papias)
So, the authorship is far from certain, and there are very good reasons to distrust the miracle stories.
Which leaves us with the fact that the Gospel of John is not good evidence at all for the truth of Christian claims.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 797 by Faith, posted 11-20-2017 12:19 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 818 by Faith, posted 11-20-2017 4:40 PM PaulK has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 821 of 1540 (823985)
11-20-2017 4:58 PM
Reply to: Message 818 by Faith
11-20-2017 4:40 PM


I didn’t accuse the writer of John of any dishonesty beyond - likely - slanting his account. He probably made up many of the words attributed to Jesus, but equally likely (but wrongly) thought they were things Jesus would have said. But that was normal practice even for historians, and hardly surprising when memory was the only record - and that second-hand at best.
Although I do note that the Bible includes pseudonymous documents and outright propaganda (again normal for the period) and fictions.
Even if you choose to take some things I do say as small dishonesties you don’t even touch on other and more important points, making your reply my a diversion based on faux outrage than a genuine rebuttal or even an attempt at one.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 818 by Faith, posted 11-20-2017 4:40 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 822 by Faith, posted 11-20-2017 11:04 PM PaulK has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 824 of 1540 (823998)
11-21-2017 12:25 AM
Reply to: Message 822 by Faith
11-20-2017 11:04 PM


quote:
Sounds like an accusation of dishonesty to me.
Perhaps, but it’s a low level of dishonesty, common in anyone who seeks to persuade over simply relating the truth. I’ve seen far worse from Christian apologists - professionals and amateurs.
quote:
Whatever words he imputed to Jesus were words acceptable by God Himself. If he wrongly thought they represented Jesus' thought, that sounds like dishonesty to me, or error, which of course cannot occur in God's word
Error rather than dishonesty. And there certainly are many errors in the Bible. Are you being dishonest in making such an obviously false claim ?
quote:
The Bible is God's own revelation to us, and not subject to the kinds of errors you are talking about. You are speculating anyway, this is all made-up junk to discredit the Bible.
And more falsehoods. Really I must thank you for demonstrating the gross errors that can be produced by bias. Which is one of the reasons why the Gospels can’t be greatly trusted.
quote:
Whqtever the Bible includes is the truth. Period.
According to the false dogma of your cult. Which is hardly persuasive. Maybe you should repeat your claim that debate is futile because your opponents don’t uncritically believe your every word.
quote:
Oh dear, sounds serious, but it's undecipherable anyway, and it can only be seriously wrong
Let’s reword it then. You failed to address the major points in my post. Therefore they stand without any rebuttal. Fake outrage over a minor issue - which is all you offer - is just an attempt to hide that.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 822 by Faith, posted 11-20-2017 11:04 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 825 by Faith, posted 11-21-2017 12:44 AM PaulK has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 827 of 1540 (824001)
11-21-2017 1:14 AM
Reply to: Message 825 by Faith
11-21-2017 12:44 AM


quote:
The gospel of John seeks to persuade to the truth, for the sake of the immortal souls of human beings. The distinction you are making about persuasion versus truth is spurious.
Nonsense. Anyone seeking to persuade is going to be tempted to slant their account, to leave out awkward details or stories that might detract from the intended message.
quote:
All anyone has done since I pointed that out is twist it into a lie.
And that is an outright lie. I for one take it as truthful. I just disagree with your bizarre idea that persuasion means telling the truth.
quote:
You and others here impute my views to me as some odd idiosyncratic invention of my own, but every day i hear sermons that share my point of view, I own hundreds of books that share it, my entire Christian life has revolved around the traditional understanding of the Bible, traditional theology.
How odd that I called it the false dogma of your cult then. An odd way of suggesting that it is yours alone.
And again when I DO say that a view is yours I mean that you believe it. And usually implying that you are arguing it solely because you believe it without any real support.
quote:
There are over a million sermons on the site Sermon Audio by preachers who share the point of view I try to represent faithfully here. I believe I represent it honestly.
How can you honestly present an obvious falsehood ?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 825 by Faith, posted 11-21-2017 12:44 AM Faith has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 828 by Phat, posted 11-21-2017 7:48 AM PaulK has not replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 876 of 1540 (824163)
11-23-2017 3:35 PM
Reply to: Message 873 by Faith
11-23-2017 3:05 PM


Re: the nature of evidence
quote:
I don't think you can make such a blanket statement about all witnesses in all circumstances. And there's nothing particularly difficult about what John or any of the NT writers report of the miracles to suppose error through some sort of mental fog.
It’s pretty much true. Everything written down DOES have to come via the senses and memory. I don’t see how you can deny that. (Maybe you can quibble on memory, but only in special cases that don’t apply). And the case that any Gospel was written by an eye-witness seems weak, which gives at least one more level of indirection.
quote:
Water turned to wine? How many ways could that be distorted by this supposed mental fog? Do you suppose it really didn't change at all or maybe turned to apple juice?
A trick - or an accident - switching the barrels, or maybe the water barrels only being used to cover while more supplies were obtained is one possibility. Add in the problems of memory and bias and it is quite possible. Or - if the author was not an eyewitness - it might be a parable taken for reality.
quote:
A lifelong lame man walking? A lifelong blind man seeing? Give me a break
The lifelong is just the sort of exaggeration that can creep into accounts. Whether their complaints were entirely physical (or even genuine) is unknown - if the cures happened at all. The Roman Emperor Vespasian is supposed to have miraculously cured the blind and the lame, too - it’s reported by Tacitus. I don’t believe that either.
quote:
The circumstances of Jesus' ministry were electrifying enough to be vividly imprinted on everyone's memory. Besides which, any description that was faulty had hundreds of witnesses ready and able to correct it. The gospels would not have gone down as inerrant unless they passed all these tests.
They didn’t go down as inerrant until long after they were written. Papias said that Mark’s Gospel got the order of events wrong. The author of Luke was willing to disagree with Mark - and quite possibly Matthew. The main argument hypothetical source Q is that the author of Luke wouldn’t *intentionally* disagree with Matthew as much as he did.
Decades after the event leave plenty of time for legends to develop, for confabulation, exaggeration, confusion, for teachings to change and the changed teachings to be put into Jesus’ mouth.
The Gospels just are not reliable sources for many things.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 873 by Faith, posted 11-23-2017 3:05 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 877 by Faith, posted 11-23-2017 3:50 PM PaulK has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 878 of 1540 (824165)
11-23-2017 4:17 PM
Reply to: Message 877 by Faith
11-23-2017 3:50 PM


Re: the nature of evidence
quote:
That's just a bunch of BS. For the gospels to have been taken as truth for two millennia means they were not contradicted by the many who could have.
Since we know that they were contradicted - by quite early believers - it is your response that is BS.
quote:
THERE WERE LOTS AND LOTS OF WITNESSES TO JESUS' MIRACULOUS ACTS, LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS, WHO PASSED ON THEIR TESTIMONY TO LOTS AND LOTS OF OTHERS
Or so you assume. Let us not forget that - using the generally accepted dates - it is entirely possible that none of the Gospels were written before the Jewish revolt brought a devastating war to Judaea. Let us not forget that none of the Gospels cite any sources. Let us not forget that no independent source records even the most obvious miracles that supposedly occurred during Jesus’ life. Let us not forget that most Christians at they time would not even have been born when Jesus lived. Let us not forget that fiction can come to be taken for fact remarkably quickly as Arthur Machen’s story The Bowmen came to be mistaken as fact, as The Angels Of Mons - surely there were many eyewitnesses who could contradict that miracle - yet the story persisted.
I could say more, but that seems sufficient.
quote:
And the minor differences of perspective you insinuate but don't describe (by ONE writer?) hardly disqualify the general facYs
The differences are quite significant. Enough to convince many scholars that the authors of Luke and Matthew had a common source, rather than Luke incorporating material from Matthew.
quote:
all you are doing is the usual curmudgeonly speculation, you don't know anything, it's all made up.
I am pointing out things that are likely to happen You are making things up.
quote:
The writings went down as "inspired" in the early years if you don't like "inerrant," because they would not have been accepted into the early canon lists without that attestation of inspiration by the vast majority of the churches.
It’s not that I don’t like inerrant it’s that they were NOT taken as inerrant in the early years. As for inspired - well why don’t you find out when they got that classification and what it was taken to mean before you start trying to claim that it is significant.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 877 by Faith, posted 11-23-2017 3:50 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 931 by Faith, posted 11-25-2017 7:49 PM PaulK has replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 899 of 1540 (824231)
11-25-2017 5:50 AM
Reply to: Message 894 by Faith
11-24-2017 5:02 PM


