"Frank Mayhar"
exit.com> wrote in message
news:ok6jc5-pbf2.ln1@tinker.exit.com...> On Fri, 04 Apr 2008 10:23:03 +0000, Suzanne wrote:
>> "Frank Mayhar"
exit.com> wrote in message
>> news:tdefc5-47i1.ln1@tinker.exit.com...>>> On Thu, 03 Apr 2008 02:10:32 -0500, Suzanne wrote:
>>>> "Frank Mayhar"
exit.com> wrote in message
>>>> news:k4c0c5-1v4.ln1@tinker.exit.com...>>>>> On Fri, 28 Mar 2008 22:58:14 +0000, Suzanne wrote:
>>>>>> "thomas p."
yahoo.com> wrote in message
>>>>>> news:47ec9170$0$2086$edfadb0f@dtext02.news.tele.dk...>>>>>>> Yet you won't explain why one book is evidence but the other one is
>>>>>>> not.
>>>>>> All of the scripture is evidence, Thomas.
>>>>>
>>>>> No it's not, Suzanne.
>>>>>
>>>>>> "All scripture is given by
>>>>>> inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for
>>>>>> correction, for instruction in righteousness" - 2 Ti 3:16
>>>>>
>>>>> A document cannot be used as evidence that what it says is true. The
>>>>> Bible cannot be used as evidence that the Bible is true. This is
>>>>> called the "bare assertion fallacy." Look it up.
>>>>>
>>>> The Bible can be used as evidence because of the internal evidence
>>>> written within it.
>>>
>>> Um, no, not without corroborating external evidence. And in fact much
>>> of the so-called "internal evidence" is actually contradicted by
>>> historical fact, such as the interesting tidbit that the town of
>>> Nazareth didn't actually exist until some time in the second century.
>>> And while I won't go into them now, there are lots more little
>>> contradictions like that.
>> Frank, the gospel that quotes Jesus telling about the destruction of the
>> temple, was written before the temple was destroyed. That constitutes
>> internal evidence that is just that, real evidence.
>
> The only problem with that bare assertion is that it isn't true. Luke
> was written _after_ the events it describes, including the destruction of
> Jerusalem. In fact, the earliest actual manuscripts date from the late
> 2nd century; there is indirect evidence that they were authored earlier
> but the actual author is disputed, as is the date.
>
No, Frank, Luke was written before the destruction of the
Temple.
>
> And what about the nonexistence of Nazareth at the time that those events
> were purported to have happened? You plan to just ignore that and hope
> it goes away?
>
It's not true that Nazareth didn't exist. Frank Zindler, the editor
of American Atheist Magazine has claimed that Nazareth didn't
exist and he gives his reasons, which you can read at Wikepedia
Encylopedia. But to my knowledge, he doesn't show both sides.
The synagogue in which Jesus taught in Nazareth was torn down,
as were all of the buildings a few centuries after he lived on the
earth. You can read about that also in Wikepedia. Just because
Frank Zindler thinks that the town isn't found, doesn't mean that it
didn't exist. It did exist. My father grew up in Highland, Texas in
Erath County. It's not on the map now. There is even another city
near Tyler now with that name. Thurber, a town that is now a ghost
town in Texas, which is 75 miles west of Ft. Worth is not known
by many anymore. I've seen it, and you can see where the
coal-mining took place, and you can see buildings. Yet it was one
of the largest bituminous coal towns in Texas, in it's day. Skeptics
also doubted that there was an Ai, that is mentioned in the Bible,
now they have found it, and excavation is going on there.
--
The prophecy about Jesus being a Nazarene comes from the book
of Isaiah,
>
>>> So you're getting your "internal evidence" from a source that has been
>>> clearly shown to be unreliable at best.
>> Appaerently not, Frank.
>
> It's your funeral, Suzanne. If you want to believe falsehoods, hopefully
> it's only _your_ life that you're wasting.
