Determining a book's truth.

Okay. First that is long before there was any Christian Canon.as to your major question, it is pretty hard to find anyone that believes the Bible is literally true. It is easy to find many who claim to believe the Bible is literally true but when you begin discussing it with them you quickly find out what they really mean is that "it is truly interpreted by them".

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Well, good luck in your quest.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

You are simply quoting the standard lies from the Christian Cult of Ignorance. It is sad and frankly, embarrassing when someone claiming to be a Christian comes in and repeats such obvious nonsense. If you know of a good example of such a prophecy, please start a thread on it so it can be examined. They copied each other. The New Testament writers quotemined those who came before. Further, the Bible is not wondrously harmonious but rather filled with contradictions and mutually exclusive parts.I have to ask, have you ever even read the Bible or are you like most Biblical Christians, ignorant of what is actually in it?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Psalm quotemines: Of course, 2 Timothy is not talking about the Bible which simply didn't even exist at the time but rather inspired writing in general. Nor does it mean that any of it is factually true.You can learn much from fairy tales and myths, from epics and sagas, regardless of whether they are fact, fiction or some combination of both. That can only be true if you take the position held by many Christian Theologians that if there is any conceivable way to get around the contradictions, regardless of whether it is true or not or even plausible and reasonable, the contradictions don't exist. That is called willful ignorance. Do minimal research. There is simply massive evidence that there has never been a world-wide flood. That is of course called circular reasoning. The book cannot support itself. It is only when the book is tested against reason and reality that you can determine its worth.As to prophecy, if you believe you can show examples of true prophecy that was fulfilled, please by all means present them for examination and discussion.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Also 100% false. In fact, that particular myth, the Tyre myth and the phony net photos, was the direct precipitation cause of one member here abandoning Christianity. See Message 1.The Daniel stuff is what is called post-hoc reasoning. It is simply making stuff up.Actually, even the books of the old testament were not compiled and set into Canon until after Jesus time.Further, there is no one Bible Canon even today. The Books in the Bible vary from Canon to Canon. I am not speaking of translations, but rather Canon, the list of what books should be included and excluded. Sure. A reasonable summation of Scripture but one that can also include Huck Fin and Moby Dick. That is certainly true but when it comes to the Bible, it is obvious that God did not put it together since there is no one single Canon.As to contradictions, the Creation Myth found in the younger story of Genesis 1 and the earlier, older combination of stories beginning in Genesis 2 are mutually exclusive. The Gods are different, the order is different and the methods are different. We use reason, the brains GOD gave us, and test the stories against reality.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

A Canon is the list of book accepted into a Sacred text. The Protestant and Roman Catholic Cannons are pretty close, they include the same books although some protestant churches roll some into the Apocrypha.But That is just one Canon, the Western Canon. There are many others, the largest being the Ethiopian Orthodox Large Canon (they also have a short Canon) that includes 82 Books IIRC.The smallest Canon IIRC is the Samaritan which includes only the first five books of the Old Testament. God can work through anything including fiction. I'm sorry but I simply don't believe that. It is another of those friend of a friend stories.The facts are that Alexander did not destroy the old city of Tyre when he conquered it. He left it intact and in fact it was still a functioning fortress when the Crusaders returned and had to take it again.Read the thread I linked you too. No, of course not. I'm saying you should use your brains to test the truth of the Book, in this case the Bible. For example, the truth is that the Prophecy about Tyre was never fulfilled.The Bible is a Map, and like all Maps should be tested against reality. Where it is accurate it is fine but just because the map says there is a bridge there, don't drive across without looking to make sure.AbE:I didn't address this the first time, so let me address it now. You said: Actually, that too is false. Nebuchadnezzar laid seige to the city, tried for 13 years to take the fortifications, and failed. He was forced to simply give up and head back home. The Old City of Tyre, the one on the Island, was NEVER torn down to the ground and used only as a place to dry nets and is even a thriving metropolis today.The old Tyre canard is definitely not fulfilled prophecy of any sort.Edited by jar, : add more on Tyre:

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

What you are doing is, as I pointed out in Message 40, You are looking for any conceivable way to avoid the contradiction whether it is reasonable, logical or true.Nebuchadnezzar tried to conquer Tyre. He failed. After 13 years of trying he had to retreat. Alexander conquered the city but again, he did not destroy Tyre and in fact left it after making offering in the Temple inside the city. Tyre was still a fortress in 634 when the Muslims took it and held it as a fortress until 1124 when the Crusaders arrived.From 2700BCE or so right through until today Tyre has stood. That is called willful ignorance of the facts. Stop and check the actual history of Tyre instead of simply believing what your pastors and ministers tell you. Read the actual prophecy instead of simply believing what your pastors and minister tell you.Edited by jar, : No reason given.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

