If some parts of the Bible can't be trusted how can any of it?

>Often folk don't understand me, I'm old and slow and sometimes have
>trouble explaining things.Welcome to the club!!!Thank you for your patience with me also. It's difficult communicating with message board.>If a prophecy is only understood after the fact, it is useless.I'm not saying Isaac Newton is the final and last and highest Bible interpreter of all time, but you are demanding a standard of proof that even Isaac Newton dared not demand of God. Newton's intelligence was considerable, his knowledge of the Bible formidable, and his knowledge of history extensive.And, it was enough for Isaac Newton for the Bible to say what would happen well before it would happen, and for flawed mortal men such as himself to look, study, and notice after the fact, and then see that God had said it all along, and marvel and praise God.There are many examples when you read the Old Testament where God shows he knows what would happen days before it happened. He told people when they would die if they did not repent, and He had Isaiah name Cyrus as the king that would rebuild His Temple decades before Cyrus was born.Jesus Christ said in Matthew 23 that the generation of men that stood before him would pay for all the righteous blood shed from Abel to Zechariah, and in Matthew 24 Jesus Christ said that the Temple would be destroyed with every stone overturned, and both happened in 70 AD, when around a million? Jews died when Titus' Roman legions sacked Jerusalem, and the soldiers of Rome overturned every last stone looking for the gold that had melted off the Temple.>So how about showing us a specific Biblical prophecy that will come
>true in the second half of 2004 or during 2005.Anyone who thinks prophecy is made up by zealous Christians out to rule over people who don't know the Bible, should try making up prophecies from the Bible that came true in the historical verifiable past. The accuracy and specificity and verifiability demonstrated in Page not found must be duplicated, where the God of the Bible demonstrates to us that only He knows what happens thousands of years before it happens.At Page not found we learn that:1) The prophecies of Moses, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel all written well before 250 BC point to 1948 AD as the year the Jewish people would be gathered from the world to rule themselves in Israel.
2) The prophecies of Daniel and Moses and Haggai all point to the Messiah arriving at the 2nd Temple, in the time we call the 1st century.ROTB

Well, not quite.as I said in another post, a prophecy has to have certain characteristics. First, it must be understandable. Vague statements that can be satisfied in several ways simply don't count.Second, there has to be a reasonable time line. Newton saying that Israel will become a nation again simply is less of a prophecy then my saying that in the next two decades man will go to Mars.Third, it has to be unexpected.Fourth, it has to be understood before the fact. As an example, Matthew was probably written long after the temple had been destroyed so saying it predicted something that had already happened just doesn't work.So keep trying, perhaps you'll be able to do what your sources have been unable to do.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

>as I said in another post, a prophecy has to have certain
>characteristics. First, it must be understandable.I think you meant to say "understandable before the fact and but not only after the fact." Right?>Second, there has to be a reasonable time line. Newton saying that
>Israel will become a nation again simply is less of a prophecy then
>my saying that in the next two decades man will go to Mars.
>Third, it has to be unexpected.
>Fourth, it has to be understood before the fact.Checking the dictionary at Prophecy Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com it does not say anything about prophecy having a particular time line, or being unexpected, or when it is understood.>Vague statements that can be satisfied in several ways simply don't
>count.How many ways does Page not found point to 1948 AD? I only count one.Please demonstrate what you are speaking of. Using the verses used by the author of the preceding link, make them point persuasively to another verifiable historical event, or make them plausibly point to the same historical event in a different way.ROTB

>How can they be the Word of God if they're translations?Since the New Testament agrees with the LXX version 97% of the time, as opposed to siding withthe Masoretic text 68% of the time
http://www.yourarmstoisrael.org/...rst_Response_Handbook.pdfIf the translation of the Hebrew in 250BC to the Septuagint was good enough for Jesus and his apostles, it is good enough for me. Translations are fine so long as they are done well. The King James Bible, though the Old Testament is not from the Septuagint, borrows from the Septuagint at key points, and the translation of the New Testament Greek is very very good.I apologize for taking so long to reply.ROTB