>
>>>> Your "bare assertion fallacy," would be laughed at by people in
>>>> seminaries,
>>> No, "people in seminaries" are almost certainly smarter than you and
>>> know a fallacy when they run into it. They would use more
>>> sophisticated methods to avoid contradictions. You, on the other hand,
>>> only have the one method and you use it over and over.
>> Sorry, Frank, but you need to investigate a little more carefully. You
>> just display that you don't know what was written and when it was
>> written, when compared with the time frame that would clear it up for
>> you.
>
> You see, I'm not as gullible as you are, Suzanne. I don't believe folks
> who go to great lengths to "prove" their bible just because their
> religion demands it. I've read as much apologetics as I can stomach (and
> it's entirely likely that I've read more of that crap than _you_ have)
> and none of it holds water. These people build great chains of
> supposition and "plausibility" to support their preconceptions, yet they
> have not a dram of independent evidence. And when they find the
> occasional bit of real data that might be twisted to supply inferred
> support for their notions they jump on it and build great, shaky edifices.
>
> You _want_ to believe in the truth of your holy book. As for me, quite
> honestly, even if it was historically factual, I wouldn't believe the
> supernatural elements regardless; I don't _care_ whether or not the Bible
> is historically accurate. But it just so happens that it simply is not.
> And I find it amusing and often tragic that so many people base their
> entire lives upon a work of fiction.
>
>>>> and by all the biblical archaeologists who have proved that it is able
>>>> to be used for reference. That is how they have found all of the
>>>> things they have found.
>>> No, they've found "all the things they have found" (which aren't many,
>>> despite your unfounded belief) by digging around in a place that has
>>> hosted more and more varied religions that any other place on Earth, an
>>> area that has been settled for millennia. Dig almost _anywhere_ in
>>> that area and you'll uncover something. Further, the stuff they _have_
>>> found, what there is of it, hasn't particularly supported your
>>> "reference."
>> No, that isn't true. Many of the things that are obvious in Jerusalem,
>> for example, today, were not known even in my grandparent's day. They
>> have to accept it all on faith...and they did so, because they had
>> internal confirmation from the Holy Spirit.
>
> They accepted it because it was a tenet of their religion, not because of
> any imaginary "internal confirmation."
>
>> But biblical archaeology has
>> made great strides to help people such as yourself to realize that the
>> scriptures tell what happened and where.
>
> Um, no, it hasn't. The overwhelming majority of "biblical archeology"
> has failed to provide evidence of anything in particular. Of course, the
> very few digs that actually turn something up are jumped on by you clowns
> with cries of glee that you finally have something that "proves" your
> beliefs. But you're wrong.
>
I've never seen such a falsehood before as this, Frank! I've
read of many discoveries that are significant. And why would
Christians be happy to find such things? Because of people
such as you, who seem to need verification. Not for themselves.
You make a point of ridiculing me and calling me "gullible."
That's a very silly comment on your part. There is more evidence
for Nazareth being a real place than there is that there is not one.
And you claim that I just want it to be true. I don't just want it
to be true, Frank, I know for a fact that it is true. And as far as
who is gullible, you are gullible to atheist views.
>
>> There is a Bible section that
>> deals with what is now called "Warren's Shaft," which was a way in which
>> they could get water into the city in case of great threat of an enemy's
>> surrounding the city. People said that could not be true, because if it
>> were, that means that the people then would have had to cut through
>> solid rock in order to do that. They did not have the means that we do
>> today to do that. But they did do it.
>
> Yeah, yeah, and scholars were skeptical that people had the ability to
> smelt copper in precolumbian America, but they did. And scholars were
> skeptical that people were able to make sea journeys of thousands of
> miles, but they did. Ancient people were just as capable as people
> today, there were just fewer of them and they didn't have as much
> knowledge. They _did_, though, have just as much ingenuity.
>
> It proves nothing but that people then weren't all idiots.
