Is the Bible the Word of God?

[pajarito 0]

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Jesus was asked whther the old law is still valid and he said yes. So all the hateful bullshit in the OT like murdering homsexuals, sabbath breakers, disobedient children, blashpemers, witches etc still stands if you believe in the bible. Thankfullyt most people have a strong enough sense of morality to ignore its stupid teachings.

The Bible is not only a book of morals. It also gives a long historical account of the Jewish people and the Nation of Israel. The commands of the Old Testament are divided into moral, ceremonial, and civil law. The moral law (e.g. 10 Commandments) remains in effect. The ceremonial law (sacrificing 2 oxen, etc.) was fulfilled in Jesus’ sacrificial death and the New Testament teaches that it is not binding anymore. The civil law (stoning for adultery, don’t eat shellfish, etc.) was the law of the nation of Israel, which operated as a Theocracy, and is not the civil law of any other nation. One has to keep in mind that the acts which you mention as “abominations” in Leviticus aren’t necessarily the laws or commandments of God. They are of the Nation of Israel. Your statement above needs contextual refinement. You should try and really understand Christianity before you reject it. Just MHO.

[pajarito 0]

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But there ARE subtle differences between translations that have "ripple" effects. One interesting proposition can be found here:

http://www.truluck.com/...d_homosexuality.html

It deals greatly with the meaning of words in the greek and Hebrew and how they were altered upon translation. I do not know if it is ENTIRELY correct, but it makes some compelling points about a translator's influence on their work.

When one complex language is used to translate a text into another, choices made by the translators can often have drastic OR subtle effects.

Ok…
Let’s take your example. Assuming that there is no exact word for “homosexual” as the website claims, it is explained in detail so there is no confusion.

For example:

Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator – who is forever praised. Amen. Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
Romans 1:24 – 27

Like I said before, there are errors in translation. That is inevitable. However, none affect the fundamentals of Christianity and certainly not what you mentioned.

[beowulf 1]

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London, England is the center of the world....12 hours in either direction will take one to the Intnl Dateline. God has known that for Billions of Billions of Billions years...the same in other worlds before this one.
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That doesn't explain why. Just because men set Greenwich Mean Time as the starting point for the measurement of time doesn't mean that London is the center of the world.

[AlexCrowley 0]

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That doesn't explain why. Just because men set Greenwich Mean Time as the starting point for the measurement of time doesn't mean that London is the center of the world.

For heaven's sake dont say that to the English, they still have this Britain rules the world mindset. ;)

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[beowulf 1]

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That doesn't explain why. Just because men set Greenwich Mean Time as the starting point for the measurement of time doesn't mean that London is the center of the world.

For heaven's sake dont say that to the English, they still have this Britain rules the world mindset. ;)

yeah I am just wanting to understand how he came up with London as being the center of the world. It seems pretty arbitrary to me. I could have been any other place, but why London?

[shropshire 0]

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but why London?

Because of a president of the USA.....

It dates back to October 1884. At the behest of the President of the United States of America 41 delegates from 25 nations met in Washington, DC, USA for the International Meridian Conference.

At the Conference the following important principles were established:

It was desirable to adopt a single world meridian to replace the numerous one's already in existence.
The Meridian passing through the principal Transit Instrument at the Observatory at Greenwich was to be the 'initial meridian'.
That all longitude would be calculated both east and west from this meridian up to 180°.
All countries would adopt a universal day.
The universal day would be a Mean Solar Day, beginning at the Mean Midnight at Greenwich and counted on a 24 hour clock.
That nautical and astronomical days everywhere would begin at mean midnight.
All technical studies to regulate and extend the application of the decimal system to the division of time and space would be supported.
Resolution 2, fixing the Meridian at Greenwich was passed 22-1 (San Domingo voted against), France & Brazil abstained.


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(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[beowulf 1]

But why would 'God' care about that?

[AlexCrowley 0]

Because if he created the world in 7 days then he's obviously as interested in a unified world time clock as everyone else.
creation = 7 days (inc lunch). Flood = 40 days and nights. Time in the desert = 40 days and nights. Resurrection = 3 days.

Woah additional confusion: 1 God day = 1000 human years (2Peter 3 8 But forget not this one thing, beloved, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. - Uh oh creationists, kinda blows out the 6000 year thing)

God has the whole day/night thing - wasnt quite as solid on the whole 30 day month thing, but it took a Londoner to break that down into solid hours and minutes rather than simply how long it took a candle to burn down, God thought it an awesome idea and decreed London the center of the universe. As everyone knows. It's the same reason that the universe orbits the Earth, stupid!

