The Bible was NOT man made, it was Godly made

One of the first evidences that anything called a Bible is just the product of man is that there is no such thing as "The Bible".There are actually a few "Bibles", the books determined by various Canons. The smallest Canon has only 5 books, the largest Canon has over 80 books.To claim that "The Bible" was Godly Made, you need to explain why there is not one Bible, but several. You also need to justify why whichever one of the many Canons YOU happen to choose is the "Godly made" one as opposed to the others.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

As I said, the smallest Canon contains only the Pentateuch and excludes everything beyond that including ALL of the New Testament. There is no such thing as the "regular Bible" today. Never has been. What constitutes the "regular Bible" depends on the Christian Sect you belong to. That is not how science does it at all. Nor is it the case with the different Canon. For example Enoch, the source for the story about Satan's Fall is included in some Canon, excluded in others. 2Peter, 2 & 3John, Jude and Revelations are included in some canon but excluded from others.It is not a matter that something new comes along, it is that the men, plain old men that decide what is in a particular Canon make choices.The Bible is definitely not "Godly made", but rather very much the creation of man.And, of course, none of the 4 Gospels say the same thing, they all have areas of contradiction.Even the very existence of four Gospels is evidence that what we see is the work of man, not GOD. GOD would certainly be capable of telling the story one time, fully, completely and without error. But that is not what we see. Instead, the four main Gospels (and there are actually quite a few Gospels in addition to the basic four) were each written by unknown people, many, many decades after Jesus death.There are many other such examples. The creation story in Genesis 1 is entirely different than the older, combined tales found in Genesis 2. Even the depiction of God found in the two tales is entirely different.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Well, the question "is the Bible the work of man of Godly made" is a large question even if unimportant in the larger scheme of the faith. There is much to cover, and the evidence that the Bible is the work of man, dedicated and inspired men, but just man none the less, is overwhelming. No, those are simply translations and versions. I am talking of entirely different Canons.The problem is that many Christians are totally ignorant about the breadth and history of the Faith, and unfortunately, that includes a very large percentage of today's Christian Clergy. They are simply ignorant of basics such as the various Canons. I'm not sure why the Samaritan Christian Church only accepts the first five books, the old Torah, into their Canon and not even the whole Tanakh. That is a good question.But at the other extreme, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church has 81 books in their Broad Canon. Thank you. You have simply supported my point. What you describe is exactly how the different Canons were developed, although it is not just a mater of months but of years and even centuries.These committees were the ones making decisions, and even though they might be inspired, it is still just men making bibles. The proof is that different committees came up with different lists of what books should be in the Bible.If the Bible was Godly made then there would be one list of which books should be included. I'm sorry but that is just making excuses, and it also just supports my point. When we look at the Bible we are not looking at what GOD said but rather just what men said about what God said, with all of the limitations of the man. Claiming that there are no errors in the Bible is simply lying to oneself and others. Many parts of the Bible contradict other parts. Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 contradict each other on both order and method and describe to entirely different aspects and visions of God, as I have already pointed out to you. We have a pretty good idea about when most of the books of the New Testament (and in fact most of the apocrypha) were written. And, as you said, "How could people write what Jesus said WORD for WORD many decades after his death?"The answer is that they didn't. The older Genesis stories are the ones that are found in Genesis 2. The story found in Genesis 1 is the younger of the various creation myths.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

None of the Gospels were written during the period Jesus lived. The earliest of the four Gospels was most likely Mark, and Matthew and Luke seem to have simply copied parts of it, often verbatim. It's likely that there was at least one other common source that all three authors used, usually referred to as 'Q' that has been lost over time. While Matthew and Mark may well have been recounting personal memories, there is no indication that Luke ever even met Jesus so everything in Luke is likely second or third hand accounts.The Gospel of John, if actually written by the Apostle John, is entirely different than the synoptic gospels.The rediscovery of the Gospel of Thomas that contains many of the passages used by the authors of Matthew and Luke also leads credence to the existence of some second source other than just the Gospel of Mark. Again, that is simply nonsense. Have you read the other books, books like Enoch, 1 & 2 Adam and Eve, the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Mary and other works, often included in some Canon, excluded in others. They are not against God or even anti-Christ.Let me also try to address another of your issues. What we call books, chapter, verses and even sentences are simply a modern convenience. The original scrolls did not separate things, they were one continuous writing with no chapters, no verse, not even what we would recognize as sentences.The story that is found in Genesis 1 actually continues to what today is marked as Genesis 2:4. The parts we find in Genesis 2:1-4 are actually part of Genesis 1.In addition, the order found is not the order written. The two tales are from two different eras, two milieu, two cultures.The question you should ask is "Why did the redactors include two different, mutually exclusive stories, and go even further, placing the younger mor recent story before the older more ancient one?"

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

One of the Adult Sunday School courses I used to teach was on some of the histories of the various Bibles, particularly the different English Translations. One key part was showing that the KJV was the first "Politically Correct" version of the Bible, created primarily to avoid the political, cultural and economic problems that had been created both by the previous Monarchs and earlier English Language translations.It was interesting to see the lights going on in the various students as they stepped through the history, and they all went away with a whole new appreciation of the "Bible".That was always one of the most popular classes I taught and always drew a large crowd of members including many who normally never came to Sunday School.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I'm sorry but it seems that there is a lot about the various Canon, various Bibles that you have not yet been exposed to.We are heading far afield from the topic of this thread, and I think I will simply summarize the evidence I have presented so far.There is no one Canon.There is no one Bible.There is no one list of what books are in a Bible.Those three facts prove that the Bible is not Godly made but man made.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Not exactly.The Canon is the list of Books that are said to be Divinely Inspired and so worthy of being included in "The Bible".The problem is that there is not one Canon, but rather many. The Roman Catholics have a Canon, but then the Protestants have another. The Samaritan Christian Church (one of the oldest by the way) says that only the first five books, the Pentateuch, should be considered Divinely Inspired. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church (another very old one) has two Canons, and the broad Canon contains 81 books. The Syrian Christian Church (yet another very old one) has only 22 books in their Canon and exclude 2&3 John, 2Peter, Jude and Revelation.All of the different Canons were created by committees, committees of men. Different committees made different decisions about what books are in the "Bible"Please do not misunderstand. I believe that the Bible as well as much other that has been written is Inspired, and Inspired by GOD. But things like the "Bible", like religion itself, are still just creations of man. They are Maps, attempts by man to help guide and instruct, they are not the Territory, they are not GOD.Elevating some imaginary concept such as "The Bible" to the status of "Godly Made" is to mistake the Treasure Map for the actual Treasure.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I'm NOT saying anything about Fakes.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

None of the various Canon are fakes. They are all, every single one, the result of committees of men, inspired by GOD, creating what they think is the accurate list of books that should make up a Bible.The fact that all of these committees came up with different lists is one of the strongest proofs that the Bible is the product of just man.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

to which Juraikken replied:

quote:

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the compilation right? not the actual writing?

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No. The actual writing is the product of man. The Exodus Fable is a great example. It is written like the old Mack Sennett comedies complete with cliff hanger end points designed to bring the folk back for the next installment of the story."Will Pharaoh keep his promise and let the children go, or will God harden his heart yet again? Stay tuned for the next episode called 'Frogs in the street.'" No. All of the compilations are inspired by God as was Moby Dick, Wind in the Willows, A Canticle for Leibowitz and Language in Thought and Action.Inspiration is not a blueprint, to do list or roadmap. Inspiration is but the initial nudge to begin the journey, start a task or build an edifice. So far there is no indication that we are any smarter than the folk that created the Canons. And there are NO original sources known for any of the material in any Bible or Canon.All we have to work with are copies, versions written by man, edited by man, compiled by man, redacted by man.In addition, the process you describe, collect, read, study, debate, understand are ALL simply the actions of man. The final product would, like all the Canons before, still just be the product of man.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Juraikken, I realize that you are young, but you are not THAT young. It is time you began to actually learn some history, and that is what this thread is about.For example, you state : Beside the fact that you got even that wrong, if anyone could be said to be the author of the US Constitution it is James Madison and not Thomas Jefferson, there are ways to determine who was involved in its creation. In the case of the US Constitution we have independent records that show who the delegates to the convention were, independent records of the deliberations that went on, newspaper accounts published at the time, original copies both of the final document and of many of the drafts and correspondence that was involved.We can determine what happened in the past in relation to the US Constitution.That is NOT true of any of the Bibles, or of any of the Books included in the various Bibles, or of any of the committees that developed the various Canons.The past does leave evidence.In the case of the US Constitution we can establish provenance. In the case of the Bible we cannot.In the case of the US Constitution we have ONE final document that was then ratified, certified by all of the individual States; one version, identical word for word, and so certified by each State's Legislature.That is simply not the case when talking about the Bible.There is no such thing as "The Bible."It appears from your posts that your education has been abysmal. I'm sorry. I certainly hope it was not in one of California's Public Schools since until the system was gutted by Ronald Reagan, it was one of the finest systems in the world. I shudder to think it has degenerated so far.But none of these are more than a bump in the road. Because you are still young, you have time to learn, to correct the false information that it appears you were taught. Until now, it appears that you have been poorly served by teacher, Clergy and the public. However you have an opportunity to change all that.EvC is a wondrous place filled with brilliant people willing to help you with your quest for knowledge. Use this as one resource. Pick the brains of the many folk here that I constantly learn from.Consider EvC a Mitzvah, a blessing. Challenge the members here to teach you. Push them. Like a sponge, soak up all of the knowledge and wisdom available here.Start a new phase of your journey. Learning is a glorious experience.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Way off topic so just a short answer.Yes I think education is for everyone.Yes I think it will help everyone.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

But not some long cut-n-paste.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

As a believer, I find it amazing you could make such a statement. If you think you know of some fulfilled prophecy, please start yet another thread on them. So far no one has been able to actually show many such critters.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Instead of just cut-n-pasting more PRATTs (points refuted a thousand times) Start yet another thread on the one you think you can support.Better yet, search the site here and read the existing threads on that nonsense.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion