Rook, I don't know if you will answer this but
Offline How can we be certain of contradictions? I mean I was dicussing one you covered in your show about who came to the tomb first, Remember Mark 16:1, Luke 24:10, John 20:1 and Matthew 28:1, and they claimed that it wasn't a contradiction just different versions of the same story but they still claimed that there was harmony in the story. Just because they left people out. Now my other question is, where can I learn as much as you know, And what are some of the best ways to use contradictions and debate theists? because I am great with evolution but I don't know the bible quite as well as you do. I have read it numerous times but it doesn't stick as well as science does so I can't refer to it as easy.
Co-Founder of the Atheist/Freethought website Pathofreason.com
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Well, I'm not Rook, but anyway...
I really think that the best way to learn the Bible and these types of issues within is to read something from their team. With any reasonable amount of logic, you can not only debunk their arguments while you read, but you can also learn what type of canned responses to expect when arguing with them. If you're looking for something exhaustive, go with Josh McDowell's 900 page textbook of apologetics, The New Evidence that Demands a Verdict. After that, pick up The Jesus Puzzle by Earl Doherty and/or The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man by Robert Price. Then you're armed on both sides. :-D
"Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions." -Thomas Jefferson
"By not caring too much about what people think, I'm able to think for myself and propagate ideas which are very often unpopular. And I succeed." -Albert Ellis
I actually have The Evidence that demands a verdict, but It makes me kinda sick to read it. I am taking it page by page refuting things as I go along. It's just hard to know what is accurate and what isn't anymore. Thank you so much for responding to me! I used to be your typical run of the mill Christian , I spent 19 years going to church before I realized how insane and violent the old testament was.(amongst other things) Your site is a wonderful education tool! Now I do what ever I can to learn as much as I can. But thank you so much for the recomendations! You guys are wonderful. I love the Ray Comfort debate. If you ever need anything let me know. I run the website www.pathofreason.com and I will help you guys in any ways I can.
Co-Founder of the Atheist/Freethought website Pathofreason.com
www.pathofreason.com
Check it out
That's the problem with apologetics. They never give an acceptable method of distinguishing bad arguments from the good ones. (And even if they're bad, some still use them.)
“If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.” -- George Orwell
I haven't been on the site for a long time because life has been so fast paced, but your question certainly intrigued me. I guess what is interesting is that you really believe that Rook knows the Bible. I have debated with Rook on his writings and I will be the first to say that I no longer waste my time, because even when Rook is proved to be wrong (and he admitted it) he does not correct errors on his website. That fact says a lot about his desire for truth.
I would like to address the "contradiction" that Rook and others believe they have found in the Gospels concerning the visitors to the tomb. I simply want to give you something to think about. I am not making up this story and I think it will simply show you that if one wants and strongly desires to find error - they will simply over look what is right in front of them.
I saw where you spent 19 years in a church. Clearly by my login, you can see that I am a minister. I did not, even from the beginning, attempt to hide where I stand. I am neither angered by this site nor am I suprised. What happens on RRS is simply another proof that scripture is true.
As a youth minister, I spoke to 200 kids a week concerning the Bible and how it should apply to their life. I have written this before, but I happened to find it so I will paste it here for you.
It was not too long ago, as a youth minister, we had a worship service on Wednesday night. I put one student on one side of the auditorium and had him write down everything that he saw as important that happened during the worship time. I had another student do the same thing from the other side of the auditorium. I did not tell them about one another and I did not tell the other students what they were doing. At the end of the worship, I compared their notes. There was very little that they had in common. They saw things from different perspectives and they had two different personalities. My question to you is - Which one of them was false? Which one of them was incorrect in what they saw? I can't remember everything they wrote, but one of them listed all the band members on the platform and the other did not even name one of them. One of them wrote about the bright lights (looking at the stage) - while the other one talked about the dimly lit room (The lights were out in the congregation space and it was night so no lights through the windows).
Let me conclude with this. If the gospels were the same (word for word) in describing events - The claim would be conspiracy theory. The example used above is a very poor example of a "contradiction" in scripture. I will also say that I would not, even if challenged, deal with every one of Rook's views concerning scripture, because to even list the above as a contradiction is a clear indicator of Rook's depth of thought AND even if I debunked them - he still would not change his website.
The only way you will understand scripture is you have to know the one who wrote it. You have to believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Man, on his on, has no access to the things of God.
I hope this helps.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
REVLyle, how do you deal with the Gnostic texts and eastern ideas ? Geeez , could I actually end up in Hell for eternity ?
you write , "Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior"
Sounds like idol worship, My Jesus would not approve of that quote. Should read "Jesus Christs' MESSAGE as we are ONE with Lord and that is Saving"
Jesus would be mad at you lost friend. BTW, Jesus was an Atheist, and so is
G O D , no god before ME ! WE ARE ONE ......
[sarcasm] Uhhh. Yeah. He just reads all of those books looking for spelling errors. Not looking for the truth at all.[/sarcasm]
Why does it sound like 'looking for the truth' according to you means believing in something before looking for verification of it?
'strongly desires to find error' WTF?
Does this not contradict your accusation concerning the 'desire for truth'????
Make up your mind. When someone looks for the truth, is it not a good idea to try to find errors? We call that 'critical analysis' something sorely overlooked in your youth ministering I'm sure.
Or self-fulfilling. Like starting out a fake story with "Some people won't believe this, but..."
One wonders Why you became a minister instead of something more useful except for the fact that most jobs require interaction rather than preaching.
Personally, I wouldn't mind attending your trial for human rights atrocities concerning the mistreatment of children in this manner.
Yet no one is demanding that anything else written by those two students must be considered 'gospel truth'.
[ad hom]One book could say "Rape sheep!" and another could say "Love sheep." and you people would still say that they are the same thing. [/ad hom]
Even though your assertions concerning Rook's thinking have been debunked, you haven't changed. Tu quoque answer for the ad hom.
Bull-fucking-shit! I shouldn't HAVE TO 'BELIEVE' in ANYTHING for it to be true.
If you want me to 'know the one who wrote it' then I'm going to need a time machine or an ancient text expert. Oh wait. Don't I already know someone who studies ancient texts?
What helps? Being preached at again after already enduring it for 19 years?????
Whatever.
There are literally hundreds of other contradictions that go unanswered/ignored that are subjected to this same discourse. The idea that you offer something new and Rook does not is completely backwards.
"Thoughts, like fleas, jump from man to man, but they don't bite everybody." - Stanislaw J. Lec
REVLyle, ill give you credit, that is a good way to explain a lot of contradictions in the bible. However, thats only one minor problem that the bible has. It still has murders, torture, support of slavery, etc... Not to mention the fact that the entire religion is based around fear.
Really, if you want the best way to debate the bible with a theist, just use history. The bible has mislead MANY people in the past, and continues to do so today. That fact alone should cause people to at least admit that the moral code of the bible might be a bit skewed. They might respond by saying " but that is caused by evil people twisting the words of the bible into something sinister." Maybe, but probably not. I know a few christians who would consider themselves to be good people, but who also have some very skewed ideas, simply because the bible tells them to think that way.
Most christians out there already ignore half the bible anyway. They cherry pick their way through it and only listen to the parts that fit with their moral code. Thats something I have never understood, how someone chooses which parts of the bible to follow and which parts to ignore, and then say they get their morals from the bible. Fundamentalists are the only people that can truly say they get their morals from the bible, and those people scare me.
"I may be going to hell in a rocketship, but at least I get to ride in a rocketship. You have to climb those damn stairs. " - Katie Volker
darth-josh,
I have studied and I have read and the more I do - the more I know that the Bible is true. Faith in God is not blind faith. I have researched what Rook and other like yourself have stated and I simply find more evidence for the truth of God's word. I have no problem with anyone asking questions concerning God's word, but there is a difference between searching for truth and assuming error hoping to validate it. When my child tells me a story, I will question him to make sure that what he says is true. I will certainly investigate. With that being said, I do not assume he is telling a lie and then attempt to validate my assumption. That is exactly what many do concerning the Bible.
