Amputee Healings?

[thick88]

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
My precious holy Father, PLEASE give me a seat next to Chris. Ephrem on the other side? PLEASE!!![/quote]

I already told you once that, if heaven is an eternity with people like you and Chris, i’ll happily go south.
[/quote]
Wait a minute. . . assigned seating? screw that, can I sit where I want in Hell?

[Tiribulus]

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
My precious holy Father, PLEASE give me a seat next to Chris. Ephrem on the other side? PLEASE!!![/quote]

I already told you once that, if heaven is an eternity with people like you and Chris, i’ll happily go south.
[/quote]Yeah but God’s bigger n smarter n you see? If it were up to me I would have happily “gone south” as well. All of this will be forgotten. (the bad stuff anyway) There would be no I told ya so’s, no finger pointing. No sin, no sickness, just the unthinkable majesty and bliss of His wondrous presence for all eternity. If he brings you along you’ll be glad beyond words that He did. So will I. [quote]thick88 wrote:<<< Wait a minute. . . assigned seating? screw that, can I sit where I want in Hell? [/quote] No. The seating thing at the marriage supper of the Lamb is not serious on my part btw. I have no idea.

[pat]

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

Are you aware of the letters written during this time that were outright fraudulent and historically false?
[/quote]

Which ones?[/quote]

See Historicity of Jesus and Apocrypha on Wiki for a good primer.[/quote]

Don’t want a primer, I want to know which letters are you referring to. Are you making reference to the Deuteronical books?[/quote]

1 and 2 Esdras, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Tobit, Judith, Sirach, Letter of Aristeas, Ladder of Jacob, Eldad and Modad, Lives of the Prophets, Psalm 151, Book of Enoch, Epistle of James, Epistle of Barnabas, etc.

Apocrypha, Anagignoskomena, Pseudepigrapha, Antilegomina, etc. Not to mention disputed letters in the current bible like Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation (per Luther), Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1-2 Thessalonians, and Philemon (per Baur), etc.

I’ve read several of these letters, and they seem every bit as “real” as the letters included in the bible.

People made shit up then, and they make shit up today. The bible is far from the historical document that people like to believe. Everything in it, and everything excluded from it, are suspect.

I’m not going into detail beyond that. If you want more info, there’s a ton at the Wiki references I provided earlier.
[/quote]

It’s not a historical document. It’s plain folly to look at it that way. If that’s what your taking it as, then no wonder.
It’s a book of faith of truth, not a history book. The meaning is more important then the events. [/quote]

The truth is inextricably tied to the accuracy of the recorded events.

If Jesus wasn’t actually resurrected in a historically factual sense, the doctrine based on this historical fact is unfounded.[/quote]

Depends on the truth… The fact that the bible isn’t a history book doesn’t mean it does not contain historical facts, it means that depending on the book, the historical facts matter more or less. Certainly in the gospels the fact that Jesus existed, proclaimed the gospel died and ressurected are facts that must be true for them to be valid. Now if that happened the day before, during or after the ‘day of preparation’ is less important. It happened about about that time period.
Now, for instance in the case of Sampson for instance, it doesn’t matter if he killed a thousand men with the jaw bone of an ass as much as the moral that Sampson was chosen by God to lead, he disobeyed and became a slave, but ultimately he still executed God’s purpose for him by destroying a the Philistines.
Whether or not the Sampson story is 100% historical fact doesn’t matter. The fact remains that even if God chooses you, you can still disobey, even if you disobey, you can fulfill his purposes; though you’ve damned yourself. Further, you can still repent even after the damage has been done. Of course you can pull it apart and read it even deeper, but you get the picture.[/quote]

It’s important, for 2 reasons:

1. If some of the “miracles”, like Sampson slaying 1,000 men, aren’t factual, but were made up and dishonestly perpetrated as being factual, it says something about the character of the men presenting these stories as actual facts. If they lied or were sincerely mistaken about some of those stories, they may have lied or been sincerely mistaken about others stories as well, like Jesus walking on water or appearing to Mary Magdalene after being killed. Not that it’s a foregone conclusion, but it does cast reasonable doubt.
   [/quote]
   We don’t and cannot verify the historical accuracy on any of those texts. It simply cannot be done. Nor can you produce any other documents that old that are spot on historically accurate. The truth is there is a 50/ 50 shot of them being accurate, but it cannot be known. In either event, these recordings are the story of these ancient peoples, their beliefs and how they lived. The lesson gleaned are just as important if either case is true.