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[beowulf 1]

I just knew there was a simple explanation!

Thanks

[kallend 2,027]

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London, England is the center of the world....12 hours in either direction will take one to the Intnl Dateline. God has known that for Billions of Billions of Billions years...the same in other worlds before this one.
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That doesn't explain why. Just because men set Greenwich Mean Time as the starting point for the measurement of time doesn't mean that London is the center of the world.

London (Greenwich) is the origin of space and time for all known intelligent life in the universe. YMMV.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[beowulf 1]

Ah good now we have a Professor's input on this matter. Maybe you can explain to me( since I must be a total dumb ass for not already knowing) why London is the center of the universe and how God knew that billions of years ago? Also how did we know that God measured time in seconds, minutes and hours? If he is omnipotent then why does care how we measure time and where the center of 'life the universe and everything' is?

[labrys 0]

LOL

Nice try. Everyone knows that when God created Earth he actually drew the Intl Dateline around the whole thing with a really big sharpie but it's all covered with dirt and debris now so we just have to have faith that it's there

Owned by Remi #?

[Mockingbird 0]

Pajarito, I see you linked to equip.org. That's one of my favorite websites (from the Chrsitian Research Institute). Do you ever hear Hank Hanegraaf on the radio? Really dear man and extremely knowledgable in his field.

One of the acronyms he uses to sum up the question of whether the Bible is divine in origin is MAPS:
M- The Manuscript evidence (the manuscript evidence is absolutely fascinating, in fact, overwhelming. No other book in history comes close in its amount of hand-copied manuscripts which have so few discrepancies! Especially when you consider how many people were involved in the copying and the time span over which the copies were made.)
A- The Archeological Evidence
P- Its Predictive Prophesies (which you also mentioned), one of my personal favorites being the prophecy of Isaiah about a King Cyrus 160 yrs. before King Cyrus lived. Of course, the prophecies concerning Jesus are the ones held most dear by Christians.
S- The Statistical Probability of such harmony among the 66 books written by 40 different authors over a span of 1500 years.

Blue skies & happy jitters ~Mockingbird
"Why is there something rather than nothing?"

[AlexCrowley 0]

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S- The Statistical Probability of such harmony among the 66 books written by 40 different authors over a span of 1500 years.

Batman has way more books and way more authors over only 50 years and like the bible he goes through minor character changes (dark and vengeful, to the peaceful intellectual, back to dark and vengeful).

Why is statistical probability considered proof the Bible is accurate but when you try to talk evolution Xtians get all pissy and talk about it being statistically impossible.

WTF?

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[Mockingbird 0]

Why is statistical probability considered proof the Bible is accurate but when you try to talk evolution Xtians get all pissy and talk about it being statistically impossible.

Hi, Alex. I'm afraid I don't know the answer to that question. (I don't argue creation v. evolution as there is a lot of science involved, and I sucked at science.) However, the statistical probability that I was referring to had to do with the Bible's origin... one mind used many "channels" over a long period of time to author a volume which is remarkably harmonious throughout. That's all.

(Just curious: Did you skydive this weekend? I'm dying for someone to ask ME that question... hint, hint)

Blue skies & happy jitters ~Mockingbird
"Why is there something rather than nothing?"

[Mockingbird 0]

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but then no one could claim 'One True Path' and feel superior to all others

It is waaaaay too bad that discovering and following the "One True Path" would have this effect on some (i.e., making them feel superior). If anything, it should make them grateful, and sacrificial in their willingness to share it respectfully with others. If it makes them feel superior, I would doubt whether they actually received it with the heart and are on it.

Blue skies & happy jitters ~Mockingbird
"Why is there something rather than nothing?"

[Mockingbird 0]

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The truth is, the Bible was written by MEN that had questions about life and death that they couldn't answer, so they did what every other religious weirdo in history ever did.....find an answer, any answer, ANYWHERE AND ANYTHING, as long as they have an answer so they can sleep better at night. That's how all religion was born, some desperate men seeking answers and resolving to make them up and pass them on to future generations as fact to give comfort about death.

Could you be over-generalizing? There ARE answers out there... really. Ones that weren't "made up" even! Really.

