[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]mse2us wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]BBriere wrote:
Ok, you both make valid points. Remember, I am a believer in Noah’s Ark. I just doubt it will ever be found or is still intact. It really doesn’t matter. Someone that says they need to see Noah’s Ark to believe in God or the Bible would doubtfully actually change their mind after seeing it.[/quote]
Oh poppeycock. You thumpers always thump to the same drum. You want the critical thinking among us to have blind faith in a book put together by imperfect humans, under a corrupted process, with a legion of verified corrupted transliterations that were translated with the aim of fitting dogma rather than accuracy, and that was predated by other older religions that told many of the same stories.
If the argument is always going to be, “don’t look too closely”, “don’t subject it to examination and question” - instead, accept it on “blind faith”, I think to many critical thinking people, this does’t pass muster. In fact, I find most of the religious among us, have never studied the history of the bible, how it was constructed, or have even heard let alone considered some of the scholarly criticisms against it.
In fact, I find that most religious people, accept their brand of dogma, whether it be Islam, Christianity, etc., on “blind faith”. I do however, respect those that have done a critical analysis and still come away believing. At least they did some critical thinking along the way.
However, if such an ark were indeed found, and it was dated to the proper time period, and it was of the same size described in the Bible, and it contained evidence of two of every animal, etc etc etc., it would only give veracity to a deluge story that already predated the bible. The ark is hardly a starting point to make converts.
“Blind faith” - don’t ask me to have it. Don’t ask me to believe that the Muslims are wrong in their equal faith. Don’t ask me to believe that the Buddhists are wrong in their faith. Don’t ask me to believe that the Jews have it wrong. Don’t ask me to believe, blindly, that EVERYONE EXCEPT the Christians of this world have God figured out. Don’t ask me to believe that a loving perfect God has condemned all those born in a different culture who were raised under an different but equal and perhaps a culturally inescapable dogma. I’m not buying it. So sell it somewhere else.[/quote]
I too felt a similiar way as far as the Bible being written by imperfect humants, the fact that it’s a historical fact that dishonest translators mistranslated parts of the Bible due cultural, theological and political reasons. So I too had a hard time putting faith in the Bible and I lost interest in religion. An event in my life caused me to have a renewed interest in religion but I had to get past the issues I mentioned above and lot of the issues Bodyguard brings up. So I decided to examine the Bible and see if I could find answers to many of the questions I had. After searching and doing research I came away with more faith in the Bible then I every had and a renewed zeal for religion.
The first issue was why God used imperfect men to write the Bible? After looking into the matter I realized that God could not have done it any other way. The Bible says at Isaiah 45:18 that God made the earth for humans to inhabit. The Genesis account states that humans were created perfect: free from all sickness and death. Once Adam and Eve sinned two issues were raised as a result. The first was whether God was being fair and just in putting the restriction on Adam and Eve to not eat from the one tree. This then called into question God’s sovereignty and his rightfullness to rule or whether he has the right to say do or don’t do. The second issue was whether man could be like God and have self-determination and independence from God or whether man can rule themselves apart from God which is what Eve desired. All of this took place on earth with man so these issues that were raised had to be settled on earth with man. God also said that he was going to produce a seed that would undo the inherited affects of sin which results in death from Adam and kill the angel that became Satan. So through humans who were now imperfect God’s original plan for the earth and humans was going to be accomplished. Romans 15:4 states that “all the things that were written aforetime were written for our instruction, that through our endurance and through the comfort from the Scriptures we might have hope.” God wisely inspired imperfect humans to do the instructing to inspire hope and endurance. Since the Bible was written for imperfect humans only from an imperfect human perspective could man relate to other man. The Bible over and over again shows how the Bible writers and the people the Bible writers wrote about made mistakes and how God forgave them when they repented and how he punished them when they ignored repeated warnings.
