Plastic Jesus

How are the prophecies (the ones that appear to have come true) in the Bible explained by those who do not believe Christianity is true? Are there prophecies in the Bible that did not come true?

I'm sure there is already a thread on this, but there are many threads :\ so can someone who is familiar with this forum please provide a link to the thread?

Casper

What does one have to do with the other?

A stopped clock is still right twice a day.

Plastic Jesus

They are two seperate questions.

1> How can you explain the prophecies in the Bible that came true?

2> Are there any prophecies in the Bible that did not come true?

"A stopped clock is still right twice a day."

I don't follow.

Vorkosigan

Let's step back and clarify statement one with at least five examples of specific prophecies that have come true.

Vorkosigan

Psalm 13:5

There are so many fulfilled Biblical prophecies, and different kinds of prophecies. Here are only a few, but compared to the total number of them, this is a tiny fraction. I'll be adding more later... These aren't in chronological order, when I have more time I'll put together a better organized list.

<snip text--Roland98>

Prophecies were copied verbatim from this site.

Please pay attention to copyright infringement in the future.

Psalm 13:5

[edited]

Again copied from this site.

rostau

Genesis 12: 2-3 makes a number of claims:

1. God will make the descendants of Abraham into a great nation
2. God will bless the descendants of Abraham
3. God will bless those who bless the descendants of Abraham
4. God will curse those who curse the descendants of Abraham
5. Everyone not a descendant of Abraham will be blessed through the descendants of Abraham

This is all pretty problematic. First off, what is meant by 'a great nation'? Israel today is certainly not a 'great' nation by any standards. It is not a super-wealthy nation, it is only a militarily powerful nation because the USA gives it weapons, it is not a very populous nation, it is not a nation of much economic importance. The only sense in which Israel can be regarded as 'great' is that it has provided a 'great' deal of work for modern historians. But maybe the verse refers to 'the Jewish people' instead of 'the state of Israel'. OK. People who have been Jewish have made a positive contribution to the advancement of western civilization. Of course, people who have not been Jewish have also made such contributions. Hmmm. Not really much of a prophecy then.

OK, I'm not entirely clear on the meaning of 'bless' in this instance, but unless 'bless' means something like 'torment', I can't really see that this is true. Throughout Western history, Jews have been treated pretty badly by non-Jews in the west (and they've done a fair share of bad-treating back, it must be said). In the 20th century, you'll recall, lots of Jews were put into ovens. That's hardly blessing them. Nowadays, of course, many Jews in the diaspora live entirely free of prejudice and are successful and wealthy, but then again, so are many non-Jews. Jews inside Israel suffer ongoing terrorism and live in fear, so that's not really blessing them either. And the state of Israel is regarded by everyone except itself and the US government as something of a rogue nation. Not too blessed.

On the third point, I think the jury is out. I don't think there's any evidence one way or another that people who are particularly nice to Jews or to Israel get any advantage from it. In fact, it can be argued that in the modern world, being nice to Israel will get some terrorists on your case, so that's not particularly helpful. So, I guess we'd have to say this hasn't been fulfilled.

Point 4 says those who curse the descendants of Abraham will be cursed. Again, this is a 'win some, lose some'. The Nazis sure saw their ass, but that's a single instance. In general, for most of western history, people who have been nasty to Jews have gotten away with it, and prospered. So, again, no prophecy has been fulfilled here either.

I now confess I don't even know what point 5 means. We will be blessed through the descendants of Abraham? What does that mean? Is that a promise or something? In any case, in order for us all to be blessed through the descendants of Abraham, we must in fact be blessed. And we're not blessed, are we? And those of us who feel blessed, can they say they've been blessed 'through the descendants of Abraham'? I don't think so. So, point 5, no fulfilled prophecy there either.

An objection you will probably raise in respect of point 5 is that Jesus was a descendant of Abraham, and through Jesus, all mankind can be blessed. (See, I can do this 'Christian thinking' thing if I want to :-)) Unfortunately, I have yet to be convinced that Jesus existed as an historical personage. Until such time as I am convinced of that, I regard Jesus as fiction. Any argument predicated on Jesus is therefore null and void.

And finally, who exactly *are* the descendants of Abraham? Abraham, also, is fiction, in my view. But let's use 'Abraham' to represent a tribe of semitic people living in the Middle East long ago. The bad news is that the actual genetic descendants of these people aren't easily identifiable. Certainly no one can argue that 'all Jews' or even 'all Israelis' are descendants of this tribe of people.

rostau

Actually, the referenced verse in Genesis says:

Assuming that this means all the land between the Nile and the Euphrates, this prophecy is not only not currently fulfilled by the state of Israel, it has never been fulfilled in the history of mankind.

rostau

On Leviticus 26: 3- 8, nice editing there :-) Leave out the tough parts. Here's the whole segment:

Okay. Need I say more? 'You will live in safety in your land?' Ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho.