Blue skies & happy jitters ~Mockingbird
"Why is there something rather than nothing?"

[AlexCrowley 0]

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Hi, Alex. I'm afraid I don't know the answer to that question. (I don't argue creation v. evolution as there is a lot of science involved, and I sucked at science.) However, the statistical probability that I was referring to had to do with the Bible's origin... one mind used many "channels" over a long period of time to author a volume which is remarkably harmonious throughout. That's all.

Fair enough, although I don't find the book overly consistent except in a larger sense. It's something that I'd love for someone to explain. I realize that the majority of Xtians dont discount evolution, I just wonder about those that do:)

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(Just curious: Did you skydive this weekend? I'm dying for someone to ask ME that question... hint, hint)

Actually yes I did, how funny you should ask. Did you skydive this weekend?

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[AlexCrowley 0]

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P- Its Predictive Prophecies (which you also mentioned), one of my personal favorites being the prophecy of Isaiah about a King Cyrus 160 yrs. before King Cyrus lived. Of course, the prophecies concerning Jesus are the ones held most dear by Christians.

Urm.

So: The reason the Bible is written by God is because the prophecies are so convincing.

Especially the ones about Jesus the Messiah

Ok.... Was anyone really surprised that the bits fortelling the future of the Messiah in the first book magically match up with the second book being about the Messiah!? Seriously, it would be far more miraculous if the NT stated "Well, there was this Jesus guy who was saying some cool stuff til he was nailed to a tree, and lo the Messiah was Nigel, who worked in accounting." (must have been removed from the bible at the same time they removed all references to dinosaurs*) And lo, I was converted. I never saw the whole Nigel thing coming, ever. Ergo God exists.

I'd imagine that if the prophecies said "And lo, In the year of the fruitbat, in the City of the bulldog one shall step forth as the son of God. He will wear the trinity crown and he shall belch often after ingesting the glowing flesh of cows and rats wrapped in bread, and his name shall be Derek" and a few thousand years later a London kid named Derek belches after finishing a BigMac on his way back from the gym in an Adidas logo tee shirt, then we probably have a messiah - someone would make up some crap about The Year of the Fruitbat meaning whatever the timeframe it happened in was that year.

If the prophesies are so convincing I have a one word question: Judaism?

The other fun thing about books of prophesies is that if they're inaccurate you can just say "You just wait and see!" On a long enough timeline any prophecy will come true. It's basic statistics - the same argument used for the S in MAPS ('statistically the chances of these books being written this way is infitesimally small so its a fact!' 'A human eye evolving?!?!? BAH the chances of that happening are infitesimally small!' And a head explodes.)

Lets not even go into the lack of hard information available regarding Jesus actually fulfilling prophecy - you know, like using unquestioned historical materials outside of the Bible. The Romans kept a lot of records.

When I (or one of my wrestling fans) write my biography you can be damn sure I'll be from the bloodline of Frank Zappa and Jimi Hendrix, a legendary skydiver who disproved the "theory" of gravity, and had more money and a larger penis than Gravitymaster


*Redacted excerpt discovered by renowned theologist Professor Bill Hicks circa 1994, published first in his lecture Revelations

" And lo Jesus and the disciples walked to Nazareth. But the trail was blocked by a giant brontosaurus... with a splinter in his paw. And O the disciples did run a shriekin': 'What a big f***** lizard, Lord!' But Jesus was unafraid and he took the splinter from the brontosaurus's paw and the big lizard became his friend. And Jesus sent him to Scotland where he lived in a loch for O so many years inviting thousands of American tourists to bring their fat families and their fat dollar bills. And oh Scotland did praise the Lord. "

TV's got them images, TV's got them all, nothing's shocking.

[rhino 0]

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Wherein lies the justification of this position?

Faith and experience. God has spoken directly to me in such ways that cannot be questioned on a number of occasions.

[rasmack 0]

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Wherein lies the justification of this position?

Faith and experience. God has spoken directly to me in such ways that cannot be questioned on a number of occasions.

I did not question that. My question was if the Bible was the literal Word of God letter by letter.

HF #682, Team Dirty Sanchez #227
“I simply hate, detest, loathe, despise, and abhor redundancy.”
- Not quite Oscar Wilde...

[Mockingbird 0]

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Actually yes I did, how funny you should ask. Did you skydive this weekend?

