Very interesting thread. I think that an atheist and a believer in God both believe what they want to believe.
The Bible, Why not Reliable?
by sayitsnotso 93 Replies latest watchtower bible
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PSacramento
YES--how can we VERIFY exactly WHEN those words were spoken by Jesus?
Answer: We can't.
Correct, we can't verify.
So what do we do?
We can take it on faith and are free to do so or we can deny it out right and are free to do so, or we can ry to reconcile what we know and waht was written.
In the end, in all cases, we would be sepcualting because, in any case, we don't knwo for sure one way or another.
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PrimateDave
40 men wrote it over a span of 1600 years or so. But all 66 books are harmonious and contain a consistent theme. How could this be possible by humans alone?
Moses did not write the Pentateuch. Why would he speak of himself in the third person and call himself the "meekest" man. How many writers does that leave? By "harmonious and consistent theme" do you mean that later writers borrowed ideas from earlier writers and imposed new meanings on them? Where are the "copyright dates" on individual books of the Bible that give you a span of 1600 years? If any of your answers are based on traditions of men and apologetics of believers, why should I believe them? Why should you?
It accurately fortold events. (i.e. naming who and how Babylon woud fall).
Men wrote stories after the fact and called them prophesies because they knew that people were ignorant and gullible. Not much has changed in the 21st Century, except for the fact that we now have the internet, public libraries, and innumerable pages of real Biblical Scholarship for anyone who cares to educate themselves.
The notion that if everyone followed the morals of the bible the world would be a better place.
I spent tme in Japan and found the non-Christian people of that fine country to be honorable human beings.
Scientific accuracy in a time when people did not know about these things (progressive order of earth's preparation for human habitation, saying the earth was round and hung on nothing, water moves in a cycle, universe is governed by laws, what it touches on regarding heath and sanitation is accurate (quarantine, waste disposal, not having a calm mentality bad for the health)
How is this for scientific accuracy:
Honesty of its writers.
Snakes and donkeys can talk. Men can live over 900 years. A flood covered the entire Earth but didn't affect snow and ice in Antarctica or Greenland. Seventy descendants of Abraham entered Egypt and in four generations became a population in the millions. In one Gospel Jesus went to Egypt as a child, yet in another he did not. Etc.
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Terry
We can take it on faith and are free to do so or we can deny it out right and are free to do so, or we can ry to reconcile what we know and waht was written.
In the end, in all cases, we would be sepcualting because, in any case, we don't knwo for sure one way or another.
The same could be said for the Koran and I bet you aren't thumbing through that book at night before bed!
Basing your life and your belief on what you DON'T KNOW and CAN'T KNOW is a fool's errand.
What is wrong with basing your life on what you DO KNOW and CAN KNOW instead?
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undercover
earth was created before the sun?
Where does it say this in the bible?
1 In [the] beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
2 Now the earth proved to be formless and waste and there was darkness upon the surface of [the] watery deep; and God’s active force was moving to and fro over the surface of the waters.
3 And God proceeded to say: “Let light come to be.” Then there came to be light.
4 After that God saw that the light was good, and God brought about a division between the light and the darkness.
5 And God began calling the light Day, but the darkness he called Night. And there came to be evening and there came to be morning, a first day.
Light was created after the earth proved to be formless and there was darkness. Light comes from the sun.
But there's a problem. What did he create on the 4th day?
14 And God went on to say: “Let luminaries come to be in the expanse of the heavens to make a division between the day and the night; and they must serve as signs and for seasons and for days and years.
15 And they must serve as luminaries in the expanse of the heavens to shine upon the earth.” And it came to be so.
16 And God proceeded to make the two great luminaries, the greater luminary for dominating the day and the lesser luminary for dominating the night, and also the stars.
17 Thus God put them in the expanse of the heavens to shine upon the earth,
18 and to dominate by day and by night and to make a division between the light and the darkness. Then God saw that [it was] good.
19 And there came to be evening and there came to be morning, a fourth day.
So god created light, day and night on the first day...after the earth but then created the "luminaries" on the fourth day. One for day and one for night. Another problem is that the luminary for dominating the night isn't a luminary on its own, it reflects light from the sun. Which day did he creat the sun...day one or day four?
Another problem... if the sun wasn't created till the fourth day, how was vegetation created on the third day? Plant life needs photosynthesis and that comes from sunlight.
It's obvious that the creation account was written by a primitive person who had no knowledge of the solar system. It's an observation with limited knowledge and a belief in a higher power that created it all.
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XJW4EVR
This is sleight of hand at its worst, actually.
How did you come to this conclusion?
If you read any John Grisham novel you will find a great many actual places and things which DO EXIST woven into his totally FICTIONAL stories.
Now, think about this--will you please?
Two thousand years from now archeologists will make many discoveries which CONFIRM GRISHAM'S record!!
I ask you this point blank: WILL THESE ARCHEOLOGICAL FINDINGS MAKE GRISHAM'S NOVELS NON-FICTION at that point???
If your point is that you believe that the Bible is non-fiction, then please, provide us with some proof. I like arguements. You know major premise, minor premise, conclusion. You just go to the conclusion, and expect me to follow you blindly. Sorry, but I gave up following blindly when I left the JWs.
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PSacramento
The same could be said for the Koran and I bet you aren't thumbing through that book at night before bed!
I've read the Koran, it's not my cup of tea.
Basing your life and your belief on what you DON'T KNOW and CAN'T KNOW is a fool's errand.
What is wrong with basing your life on what you DO KNOW and CAN KNOW instead?
Nothing at all, I base my life on what I KNOW for fact and what I don't know for fact but makes sense and has been proven by others to be fact, but I also understand and leave open the possibilities to the things that can't be proven today.
I don't short play the fact that humans are equipped to live and aim for outside the reality they may be "earth bound" to at any given moment.
We have an infinite ability to imagine to NOT confrom to our "reality of the time", something the no other being that we know of can do.
That gift is there for a reason I believe.
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betterdaze
Every point the OP makes is addressed here.
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donny
Here is how I came to "unbelieve" the Bible as being the word of God. After I thoroughly determined the WTBTS was not what it claimed to be, I began looking at the Bible with similar scrutiny.
So I began reading it from the beginning without any "aids" and I came to the conclusion that if such a grand being exists that could have created everything we see here in the physical universe, there was no way it was the same spoiled child mentality being that supposedly recorded what we see in the bible.
I don't see the "consistency" that many see. I see a lot of contradictions, useless information, and just outright abhorrent behavior from a so-called supreme being.
Donny
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sayitsnotso
2 Now the earth proved to be formless and waste and there was darkness upon the surface of [the] watery deep; and God’s active force was moving to and fro over the surface of the waters.
3 And God proceeded to say: “Let light come to be.” Then there came to be light.
How do we know verse 3 means that let light come to be isn't from the perspective from on earth? Couldn't something have been blocking the light during these creative events? Whether on earth or between the sun and the earth?