My story is not fake. I did not go to an apologetics book to figure out how to "argue" as kelly advised. I simply took a real world situation and demonstrated that this "contradiction" does not exist. I see all over this website "Give me proof. Give me proof." Even if you hate what I stand for (and obviously you do) you simply cannot argue with the fact that what I did PROVES that eyewitnesses simply CAN all be accurate in what they write and yet be different in their writings. What the students wrote was truth.
It is almost laughable that you think being a minister does not require interaction. I spend time with families during their most joyous occasions and during their most troubling ones. I give of myself to others constantly. I wonder, when was the last time you found yourself in the poorest of third world countries helping children who barely have enough to eat? When was the last time you gave of your money to help people with clothes and shelter? Maybe that does describe your life. I certainly do not believe charity only belongs to Christians, but you do not even know me. I did not describe myself as a preacher - you did. I am a minister and I live my life as such. I do preach, but that is a fraction of what I do in my life.
Human rights atrocities? Let me see:
1. I told them to love God
2. I told them to reflect that love by acting in a righteous way
I know you do not believe that there is a God, but again - You cannot prove there is not a God anymore than I can prove there is one. (I know, Y'all think the burden of proof is on me - I have heard all of Sapient's junk). So since you are going on belief just as much as I am - should you also be on trial? Are you passing your beliefs on to others without being to PROVE that you are right?
You really think that Rook offers something new???? WOW. Now THAT is incredible. Like I said before, everything that is being done at the RRS site has already been talked about in scripture. I have no problem quoting you verses, but I am sure you would just be angrier. Calm down. It is not good for you.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
Thanks for at least stating your position without attacking me. My story happened because I was curious. I had heard this argument (the stories did not jive) many times and I simply wanted to see what would happen. I would love for you to simply expound on some of what you are talking about. I do not want to go from issue to issue in the Bible. I am not afraid of that, but if you would not mind, tell me more about what you are saying concerning the cherry picking and the skewed ideas of the "Christians that are good people." I know of many "Christians" that have some skewed ideas as well. I simply believe many of them are Biblically illiterate. Some are simply immature in their faith. Some simply believe what a televangelist said at one time (Don't get me started on that issue). I certainly do not believe I have all the answers, but I will say that over many years of reading and study I have grown in my faith in God's word. Some of that growth has come from people questioning my faith and in turn I have questioned. It has made me research and know why I believe what I believe.
Thanks.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
Faith ? poor lost souls, Say as Jesus did, I AM the Nitty Gritty SHIT, as you !
, be careful , you might get hurt ....
and then another Prophet was murdered .... WE are one with the Walrus http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqOKvonLrH8
I know this is probably information you all ready know, but only 2 of the gospels are "eye witness" accounts. Matthew and Mark are supposed to be eye witness account, while Luke and John are based on information that was supposed to have been based on an unknown authors. Perhaps someone can tell me if I am right so far?
Contradictions in the bible are irrelevent in my opinion. I know there have to be some sriously legitimate ones, after all man wrote, edited and voted the damn thing into existance. I agree with Darth that the autrocities in the bible keep me from believing. All most everything it says yends to point to the fact it was not anything other than uninspired. I was a christian for a very tiny part of my 39 years here and I just didn't have the faith it required I guess to want to believe every little thing that it says. For instance, adam and eve and the fall of mankind sounds too allegorical to me to believe. I mean come on, it sounds like ancient man trying to understand the world around them more than literal history. If you can question whether or not this is literal, how can lowly man know what is literal and what isn't other than faith.
REVLyle's experiment is interesting, but hardly conclusive. You can do the same thing with the game telephone and find out that when someone says something and passes it to someone else by word of mouth by time it gets back to you the story has changed dramatically. Since we don't have the original texts, it is impossible to tell what they would even say. "Misquoting Jesus: Who changed the bible and why" is a great book that is highly referenced and goes into some of this arguement.