Why, YES, I did. How did you know? I did my AFF Level 4 & 5... quite a huge triumph for me as I had been stuck in Level 4 for almost 2 months. I tried and tried, but couldn't pass. So I went to the wind tunnel a couple of weeks ago, and lo & behold, I passed yesterday! I feel like a heavy burden has been lifted from my shoulders. Thank you for asking.

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Fair enough, although I don't find the book overly consistent except in a larger sense. It's something that I'd love for someone to explain. I realize that the majority of Xtians dont discount evolution, I just wonder about those that do:)

First, what do you mean that you DO find the bible to be consistent in a "larger sense"?

Blue skies & happy jitters ~Mockingbird
"Why is there something rather than nothing?"

[pajarito 0]

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Ok.... Was anyone really surprised that the bits fortelling the future of the Messiah in the first book magically match up with the second book being about the Messiah!? Seriously, it would be far more miraculous if the NT stated "Well, there was this Jesus guy who was saying some cool stuff til he was nailed to a tree, and lo the Messiah was Nigel, who worked in accounting." (must have been removed from the bible at the same time they removed all references to dinosaurs*) And lo, I was converted. I never saw the whole Nigel thing coming, ever. Ergo God exists.

I'd imagine that if the prophecies said "And lo, In the year of the fruitbat, in the City of the bulldog one shall step forth as the son of God. He will wear the trinity crown and he shall belch often after ingesting the glowing flesh of cows and rats wrapped in bread, and his name shall be Derek" and a few thousand years later a London kid named Derek belches after finishing a BigMac on his way back from the gym in an Adidas logo tee shirt, then we probably have a messiah - someone would make up some crap about The Year of the Fruitbat meaning whatever the timeframe it happened in was that year.

There’s more to it than what I mentioned. Prophesy foretold that Jesus had to come from a very specific bloodline. It also mentions location of birth and the time of his coming. There are actually at least 109 distinct prophesies concerning the criteria for the Messiah. The odds of just 20 of these prophesy being fulfilled in one man is more than I can fathom.

Is Jesus the Messiah?
Prophesy fulfilled by Jesus

In addition to that, however, there’s the eyewitness testimony of performed miracles:

Miracles performed by Jesus
- Changed water into wine (John 2:6 – 10)
- Cast out demons (Matt. 8:28 – 32; 15:22 – 28)
- Healed lepers (Matt. 8: 3; Luke 17:14)
- Healed diseases (Matt. 4:23, 24; Luke 6:17 – 19)
- Healed the paralytic (Mark 2:3 – 12)
- Raised the dead (Matt. 9:25; John 11:43 – 44)
- Restored sight to the blind (Matt. 9:27 – 30; John 9:1 – 7)
- Restored hearing & speech to the mute (Mark 7:32 – 35)
- Feed the multitude (Matt. 14:15 – 21; Matt. 15:32 – 38)
- Walked on water (Matt. 8:26 – 27)
- Calmed a storm with a command (Matt. 8:22 – 27; Mark 4:39)
- Rose from the dead (Luke 24:39; John 20:27)
- Appeared to disciples after resurrection (John 20:19)

The last one is the kicker. Without the resurrection, there is no Christianity and no reason why anyone should believe or put trust in such. In addition to fitting all the criteria (I challenge you to find one he did not), he proved who HE SAID he was by defeating death. There may be other ancient “stories” depicting similar occurrences but they don’t have the same kinds of evidence to support them.

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The other fun thing about books of prophesies is that if they're inaccurate you can just say "You just wait and see!" On a long enough timeline any prophecy will come true. It's basic statistics - the same argument used for the S in MAPS ('statistically the chances of these books being written this way is infitesimally small so its a fact!' 'A human eye evolving?!?!? BAH the chances of that happening are infitesimally small!' And a head explodes.)

Many cults do this very thing (e.g. Jehovah’s Witnesses & Mormons). You’re absolutely correct in saying that your prophesy doesn’t mean a damn thing unless it can be shown to have come into fulfillment. The “failed” prophesy of the Watchtower Organization is a huge example of why it is not to be trusted and is not “of God.”

[beowulf 1]

What was the failed prophecy of the Watchtower Orginazion?

[pajarito 0]

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What was the failed prophecy of the Watchtower Orginazion?

"If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the LORD does not take place or come true, that is a message the LORD has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously."
Deut. 18:22

False Prophecies of the Jehovah's Witnesses