Pringlesguy7 responds to me:
quote:
if you know who wrote the first 5 books of the Bible
That's just it. We have no idea who wrote them.
Oh, the tradition is that Moses wrote them, but we know that is physically impossible. Deuteronomy contains a description of Moses' funeral, so we know that at least some of the Pentateuch was written by somebody other than Moses.
And given that Moses doesn't seem to have ever existed, we are left with the conclusion that some anonymous authors wrote it.
quote:
And how do you know if the other accounts are closer?
Because they came earlier. They are closer to the event, therefore they are more likely to be correct. That doesn't mean that they are right. After all, an earlier fictional account is still a fictional account. However, given that a great amount of the Old Testament is plagiaraized Babylonian mythology, if any of these sources are going to be accurate, it isn't going to be the Bible.
Question: Which is more likely to be the most accurate version of a story...the original or the translation?
I personally think that it is possible to make a perfect translation (difficult, but possible), but the question is which is more likely to be the most accurate version?
Since the Bible appears to be translated stories, how much validity should we give to them as being the most accurate?
Of course, the oldest extant culture are the Aborigines in Australia, going back 60,000 years, and their mythology looks nothing like what the Bible says.
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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!