My guess is that they are simply ignorant of the facts or the scripture.As I said earlier, IMHO the Daniel Prophecies are simply post-hoc reasoning. If you mean Message 1 then no, it is not closed.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

They are post-hoc because it is folk today that are running around trying to find meaning to assign.The problem is that so many ministers and pastors these days seem to misunderstand the function of Prophets. They are not fortune tellers. The function was to carry a message from God to his peoples. And it was a message for right now, for the immediate audience. If they could not understand or use it, it was pointless.It is not a matter of when the lines were written, it is when we assign meaning to them. That is the post-hoc aspect.This is nothing new by the way. The authors of the Gospels did it when then went back and quotemined Isaiah to make it look like it was a prophecy of Jesus.There actually are what seems to be actual prophecy in a few places in the Bible, but few Biblical Christians seem to find them.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

But what we are telling you, what the satellite photos tell you, is that that did not happen. He did put in a lot of effort. Thirteen years of siege, but he failed.Tyre was the fortress on the Island. The land part was but the marketplace, the trading place where people came to buy and sell the products imported through the port.

Of course Jesus was ignorant. He was just man, totally 100% man. He had to learn how to go potty just like every other human.But he also talked to people using the idiom of the day, stories they were familiar with.The author of Matthew (or authors) cribbed from the Old Testament too. They quotemined and twisted material to support their assertions as do many Christians today.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Looking at your list, there are some things in there that can be tested, others that cannot. First, there is no evidence that God wrote the Bible and lots of evidence that God did not write it. Well some plagues we can know happened, there is evidence from many, many sources that confirm them. But if you mean things like the Exodus Story, there is tons of evidence that none of that happened as described in the Bible. Not really. It doesn't much matter if Jesus actually existed or not, the message can still be tested by reason and reality to see if it is valid.But remember, even if someday we came upon positive evidence that Jesus existed, say we find all the expense reports including a purchase of five loaves and two fishes and another entry for seven loaves and an a few little fishes, that still says nothing about Jesus divinity.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Not only was the KJV not the first printed Bible, it was not the first English Language Bible. The KJV was a politically correct compromise Bible created to try to minimize the conflicts between the Anglicans (and a few other Protestant Sects) and The Roman Catholics in Great Britain.Before you go much further, you really need to learn just a little of the history of the Bible and all of the various versions (not translations but rather Canons) that exist.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Nonsense. Of course the Church wanted common folk to read the Bible. That is another of those total falsehoods that many current Christian Pastors keep peddling. The first English language Bibles date all the way back to the late 1300's, over 250 years before the KJV.The other thing that gets overlooked is that there were Litanies long before the Bible was common. There was also the Book of Common Prayer which also predates the KJV.If you are not familiar with the BCP and the other Litanies, they are an order of Service. Part of the service are the Propers.Propers are those parts of the service that vary, they include the Readings, the Gospel, Psalms and Collects. The readings, Psalm and Gospel are directly from the Bible and it was expected that the family did have a Bible so they could find the material in the Propers.There has been a Daily Office for almost as long as there has been Christianity, and prescribed Propers for each day, and each of the Hours.Unfortunately, based on your posts so far, it really appears that you have been taught a very, very limited and biased history of Christianity.Just for your information, here is the Proper for today. You can also find the Proper for any day at that site. And in the Protestant movement.One of the things that gets ignored is that the issues raised in the Reformation were almost all actually resolved and adopted during the Councils of Trent.The separation of Western Christianity into Protestant and Roman Catholic camps was far more over politics, power, wealth, ownership and in the case of the Anglican Church, a conflict of calendars and the need to have an heir and a spare.Theology actually was a very small part of the movement.Unless you can establish some connection between the rest of your post and the question of how to Determine a book's truth, I don't see how it is important or relevant.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

What you say is unfortunately very true. Far too many Christians, particularly Pastors in many Christian sects, are woefully ignorant of Christianity or the History of Christianity, and an awful lot of what they preach is just plain nonsense and false.A good example is on Canons.Canons are the lists of what is included in a Bible. Different Churches have different Canons. The smallest Canon I know of includes only the first five books of the Bible, the largest I know of includes over 80 books.Translations are something entirely different. Frankly, all we have are translations and copies. There is not one original Biblical document that I know of.Translations abound even within Canons.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion