On Sun, 06 Apr 2008 00:52:01 -0500, Suzanne wrote:
> "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.
No, Suzanne, it wasn't. The best evidence we have suggests that it _may_
have been written as early as the late first century (still after the
said destruction), but in fact that evidence is not very good and there
is better evidence that it was actually written after, and partially
based on, the gospel of Mark, in the second century.
If you have evidence that it was written earlier (other than just bare
assertion, of course) then show it.
>> 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.
Suzanne, something _did_ exist there. It _was_ found. It was a
graveyard. Not a town. The town of Nazareth was founded at least two
hundred years _after_ the events described in the gospels. And it's not
just Frank Zindler that thinks so.
Of course, if it _did_ exist, you have evidence of its existence, right?
Other than bare assertion, that is.
> 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.
Uh, huh. And this has exactly nothing to do with a town in Israel that
didn't exist at the time the events described in the gospels were
purported to have taken place. A town that was founded later (and early
enough to have been mentioned in the gospels, which were generally
written _after_ the founding of said town) and which still exists today.
> 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.
Just because Ai is _mentioned_ doesn't mean that the archeology supports
the biblical accounts. In fact, the archeological record shows that the
city existed from about 3000 BCE but was destroyed at around 2400 BCE and
never rebuilt. There is no evidence whatsoever for a late Bronze Age
city at that site. Source:
http://www.theskepticalreview.com/
tsrmag/982front.html (
http://tinyurl.com/3h8ef7), which itself cites
_Biblical Archaeology Review_, "Joseph A. Callaway: 1920-1988," November/
December 1988, p. 24.
The conclusion the original researcher comes to is that "[a]rchaeology
has wiped out the historical credibility of the conquest of Ai as
reported in Joshua 7-8. The Joint Expedition to Ai worked nine seasons
between 1964 and 1976... only to eliminate the historical underpinning of
the Ai account in the Bible." Same source.
So you're wrong on this count.
> The prophecy about Jesus being a Nazarene comes from the book of Isaiah,
Nope, you're wrong on this count as well. It comes from Judges and it
refers to a "Nazarite unto God," not a "Nazarene." The Isaiah passage
only says, "And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse,
and a Branch shall grow out of his roots," using a term with the same
root as "Nazarene" but not referring to a town at all. Whoever wrote the
book of Matthew just wasn't very smart or well-read.
So I reiterate:
>>>> So you're getting your "internal evidence" from a source that has
>>>> been clearly shown to be unreliable at best.
>> 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.
I note that you have ignored this entire section.
>>> 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!
You don't read very much apologetics then, do you?
> I've read of
> many discoveries that are significant.
Suzanne, no one has claimed that all of the places mentioned in the Bible
are fictional. You and those like you are the ones claiming that all of
them are true! And that just isn't so.
By the way, discoveries that are archeologically significant are not
necessarily (are usually _not_, in fact) theologically significant.
> And why would Christians be happy
> to find such things?
Um, because they can point to such discoveries whenever someone like me
tells them there's no evidence for the claims of their holy book? Is
this a trick question?
> Because of people such as you, who seem to need
> verification.
Oh, please. I don't "need verification." There's nothing to verify.
Even if every mention of every town, village, person, dog and cat in the
Bible were tree, there would _still_ be no evidence for the supernatural
BS. Although I have to say that it would go a long way toward making the
document a decent historical record, which it simply is not.
> Not for themselves. You make a point of ridiculing me and
> calling me "gullible." That's a very silly comment on your part.
Nope. It's true. You are gullible. You have swallowed the claims of
your religion uncritically and totally and now you are defending it to
the limit of your ability. Which is, unfortunately, not very far.
> There
> is more evidence for Nazareth being a real place than there is that
> there is not one.
Yes, Nazareth _is_ a real place. Now. And historically back to about
200 CE. But not before that, and especially not during the time the
events depicted in the gospels supposedly took place.
> 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.
Sorry, Suzanne, but I can see that you have doubts, as well. The harder
I push with the facts, the more desperately you defend your beliefs. If
you truly knew "for a fact that it is true" then you wouldn't worry about
the problems I'm pointing out.
> And as far as who is gullible, you are gullible to atheist views.
Now many is that now? Five? Six? "I know you are but what am I" isn't
a valid debating technique, Suzanne.
Oh, and there's no such thing as "atheist views."
>> 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.
So what? That proves nothing but the fact that it existed. You seem to
think that it also proves everything _else_ the Bible claims, which isn't
the case.
> Warren't shaft, by the way is in Jerusalem, not Nazareth.
Yes, it is, are you confused?
>>> 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.
If the skeptics claimed that there was no such shaft then yes, they were
wrong, but that means nothing by itself. (And you apparently don't know
what "denial" means.) Did you even bother to read my paragraph up there
about smelting copper and sea journeys?
>> 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.
No, it isn't. The Biblical story could as easily have been made up to
explain the existence of the shaft as it could have been the story of the
building of the shaft, and there's no way for you or anyone else to know
the difference. Not without something other than bare assertion as
evidence.
> It would be equivalent to
> people finding the wooden horse in the Troy story, that soldiers could
> have gotten into.
Right. A single-use tactic to win a single battle is the equivalent to
the centuries-long existence of a massive public works project. Right.
> 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.
So what? Speculation is not evidence. Oh, and neither is a television
show.
>>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.