I am not into bashing others' beliefs, but I feel quite open to question them and I don't mind others telling me if my beliefs are wrong, but I would rather go to hell based on my opinions of bible god than spend an eternity in bliss while the majority of mankind suffers because some mythological beings decided to eat some fruit.
"Always seek out the truth, but avoid at all costs those that claim to have found it" ANONYMOUS
Ask my christian minister neighbor how much charity I do since he can't even be bothered to make sure his 'latch-key' children have a warm place to stay until he can leave the church to come home when they forget their key. The older of the two children is 11.
Ask the christian chick that I gave $40 to pay the locksmith to open her car to get her keys so she could make it to church choir practice on time yesterday.
Ask the christian family around the corner whose kids helped theirs with Science because they've never heard of geology.
Ask the 20 or so people over the past few years that I have helped what I told them to do as repayment of my good deed. "Don't thank god that I came along. Thank me by paying it forward and feel good for doing it because I do now."
Why did I do those things? It wasn't any jesus sitting on my shoulder. I did those things and many others to feel good for doing them. Perhaps if your fellow ideologues could take care of themselves a little better then I would get the chance to help 3rd world countries. As it stands now, I feel like I'm in one now because the people I interact with have just as many problems in their environments.
Don't ever cry 'christian charity' as a reason to believe to me. I've done more for christians than I have ever had to do for atheists. And all without the help of your deity or your happy little book of hypocrisy.
You missed some of my response to you. 'critical analysis' and 'self-fulfilling'
Your scripture is right because it stated the obvious result of its own application. Clever little verses saying that 'in the end you'll be persecuted for your beliefs' could be said in ANY religion and applied at any time.
I can prove that I lack a belief in god and I can tell you why. Duh. What's your reason for Why you DO believe? 'Faith?' 'The bible says so?'
No I am NOT going on as much belief as you are. I'm not the one trying to reconcile a centuries-old book with modern civilization by crying 'No fair!' when allegedly eye-witness HEARSAY is shown to contradict itself.
I never said that your story about the kids was fake. I would like to ask you next time to take it the next step and have those kids' friends 30-40 years from now go back and write their account of the concert/show. Then it would be a comparative analogy with as much credence as the bible's stories.
One wonders if those recounts would suddenly have the guitar player burst into flames in them.
[sarcasm] I'm sorry. I didn't realize that you had a special chapter in the bible that stated that a young man in the 21st century would prove that your messiah might never have existed based upon an analysis of jewish hellenism. [/sarcasm]
No, I wouldn't get angrier. Let's go. I have several bibles. Which 'version' do you like?
Too many atheists throughout history have 'calmed down' and let your religion wreak havoc on humanity. I will NOT 'calm down'. I will NOT be quiet when my fellow ideologues treat your religion with wanton permissiveness and negligent tolerance.
And I will most certainly match you ad hom for ad hom while discussing the flaws in your scripture.
"Thoughts, like fleas, jump from man to man, but they don't bite everybody." - Stanislaw J. Lec
Yeah Cali_Athiest2, I try also too understand, because I care, I don't much ask why, I just do.
Trust your common sense, it's all we got. If it ain't all ours then we are slaves to something. Fuck that !
Bashing religion is indignation, because love cares, LOVE is LOUD, and unrelenting.
Get it on, get more pissed off .... look around .... think of your grand kids kids.
Why care? , I don't know , I just DO !
To REVLyle:
Ill give you a good example of a large group of christians that had a fairly skewed view. I'm currently a college student, and on this particular weekend my parents decided to come up to where I live and visit. This was before I told them I was atheist, so we ended up going to a local church, with some friends of my parents, on sunday. The preacher decided that the subject of the day was going to be the "under god" statement in the pledge. He spend the majority of the sermon explaining that the people who wanted to remove the "under god" line from the pledge were the enemies of christianity, unpatriotic, and seeking to undermine their kids moral values. He then went on to say that it was a christians duty to stop these atheists from getting away with this.
