First Question

[moanareina]

 

OK Ironhorse...first, where did I say the bible is not authentic. I said to understand it correctly you would have to know ancient hebrew and greek and also you would have to have lived in that time and got to know the culture etc.

Sorry moanareina, but I'm inclined to disagree.  If the bible is genuinely the infallible, inerrant, revelation of an omniscient, omnipotent god, who is the same today, yesterday, and forever, then we should be able to understand it without in-depth knowledge of the ancient cultures in which it was written. 

 

Romeo and Juliet was written in a different time and culture.  Nonetheless, Brazilians are able to understand the hatred of the Montagues and Capulets, even if they are not well-versed in 16th century British history.  People in China can feel and empathize with the love that Romeo and Juliet shared even if they are not linguists or fluent in the high language of Elizabethan England.  The most emotionally elegant presentation of the play I ever saw was a performance in Russian; and the message came through perfectly even if I didn't understand a word of it. 

 

A finite, mortal human wrote a masterpiece 600 years ago that still to this day universally touches and inspires people of all nationalities and all walks of life.  Shouldn't an omnipotent, omniscient god be able to do just as good (if not better)?

 

 

Well, of course you can understand Romeo and Juliet to a certain extent. But if you really want to get the author's intentions with this piece, you have to have some background knowledge as what historical context it has been set in and how culture was organized etc. Otherwise it is just a story and you make your own assumptions.

 

At the moment I am preparing for the last exams I am going to have and one of them is German literature. So I had to read four books, one of them was from the time of the Restauration to understand it's significance you need to know what that time was all about. You need to know the author's background and what his intent was. You need to know what audience his pieces in general where directed at and what audience this particular drama was directed at. Then you will have the full understanding of it. Otherwise you might think it is a cute little story but miss it's humor, it's message all together. And if you had lived at that time, you would have really known and not just assumed. Same with the other books I had to read. So I say, you need to know that stuff to correctly study those books.

 

Now as I said, the bible does not speak of itself to be the inerrant word of God and this is why I think, even if it was God inspired, it might not be for us today to read anymore because we just simply have no knowledge of the cultural background and can just assume what certain passages supposedly mean.

[Guest end3]

Here in St Petersburg in the Hermitage, I can see authentic Roman swords, helmets, contemporary busts and statues of the various Ceasars, original Roman coins, etc...  In fact, there is an entire city block inside the building dedicated to such original artifacts.  Yet not a single artifact exists of Jesus.  Not a single original manuscript penned by anyone who knew him or knew someone who knew someone who knew him.  Not a single bust, not a single fresco, not a single pubic hair.

 

So, when you come here claiming a collection of books is more represented and authentic, I have to wonder what kind of papyrus you are rolling your weed in.

This always amazes me. You would bitch if you had evidence as well. Faith would be invalid. Pick a side of the fence.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

 

 

OK Ironhorse...first, where did I say the bible is not authentic. I said to understand it correctly you would have to know ancient hebrew and greek and also you would have to have lived in that time and got to know the culture etc.

Sorry moanareina, but I'm inclined to disagree.  If the bible is genuinely the infallible, inerrant, revelation of an omniscient, omnipotent god, who is the same today, yesterday, and forever, then we should be able to understand it without in-depth knowledge of the ancient cultures in which it was written. 

 

Romeo and Juliet was written in a different time and culture.  Nonetheless, Brazilians are able to understand the hatred of the Montagues and Capulets, even if they are not well-versed in 16th century British history.  People in China can feel and empathize with the love that Romeo and Juliet shared even if they are not linguists or fluent in the high language of Elizabethan England.  The most emotionally elegant presentation of the play I ever saw was a performance in Russian; and the message came through perfectly even if I didn't understand a word of it. 

 

A finite, mortal human wrote a masterpiece 600 years ago that still to this day universally touches and inspires people of all nationalities and all walks of life.  Shouldn't an omnipotent, omniscient god be able to do just as good (if not better)?

 

 

Well, of course you can understand Romeo and Juliet to a certain extent. But if you really want to get the author's intentions with this piece, you have to have some background knowledge as what historical context it has been set in and how culture was organized etc. Otherwise it is just a story and you make your own assumptions.

 

At the moment I am preparing for the last exams I am going to have and one of them is German literature. So I had to read four books, one of them was from the time of the Restauration to understand it's significance you need to know what that time was all about. You need to know the author's background and what his intent was. You need to know what audience his pieces in general where directed at and what audience this particular drama was directed at. Then you will have the full understanding of it. Otherwise you might think it is a cute little story but miss it's humor, it's message all together. And if you had lived at that time, you would have really known and not just assumed. Same with the other books I had to read. So I say, you need to know that stuff to correctly study those books.

 

Now as I said, the bible does not speak of itself to be the inerrant word of God and this is why I think, even if it was God inspired, it might not be for us today to read anymore because we just simply have no knowledge of the cultural background and can just assume what certain passages supposedly mean.

 

I completely agree that to grasp the subtler nuances of Romeo and Juliet (or the bible), it would be helpful to understand the context of culture.  My main point, though, is that the overall message of the play is easily understood by all.  There is really only one way to interpret it: Romeo and Juliet fell in love but their families hated each other, so they hatched a plan that ended in tragedy due to a series of miscommunications and unfortunate events.  That is the overall message, and true, beyond that, people take from it whatever they take.

 

The problem with the bible, though, is that it was supposedly inspired by god as his revelation of himself to us.  There are 41,000 different christian denominations, which indicates that there are at least 41,000 different ways of interpreting god's "perfect" revelation of himself.  Within each of these denominations there are likely to be individuals who disagree with certain parts of the denomination's interpretation.  This means the actual number of interpretations is considerably higher.  Some say the overall message is everlasting life through god's grace; others focus on god's vengeful judgment against vile sinners in hell as the main point; while still others look only to jesus.  Then there are those who stress salvation through faith versus those who proclaim that faith without works is dead.  That is a lot of variety for a book that was supposedly inspired by an omniscient god.

 

To add to that, if the bible were inspired by a god who is the same today, yesterday, and forever, wouldn't he have inspired it to be written in such a way as to be understood today, yesterday, and forever?  Surely, in his omniscience, he would have foreseen 21st century American society and would have figured out some way of communicating to us the same message he intended for the ancient Hebrews to understand, because the message supposedly never changes.  Wouldn't he have precluded the necessity of having to understand bronze age goat herder societies in order to figure out what he was trying to tell us?  Especially if the fates of our eternal souls hung in the balance of interpreting it correctly?

 

This is why I don't buy the idea that the bible was inspired by god.

 

Good luck on your exam!  I took German language and thoroughly enjoyed it, but I will probably never be so fluent as to attempt a German Lit. class.

[Kuroikaze]

 

There is more evidence for the Bible’s authenticity than for any literature of antiquity. 

 

One example:

The Dead Sea Scrolls found in several caves between 1947-1956. The manuscripts

are dated between 480 B.C. and 318. A.D. Many of them contained entire books

of the Bible. The text matches our modern translations.

 

 

Um...they don't actually match the modern translations since they are "translations." What I think you mean to say is that the dead sea scrolls match (fairly closely, not exactly) the manuscripts which were previously most recent. Prior to the discovery of the dead sea scrolls the most recent copies of said documents (the Masoretic texts) dated to around 900-1000 C.E.

 

Yes, the texts largely match but there are a myrad of problems with moving from "these two texts match" to "Jesus is the son of God and died on the cross for our sins."

 

First, these were early copies of OT books, none of them were copies of anything in the new testement, so it says nothing about the NT's accuracy.

 

Second, the books found there were still copies that were, at the very least, several centuries older than the copied texts, which says nothing about how accurately it either the dead sea scrolls or the masoretic text represented the originals, and in fact most bibilcal scholars are of the opinion that many books in the OT never really had an original since many of the books seem to have been written in pieces by several authors over long periods of time and pieced together later.

 

Third, and most importantly, there is no logical reason to move from the claim that the originals are correctly represented in these copies to the claims in this book are actually true, and in fact there is much arceological evidence that many of the events in the OT either did not happen or were very exagerated.

[Ravenstar]

500 BCE isn't actually very old… a lot of the dead sea scrolls are not entire, they are fragments… do they attest to the Torah? Certainly, but a whole lot of the Torah was taken from traditions and different cultures some 1500 - 2500 years older, and we DO have some of those originals.

 

I posted one version of the Principles of Ma'at in another thread, at LEAST 2000 years older than the Dead Sea scrolls and the obvious origin for the 10 commandments. 

 

Try to read some Chaucer… seriously, it's English… good luck with it though. Now compare that with translations from different cultures and ages and languages. Just for fun, give it a try… CHAUCER.

 

There is no such thing as 'authenticity' of the Bible (OT)… it's a syncretistic collection of ancient middle eastern religious and moral thought, with some Hebrew 'history' and a whole lot of political propaganda, Judaized. The NT is a Hellenized hijacking of judaism.. with a lot of paganism and serious editing over the ages.

[♦ ficino ♦]

There is more evidence for the Bible’s authenticity than for any literature of antiquity.

This is Josh McDowell or some other apologist talking, and as with other claims by him/them, it is not true.

 

1. You need to unpack "authenticity." Many of the epistles are not written by the apostles who are said to have been their authors. Much of the OT is much later than it purports to be. Various passages have been shown to have been doctored in the transmission. Etc.

 

2. There are non-Christian writings that come to us in copies made closer to the time of writing than are the NT manuscripts to the supposed time of writing of the originals (if you go by dating of conservative biblical scholars), e.g. just off the top of my head:

--Diogenes of Oenoanda's exposition of Epicurean philosophy was inscribed in stone in the agora of his city in Asia Minor at his expense during his lifetime

--writings of the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus survive in carbonized papyri from Herculaneum from what appears to have been Philodemus' own library

--the text of several plays of Menander is transmitted in papyri of less than a century after his own time

-- ditto for Plato's Laches (not the entire dialogue, but from the 3rd cent. BCE papyrus you can see that the major Byzantine manuscripts were quite accurate)

-- poetry by Gallus survives in Herculaneum papyrus from around Gallus' own time

-- ditto for Lucretius and Vergil

 

It won't do to say that the bible is better attested than any other ancient literature.

 

Often, what this claim boils down to is a claim that there are MORE MANUSCRIPTS of the bible. But that fact simply attests to the greater demand for copies of the bible as the Empire became Christian. The number of manuscripts has nothing to do with the closeness of their text to the text originally written.

[falemon]

 

Here in St Petersburg in the Hermitage, I can see authentic Roman swords, helmets, contemporary busts and statues of the various Ceasars, original Roman coins, etc... In fact, there is an entire city block inside the building dedicated to such original artifacts. Yet not a single artifact exists of Jesus. Not a single original manuscript penned by anyone who knew him or knew someone who knew someone who knew him. Not a single bust, not a single fresco, not a single pubic hair.

 

So, when you come here claiming a collection of books is more represented and authentic, I have to wonder what kind of papyrus you are rolling your weed in.

This always amazes me. You would bitch if you had evidence as well. Faith would be invalid. Pick a side of the fence.

No we would not bitch, what bullshit excuse for a lack of evidence is that?

 

And that notion of faith is a trick to get you to continue to believe Christianity's claims without any evidence of it, bypassing discernment. It's also a great way to get anyone to accept anything.

 

"God is in this brick, believe and you can cross the river by jumping into a dangerous lake. I got no evidence, but you have to have faith." <- that is what your notion of faith gives rise to

[mymistake]

 

Here in St Petersburg in the Hermitage, I can see authentic Roman swords, helmets, contemporary busts and statues of the various Ceasars, original Roman coins, etc...  In fact, there is an entire city block inside the building dedicated to such original artifacts.  Yet not a single artifact exists of Jesus.  Not a single original manuscript penned by anyone who knew him or knew someone who knew someone who knew him.  Not a single bust, not a single fresco, not a single pubic hair.

 

So, when you come here claiming a collection of books is more represented and authentic, I have to wonder what kind of papyrus you are rolling your weed in.

This always amazes me. You would bitch if you had evidence as well. Faith would be invalid. Pick a side of the fence.

 

 

Tell us who is bitching that we have evidence for all the scientific discoveries that humans have made so now we can't have faith in them?  If we had evidence of God then we would study God as well.  It wouldn't be religion, it would be science.

[moanareina]

I completely agree that to grasp the subtler nuances of Romeo and Juliet (or the bible), it would be helpful to understand the context of culture.  My main point, though, is that the overall message of the play is easily understood by all.  There is really only one way to interpret it: Romeo and Juliet fell in love but their families hated each other, so they hatched a plan that ended in tragedy due to a series of miscommunications and unfortunate events.  That is the overall message, and true, beyond that, people take from it whatever they take.

 

 

 

The problem with the bible, though, is that it was supposedly inspired by god as his revelation of himself to us.  There are 41,000 different christian denominations, which indicates that there are at least 41,000 different ways of interpreting god's "perfect" revelation of himself.  Within each of these denominations there are likely to be individuals who disagree with certain parts of the denomination's interpretation.  This means the actual number of interpretations is considerably higher.  Some say the overall message is everlasting life through god's grace; others focus on god's vengeful judgment against vile sinners in hell as the main point; while still others look only to jesus.  Then there are those who stress salvation through faith versus those who proclaim that faith without works is dead.  That is a lot of variety for a book that was supposedly inspired by an omniscient god.

 

To add to that, if the bible were inspired by a god who is the same today, yesterday, and forever, wouldn't he have inspired it to be written in such a way as to be understood today, yesterday, and forever?  Surely, in his omniscience, he would have foreseen 21st century American society and would have figured out some way of communicating to us the same message he intended for the ancient Hebrews to understand, because the message supposedly never changes.  Wouldn't he have precluded the necessity of having to understand bronze age goat herder societies in order to figure out what he was trying to tell us?  Especially if the fates of our eternal souls hung in the balance of interpreting it correctly?

 

This is why I don't buy the idea that the bible was inspired by god.

 

Good luck on your exam!  I took German language and thoroughly enjoyed it, but I will probably never be so fluent as to attempt a German Lit. class.

 

 

Thank you for your wishes. Well, if you have not grown up with the German language or learnt it when a child it is almost impossible to become fluent or lets say to speak correct. English is a lot more easy to learn. So I don't blame you . There are very few exceptions of immigrants who speak German or Swiss German properly and with no accent and all and even second generations have an accent.

 

I have never read or studied Romeo and Juliet...ah I know I know I should...but for the books I have read l know it makes a tremendous difference to know cultural context. I agree you get the general story. Now without cultural background it is hard to understand why those two families hated each other. For my English literature exam I read Farenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. It is a neat story you get it's general story without knowing about any background. But you sure can't interpret it proper without it. You question why people are smoking when in todays society smoking clearly is not something people in a progressive future would do. You also don't get why the burning of books was such a strong symbol in that story. The whole critic this book is making on censorship and other political issues is lost if you don't know about the Carter area and it's paranoia towards socialism and the cold war etc. If you just read it as a story without background knowledge, it is a nice story that could be applied to today's society with some elements that are strange but not as strange to completely dismiss it. But sure enough you can't interpret it correctly.

 

There are some stories in the bible that are outstanding. For example the story of the prodigal son. I know I know, you probably heard that story a thousand times and have had it all. But the way it is told and read by modern christianity is totally missing it's message. It became a story of a rebellious son who left his father's house and all. When in fact it was the story of an incredible generous and loving father who for the time it was told did stuff that was totally inappropriate to do. Like giving his son his inheritance even though he was still alive. Letting his son go without telling him how he would fail and be screwed. Taking him back without even listening to his son's excuse, without even finding out if his son has learnt a lesson. It is a story of a father who cared more for a relationship to his son then for social norms and behavior. He risks to lose his son in order to gain a relationship with him. Etc. If you forget about the context that story was written in it becomes the usual: We are sinners not worthy of God's love and we have to worship God forever for being graceful and taking us back even though we do not deserve his love and would be thrown in hell if he did not have his plan to save us. But the story is not about us, it is about God. Now you can think of it what you want to, I am not advocating for the bible here. For whatever reason it was written, I don't care too much. I just say you can miss the meaning of an event entirely when not having knowledge of it's cultural background.