There is no way you can seriously suggest this prophecy has been fulfilled, but the main reason is that it is not a prophecy. It is a promise. God promises that if the Hebrews obey his commands (this is during the time when they're wandering around in the desert), they will be given a country where there is natural abundance, and they will live in peace there. If they obey his commands, furthermore, they will have amazing military capacity. We all know that the Hebrews didn't obey God's commands, and got repeatedly shafted for their disobedience.

Now, you try to tie this passage, written about some goatherds in the desert, to events during the 20th century in the modern state of Israel. Leaving aside the obvious fact that people in the modern state of Israel are patently not living in safety in their land, your interpretation of events would imply that the Israelis had their military successes because they were obedient to God. But this cannot be true, because in between making that promise and the foundation of the state of Israel, God allegedly sent his only son to alter the promise to the Hebrews and create a new promise to all mankind, thereby rendering the old promise to the Hebrews null and void. This was the significance of the rending asunder of the shroud on the Tabernacle upon Christ's death, right? That was God saying, 'the old deal is off, here's the new deal'. So promises made to the Hebrews while they were wandering in the desert must have been fulfilled before the coming of Christ in order to be regarded as having been upheld. Right? You still with me?

But we already know that during that period the Hebrews were not obedient to God's commands, and God repeatedly smacked them upside the head for it. The consequences of their almost fanatical disobedience to God's commandments are the content of pretty much the whole Old Testament. So, in a sense, what we can say about this passage is that God told the Hebrews that if they listened to him, life would be schweet, but they didn't listen to him and life was not schweet. But to try to imply that this passage refers to the military success of modern Israel is just silly, especially since the promised rewards are contingent on obeying God, and the only way to obey God nowadays is to love Jesus. That's what it says in the Bible. Right?

Vorkosigan

Thanks, Psalm, for at least making the effort.

Psalm, perhaps you and I are going to have a disagreement about the word "specific." But before we do that, we should perhaps point out that these passages were not written in 1400 BC but much later, sometime in the period of about 900-700 BCE, by which time the Hebrews had already created a couple of small kingdoms. Thus, these are not "prophecies" but justificatory claims by writers creating with one eye on the current political scene. A good introduction, though complexified, of course, by later scholarship, is Friedman's Who Wrote the Bible?.

2 "I will make you into a great nation
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you."

The problem of interpretation here is why I demanded a specific prophecy. This one is unspecific, in fact, it is completely vague. What does it mean to be "blessed?" Israel is not now and has never been "a great nation." In fact, given the violence and potential for world war that has accompanied Israel's rise in the Middle East, one could well argue that it has been a curse. This one is vague, and cannot qualify as a prophecy inasmuch as it was written well after the events it depicts occurs.


See comments on first one.


Psalm, this is not a prophecy. Here is the entire passage.

1 " 'Do not make idols or set up an image or a sacred stone for yourselves, and do not place a carved stone in your land to bow down before it. I am the LORD your God.
2 " 'Observe my Sabbaths and have reverence for my sanctuary. I am the LORD .
3 " 'If you follow my decrees and are careful to obey my commands, 4 I will send you rain in its season, and the ground will yield its crops and the trees of the field their fruit. 5 Your threshing will continue until grape harvest and the grape harvest will continue until planting, and you will eat all the food you want and live in safety in your land.
6 " 'I will grant peace in the land, and you will lie down and no one will make you afraid. I will remove savage beasts from the land, and the sword will not pass through your country. 7 You will pursue your enemies, and they will fall by the sword before you. 8 Five of you will chase a hundred, and a hundred of you will chase ten thousand, and your enemies will fall by the sword before you.
9 " 'I will look on you with favor and make you fruitful and increase your numbers, and I will keep my covenant with you. 10 You will still be eating last year's harvest when you will have to move it out to make room for the new. 11 I will put my dwelling place [1] among you, and I will not abhor you. 12 I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be my people. 13 I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt so that you would no longer be slaves to the Egyptians; I broke the bars of your yoke and enabled you to walk with heads held high.

In this passage the Hebrew Sky God YHWH is telling his people the terms of his agreement with them. It is paired with the next one, explaining what will happen if they break the agreement. There's no prophecy going on here.

In any case, as is well known to scholars, these passages were not written by Moses in 1,400 BCE, but much later.

Psalm, see notes on the previous one. Leviticus was written sometime in the first millenium when all these things had already come to pass.


Daniel was written in the second century BCE, not the sixth. Consult any good reference book, such as John J. Collins' one in the Anchor Bible Commentaries series. Daniel is referring to events in his own time, the second century. This is well known to scholars. Thus, this is not a fulfilled prophecy either.

The Book of Micah dates from after this period, some parts apparently date from after the return from Exile. End of that discussion. The very passage in question is most probably a later addition. As a citation on Kirby's excellent website notes:
"In 3.9-12 the priests and prophets are the object of Micah's invective, and for the first time the threat of the destruction of the Jerusalem temple is made. As we have seen, this last passage is doubtful: Jer. 26.18 dates it in the time of Hezekiah. Anyone who accepts its authenticity will note that the passage must have made a great impression if it could be quoted a century later in a court as a reason for acquittal in such an important case." (Introduction to the Old Testament, p. 271)."