Re: the nature of evidence
quote:
I reject the idea of fog in the case of the miracles of Jesus, as I already explained.
Rejecting the idea that human beings - transmitted and recorded the story is hardly a sensible position. You can assume that Divine Inspiration made the stories absolutely accurate but you’d be begging the question (as well as being wrong).
quote:
I'm so beyond doubting the clear testimony of scripture I just can't understand how anyone manages to deny it. You have to imagine people being amazingly stupid or evil to think such a thing. Pretty simple people too, not the Machiavellian geniuses they'd have to be.
Not really. As I pointed out earlier Arthur Machen created a false miracle story without any intent. Normal human tendencies - and the circumstances - are quite sufficient.
quote:
It's actually funny to think you believe the miracles of Jesus were not electrifying enough to make an impact on history, when Christianity grew to dominate the western world for two thousand years, fully embracing all the miracles as reason for us to believe in His salvation as John intended
The reality of course is that the alleged miracles did not electrify the world. If they had they would show up in non-Christian sources, and they don’t. If they were just exaggerated or even made-up stories they could easily have had the same effect.
quote:
Just stories about witnesses?. Oh my aching head. Again you have to imagine people evil enough to invent witnesses to invented miracles and able to succeed with such a subterfuge in transforming the western world from paganism to Christianity.
That is just your love of conspiracy theory talking. Quite frankly you would probably find it plausible if you weren’t a Christian. (But the Book of Mormon is an outright fake and the Mormons have still been pretty successful.)
quote:
Yes I have faith that the gospels passed the tests, but as I've said, I could not possibly have faith in anything that didn't pass such tests. Sheesh.
So the logic is that the Gospels must have passed your imaginary tests BECAUSE you have faith them ?
No, it doesn’t work that way.
If you have faith in things without definite knowledge that they did pass the tests - which you don’t and can’t have for the Gospels - then you certainly CAN have faith in things that didn't pass the tests. That is simple, obvious fact.
And that’s without mentioning your faith in Alex Jones and Info-Wars and quack medicine and conspiracy theory....

This message is a reply to:
 Message 894 by Faith, posted 11-24-2017 5:02 PM Faith has not replied

  
PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 932 of 1540 (824281)
11-26-2017 1:38 AM
Reply to: Message 931 by Faith
11-25-2017 7:49 PM


Re: the nature of evidence
quote:
You are pointing out things that in your curmudgeonly imagination are likely to happen; in other words you are making it all up.
Of course you are just lying as usual.
In reality it would be quite amazing if the stories in the Gospels had not undergone considerable development (and in fact there are places in the Gospels where we can see development happening, even with written stories).
Assuming that any of the Gospels is a simple and exact eyewitness account - as if it were recorded at the time of the events - is simply wrong. To say that any of the miracle stories has to be a full and accurate account is speculation indeed.
To disagree with that speculation - to point out that there are more plausible alternatives is not speculation. Only if those alternatives were claimed to be fact would it be speculation.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 931 by Faith, posted 11-25-2017 7:49 PM Faith has not replied

  
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