 

Ironhorse said one has to study the bible correct. So this was about studying the bible correct. If you want to study something correct I think you cannot just take an english translation that already has some misinterpretations in it and say you are studying it correct.

 

I agree though that if the bible was God inspired and God was the same today yesterday and tomorrow and the bible was the inerrant word of God he could have come up with something that was more clear and all. Though I always thought it was the mystery of it, like God not wanting to have something that is so clear on everything because that way, you need this relationship with him. And only that way you could take what was meant for you but never make it a generalization.

Since the bible is written by men, either way, if it was inspired by God or just invented, it is only how men view and imagine God and not how God views men. The bible says nothing about being the inerrant word of God. Nothing. There is not much that supports the God inspired thing either. So it is just a collection of either fictional or propaganda material or whatever people experienced back when it was written.

[Bhim]

 

 

 

There is more evidence for the Bible’s authenticity than for any literature of antiquity.

 

 

Rubbish.

 

One example:

The Dead Sea Scrolls found in several caves between 1947-1956. The manuscripts

are dated between 480 B.C. and 318. A.D. Many of them contained entire books

of the Bible. The text matches our modern translations.

That simply proves the Old Testament was written earlier than 500 B.C. In no way does this make the Christian Bible authentic. It doesn't even make the Jewish Torah authentic. The Jewish Torah is not much older than that. It's full of myth and legend that never actually happened.

This point is worth reiterating. If the Old Testament were proven to be a factual account of Jewish history, this would serve to bolster the claims of Judaism. This religion poses the strongest threat to the claim of Jesus' messiahship.

 

Christians should stick to the Septuagint. At least in that world Mary's a virgin.

[Vigile]

 

Here in St Petersburg in the Hermitage, I can see authentic Roman swords, helmets, contemporary busts and statues of the various Ceasars, original Roman coins, etc...  In fact, there is an entire city block inside the building dedicated to such original artifacts.  Yet not a single artifact exists of Jesus.  Not a single original manuscript penned by anyone who knew him or knew someone who knew someone who knew him.  Not a single bust, not a single fresco, not a single pubic hair.

 

So, when you come here claiming a collection of books is more represented and authentic, I have to wonder what kind of papyrus you are rolling your weed in.

This always amazes me. You would bitch if you had evidence as well. Faith would be invalid. Pick a side of the fence.

 

 

So your snarkyness and propensity toward senseless statements have yet to fail you, but your point? 

 

[sdelsolray]

…

-I will say this from my story: I was not indoctrinated but taught from a early age to

read, study and always ask questions. Never assume something is true until you have examined

all sides.

…

 

After consideration of the numerous posts you have written, I conclude your statement above is incorrect.  Whether it is a fantasy you actually believe in, or an outright falsehood, I care not, although I suspect the former.

[waitingongod]

Ironhourse posted:  "-You have to consider the context in order to determine literal or symbolic. 

Why? If a text read, "He had so many bees in his head he couldn't think."

Would the bees be literal or symbolic?"

 

My response - I assume you're implying that this would be symbolic.  Why?  The bible also says some dude got swallowed by a giant fish, some dude built a massive boat to house every animal, some guy created the entire universe in 7 days, some chick had a baby without having sex, some dude fed 5,000 people with a couple of fish and bread.......

 

If I believe those things are true, then by that logic, your statement above could very well be true.

 

So the question is, what makes it possible for you determine what's true and what's not?

[falemon]

A completely unbiased approach would not begin with Christianity and only examine that belief, instead a truly unbiased approach would look at every religion equally.

 

How many religions have you applied this rigorous process to?

[ironhorse]

A completely unbiased approach would not begin with Christianity and only examine that belief, instead a truly unbiased approach would look at every religion equally.

 

How many religions have you applied this rigorous process to?

 

I have previously posted that I have read and studied other religions. 

The christian faith is the one, to me, that makes the most sense and

in practice, is very real. 