And again:

"Jay G. Williams writes: "There has been considerable debate among scholars about how much of the book is actually attributable to Micah himself. As usual, the more radical scholars perform amputative surgery and remove most of the passages of hope (that is, most of 4-7) as later additions. A few conservatives attirbute every word to the original Micah. The truth, however, seems to lie somewhere between the two extremes. Certainly there are several passages (for instance, 4:10 which speaks of exile in Babylon) which were probably added later. On the other hand, it hardly seems necessary to deny to Micah most of what is found in the latter half of the book. One can only do so by asssuming before hand that an eighth century prophet must have said this and not that. The truth is that we know so little about the prophetic movement as a whole that no such hypotheses can be very fully substantiated." (Understanding the Old Testament, p. 248)."

It would be difficult to show that this prophecy dates from before the destruction you speak of.

Note that in all of the examples you have given so far, there is no specific prophecy, just a vague sense of the future. For example, just today I yelled at some kids at my son's school to stop standing on the teeter-totter because someone would get hurt. Sure enough, as soon as I turned my back, someone fell off and scraped his knee. Do you consider that I have magical prophetic powers? Or rather, is it that any intelligent person can foresee that if the political class is corrupt and society unbalanced, eventually the nation will be ravaged?

That statement will have to be demonstrated. How do you know Micah wrote at that time?

Matthew was written after the Temple's destruction, sometime between 80 and 120 CE. Thus, nothing here.

Luke wrote after Matthew, probably sometime between 80 and 150. He copied Mark, where this prophecy first appears. Mark apparently wrote sometime after 70 as well.

See notes on Deut. below....

Psalm, what makes you think an American humorist is an authority on the situation in Palestine in the 19th century, and further, what makes you think that the 19th century represents Palestine between 135 and 1948?

Deuteronomy was not writte in 1,400 BC but in parts spread over several periods, and reworked during the post-exilic period. Consult Kirby's website and review the links:

http://www.earlyjewishwritings.com/deuteronomy.html

This passage reflects the events of later years. BTW, I notice that you left out that prophetic gem :

"68 The LORD will send you back in ships to Egypt on a journey I said you should never make again. There you will offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but no one will buy you."

Not to mention that deut simply lays out the terms of the covenant with the tribal god, and does not make prophecies.

See notes above. Moses did not write this book, several writers did, and it achieved its final form in the post-exilic period.

This one is vague. Which people on earth has not been persecuted, but perserved? Give me something specific, please.

Psalm, these chapters in Isaiah are post-exilic, and refer to the return from Babylon. Again see the references and links on Kirby's website:

http://www.earlyjewishwritings.com/isaiah.html

See the major references on Jeremiah, another book that reached its final form in the post-exilic period. If memory serves the basic format of this work remained fluid until at least the period of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

See previous remarks.

Psalm, your history is utterly wrong, which is one reason you think these are fulfilled prophecies. See any basic reference on the birth of Israel, such as Sachar's A History of Israel. The fighting began weeks before the declaration on May 14. For example, the Arab Legion from Jordan had
captured the Ezion bloc kibbutz settlements a few days before and the Arabs were already shelling Jerusalem. Meanwhile the Jews had started their own offensive, capturing Safed about 5 days prior to the declaration.

See previous remarks. Never mind that this prophecy is not specific.

Psalm, this is another book that was heavily redacted in the post-exilic period (se Kirby's site). Also non-specific.

See previous remarks. All these books were redacted in the post-exilic period, some probably written at that time, though that is hotly contested.

From Kirby's site:
"James King West writes: "Not all of chapters 1-39 come from the original Isaiah. Three sections in particular are later additions. (1) Chapters 24-27, 'the Isaiah Apocalypse,' represents a fully developed apocalyptic style which did not appear until the exile and later. It should be noted, however, that Isaiah's own oracles are marked by certain features which the later apocalyptic school found compatible with its point of view, such as the dualistic contrast between light and darkness (cf. 9:1-7) and the prophet's quiet trust that God is sure to act on behalf of his people (cf. 7:30). (2) Chapters 33-35 bear an exilic coloration; 34 and 35 are in the style of Deutero-Isaiah. (3) Chapters 36-39 are historical narratives nearly identical with II Kings 18:13-20:19, having been taken from the same source utilized by the Deuteronomist. Obviously they were attached to the Isaiah collection due to their accounts of the prophet's involvement in the crisis of the Hezekiah period." (Introduction to the Old Testament, pp. 269-270)"

This is not a prior prophecy, but a later creation.

In sum, you have provided nothing that is specific, and the books you cite were all redacted -- indeed, many were written -- in later periods. There are no real prophecies here.


Vorkosigan