>
It does prove something, Frank. It proves that the shaft really did
exist, which skeptics had doubted that it existed. Warren't shaft,
by the way is in Jerusalem, not Nazareth.
>
>> Then they found the shaft and that
>> verified the story and that it was exactly as it was reported.
>
> Well, gee, seems that fictional stories are often set in real places.
> Imagine that!
>
You are in denial. What was claimed originally, was logically
shown to be wrong.
>
> But as you say below, all that proves is that there was such a shaft, not
> that the stories are true.
>
I didn't say that about Warren's Shaft! I said that about
Troy being found. Warren's Shaft IS the story, itself. It
would be equivalent to people finding the wooden horse
in the Troy story, that soldiers could have gotten into.
By the way, the story about Warren's Shaft, earlier people
assumed that it meant that the water would flow through it
into the city. But now many think it means that people
could walk through it to go to the Spring and get the
water. The other night on the History Channel, they
showed this actual tunnel.
>
>You latch on to one single piece of data and
> try to turn it into support for the whole thing, when it isn't.
>
You are presenting me falsely! I usually show both sides
of a story and then show why I believe a certain side. I am
not grabby about claims, I consider them very carefully.
>
>>> Further, applying your standards, one would conclude that the discovery
>>> of the city of Troy "proves" that Homer's stories really happened.
>> What that proved is that there really was a city of Troy.
>
> Of course, just above you claimed that the discovery of "Warren's Shaft"
> proved that the Biblical story involving it was true: "Then they found
> the shaft and that verified the story and that it was exactly as it was
> reported." But here you claim that all discovering Troy did was prove
> that there really was such a place.
>
It does show that the story is true. It shows that a passageway
was made through solid rock to get to the Gihon Spring in case
of a siege of the city. And you are wrong and presenting what
I've said incorrectly. That they found the archaeological site of
Troy is great, but it does not prove the story of the wooden
horse. Finding the wooden horse would do that. Warren's Shaft
is equivalent to the wooden horse, in that it is the story that was
told in the Bible passage.
>
> You have a double standard, one for your holy book and another for
> everything else. Your holy book is "special." Why? Because it is.
>
Er....no. Jesus prayed to the Father for people to be sanctified by
God's word. God's word already was special before he prayed
that, but he prayed especially that his followers, and also those
who trust what his followers (in his day) said in their testimonies
(which includes us in the future), should be "sanctified" by God's
word. I've carefully shown why the N.T. is God's word, too, by
showing this that Jesus prayed. So if you are another of the inane
people that claim that Christians "worship" the Bible, that's just
plain wrong. We read it because Jesus told us to do that. It is
Jesus that is the one being revered and what he has told us to
do.
>
>> It does not
>> prove that there was a wooden horse that was filled with enemy soldiers.
>> But it certainly is possible.
>
> Not so much, actually, since the story is a fable. Made up. Fiction.
> _Good_ fiction, but fiction nevertheless.
>
The story is not a fable anymore, since they found Troy. In case
you don't know it, that makes it real. It's extremely likely that the
story is true.
>
>> But that is not the Bible. The Bible is
>> brought about by those following the Lord.
God's word has always been "special." All the words that
issue forth from the mouth of God are special. "Man shall
not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth
out of the mouth of God," Mattew 4:4.
>
>> Since you don't believe that, you are at a disadvantage.
>
>
> What, because I'm not deluded? Because I don't believe falsehoods?
> That's hardly a "disadvantage." I would call it an advantage, actually,
> seeing as how I spend neither time engaging in talking to myself nor
> money supporting the hucksters who call themselves "Christian leaders."
>
I'm not a huckster and I am a Christian leader. And I did not
say anything meaning the way that you are telling it. I merely
said that you would be at a disadvantage if you did not
receive this. I did not say that you were deluded. I think that
you simply don't know.
>
>> But as things are discovered, more and more
>> to people such as yourself, people that are skeptical should see that
>> they have been wrong about some things, just as some in the past have
>> discovered, and have turned to the Lord in repentance.
>
> But, unfortunately for you, the opposite is happening. "As things are
> discovered," more and more people realize just how insupportable your
> religion really is, just how much evidence there is that it is just
> another myth like all the rest.
>
What I have been saying that you are trying so hard to
go against, is that there are many things that have been
found in biblical archaeology that are in the Bible. Now,
you are misunderstanding why I've said that. People today,
such as - say a 25 year old person, thinks that all that we
know of existing today over in the Holy Land, was not
always found, but was buried and in need of being
discovered and excavated. I say that because they may
take it for granted that those places have always been
there. They recently discovered the pool with the porches
where the invalid man lay on one of the porches, unable
to get to the water after an angel had troubled the waters.
A very young person would not be aware of any of that.
Some older people aren't aware of it either. So when
someone says "there's no evidence to support the Bible,"
that simply is untrue. There is a lot of evidence supporting
the Bible.
>
>>> Just because the Bible is your holy book does not make it "special" in
>>> any way. You ascribe mystical powers to it, but, Suzanne, it's just a
>>> bunch of made-up stories. Like every _other_ holy book in the world.
>
>> It doesn't have a thing to do with any kind of hoaky mystical powers. It
>> has to do with the Holy Spirit of the Lord who speaks to all.
>
> *snort* First you say it doesn't, then you say it does. Make up your
> mind, woman! Which is it, hokey mystical powers (i.e. the "Holy Spirit
> of the Lord who speaks to all") or no hokey mystical powers?
>
This has nothing to do with mysticism. This is what you just
don't get. I'll explain. When you tell someone that your
computer is capable of editing digital photos, do they tell
you that you are doing that by "mysticism?" No, but some
of them think about like that. Many people are still not very
knowledgeable about their new computers and what they
will do. It's not a hoaky thing that your computer could do
such a thing because in order to do that, you have to have
had the software loaded on your computer to enable it to
do the digital editing. What you don't get is that the
Holy Spirit is actually "downloaded" into a person when
they receive Christ as their Savior and Lord. There are
several definitions of "mysticism." They way that you are
using the term sounds more like this definition:
"vague speculation : a belief without sound basis."
This is not something vague or ethereal. It's a real
transaction that takes place, that the Lord gives you
the gift of the Holy Spirit.
>
>> It's not a
>> book of made up stories like every other book of any kind. Nothing at
>> all is like the Bible.
>
> Except that it is _just_ like every other "holy book" that has ever
> existed.
>
It is not. That's what you don't understand.
>
>> It is "God-breathed." Jesus requested to his
>> Father that the Bible, which is God's word, would sanctify those who
>> will study it. The Bible declares "faith cometh by hearing, and hearing
>> by the word."
>
> Yeah, I know it does. I read it five times cover to cover, remember?
> And many more times than that, just the NT. You know what it did for
> me? Not a damned thing. I started seeing the self-contradictions within
> it, as well as the contradictions between it and reality, and eventually
> stopped believing. This happened over 25 years ago and I've never had a
> moment's concern that I somehow might have been mistaken or wrong in some
> way. Quite the opposite, I began to realize just how silly and often
> crazy such religious beliefs are, and how little ability most adherents
> to such religions have to deal with reality or with beliefs that differ
> from their own.
>
What has happened that you did not get answered?
Something is there that I am sure I don't know.
>
> You're an excellent example of this.
>
>> God's love is stronger for you than the negative forces
>> that want you to not see it.
>
> Now you're just being silly. Don't you know that this stuff is utterly
> meaningless to people who don't already believe it?
>
It sounds to me that you have head knowledge without
having heart knowledge. The Holy Spirit can reach you
in your heart and show you that he is real. That's what
happened to the people in Acts 2:37 after Peter testified
to them. The Holy Spirit was a participant in the action,
and he was simultaneously working in their hearts as
Peter spoke to them. Christianity is not a religion so much
as it is a relationship with Christ.
>
Suzanne