>That's pretty bizarre - a string of unsupported assertions that
>"proves" something.>I still say it was Shiva raising up England to smite folks. Or
>maybe it was the Invisible Pink Unicorn, though She's not real big
>into Smiting.I apologize for going off on a tangent. The Septuagint was quoted by Jesus and the apostles 97% of the time when the Old Testament was quoted throughout the New Testament. So though the Septuagint is a translation, it met His standards for accuracy.http://www.yourarmstoisrael.org/...rst_Response_Handbook.pdf is the source I used for the 97% figure. He is a Rabbi that is now a follower of Jesus.ROTB

Your source doesn't say that Jesus or the Disciples used the Septuagint 97% of the tme at all. Just as well - because Jesus and the Disciples would not have been speaking Greek most of the time.It does say:

quote:

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...the New Testament agrees with the LXX version 97% of the time, as opposed to siding with the Masoretic text 68% of the time

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But since 97 + 68 is rather more than 100% it certainly DOESN'T follow that the Septuagint was used 97% of the time. And the usage of the NT authors - who were writing in Greek and may not have even understood Hebrew or Aramaic - doesn't necessarily reflect the usage of Jesus or the disciples.This message has been edited by PaulK, 08-24-2004 03:45 AM

>But since 97 + 68 is rather more than 100% it certainly DOESN'T follow
>that the Septuagint was used 97% of the time.Quotes from the New Testament agree with the Septuagint 97% of the time, but with the Hebrew text 68% of the time.The reason you don't add 97% and 68% together, is that the Hebrew and the Greek translated from the Hebrew agree with each other also. Put another way, sometimes the New Testament agrees with both at the same time.ROTBThis message has been edited by ROTB, 08-24-2004 03:52 AM

I will attempt to summarize Page not found as best I can. Thank you for your patience!I said:
>>God promised to scatter the Jews into the world if they did not
>>repent, and then he did it. He also brought them back (1948AD)
>>exactly when he said He would.
You replied:
>How does it make sense for this prophecy to be based on a calendar
>rooted in the false assumption that Jesus was born in 1 AD?I suspect you misunderstood. The prophecies that point to 1948 AD in Page not found have nothing to do with the time Jesus would arrive. The arrival time of Jesus is explained in Page not found.According to the Bible, years are 360 days, and not 365.24 days. Please see Page not found and Page not found which are part 1 and 2 of the same discourse respectively.A biblical year is a time span of 360 days, not 365.24 days.606BC
+ 70 biblical years (Jeremiah 25)
+ (((390+40) Ezekiel 4)- 70 Jeremiah 25) x (7 Leviticus 26) biblical years
+ no year zero1948ADOr if we follow the algebra more closely line by line:
606BC
+ 70 + ((390+40)-70)x7 + no year zero
+ 70 + (430)-70)x7 + no year zero
+ 70 + (360)x7 + no year zero
+ 70 + 2520 + no year zero
+ 2590 biblical years + no year zero
1948AD2590 biblical years x (360 days per biblical year/365.2422199074 days per calendar year) = 2552.82645099 calendar years606BC
+2552.82645099 calendar years
+ no year zero (this adds 1)
1948ADOn your calculator:0
-605.38 (negative since we need to represent BC on the calculator, and July 17 of that year, and keeping tabs of the fact that when counting BC, going forward in time requires making the number designating the year smaller)
+1 (since there is no year zero, we need to skip it)
+2552.82645099 (biblical years adjusted to calendar years)
=1948.44Which corresponds roughly to May 14, 1948. Page not found claims the calculation to be "off" by only 17 days, or 0.00182%.It's late. See you all tomorrow night.ROTB

Well at least you begin to understand why you were wrong.Try thinking about it some more.

Oh well time to tackle another of the yfile lies. There's nothing in the Bible to say that a year is always 360 days nor that 360 days must be used whenever prophecy talks about a year.The whole idea was made up to fiddle "prophecy" calculations.

Sorry, but I have already shown that the examples given in your links are not prophecy.First, they were only understood after the fact. Second, many were not even written until after the fact, as in the case of Matthew.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Hello ROTB,I've tried to avoid simply "ganging up" on you here, but the point others have been making is important. That is, "after the fact" prophecy identification simply allows too much leeway for manipulation of the data.When I first read Grant Jeffrey's "The Signature of God" several years ago, there were several "selective applications" of numbers and scriptural references which immediately made me suspicious that such manipulation was operative here.Since there are several complexities involved, (which is why you post so many links), I will for now only refer you to this brief statement made by a studied Christian and mathematician:

quote:

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Signature or Forgery?

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An open letter to Grant Jeffrey, author of "The Signature of God"

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Note: This letter was originally sent to brother Jeffrey (twice), who did not respond. In the interest of making these facts generally known, I have posted it publically. The letter should NOT be construed as an attack on brother Jeffrey or his ministry. The letter simply calls attention to what I believe are inaccuracies and faulty arguments in his book.

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Point #3. In the chapter entitled "Precise Fulfillment of Biblical Prophecy -- the Signature of God" you discuss a passage from the book of Ezekiel (chapter 4, verses 1-17), which you claim predicts the revival of the modern state of Israel in 1947. You base your time calculations on the passage's reference to 390 "years of iniquity" for Israel and 40 "years of iniquity" for Judah. But in the passage these are called years of iniquity (Ezek. 4:5), and not years of future punishment. They represent the period of time that Israel and Judah have strayed from the Lord. The total number of years is 430, the same number of years which Israel stayed in Egypt until the "iniquity of the Amorites" was full (Gen. 15:16). In the time of Moses, God drove the Amorites from Canaan when their 430 years had been fulfilled - and in the same way, God drove Israel from the land after their 430 years were fulfilled.

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Ezekiel bore the iniquity of Israel and Judah for 430 days, one day for each year. These "days of seige" (Ezek. 4:8) are prophetic of the impending seige of Jerusalem by the Babylonians (Jer. 52:4-7) and not of the future exile of the Jews from the land of Canaan. After the days of his seige are ended, then Ezekiel prophecies the exile by scattering his hair to the winds (Ezek. 5:2). There is no indication whatsoever that 430 years refers to the length of Israel's future exile.

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Part of your argument depends on the application of Leviticus 26:18, which states: "If ye will not yet for all this hearken unto me, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins." According to the clear, plain application of this principle, if the Jews do not repent after 70 years of punishment, God shall punish them an additional 7 times 70 equals 490 years. So the total punishment would be 560 years, 8 times the original punishment.

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But instead of a straightforward application, you use Lev. 26:18 in a very arbitrary way. Although the Scripture clearly indicates that 70 years was to be the total length of exile (Jer. 29:10-14), you take the 70 years as somehow the initial segment of a 430-year sentence -- entirely without Scriptural justification. You claim that Israel did not repent after 70 years, so God multiplied their punishment seven times. However, you do not multiply 70 times 7, or even 430 times seven, but rather 360 (equals 430 minus 70) times 7. This is just playing with numbers. By similar reasoning, you could justify any of 40,70,390,430 years for initial the punishment period (because these are all numbers which appear in the passage), and add seven times any of 40,70,390,430,30 , 320, 350 or 360 . This alone gives 28 distinct combinations. Moreover, if this combination rule failed to yield the desired result, there are other rules and numbers in the Scriptures which could be taken and applied. It's not surprising that eventually a combination was found which worked.

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1998 CrossPollen. CrossPollen articles may be copied without permission from the author AS LONG AS (1) the article content is not changed (2) the original copyright notice is included. Copyright 1998 CrossPollen. Last Revised: January 12, 2002

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http://www.accuros.com/thornbush/pollen/bibcode.htmThe exampled quote above reflects only some of the "selective determinations" involved in indentifying "prophetic" dates and events ex post facto.Were these selections chosen before the fact and used to accurately identify a date in the future, this methodology might have some significance. Historically (and revealingly), however, such attempts at prior identification have a dismal track record.Again, I hesitate to "gang up" on you here, but the ex post facto interpretation of alleged prophecy is simply too susceptible to selective interpretation. Had the state of Israel been recommissioned in the year 1878, I have little doubt that the biblical data could be manipulated to incorporate that date as easily as 1948.Amlodhi

You know.. I would like to see where you get your supposed numbers.Did you know that when people quote statistics, they are made up on the spot 90% of the time??

Your formula is not taking into account the biblical leap years.

No, you misunderstood my objection.All your dates are based on the Gregorian calendar, which erroneously dates Jesus's birth at 1 AD. How can we be expected to believe that God's prophecy would be based on a calendar rooted in falsehood?You're getting a date of 1948, but nobody who didn't know Israel was founded in 1948 would have gotten this date. Maybe, but that's not how long a year is. A Year is 365.24 days. Why would God base his prophecy on an erroneous year length? That works out better, but why did you post an erroneous equation in the first place?