Now, when I read the line "seperation of church and state", its fairly black and white. There's a seperation of church and state, end of argument. So this seems like a very skewed way to look at this situation. And it pissed me off. It took all of my self-control to not stand up and start yelling at this guy in the middle of church. But in the bible it says that atheists are evil, and therefore any attempt to remove religion from anything is evil.
These were normal people. Not fundamentalists, not extremists, just your average everyday person living in north texas. My parents were also nodding along with this guy. This may not be a "You eat babies?" kind of moral situation, but it is a good example of a large group of normal people that have a skewed view caused by religion.
And just to make sure I have all the bases covered, there are also the people that hate homosexuals because the bible says so, people that believe abortion is wrong ONLY because of the bible, people who think dungeons and dragons and harry potter is evil(I've only met one, but that was an entertaining experience.), etc...
Examples for people cherry picking are fairly easy to find. Just consider the passages about stoning children, burning witches, and tell me how many modern day christians follow those parts. Personally I dont have any problem with people cherry picking, I just dont understand it.
"I may be going to hell in a rocketship, but at least I get to ride in a rocketship. You have to climb those damn stairs. " - Katie Volker
I never saw the point in arguing biblical contradictions, esspecially when they can just assert the fact that different accounts from different perspectives will not perfectly agree. I know of no one who has yet been able to demonstrate that this is not the case for the bible and so I don't use the fact that the biblical accounts contradict each other in an argument. Everytime I do it never gets me anywhere. However the reason why the bible fails to convince me has nothing at all to do with biblical contradictions. Actually it has almost entirely to do with the fact that the bible asserts faith as its primary justification and the fact that it is filled with informal logical fallacies. I have had many christians point many of them to me, I should start documenting them, but so far I've seen, and this is not a complete list, but I have seen:
Appeal to force
Appeal to consequences
Argumentum ad Hominem
Poisoning the Well
False Dichotomy
False Analogy
And those were just the few that I could think of off the top of my head. And these are contained within the bible itself, not how christians argue to justify the bible. I would be interested to see someone go through the bible book by book, chapter by chapter and verse by verse and record all of the fallacies contained within.
It basically comes down to this, though, any system of belief that has to rely on faith as its foundational justification has a serious problem. Because it would be logical to conclude that any belief with no basis in reality would naturally have to require one to accept it on faith. No one yet has been able to tell me one belief that cannot be justified by faith alone. This is because faith is just a choice to trust the accuracy of a given assertion, it is no informational filter at all. There is absolutely no way for faith alone to filter out true information from false information. Which is why any belief that relies on faith as foundational has a serious problem. Then there is the fact that any book promoting a belief system with no basis in reality would naturally need to rely on logical fallacies to be convincing. It would not be able to rely on factual arguments because the belief has no factual basis. So, while the fact that christianity in the bible commits both of these egregious errors is not necessarily proof that christianity is false, it is a reason why christianity and the bible fails to convince any rational person.
It was interesting to hear from an actual minister. The actual contents of what he said only stengthens my doubt.
The only thing he said that was a partially good point was the catch-22 that too much agreement looks like prefabrication and too little agreement looks like just plain wrongness. There is some truth to this in how people actually act.
I agree that arguing specifics of the bible are pointless in the end. The real problems with christianity doom it long before we ever get to the text. For instance:
The following applies to all holy-book-based religions: If the contents of the Bible were so all-fired important, why would God trust them to book-form, so inherently fraught with problems? The mere existence of the bible implies to me that god is quite apathetic about whether people buy into it or not.
All messianic religions have the following problem: the very existence of god obviates the need for a messiah since everything god wants done can be done without resort to a messiah. The existence of a messiah, then, implies that god is either incompetent or inefficient. If we require that god by his very nature be capable of supreme competence and efficiency, the existence of a messiah tells us that god is not god.
The knife in the heart of Christianity is that Jesus did not die for our sins, since he did not die, but rose again on the thrid day. Christianity is based on a mythological payday loan.
This indirectly answers the original question in making the point that you really don't need to be an expert in the bible to find christianity lacking.
To WHITEMANRUNNING:
Alright, let me start by saying once again that I do not have all the answers, but I certainly want to address your point. I couldn't agree with you more concerning separation of church and state. I certainly do not want the state coming in and dictating to me what I must preach and what I must believe. If you go back and look at history you will certainly see that when the state and church were connected - lots of corrupt stuff happened.
I can also tell you WHY, perhaps, this preacher took an opportunity to preach on this subject. You have already seen on this topic that Darth-Josh made the comment:
"Personally, I wouldn't mind attending your trial for human rights atrocities concerning the mistreatment of children in this manner."
So let me ask you. Here is a person who would like the government to put me on trial for teaching teenagers the Bible. How does that sound like the separation of church and state? He should be free to teach children to curse the name of God, but I should be put on trial for teaching children to love God??? The hypocrisy that I see on this site is almost overwhelming.
I just wonder - Will all of you jump to my defense when the state comes in and arrests me because I preach that homosexuality is a sin and the government calls it hate language - which leads to my next point.
I have never preached and I cannot find in my Bible anywhere that we are told to HATE homosexuals. I can honestly tell you that I have never heard a sermon on "hating homosexuals" and I have been in church for 39 years and I live in the south. We are told that in scripture that homosexuality is sin. We are told that it is an abomination, but I have yet to read that I am to hate them. Unless I explain my answer, I am sure what will happen as soon as I post this is that an atheist will quote a passage in Leviticus 20 - I am well aware that the death penalty is called for sexual immorality. I will also tell you that we are not living in that time or in that place. Then someone on this site is going to accuse me of using the "context" way out - and they accuse me of suing the same old tactics. I have seen them all. Context is important and for anyone to say other wise is a liar. Even when you begin to tell any story and you begin with "The other day . . . or This morning . . . or When I was at work . . . you are putting it into context. The Bible is no different. It is not separated from history. Many parts of it ARE HISTORY. The case of Leviticus is a people who have been in a very sexually immoral place as slaves for 400 years and they are about to go into a land that is full of nations who are also practicing sexually immorallity. God did not want his people in any way shape or form to participate in those activities. The punishment for participating would be severe.
Let me continue. As a Christian, I believe in the New Testament as well. In Acts 15 you have the Jerusalem Council. It is clear that in concerning the law, there are 4 things that apply to Christians:
1. Abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols.
2. Abstain from blood
3. Abstain from what has been strangled
4. Abstain from sexual immorality
I certainly believe there are principles that apply, (for instance, the 10 commandments are not to be ignored) but I am not required to do all of the law. As far as homosexuality, that is still spoken of as sin in the NT. It is something that Christians should avoid. I do believe there are Christians that struggle with this sin just as there are Christians who struggle with lust, lying, hate, deceit, gossiping etc . . . I would challenge anyone to find in the NT where it tells us to hate homosexuals. Jesus Christ said, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself." Let me clear about this as well. I am a very conservative Christian.
The issue of abortion. The Bible doesn't say that abortion is wrong. The Bible states that murder is wrong. Look at the situation we have ourselves in right now in this country. Just this past week an ex-cop in Ohio was found guilty of murder for not only his wife, but aggravated murder of an unborn child. AND YET, a woman can go and partially birth a child in order for a doctor to murder it and we call it abortion and it is legal. Again, the hypocrisy is unbelievable. Do I believe that abortion is wrong - YES. I believe that it is murder. Do I choose to elect politicians who share that belief??? - Yes. Just like those who are pro-choice - as if having sex wasn't a choice - want to elect those who agree with them.
I will have to tell you that once again I need you to show me passages in the Bible that instruct me to burn witches and stone children. Please show me what you are writing about. Please do not use the story of Abraham and Isaac as child sacrifice.
#1 - It is clear at the beginning of the story in Genesis 22 - Abraham is Tested
#2 - God stopped him and provided a ramIt is amazing that no one seems to go to Leviticus 18 and 20 when it comes to child sacrifice. It is absolutely forbidden by God punishable by death. I can't say anything about D&D or Harry Potter. I believe we should be careful about what we read, look at, play etc . . . but I cannot speak to these things specifically. Many atheists believe that going to church is evil and they preach that.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
darth-josh
Would you please read before you respond:
WHAT I PREVIOUSLY WROTE:
I give of myself to others constantly. I wonder, when was the last time you found yourself in the poorest of third world countries helping children who barely have enough to eat? When was the last time you gave of your money to help people with clothes and shelter? Maybe that does describe your life. I certainly do not believe charity only belongs to Christians, but you do not even know me.
As I said before - you might be a person who gives to others. Charity does not only belong to Christians. I simply responded to the issue that you thought I did not interact with people. You did not need to prove anything to me.
I am not sure what you were trying to imply by this statement:
Ask the christian family around the corner whose kids helped theirs with Science because they've never heard of geology.
I am going to assume you were not trying to say that Christian people are ignorant of the sciences. Reality simply proves the opposite. Even within my family there is an architect, engineers, pharmacist, nurses, doctors, and accountants. We have both undergraduate and advanced degrees - AND WE ARE ALL CHRISTIANS.
You wrote: No I am NOT going on as much belief as you are.
So, when it comes to how life began, what happens when you die, why am I here, AND IS THERE A GOD - you either have never asked these questions OR you simply believe or have faith in an answer. One of y'alls heroes, Dawkins, believes in Multiverse - something that has not even one ounce of proof - WOW - kind of sounds like faith to me. The problem that you and other atheist have is that you are attempting to answer philosophic questions with empirical science. It will never work. Science answers many questions - but it cannot answer the most interesting ones.
You wrote: I never said that your story about the kids was fake. I would like to ask you next time to take it the next step and have those kids' friends 30-40 years from now go back and write their account of the concert/show. Then it would be a comparative analogy with as much credence as the bible's stories.
Actually, let's not go back 30-40 years - let's go back 1000 years. Until we discovered the Dead Sea Scrolls - the earliest Hebrew manuscripts we had of the OT was around 1000 AD. When the scrolls were found all of the sudden these documents went back to around 100 BC and all the doubters could not wait to see how inaccurate the bible was - they were shocked to find out that in that 1000 year time span, you know . . . when all the additions and mistakes were taking place, that our current Hebrew text was 95% the same and the 5% difference were simply spelling changes or slips of the pen. There were NO doctrinal changes.
You wrote: One wonders if those recounts would suddenly have the guitar player burst into flames in them.
I seriously doubt that, BUT if he actually had burst into flames I am sure they would have never forgotten that. Kind of like, when Jesus rose from the dead - it was a fact that no one could forget.
Again - calm down. It is alright to disagree. You believe I am wrong. I believe you are wrong. I will say the consequences for you being wrong - are much greater. (AND YES - I am familiar with Pascal's Wager)For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
kmisho, you made some really good points. I have had a similiar discussion at the infidelguy's website about the shortcomings of holy text based religions. My big problem with jesus' alleged sacrifice is how easy it was. I mean an omni-potent god wouldn't need to create a sacrifice paid in blood to provide salvation for mankind unless he wasn't all powerfull. Besides, what a terrible sacrifice to have to come to Earth for a few years, live as a human being and then get killed only to rise up after a few days and live in heaven. It would've been a much bigger sacrifice to go to hell in place of sinners instead of the right hand of god. I guess he couldn't handle his own punishment maybe, I dunno.
"Always seek out the truth, but avoid at all costs those that claim to have found it" ANONYMOUS
"Faith in Allah is not blind faith"
"Faith in Yahwey is not blind faith"
Ok Charlely Brown's teacher.
Ok, "I can fart a full sized Lamborginni out of my ass and since you cant prove I cant, I can by default".
Rook doesnt buy claims of ghosts knocking up girls and zombie gods surviving rigor mortis after 3 days. If if anyone is in denial of the truth it is you. If anyone is out to expose the truth it is Rook.
If oil flowed like deity claims gas would cost 10 cents a gallon.