[falemon]

 

I have previously posted that I have read and studied other religions. 

The christian faith is the one, to me, that makes the most sense and

in practice, is very real. 

 

 

 

Extensively? Like, read it as much as you suggest others inspect Christianity?

[Vigile]

 

A completely unbiased approach would not begin with Christianity and only examine that belief, instead a truly unbiased approach would look at every religion equally.

 

How many religions have you applied this rigorous process to?

 

I have previously posted that I have read and studied other religions. 

The christian faith is the one, to me, that makes the most sense and

in practice, is very real. 

 

 

How lucky you are that you were born and raised in a nation where xianity is the leading religion and not in Saudi Arabia or some other place where it would have been much harder for you to come to this 'truth'.  Those poor Saudis.  They're pretty much screwed and it's simply a matter of being born in the wrong geographical area of the globe. 

[mymistake]

 

A completely unbiased approach would not begin with Christianity and only examine that belief, instead a truly unbiased approach would look at every religion equally.

 

How many religions have you applied this rigorous process to?

 

I have previously posted that I have read and studied other religions. 

The christian faith is the one, to me, that makes the most sense and

in practice, is very real. 

 

 

 

I've studied Christianity from the inside for most of my life.  Nothing about Christianity makes sense except for the flow of money to the leaders.  Christianity is just as real as any other religion.

[Bhim]

 

A completely unbiased approach would not begin with Christianity and only examine that belief, instead a truly unbiased approach would look at every religion equally.

 

How many religions have you applied this rigorous process to?

 

I have previously posted that I have read and studied other religions. 

The christian faith is the one, to me, that makes the most sense and

in practice, is very real. 

 

 

Yeah, I made this claim too back when I was a Christian (except I had a bit more credibility, having actually been raised in another religion).  I realize we're putting you in a tough spot in that we ask if you've studied other religions, and then when you say yes we claim that you're lying.  However I know not a single Christian who actually knows as much about another religion as he does about Christianity.  Partly it's because evangelical Christianity places no emphasis on tradition or philosophy.  There's pretty much just the Bible, and that's it.  So obtaining the bulk of knowledge necessary to be an evangelical is pretty straightforward: you read a relatively small book and you're done.

 

In any case I don't think you've subjected other religions to the same scrutiny you claim to have applied to Christianity (really I don't think you've scrutinized Christianity either; I know I didn't).  And you're not here to convince an unbiased third party observer.  You're here to convince us, with the ultimate motive of converting us back to Christianity.

[Ravenstar]

I already asked him to explain these religions, as he understood them, since he 'studied' them… but I didn't get much back.

 

I think that is a lie. What I have heard has not convinced me that there was any real investigation done, at all.

 

Christians are supposed to be honest, yes?

[Fernweh]

 

A completely unbiased approach would not begin with Christianity and only examine that belief, instead a truly unbiased approach would look at every religion equally.

 

How many religions have you applied this rigorous process to?

 

I have previously posted that I have read and studied other religions. 

The christian faith is the one, to me, that makes the most sense and

in practice, is very real. 

 

 

What is real about Christianity? Does the wine and host during the Eucharist actually turn into the blood and flesh of Christ? Did a donkey really talk to Balaam? Does it make any sense that god would send his son, which is actually himself, to be born by a virgin and die on a cross to save us from the sin that he set us up to commit in the first place?

[francesco]

That doctrine of transubstantiation is the one that i lol at

Especially catholic who genuinely belief based on hoax stories like a monk some centuries ago change bread into meat and give the whole church a feast

Or a witch went to church to take the eucharist bread, put it in a closed jar and it changed into real meat in a couple days

 

Oh my, i wanted to laugh when my catholic friend said that story

Their belief based on authority that saya that you have to belief and some hoax stories

That's alone tell you something eh?

[sdelsolray]

I have previously posted that I have read and studied other religions.

…

 

 

You have yet to demonstrate you are anything other than a fully indoctrinated Christian, since birth, who has launched himself on a public mission of apologetics, for reasons unknown to anyone, including yourself.  You should thank (or blame) the Baptist preacher you grew up with for this.