You say that, but you don't _do_ it. You've _never_ "shown both sides of
a story" in this exchange, not once! You invariably latch on to one or
two small bits of data and try to claim that they are "proof" of your
whole crazy belief system, hell, you've done it at least twice in just
this one post.
I'm not "presenting you falsely," I'm telling you, again, what I observe
about your behavior.
>> 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.
No, it doesn't. It shows "that a passageway was made through solid
rock." Nothing more. That the passageway exists is indisputable. Why
it was made is a matter of speculation without further data.
> 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.
Okay, here you go:
Ceramics found in the tunnels by these more recent archaeological
excavations firmly date the Warren's shaft system, and the tower
defences to at least the 18th century BC. This expressly places it in
the time when Canaanites controlled Jerusalem, and this, together
with the guard towers, expressly rules out the possibility of anyone
sneaking into the city in David's time via the shaft; the shaft's
exit was heavily fortified as was the Gihon spring. In essence,
conquering the city would have been more a case of capturing the
guard towers and holding the city to ransom over its water[1].
From
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren%%27s_shaft, which cites Ronny
Reich "Light at the End of the Tunnel: Warren's Shaft Theory of David's
Conquests Shattered" (in Biblical Archaeology Review, vol. 25, no. 1).
So no, Warren's Shaft does _not_ support the biblical story. Sorry,
Suzanne.
>> 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.
This is babble. I said that you have a double standard, one for your
holy book and another for everything else. You've just provided more
evidence that you have that double standard, since you ascribe special,
mystical powers to your holy book, in that it is "God's word."
One would have thought that "God" would have gotten a few more things
right when having all of that stuff written down.
>>> 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.
Oh, _please_. No, it's _not_ "extremely likely" that the story is true,
any more than it is "extremely likely" that _The Vampire Lestat_ is true
because it was set in New Orleans. It's _fiction_, Suzanne. Just like
your holy book.
>>> 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.
Again, special pleading. _Your_ book is "special." And you just can't
understand how someone can't believe that.
>>> 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.
I might have known that you would think I was referring to _you_ with
that.
No, but you _are_ deluded and you _do_ believe falsehoods.
> 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.
Suzanne, it's not a "disadvantage" to be free of delusion. It's not a
"disadvantage" to fail to believe falsehoods. To you it's a
"disadvantage" but to me it's sanity.
>> 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.
Almost none of which support what the Bible actually says. Up to and
including your much-referred-to "Warren's Shaft."
> 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.
Ah, so you're saying that you can use the archeological discoveries as
propaganda to convert the ignorant! Well, yeah, what else is new? What
_I'm_ doing is trying to shine a little light on the subject to show your
propaganda for what it is: False.
Yes, I _know_ that you really mean it, and that you didn't mean
"propaganda." But that's what you're saying, nonetheless. You're trying
to use "biblical archeology" to support your propaganda to convert the
ignorant and you're carefully ignoring anything that fails to support
your preconceptions. You should be ashamed.
>>> 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.
It has _everything_ to do with mysticism. That what your talk of the
"Holy Spirit" _is_.
> I'll explain. When you tell someone that your computer is capable of
Oh, no! No! Suzanne, I'm a software engineer. I've forgotten more
about computers than you will ever learn. Don't _even_ go there.
> editing digital photos, do they tell you that you are doing that by
> "mysticism?" No, but some of them think about like that.
Yeah, and lots of people don't know how their light switches work
either. So what? Ignorance is no excuse.
> 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.
Of course, you can actually touch, hear and see a computer. You can
watch as the software starts and you can interact with it. You don't
have to "believe in" the software to see and use it, you don't have to
"believe in" the electrical socket in order to plug the computer in and
turn it on, it works whether you "believe in" it or not.
On the other hand...
> 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.
You really don't have any idea how incredibly foolish you sound, do you?
Now show me what button to push to activate the "Holy Spirit." And don't
say "go pray" or "you have to believe," because you don't have to believe
in the software to use it and this is _your_ analogy.
> 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.
How convenient that you choose the one definition that you think you can
rebut. Nope, sorry, by "mysticism" I'm referring to
1. a. Immediate consciousness of the transcendent or ultimate
reality or God.
or
2. A belief in the existence of realities beyond perceptual or
intellectual apprehension that are central to being and directly
accessible by subjective experience.
From
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/mysticism
Wrong again, Suzanne.
>>> 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.
Oh, I understand _perfectly_. I understand that you _think_ it's
"special." That you have based virtually your entire existence on it
being "special." Unfortunately for you, you have made a profound
mistake, because it is not "special" in any way.
>>> 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.
Suzanne, _nothing_ "happened that [I] did not get answered." Like I
said, I started seeing the self-contradictions within the Bible as well
as the contradictions between what it says and reality. As an aside, I
_also_ started seeing the basic contradictions between difference so-
called "Christian" beliefs. In trying to resolve these contradictions I
gained one little insight that made it all make sense. Just one, and
everything fell into place perfectly. I'll bet that you can't tell me
what that one insight was, can you, Suzanne, "Holy Spirit" or no "Holy
Spirit."
>> 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.
Oh, _please_-and-a-half! Jesus H. Christ on a pogo stick, woman, you
really don't know when to quit, do you? Suzanne, what you term "heart
knowledge" is what the rest of call "fuzzy wuzzy feelings without basis
in fact." A heart is a pump for blood, it doesn't _have_ "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.
Yeah, whatever. Meaningless, like I said.
