by JosephAlward 54 Replies latest watchtower bible
Something is wrong with the editor; I'm unable to edit it. I keep getting a message saying that the message is too old to edit, but I just created it five minutes ago.
Here is the change I had wanted to make to the previous post:
What's illogical is addressing only two of the elements of the parallel,Joseph F. Alward
Fine, take all five elements as being similar. You have still failed to answer the question. Just because they are similar ( you can also add they both involved sailors), how does that support your idea that Mark is lying? What evidence do you have that he is lying? Can't they both be similar and still both be true. Example, two families go to Disneyland and come back and tell their stories. Both sets probably went on the same rides, experienced the same weather and even ate the same things. Does tht make one of them a liar?
RWC,
Your Disneyland analogy breaks down because there are literally hundreds of thousands of families who have had the same experience, largely because those experiences were so common. Mark's story about Jesus sleeping and being scolded by the captain of the storm-threatened boat, and then the seas being calmed, and then the men fearing Jesus is virtually unique.
In only one other place in literature or folklore do we find the same elements all appearing in the same story. Thus, it is extremely unlikely that it is just a coincidence that the five elements, which make the Jonah story unique, are also found in Mark's story. Now, you'll note that I said "extremely unlikely"; these words leave room for the possibility that perhaps by some miracle the correspondences are coincidental. It is in the slim "possibility" that true believes will take refuge.
However, if there is other evidence of extraordinary correspondences between Mark's Jesus stories and stories from Scripture, then I think objective observers would have to agree that those stories are just remakes of scriptural stories with Jesus as the hero, and that Mark's stories are just fictional. And, as you know, there are[i/] other stories in Mark, which show extraordinary sharp parallels to ones in Scripture.
For example, there's the story of Jesus' disciples complaining that they cannot feed so many men on so little bread, but Jesus asks them to do it anyway, and they miraculously succeed, with bread left over. This story seems to be the mirror of the one in the Old Testament where Elisha's disciples complain that they cannot possibly feed so many men on so little bread, but Elisha tells them to do it anyway, and they miraculously succeed, with bread left over. It is extraordinarily unlikely that Mark did not base his feeding story on the one in Scripture. Together, these two striking correspondences--the sea-calming, and the feedings, make it even more unlikely that Mark's stories about Jesus were true.
Then there is the agonized prayer by Jesus at Gethsemane which is the mirror of David's lament, and the betrayal by Jesus which is the mirror of the one of David by his counselor; the list goes on and on. If a true believer [i]needs
to believe that Mark's Jesus stories are correct, then he can take solace in the fact that one will never be able to prove conclusively the stories are fake; all that the skeptic will be able to do is show to those who are objectively-minded that Mark's stories were almost certainly copied from Scripture and are entirely fictional.Articles which describe further the parallels I mention above are found in the "Mark's Gospel" section of the web page in the signature line below.
Joseph F. Alward
"Skeptical Views of Christianity and the Bible"
I'm unable to edit my previous post because Simon has diabled the editing feature.
Joseph F. Alward
"Skeptical Views of Christianity and the Bible"
That's "disabled."
Joseph F. Alward
"Skeptical Views of Christianity and the Bible"
I think you'll find it times out after a couple of minutes.
If you don't edit before then, the post is set in stone.
That's just one more disadvantage in creating large posts. Not only are they rarely read, they are hard to proof-read within the time limit.
I wouldn't worry too much about minor typo's, Joseph. Everyone makes them.
I apologise - I see that Simon has, indeed, disabled "edit">
Sorry.
Farkel
You do a good job of casting doubt on the Bible, but you keep forgetting about the abilities of the One that inspired it. Regarding your conclusion that there was absolutely no way that Jonah could've survived such an ordeal, don't you think that its possible that the One that directed the fish so that it would swallow Jonah could at the same time provide the means for Jonah to survive while inside the fish, in the same miraculous fashion?
Yadirf
Daniel 11:35 ... a KEY prophecy that must be fulfilled before the "time of the end" gets underway.
In order to be a true skeptic you must do more than take two similar stories and then reach the illogical and unsupported leap that the second one is a copy of the first and therefore the second event did not happen. You must present some proof that the second story is made up. Your "logic" is as follows: A: Jonah' story is about a fish and a sea: B: Jesus calms a sea under similar circumstances as Jonah and C: Thus the Jesus story is false.
There is styill no answer to the ultimate question: What evidence do you have that Mark is lying and that he has copied a story to fictionalize an event that he claims is real? Without that you have simply presented two similar events in history and made the unsupportable attempt at a connection.
This proves that Jesus and his followers are lightweights and the whole thing including Jonah smells fishy!!!
