sotto voce

It was the magi who were in the east when they saw the 'star', that they subsequently followed, over them. "We saw his star rising, when we were in the east."

Doug Shaver

I was making a point about the author's credibility. Are you trying to change the subject? If I want to know what the dish tastes like, I'll eat it myself. If I want to know whether the author can be trusted to get his facts straight, I will take into consideration that he made a mistake about where the dish originated.

Sarpedon

Here's a better analogy: If someone testifies to certain events, and it turns out that some of the things he testifies to are shown to be false, does this discredit the other things he testifies to, which cannot be verified one way or another?

The bible is not a recipe. It is a testimony. That's why its called a 'Testament.'

sotto voce

That depends on whether the false information is germane to the overall narrative or not. So it may be the same analogy.

Would one turn down an offer of ten million dollars because the donor did not know where Dalmanutha was?

Sarpedon

Again, you are trying to change the rules. First you pretended that the gospels are a recipe, now you are pretending they are something that gives out money.

Neither; the Gospels are testimony. They are someone's story about something that allegedly really happened. Whether so called 'trivial' details are correct or not is absolutely vital to determining whether or not the testimony is true. Ask any lawyer, policeman or judge.

This is not a matter of someone offering us money, who turns out not to know where some unrelated village is. This is a matter of someone claiming that something happened in this village not knowing where it is.

Remember; the gospels claim to be true. The gospel of Mark is claimed to be the story of Jesus, as told by actual eyewitnesses, and written down by Mark (who was not an eyewitness). The Gospels of Luke and John are similar, and the gospel of Matthew is claimed to be the honest-to-goodness eyewitness account of Matthew, himself. Of course, these claims have ALL been discredited, so we mus judge the texts on their own merit, and determine their reliability based on their content. We can only do that by comparing the stories to known historical facts, and note the discrepencies.

If a man said that he found a bag of money lying on the main street of downtown Milwaukee, George Washington Avenue, I would know that something is wrong with his story, because Milwaukee's main street is Wisconsin Avenue. This is completly obvious. The fact that you ignore this obviousness, and attempt to change the rules, to pretend that something that says 'Testament' right on it is not actually testimony, but instead a recipe or sweepstakes, is absolutely dishonest. The fact that you used the ten million dollar donor example shows just how mercenary your thought processes are. You don't care about truth, fact, honesty or common sense, you only care about the payout.

sotto voce

Rather high proportions of those professions accept the Bible as worthy testimony.

Sarpedon

Changing the rules again: What is good enough for their faith may not be good enough for their courtroom. Members of those professions will overwhelmingly agree with what I said about judging the truth of people's stories.

I have yet to see you post where you do not try to distract from the issue at hand. Please address the substance of my post rather than appealing to a popularity contest.

Toto

If they do, which I tend to doubt, it is only because they were raised in a Christian country, not because they brought their professional skills to bear on the question.

sotto voce

Can we see proof of this?

Toto

You're the one making the assertion - where's your proof?