Adamu

Reminds of the time when the cardinals didn't need to look through Galileo's telescope, they knew the Earth was the center of all things.

"No need to read the bible, it's foreign to me, I know it is BS."

Roger Pearse

Well, it immediately destroys your assertion above, doesn't it? As for what the point is -- to whom? For what?

I'm afraid that I don't understand what you think you are saying here -- sorry. If you mean that the bible tells us nothing not recorded in other sources, of course you are mistaken.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Pagandawn

I wish I could answer your q, but I cannot. Peoples want to embellish their past I suppose.

One thing I am very sure of is that the Jewish Kingdom of Salomon and David is pure fiction. There is no archaeological or historical proof of it.

DrJim

Nonsense is nonsense but the history of nonsense is scholarship.

Regardless of veracity of any of the Bible's claims about the past, it is at least a composite artefact from the past , made up of a diversity of materials. OF course there are huge debates about how old any one bit of it may be, it remains a wonderful window on ancient mindsets that we would have no access to through other sources.

So what if it does not provide simple minded historians with the kind of factual information that would make paraphrses the epitome of scholarship? The bible requires critical historians with views on how some ancient folks understood their own past, thus revealing something of how they understood their present.

History is not simply the writing of a sequence of events. It also includes the interpretation of the lives, art, religion and thought of a people. The cannot tell us exactly what happened" in the past, but it can tell us a lot of how people thought in the past. On the other hand, archeaology may go a long way in telling us about events, material cultures and so forth, but it can't do much in the way of telling us how people thought about things.

Archeology can tell us that Judah suffered a massive depopulation in the early 500's bce. Lamentations, Jeremiah, et. al. provide us with artistic / religious reactions to this story that cannot other wise be known from the archaeology or the Babylonian records.

Julian

Pagandawn,

you seem a bit confused. First you claim that there is no real historical content in the bible. Then, when you are shown that there is some historical content, you change your mind and say that those are historical facts regardless of the bible. Those assertions, besides being contradictory, also don't make any sense. A historical fact is a historical fact no matter what books have subsequently been written about it.

Besides, it is not overly important to many atheists how much history there is in the bible because the bible, itself, is history. Possibly the most influential item ever, well, that and its followers.

So far your have employed a few logical fallacies, not good for someone who has declared himself 'rational,' and you are not really impressing anyone. You may want to study up on the material before you post more assertions that are just plain wrong. See, erroneous assertions are alien and hostile to my European culture. And just how does one go about being a pagan atheist? Seeing how a pagan worships god(s) and an atheist doesn't. Is it a part-time thing?

And finally, please temper your language a bit. Insults and ad hominem attacks will not be tolerated.

Julian

Adamu

Eh?

C14 dating affirms scripture.

Julian

While Pagandawn is obviously wrong in his statements, that article may not be your best bet for showing archaeological evidence. It jumps to a lot of conclusions that are not supported by the data. However, there certainly are numerous events and places in the bible that are clearly historical and supported by external evidence, like Sennacherib's siege of Jerusalem, for example.

Julian

Iasion

So,
APART from where it's not BS - it's all BS ?!

("What have the Romans ever done for us?")


Iasion

2CatLou

Well, here is an angle I have not seen in this discussion. I am a historian, and one of the courses all my unspecting college students have to take is historiography. Please keep in mind that history is written for many different reasons. Also remember that there is no such thing as completely objective historical writing. In other words, ALL written history, including the little articles and books that I write, can be called BS. To me, the Bible is interesting for the same reason history books written during the 1930s were interesting. That was before the time of Hitler. During the 1930s the things that historians, even the best European historians, wrote sounded very much like the racial supremist line that Hitler's folks preached. Early-on, American historians wrote nationalist histories that touted the virtues of its founders. It's the same way with the Bible. So, I read the Bible with a critical eye, for sure, but I do not discount all of it as BS. I consider the times when the various books in the Bible were written, and the possible motivations of the writers.

mountainman

Arnaldo Momigliano and Robert Grant both credit Eusebius
with the invention of ecclesiastical historiography in no
uncertain terms. Momigliano takes the matter a lot further,
comparing Eusebius to the "Father of Lies" Herodotus.

For these refs, see this page, and the notes on:
The Classical Foundations of Modern Historiography


I totally agree with PaganDawn -- that the bible is BS.
However, I am not content to simply state this truth.
I have researched ancient historians and their citations,
and much epigraphic, papyri and archaeological citations
in order to develop a thesis by which the history of the
invention of Constantine's top-down emperor cult
(Christianity) may be recounted in a simple manner:

1) invented in the period 312-324 CE (Eusebius et al)
2) implemented under military supremacism Nicaea 325 CE
3) opposed by Arius of Alexandria "There was a time when He was not"
4) opposed by Emperor Julian, who declares that:

The fabrication of the Galilaeans
is a fiction of men composed by wickedness.
etc

5) That the FICTION was still recognised as such in the time
of the ex-archbishop of Constantinople Nestorius, who writings
(which we supposed to be burnt by Cyril and the christians)
disclose there were many who believed the New Testament
was a straightforward FICTION (ie: Bullshit) in the early 5th C.

6) At least some of the "christian non-canonical texts"
* The Acts of Philip (Syriac)
* The Acts of Peter
* The Acts of Peter and the 12 Apostles (Nag Hammadi)
are in fact parodies against christianity, which
were written in opposition to the new top-down emperor
cult of Constantine. These parodies were written by the
people dis-possessed of their tradition, such as
the "therapeutae of Asclepius" and its associated wide
temple structure (which was destroyed), and people
like those in the Pachomian monasteres near Nag Hammadi,
in Egypt.


My thesis and background papers are available here:
www.mountainman.com.au/essenes

The comparison between Hitler and Constantine
canot be allowed to pass. To conceive of the
nature of Constantine, multiple the power of
Hitler by 100 times, and allow for the fact that
Arius -- who is alone in standing against Bullneck -
had no allies. Noone brought Constantine to bear.

The war-crimes of Constantine have yet to be
recognised for what they are. One of these is
the implementation of his personal top-down
emperor cult, which he called "christianity".
He sponsored its literature by perverting the
extant literature of the greek world, and he
sponsored the pseudo-history of the Gospels
and Acts, etc (ie: NT writings) 312-324 CE,
In Preparatio for his military supremacy.

The East was rich. He bound them by a domesday
book, and bled them dry -- his imperial church
finished the job after his death.


The "Nation of Christians" is first touted by Eusebius
under Constantine, very aware he was on the winning
side of the massive attrocities being perpetuated.

The "Nation of Christians" was a fiction until 325 CE.
It that time it became "open for trading" at Nicaea.
It has not stopped to this day.
It is a top-down cult of a military despot.
A supreme imperial mafia thug and dictator.
Who invented the New Testament of Christians.


Please see my posts about the existence of parody.
Many of the Non-canonical books (texts) are parodies.
There were written in oppsotion to the Constantine Bible.
They were written by ascetic priests.
They are clever anti-christian polemics.
Yet to be perceived for what they are.
Yet to be perceived for their motivation (ie: parody).



Best wishes,


Pete Brown