When we read the Bible today we can see the dealing and history of someone like King David who was God’s chosen king but committed murder and adultltry, how God forgave him and the bad consequences that resulted from his actions. Or someone like the Apostle Paul who admits to having to struggle against sin and having physical ailments that slow him down. When we see examples such as these we can relate to the human side of these imperfect men. Angels can only observe humans they cannot properly relate to a human because they don’t have the same failings as humans so God wisely chose and inspired imperfect humans to write for other imperfect humans instead of spirit beings.
The other issue was the fact that dishonest Bible translators often times did not accurately translate the Bible. But copyist and translators who were careful and honest saw the mistakes and later corrected them. A good example is a passage in 1 John 5:7-8 which scholars call Johannine Comma, these verse read:
“7For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Spirit: and these three are one. 8And there are three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in one.”
This rendering was in later Latin Vulgates in the 16th century and were the main verses used to support the Trininty doctrine because they are the only verses the explicitly delineates the doctrine. The Latin Vulgate of the 16th century is essentially the King James Bible. So for centuries this passage solidified the Trinity teaching in peoples mind as the main Christian doctine but the problem was that the passage was not in any of the Greek manuscripts before the 16th century. Page 81 in the book “Misquoting of Jesus” explains this well and no other translations except the King James translations has 1 John 5:7-8 rendered like above. Translators and copyist saw this and omitted that verse. The proper rendering from the NIV is:
“7For there are three that testify: 8 the[a] Spirit, the water and the blood; and the three are in agreement.”
My point is that translators who were honest and careful made sure that they copyied and translated the Bible accurately from the oldest available manuscripts. Throughout the centruries the Bible has been banned by governments and religious leaders and people who distributed or read the Bible were fined, imprisoned, tortured and often killed. So when people translated and copyied the Bible they risked their lives to do so. So I gained confidence in the fact that a lot of these people would not take the task of copying and translating the Bible lightly and they made sure that they copyied the Bible accurately.
The most compelling reason for me to put faith in the Bible is the accurate prophesy throughout the Bible. Being sort of a history buff I was able to appreciate how detailed some of the prophecy that history verfies happened just as the Bible states. For example, in the book of Isaiah and Jeremiah there is a prophecy written about 150 years in advance foretelling that a general named Cyrus would dry up the Euphrates enter into the city without any opposition and over throw Babylon in one night.(Is 44:27, 45:12 Jer 50:35-38, 51:30-32)
In Daniel chapter 8 there is a prophecy about the Medes and the Persian empire and how it would conquer like no other kingdom before it. At it’s might another King would conquer them along with the rest of the known world. At the height of his power this king would die and his kingdom would be divided into four. This of course is Alexander the Great who died at the height of his power and his kingdom was divided amongst his four generals (Daniel 8:3-12,20-25)
The prophecy even goes onto to state how from one of the four kingdom Rome would come about. This prophecy was written about 200 years before all of the above took place.
There is even a prophecy in Revelation about the United Nations!
So I truly believe that the Bible is inspired by God and God made sure that accurate copying and translating would occur so that the words in the Bible are God’s thoughts written down by men just like a secretary would write a letter her boss dictated to her.[/quote]
To be absolutely honest with you, I think you’re a certifiable nut. I honestly did not read past the first paragraph or so where you started talking about Adam eating an apple from a tree. You write this tale as if you believe in it literally…and that’s when I knew I didn’t need to read your nonsense anymore. I don’t know what else you wrote, but you claimed ot have done “research”. It appears that your research did not extend beyond the Bible.
Furthermore, and again, I don’t know what else you wrote - I will not read it, you claim God had “no other choice” but to communicate his message thru imperfect humans. LOL. That does not deserve rebuttal. It is a ridiculous claim beyond the pale.
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Bodyguard I know that you believe people who take the Bible as literal are “certifiably nuts” as you so eloquently put it. My reply was not for you and if you read my post not one time did I address you specifically. I realize that there isn’t anything someone could say or do that would convince you to put faith in the Bible. So I don’t care what you think or what your opinions are. My post was for people following this thread who want to have faith in the Bible or have faith in parts of the Bible but have misgivings like you mentioned. There is absolutely no point in debating any of your opinions.