2. The large majority of biblical scholars agree that only the very basics of Jesus’ life are h
   historically accurate. Stories of the nativity and his resurrection are NOT considered to be reliably historically accurate. And those very stories are central to the beliefs that many people have about Jesus. If the historical facts on these pivotal issues are wrong, the beliefs based on those facts are wrong as well.[/quote]
   The fact is that He died and resurrected and it must be true for Christianity to be correct. Now, as St. Paul said, if it’s not true, then we are all fools, but such foolishness should have fallen by the wayside a looooong time ago. So here is where I have to put faith in it.

Now to turn is around, there is little in history we can actually know happened the way it’s reported. Most of the time, we are trusting the old authors and historians to be telling us the truth. But the further back we go, the less history we can verify and the greater the margin of error. This goes for all history, not just biblical history.

Still it not a history book. It’s purpose isn’t to tall us about history. That’s why history exists as a separate study. It’s a religious text. If you don’t believe in God, texts about God are meaningless. It kind of requires belief in God to be meaningful…Though on it’s own it is interesting literature.[/quote]

Some histories written by other nations and cultures can be and are historically verified as accurate, while others are not. Much of what is claimed in the bible hasn’t been confirmed as historically accurate, and in some cases is actually disconfirmed (for example, anachronistically discussing technologies that were known not to exist until much later).

Let’s see 'em… The ‘histories written by other nations’ that is. Which ones and how were they ‘verified’?

And the Bible still ain’t a history book…Why are then trying to prove it’s not a history book?

[quote]
Given that inaccuracy, we can’t make any definitive claims about the resurrection of Christ. Most biblical scholars agree on this. We do have decent evidence that Jesus actually lived, but accounts of his nativity and resurrection are historically suspect.

As you point out, if Jesus wasn’t actually resurrected, Christianity is false. It may still teach valuable morals, but its core claims are false. That’s why reliable history is important.

It’s fallacious to assume that Christianity would have fallen by the wayside if it wasn’t true. There are many religions that contradict Christianity, and have similarly stood the test of time. [/quote]

Few faiths have been attacked and tried to be erraticated many times over in world history either as much a Christianity has. Can’t prove it, but there is no way it could have survived if not true. You know why people follow it? Because it works, period. I suppose all religions do to a point. But more than anything, it works. Practitioners get a sense of something more real in faith, then with out.

You’ll never be able to prove any events of the time or any time you have not been privy to are correct. You’re simply trusting what others have said, period. That’s history, let’s hope we haven’t been lied too to often, or we really don’t know shit about the past.

[pat]

[quote]thick88 wrote:

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
My precious holy Father, PLEASE give me a seat next to Chris. Ephrem on the other side? PLEASE!!![/quote]

I already told you once that, if heaven is an eternity with people like you and Chris, i’ll happily go south.
[/quote]
Wait a minute. . . assigned seating? screw that, can I sit where I want in Hell? [/quote]

Heard you have to sit in the hot seat…

[pat]

[quote]ephrem wrote:

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
My precious holy Father, PLEASE give me a seat next to Chris. Ephrem on the other side? PLEASE!!![/quote]

I already told you once that, if heaven is an eternity with people like you and Chris, i’ll happily go south.
[/quote]

I live in the south, come August, it gets hot as hell down here. Then there is Vegas 42 deg-C at midnight…

[ephrem]

At least i can run around naked!

[pat]

[quote]ephrem wrote:
At least i can run around naked![/quote]

In Vegas? You’d blend in, nobody’d notice…

[pat]

[quote]pushharder wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

…They are Christians and most of them try hard to be good…[/quote]

Someone, whether you or Joseph Smith or Brigham Young or Forlife, saying Mormons are Christians does not make them Christians. I, you, the mayor of my town, or President Obama, can say I’m an astronaut but that doesn’t make me one.

And…whether a group of people are trying hard to be good does not make them Christians either. That is irrelevant.[/quote]

You are entitled to your opinion. They are Christians, but you think I am not a Christian either because I am a Catholic… So by contrast saying I am not a Christian doesn’t mean I am not…